Gerrymandering; Epstein; Banks; Tariffs; Gaza; Costs | Yaron Brook Show

in Lisbon. So I will be, you know, trying to keep you guys up to date on my travels as we go along, telling you a little bit about what's going on over here, just impressions of the different different places, but and also covering the usual, the news and everything else, so you guys stay up to date. All right, Let's see, I just need to get Yeah, the setup here is a little different, so I'm just trying to get everything

up to speed. There we go. We've got people on the chat, We've got people watching all right the time. The schedule for this week is going to be a little in and out. We'll see. I'm hoping to do a show tomorrow at twelve pm East Coast time, and then the show on let's see Thursday and Friday, we'll see, and then I'm not sure I'll be able to do a show on Saturday and on Sunday.

and thank you for the fifty dollars. That is very very generous. Really appreciate that.

slippery to really be careful, very hilly. A Barcelona is flat, lots of trees, white boulevards, easy, easy, easy to walk through, shade everywhere. Easy. Here it's a little different. Everything's narrow, smaller cobblestones. Yeah, But other than that, it's it's it's

a cool place to be. We were so far day one, having a good time, all right, And we got this office and it's all set up, and we got the cam and sound and everything's working, and we got a great internet set up, so we should have no problems as as we move. As we move forward, how's the picture, you guys? Okay with the picture lighting all of that. Just let us know. Savannas's excuse is he was on vacation. So I take it that you don't watch your on

book show live when you're on vacation. I mean, it's not your top priority when you're on vacation. I am kidding, kidding, all right, So let's start. I mean, the you know, the Congress is going to be incredibly competitive in the election next year and in twenty six, and Republicans are very worried because there's a good chance the Republicans are

going to lose the House. The election, the mid term election is usually one in which the incumbent political party loses, and right now the Republicans have what a three vote majority in the House of Representative.

the Senate either, So it'll be interesting to see. It'll be interesting to see what happens, But houses good chance that they that they lose it, and they could lose big given how unpopular. Trump is the only thing saving Republicans right now from completely being slaught in the medium election is the fact that there's only one thing more unpopular than Trump. And the thing that is more unpopular than Trump is other Democrats, so less popular than Trump.

But Trump is very unpopular. The tariffs are very unpopular. I think by next year people will feel the tariffs. They'll pay the cost of the tarists. We'll talk about taffs in a minute. But people have said, oh, you can avoid the trouts by just not buying stuff that's made in outside the United States. It's easier said than done.

There's almost no clothes made in America. So you can try to go out there and buy buy America and you know, avoid paying the tariff that way. But the chance that you can actually be successful is very, very very low. It's just not doable. It's just not practical. Anyway. The consequence of the fact that Republicans are probably going to lose the House is a is a little bit of panic in the Republican Party, and the consequence of the panic is to try to figure out how to

minimize the losses or to reverse them. And one way to do that is what's called to gerry manda.

maybe they used to have a majority. Now you split that district up in a way that puts all that splits the Democrats with the Republicans in a way that Republicans have a majority in each one of those. This is being done almost since the founding, and it was a it was a major it's a major way in which the parties reach.

to the courts. There's arguably the courts will intervene and if the gerrymandering is done along racial grounds, that is, to to basically make sure that blacks don't get any representatives out of places where there were a lot of blacks, as I think the state of Alabama's been trying to do, and the Supreme Court has denied them and kept keep sending it back to redo, so they don't want to do. You know, the courts generally will not review cases where

it's just political. So, I mean, so before we get the Texas case. Just to give you some history, the term jury mandering. Jury mandering goes back to eighteen twelve when Massachusetts Governor Eldbridge Jerry signed a bill redrawing state Senate districts to benefit the Democratic Republican Party I guess against whom, I'm not sure, against the Whigs. So some thought, you know, that the districts were very odd shaped, that

they looked one of them looked like a salamander. A newspaper illustration dubbed it jerry manda, and the term has now come down to describe any district drawn for political advantage, drawn in order to maximize a particular party's presence in a particular district or to minimize so uh jerry mandering.

Uh I I Elbridge. Jerry. By the way, UH lost a reelection campaign to be governor of Massachusetts in eighteen twelve, but he won election that same year as vice president with UH president UH James Madison, so he was James Madison Vice president again. According to the US Constitution, political gerrymandering is not illegal. In a twenty nineteen case it came out of North Carolina, the Supreme Court ruled the federal courts have no authority to decide where the partisan

jerry mandering goes too far. UH Chief Justice Justice Roberts wrote, quote, the Constitution supplies no objective measure for assessing whether a district map treats a political party fairly. So Supreme Court's not gonna save the Democrats from losing the fight vote seats in Texas. Now, the dream, the plan, the redistricting plan, has to pass the House and the Senate. It has to be and then signed by the governor of the state.

Texas was going to vote on this this week or last week, and the Democratic Democratic politicians just left the state. They left the state to deny the Republicans in a sense of qualum which would allow for vote. So this is the delay tactic. They can't stop it. If they stayed in Texas, state marshals would have showed up and forced them to go to the state house. As it is, they're being fined five hundred dollars a day, and Texas will now sue the Democrats for dereliction of duty in

a sense or vacating their post. And so you know, this is where we are again. It's legal, it's not right, it's not good, it's not just. I mean, it would be good if I don't know, Congress could pass a law saying you can only change the districts after a census once. So once every ten years you get a change. You get to change the districts based on census information.

Maybe they could get rid of those three, I don't know much more significant is New York is trying to do it, could try to do this, California could try to do this. Now in both places, it would require them to deal with different provisions in the state constitutions or in the legislation that have tried to control gerrymandering in the past, try to limit it and minimize it. But I think if the political will is there, and I think if Texas does this, the political will is

there for them to gerrymander. And there might be other Democratic states in which they can squeeze out a few votes here and there, squeeze out a few Republicans here and there, but it is it's a pretty despicable game overall. Yeah, I mean, there are no objective standard by which you should draw districts, but it does make sense to make the districts, you know, geographically look reasonable rather than some of the absurdities that are being generated by by these maps.

Jerry mandering, salamander, you know, these long, thin districts and stuff like that. Uh, all of this is really being done by the Democrats under the you know, under the influence of Trump. I mean, Trump has has told the Republicans that they need to do this. He put pressure on Texas to do this. And this is Trump's comment. You know it's it's perfectly trumpish to comment and probably trumpish and and you know you'll get it. Okay, here

we go. Quote This is from Trump this morning. We have an opportunity in Texas to pick up five seats. We have a really good governor, and we have good people in Texas. And I won Texas. I got the highest vote in the history of Texas, as you probably know. And we are entitled the five more seats. Now. I have no idea if you got the most votes in the history of Texas. I'm skeptical, but it doesn't really matter what I find really that's part of the course

for Trump. What I find really interesting is that we are entitled the five more seats. Now, who gets to decide who is entitled to how many seats? The President of the United States get to decide how many? I mean, maybe he should just we should skip the midium election completely and just have Donald Trump decide how many Sea seats entitled to, how many seats Republicans are entitled to, And that's what we should put in the House of Representatives.

I mean, why bother with an election when we're entitled to some seats anyway, Again, this is a game the Republicans and Democrats have been playing since eighteen twelve, although they weren't Republicans Democrats in those days. But it's a game they've been playing since eighteen twelve. It's a game they'll continue to play. I this is particularly egregious, but not for the first time. They ben as egregious, if

not I as egregious the cases in the past. Uh, this will just lead the Democrats to do the same thing, whether now in the future. Uh, it's uh, you know, it's a it's a zero sum, silly a political game. But Republicans are desperate. Remember this is an act of desperation of Republicans. Uh are w really really really worried about the mentum election, really really worried about losing the House,

and uh, they really don't want to lose the House? Yps, tryna make sure the plug stays plugnant Like all right, what did yes? So I'll keep you updated. Democrats will come back to the state of Texas at some point. Democratic donors will pay up they fine of five hundred dollars a day that they're away, and Texas will have new districts and they will have probably next election five

new Republican congressman. Of course, there's always an opportunity that voters, Yeah, voters get so upset with the politicians and with the Republican Party and everything else that's going on that they just tell them to go to hell and vote for a Democrat. Now, it's unlikely that will happen in Texas, but one can always hope. Wouldn't be great if voters penalize their own party sometimes for their misbehavior, both Democrats

and Republicans. Wouldn't that be cool if people actually weren't fixated on a tribal affiliation with their political party and actually voted what they thought in terms of whether the legal party was doing good or bad, rather than a tribal loyalty. So anyway, that's that's, uh, that's what we have. And of course, uh. Trump's agenda depends on him keeping the House and keeping the Senate the only way to

get legislation passed. Although he doesn't see to care much about the legislation, he can always, he can always, you know, sign executive voters. There is an issue of things like impeachment and controlling the House just just is a lot easier,

for a lot easier for Trump. It would be a lot easier if any president to control both chambers when when the other party has one of the chambers, they get a bully pulpit, they get media attention, they get coverage, but more importantly, they get to pass the legislation, and they get to ignore your agenda, and they get to potentially impeach you. So's it would be a lot easier. All right. The Epstein case again does not seem to go away. It keeps coming back, and the White House

has not dealt with it particularly well. Uh, And over the last couple of weeks they've tried to be doing damage control and trying to figure out what the best strategy is on how to deal with this. Obviously, Donald Trump name appear in the Epstein file, I mean, that's pretty clear. Trump has launched a campaign to say that it was put there by Obama and Biden, that it's all them. Of course, if that was it, then Wyden, Obama and Biden use that in the elections. It would

never came up in the elections. So it's a little suspect my guess is his name is there, but so are the names of a bunch of a bunch of Democrats as well, And that's why Democrats didn't use it, because they didn't want to self incriminate some of the people within their own party. So the Republican base is the demanding that information be released about about the Epstein case, that the files be released, whatever the hell is in

those files. They've been demanding, you know, they've been demanding action. They want action. They think there's one big conspiracy cover up, which it looks like it is to some extent, right it is a cover up anyway.

generals unto Trump in his first term. They also want a question and they're subpoenaed Bill Clinton as well as Hillary Clinton, which would be interesting. I mean, as we know, Bill Clinton socialized with Epstein, and he claims he kind off all relations in two thousand and nine and didn't know of any crimes. So we'll see who shows up, what happens when they show up, what they actually testify to, what they actually say, what questions are asked. It's going

to be a zoo, an unbelievable zoo. In addition, as we know, the number two at the Justice Department last week held interviews which Gilaine Gilaine I was told to ask a silent Gilaine Maxwell held interviews with Maxwell, and I think he has what is it eight hours of recordings or something like that, or many hours of recordings. I don't not sure how much, but significant times of recordings a committee. The committee is going to roughly nine

hours over two days. Okay, Now she's received conditional immunity to discuss the case, and she's start asking for pardon of course, and she's already been moved as we know, as I mentioned a previous show to a low security

prison in Tallahousee, Florida. No, she's been moved from a low security to a minimum security, which is even lower security than the low security in a minimum security prison in Brian, Texas, even though typically sex offenders are required to be housed at least in at least a low security facility, so this is an exemption, right. Anyway, they plan to play some of the audio. Now what's interesting is if they don't play all the audio, people will complain.

So ultimately, if they start playing audio, they're probably gonna have to play at all.

a long list of people. So we'll see, we'll see a lot of high profile people named in the air plane logs of and a lot of people associated with them in different contacts in different places. It'll be I mean, particularly interested to see William Barr, who was a huge favorite of Trump's until he refused to throw the election in twenty twenty and support Trump's allegations about the election

being stolen, and they was kicked out. Jeff Sessions, who was probably the first Republican senator to support Trump and was kicked out by Trump very early on a justice as head of the Justice Department, as Attorney General because of disagreements between them, and then of course they have to be eye directors and all of that. It's going to be interesting. It's going to be interesting. And maybe this is all coordinated to basically say there there there's

no case, and to try to prove the maga. There really isn't anything there. There's nothing there. There's nothing about Trump, there's nothing about anybody else. There really isn't. There wasn't a pedophile reighing that he wasn't. There's no list, there's no relations to the intelligence services all of that, but

who knows. Look, I mean, Tulsi Gubbat just came out with a completely fabricated intelligence report about the all the Russia stuff, supposedly in twenty sixteen, supposedly Lincoln Obama to it. And I'm blaming Obama for everything when you read, when you read the actual details of it, it's just bizarre. But she's a nutcase, So this is a surprising, and

she owes Trump everything. She was going nowhere, and he picked her up and brought her into the administration, and she just made up this file to feed because Trump demanded it, and to distract people from Epstein and other things, and to feed mega stuff. As long as the conspiracy intels Democrats, Trump's happy to, you know, put poor fuel in the fire of Democrats centered conspiracies. So yeah, it's it's it's it's a crazy world we live in. It's a crazy world we live in. Okay, let's look at

other crazy stuff to talk about conspiracies. So Trump now is putting out an executive order, whoops, where's my executive order that he is expected to sign soon. He just announced it maybe this week. He announced it a few days ago or today. I think he announced it today

and he's expected to sign it later this week. Anyway, this will be an executive order that is that is geared to putting pressure against big banks over perceived discrimination against conservatives and crypto companies, and the executive it will threaten the fine lenders, the drop customers for political reasons. Now, the discrimination against crypto was real, there's no question that that happened. It happened under the Biden administration. It happened

under the influence of Elizabeth Warren. It happened over a period of a few months. I mean, it wasn't hidden, it was it was pretty explicit. It was out there. And you know, a silver Gate Bank was basically shut down because its whole business model was the bank crypto and it was told by the regulators that that was unacceptable, and it basically shut itself down. In New York, bank whose name escapes for me right now, but it'll come back to me hopefully soon, was basically closed by the

regulators at the same time. A couple of days after Silicon Valley Bank was shut down in twenty twenty three, and this is Silicon Bank was shut down on a Friday. It was shut down on a Sunday. It is a bank that I know because I know the bank well, Signature bank, Signature Bank. It is a bank that I

know did not deserve to be shut down. It is a bank that was not any more insolvent than many other banks in the United States, or banks were basically insolvent at that point in time because of bonds, the bond portfolio. I did a show on that at the time. It was not insolvent, any more insolvent than the other banks. It could have probably manage a liquidity crisis that the banks were facing. It was shut down pri Meldy because

it was a bank that dealt with crypto. Many other banks were just told to divest and they did so. This was an explicit policy of the banking regulators, inspired again by Elizabeth i and who campaign against crypto and her campaign against banks more broadly. So you know, this isn't surprising. It is a surprising, but this idea that you know, banks don't banks discriminate against conservatives is dubious. But the reality is the problem is not the banks.

The problem with Crypto was the regulators who forced them to divest Crypto forced them to discriminate against Crypto. And the problem, you know, in as far as I know, banks don't discriminate against conservatives. And the thing about that is, even if they do, don't they have a right to do so. Isn't a bank of private business that has a right to discriminate in terms of who it gives loans to and who it doesn't. Now they can't based

on race, for because of the Civil Rights Act. But so it turns out that, you know, if you there's some laws that you could stretch and imply that effect here. For example, the Equal Credit Opportunities Act now to create Equal Credit Opportunities Act again was written from the perspective of racial discrimination. Whether it could be applied for political political discrimination, I don't know. Now. I don't think any bank is going to try to defend itself over the

right to politically discriminate. But shouldn't they have the right? Isn't that what private property means? And why would the government? What gives the right to government the right to go into a bank and say the discriminating Why is it any of the government's business who a bank gives loans to and who it doesn't give loans to. Shouldn't that be completely one hundred percent at the discretion of the bank.

Now again, I'm all for not allowing politicians to dictate to banks which businesses they can and cannot lend to, for example, crypto, but that's not limited to crypto. It's being done for other industries as well. Democrats to do it regularly. I can imagine Republicans one day doing it. That should be banned, but that's on executive order. That

would require rethinking of the relationship between economics and politics. Anyway, he wants to sue them under or go after them under the Ego Credit Opportunities Act, Anti SLUXED laws, and the Consumer Financial Protection Law. Of course, the Financial Consume Financial Protection CFPB Agency Bureau Trump is trying to shut down. On the one hand, he wants to use it in order to protect conservatives, and another hand he wants to shut it down inconsistencies. Why am I surprised? I'm not.

The draft executive order doesn't name any specific banks, but it appears to have to an instance where Bank of America was accused of shutting down the accounts of a Christian organization operating in Uganda based on organization's religious beliefs. On the other hand, the bank says it shut down the account because it doesn't serve small businesses operating outside the United States. Go try to figure that out. I think the bottom line is that this is an executive order.

It will allow Trump to go after any bank that rejects alone from any person that Trump thinks should get alone. I mean, I think that's what's behind us. Trump wants to be able to go in and tell banks who did lend money to and who not to lend money to. Why doesn't he have that power? He should have that power. He's king after the draft of the order that the Roste Journal has seen, so this is an Osti Journal article also criticizes the role that some banks played in

an investigation into the January six riots. There was a criminal investigation. They're probably subpoena Why would they not play a role. Trump himself, when he was asked about this, recounted his own experience being dropped as a bank customer by several banks, including JP Morgan Chase. He said the banks discriminated against me very badly, and I was very good to the banks. Well turned out he wasn't very

good to the banks. It turned out that he fought for bankruptcy several times, which is not good for banks. It also turned out that in his application for mortgages on several occasions for several real estate projects, he overstated the value of the property. So no, Trump was trying to screw banks whenever he could. I mean, that's his motors of perandi, that's what he means by art of the deal. So Trump's never good for banks. Banks had

plenty of reasons for dropping him. Indeed, when Trump ran for president of twenty sixteen, during that period or the period before that, his banking relationship had shifted to Deutsche Bank because American banks didn't want to have anything didn't want to have anything to do with his organization, didn't want to have anything to do with him. Not because of his politics he was a Democrat, not because he's a conservative, he never was and isn't. It's because he

was not a very good bank customer. Nobody wanted to have to deal with his shenanigans. That's why. So this is just another power grab by Trump, which is just another way for him to flex muscles against the group of institutions that he does not like. This is just another little step towards economic fascism, where the government controls everything. I mean they already controlled the banks to huge degree, but now it's completely politicized a or or or or

politicized even further. It's already politicized with the crypto and Elizabeth walk now it's much more, even more politicized, cause now it's about whether it's his friends, and any one of his friends who doesn't get a loan will be a I the bank will be accused of discriminating a c against conservatives. I. You know, it's absurd. Again, the crypto discrimination, if you wanna call it, that was based on what the regulators told the banks they were allowed

or not allowed to do. It wasn't a case of discrimination. It was a case where the banks were just following regulations. So this is just you know, more insanity on behalf of the Trump administration, more attempt to grab control, to regulate, you know, to step in and and and uh control business and in this case banking, which is already so so heavily regulated anyway. You know, one of the things that Trump has got the bank regulators, his bank regulators to do is is to tell the banks they have

to stop assessing reputational risk posed by their customers. So certain customers and certain industries might pose a reputational as to the bank, then under Trump, they will not be

allowed to take that into consideration. And again that's a way to clear his friends and to kill himself, and to make sure that they get the kind of banking that he wants them to get, not based on the rule of law, not based on private property in the bank's rights to decide who to lend you or not, but based almost exclusively on the whim of the president of the United States. And remember, you might like Donald Trump, and you might think he's the greatest thing ever, but

he's not always going to be president. There will be other presidents, and all these powers that are granted to the executives will one day be in the hands of somebody you don't like as much. That you know. That's that would require thinking long term, and nobody wants to do that. That's that's that's real effort, all right.

But in the meantime, Switzerland, so the switch president is panicking. He's rushing to Washington, try to meet with Trump, try to appease Trump.

money to invest in the United States. And this president is, you know, with the golden share in US steel and the United States purchasing of the rare earth material the government investing directly in shares, buying shares in a rare.

and he'll get some favor. And it's just nuts. So a lot of panic and a lot of countries around the world. Now, a lot of people, people who view the world as a zoo some game, view this as a win win for America because if it's win lose and they are panicking, which means they are losing, then

we must be winning. Yay. If you understand the world to be potentially at least win win, and that win lose relationships usually turn into lose lose, and you understand the tariffs are lost to American consumers and to switch manufacturers, then you realize the tariffs, these taffs on Switzerland a lose lose. The only differences that our government is too economically illiterate, too economically ignorant to understand that what they're doing is losing. The Swiss get that it's bad for them.

Their making government does not understand it's bad for them too, And as a consequence, you know they are they are pretending that this is a win for the US and a loss for Switzerland when it's really a loss for both countries. So lose lose is what you're getting. India, you know, is right now in defying the United States digging its heels in. Remember India got twenty five percent tariffs even though I thought it had a deal for

a lot less than that. You remember JD Vance was there a couple of months ago, and they thought they had a much better deal. But then President said he would substantially Racehoubse on Indian goods beyond the twenty five percent because of the amount of oil that India is buying from Russia. And India is basically saying they are not going to let the United States dictate who they

buy all from, which is completely reasonable for India. They shouldn't be buying Russian oil, but not because the United States doesn't like it. And it'll be interesting. I mean, this is the thing, and I've said this over and

over again. I said it not for months. If the United States is serious about China being a threat, China is a threat to the United States, then the one thing the United States needs to be doing is building an alliance with the countries in Asia that are the border China, that share the seas and the ocean with China, that have size and capacity to stand up to China. Clearly, India is one of these countries. It's got a population,

it's larger than that of China. It shares a border with China, which actually is contentious where they periodically have scomishes. It is building a significant military, it's building a navy. It wants to have a say in protecting the shipping lanes in that region, in the region of Southeast Asia and Southern Asia. It is a you know, nominally a democracy. It claims to share many of our Western values. It should be an ally southerly, an ally vis a vi China.

It's hostile to China already, and yet you know, it's also discovered that the Russian weapons system that's been buying for decades probably not very good. But it also is frustrated by the fact that the United States supports Pakistan and the Trump seems so friendly with the regime in Pakistan when the region in Pakistan is not friendly to the United States and is supportive of Islamis causes which

are clearly hostile to the United States. So the US is doing a lot to alienate India's government in the name of Taos and again lose lose. India's gonna lose because it wants they export to the United States. But the US has the potential to lose here in a jew political sense, lose a significant ally in its confrontation, if you will, with China, and that could be now. Look, Trump can't think strategically. His mind does not work that way. He has a mind of a of a pragmatic thug,

and pragmatism does not allow for strategy. His four dy chess is almost always one dimensional and short term and unprincipled. And that's what's going on here. As I've told you from the beginning, the one thing Trump hates are trade deficits. The one thing Trump thinks a good a tariffs. He loves tariffs. He enjoys taffs. And by the way, he enjoys the president of Switzerland having to come and grovel

before him. So he can't think strategically in terms of what does this do to alliance visa China, how do we play this long term? How do we secure American interest in the region. That is way beyond his capacity. It really is. I'm not making that up. I'm not just slamming him. He just doesn't think that way. The only he's a great marketing professional, he's really good at that. He's good at understanding people people in America. He has no understanding of economics zero literally zoo and he has

no understanding of geopolitics. And as a consequence, he has alienated South Koreans with tariffs, alienated the Japanese. He is now talking about massive tariffs on chips microprocesses. They're coming from Taiwan, another one of our key allies in the region, right on TSMC that makes basically all our semiconductors, all the advanced semiconductors. He wants a tariff that. So the one huge advantage the United States has over the rest of the world, including China, is tech. Let's cripple a

tech industry imposing massive tabbs on chips. Now, somebody in the chat said, oh, no, tariffs are just a negotiating tactic. That is complete and utter nonsense. It's never been true. Trump has proved over the last year that it isn't true. He's proved, sorry, over the last three months, that it isn't true. What is he negotiating? What is negotiating? Israel gave Trump zero tariffs on all American goods coming into Israel. We still put fifteen percent taffs on Israel. There's no

there's no negotiating value here. There's no negotiating anything here. As long as there's a trade deficit, tariffs are good. That is the principle by which Donald Trump functions, and he believes they are a great tool to punish countries for doing things he doesn't like, like Brazil with Bolsonaro fifty percent tariff, and like he doesn't like the fact

that chips are being built in Taiwan. He wants the chips to be built in the United States, so put a huge taffs on them, which will really hood US semiconduct industry.

It's a fantasy anyway. Tabs continue to be destructive and one of the consequences of this trade war that he's gotten into with the world, including China, is that China has significantly reduced the vase bailability of minerals, critical minerals, refine minerals, refined rare earth materials from which magnets are made, different infrared sensors, motors for drones, and things like that.

They've limited the export of those materials two companies that they believe are using it for defense purposes, just like we're limiting chips sending to China. And the challenge is that there's a massive shortage among defense contractors in the United States. Lucky Barton and others cannot find enough raw

material to build the weapons systems that the US military demands. Remember, Beijing controls ninety percent of rare earths now because they mind ninety percent of railroads, but because they refine ninety percent of rare earth materials. Just there's no refining capacity outside of China. It banned the sport of geranium, gallium, and antimony that are used for bullets, missiles, and night vision.

And even though they supposedly in the last deal agreed to Trump's demand that they start selling them again, they haven't really, not in quantity. A US drone maker faces a two month delay after China blocked a magnet shipment Chinese. The Chinese supply of the magnets is demanding blueprints, the buyer's name, and proof it's not for defense. The company refused, so the order was stopped. Prices have gone up dramatically.

This is a way in which you don't know. You know, the drone might say made in the US, but a piece of it is not. You're paying that tariff on that piece. One A film was offered samarium for twins for sixty x the normal price sixty x. Now serenium samarium is needed for jet engines like they have. Thirty five other firms support paying five x for some of the materials that they need. Well, then eighty thousand Pentagon components use minerals now under Chinese control. Now, how we

got to this situation? How do we get here? Is a great question and something that if we had a strategy, we would look into and figure out a solution both. How about declaring an emergency for rail earth material and suspending all environmental regulations that prohibit mining it and building refinery capabilities to refine it. Now, that would be the use of emergency powers, or maybe get Congress to pass a law that would be even better. And let's see

which Democrats voting against it. I mean, this is a real national security issue. We are dependent on China for eighty thousand components, and we should be I mean, the Pentagon should be spending huge amounts of money on building capabilities in the United States, and the President should be supporting that with executive orders. That's the use of executive orders that will be appropriate. Instead, we're going off to

banks for discriminating against conservatives. Not only are we seeing a shortage, but there's a shortage in Australia, a shortage in other Western countries that have any kind of defense industries, there's a lack of stockpile, there's no leverage on the Chinese. And you know, now the Panda God supposed is finding funding miners, offering them grants, and of course made a big investment in that one mining company. But what he needs is refining, and what he needs is suspension of

environmental regulations, and that it has not got yet. So part of one of the victims of the terraf is American national security. Not surprising at all at all. All right, let's see, so we did that, we did that, we did that, we did that. Let's say a few things about Gaza. So yeah, I mean, the more time passes, the more it's eminently clear that there's no massive starvation going on in Gaza. A guzens hungry. Years are some

gauzens starving, maybe possibly? And whose fault is that? Well, it's clearly the first of ramas, not only because they could end it all tomorrow by surrendering and releasing the hostages, but also directly because they keep stealing the food. More food has gone into Gaza than is needed to feed the population. There is plenty of food somewhere in Gaza, it's just being held by ramas and not being distributed

to the civilian population. So the only entity political entity starving the Palestinians preventing the Palestinians from having the appropriate amount of food is ramas. And yet interestingly, Israel is being blamed one hundred percent for whatever starvation is happening, and the degree to which it's being blamed is just unbelievable. I mean, the hostility towards Israel is maybe its highest

it's ever been. All over Europe, people are hostile political parties, but also I think people in the streets in the United States survey has a survey has shown that people are shifting to an anti Israeli stand, particularly young people. Israel has done a very very poor job of explaining itself. The defenders of Israel have done a very very poor job defending Israel, and the consequence is that the hostility

is all in Israel. You know, un delivered plenty of trucks, It's just that most of them, an overwhelming majority of them, will hijack Bahamas and Haramas controls. And if you count all the trucks and the food on them, Gaza should have plenty of food for two million people. I mean, they won't be They're not going to all become a beest, but they would not be stopping. Ramas understands that the world is always just looking for an excuse to blame Israel.

The world is always looking for an excuse to go after the Jews, and it feeds them with an excuse. Every few months, it finds something. And what was really shocking is the Kramas released a video of a clearly starving Israeli hostage, in their words, digging his own grave. But you could see all the bones. He looked like he just left the concentration camp. So Haramas is starving the hostages. It's admitting to starving hostages. It's celebrating starving

hostages by sending videos of it. Why pressure on Israel. Pressure, that's for the inside Israel audience is rarely see that they become all emotional. Released hostages. That's the only the matters stopped. The war, released the hostages. Hamas is also well. We talked about this a few weeks ago. It looked like Hamas was going to agree to a cease fire. Since then, as it's seen the world turn against Israel,

it has refused any cease fire deal. Niteniao after he met last time with Trump and Trump told him to cut a deal. Antennia is basically compromising and compromising and compromising. Haramas was saying no, no, no, no, no. Oh. Hamaso looked like it was every time he compromised, they asked for more, and then he compromised, they asked for more, and then they basically basically walked away and said no to any proposal because the world just just gives them

everything they want. I mean, the reality is that all these countries declaring that they will now recognize a Palestinian state means to Ramas that their strategy is winning. It means to Ramas that October seventh was worth it. Indeed, the senior official in Tramas were shown on video saying, well, keep doing October seventh.

And Europeans and Americans look at that and saying, eh ah, just talk. They look at the lies that Ramas says about what Israel's doing. Oh, Israel, they're genocidal. They're really evil, They're really bad. It's just it really is unbelievable to see anti Semitism as common as popular as it is

right now. It's just astoning. I don't know if you saw the video of this group of young influences, you know, on some buddy's podcast, all sitting on a big table and a bunch of them and they're all talking about Hitler. And you know, Hitler wasn't as bad as a guy as people claim, just Tucker calls and talking points. Wasn't a bad guy. And look, if he did what he did to the.

thing he did. It's really scary And I can't even tell with those kids, I couldn't tell if there were right wing influences or left wing influences. Probably left wing influences, but they also sounded pretty much like tech the Carson, so I I can you tell a difference anymore. It wasn't a jubilee. Wasn't a jubilee. It was on somebody's

podcast with a bunch of people sitting around. It was on the video of this was on YouTube on Twitter, sitting around uh uh, mostly girls, mostly women, and just it's just unbelievable, the vitriol, the hatred and the stupidity it usually goes together, and the stupidity. In the meantime, Nitagneo is now favoring the complete conquest of Gaza. It's only taking him a year and ten months. So he's you know, he's almost getting in it, almost getting in it.

He's arguing to occupy Gaza completely, take the whole territory over and rule it. The chief of the IDF, General Zamil, is objecting, and indeed a significant portion of the idea is objecting. They think this would be a strategic mistake. And this is a bigcomfrontation. Now the idea of chief is antagno appointee. This is the guy nitagnow brought in. He got rid of the previous guy and he brought this guy who was supposed to be more Ali Nathaniel.

So there is a real conflict among the leadership within Israel. I think occupying Gaza, I mean, it needs to be done, but it's it's going to be difficult. It's going to be difficult to hold the territory. It's going to place a lot of Israeli troops in Home's way. It's gonna encourage Ramas to engage in kind of localized terrorist acts. But Israel needs to needs to do this. At least, it needs to go in and occupy. It needs to

destroy Kramas. Maybe then it can retreat and convince the force of Arab nations to come in to replace it. But Israel, now, I agree in Nathaniel in this it needs to go in now and destroy Kramas completely. And uh, you know part of that is it needs to just accept the fact that the hostages are probably the equivalent of death. It cannot keep waiting for a hostage deal. It cannot keep hoping and praying for the hostages to

be released. This is a mistake done in October eighth when the decision was made, or sometime after October seventh, when the decisions were made not to risk the hostages lives at all costs, that that was the priority. The priority was bringing back to the hostages, when the priorities should have been destroyed Ramas. Save the hostages way you can, But the one hundred percent focus should have been from the beginning, the complete and of the destruction of Ramas.

All right, So we'll see how that plays out within the Israeli politics government. The idea comtantly controls about seventy five percent of gods a strip, but the idea would be to occupy There are many territory which includes a lot of areas that are highly densely populated. There are certain areas where the idea has not operated at all because those areas they believe the hostages are being kept, and they believe that as they move into those areas,

harmas will kill the hostages. And I think that's probably true, and I think they have to do it anyway, as heartbreaking as that would be to many families and many people. I know, my nephew's best friend is still a hostage. So a lot of my family, you know, prioritize a deal above all else. But it's a bad long term strategy. Strategy is that would again something people don't seem to hold on to very much. All right, finally, let's do this. What do I need to do? Yes, I want to

share this graph. It's a fun graph. You've probably seen it before. This is a graph of hopefully you can see it. Price changes are very good from January two thousand.

Below that medical care services. Below that, average hourly wages. Average hourly wages have arisen one hundred and twenty seven point four percent. Now, this is not corrected for inflation. Below that is housing one hundred and eight percent. Below that, food and beverage one hundred and two percent. Below that listence somewhere here is oh, the black line crossing is inflation. Inflation's gone up by basically ninety percent during this period.

So everything I've read to you up until now has gone up more than inflation, right, with hospital services a lot more than inflation. I'm surprised how housing has not gone up that much more than inflation. Inflation is ninety percent, housing one hundred and eight percent, So on a national scale, housing has not gone up that much compared to inflation. Generally, I feel like and and average hourly wages have gone up more than housing, so much. For all of those again,

this is average, uh, this is average. Now, this is I'm using inflation. I know that term that is contentious, right, I'm using inflation here to mean a rise in the costs of goods.

household furnishing, in operations, and clothing. Clothing is flat. Clothing has gone up zero percent, which is basically, you know, ninety percent less than inflation. So in real terms, the cost of clothing has gone down a lot, a lot even you cause this price has gone down a lot. Furnishing, furnishing and operation has gone down a lot. Cell phone services has gone down forty two point not in real terms, that's inhenomenal terms, which means it's gone up gone down

a lot more if you adjust for inflation. Computer software gone down seventy two percent, toys seventy four percent, TVs ninety eight percent. Now what do you notice about this chart? What what is the difference between what has gone up and what has gone down? What are some of the differences. There's several differences here, which interesting, right? What are they? Well? First, first, all the ones, all the ones that have gone up

more than inflation, provide heavily heavily regulated by government. Obviously, all the healthcare ones, hospitals, childcarell hospitals, many co care services, to education, college tuition, college textbooks, childcare, nursery services, all heavily influenced by regulations. And then housing, food and beverage not so clear that one's not that regulated except for sugar, right,

except for consul but not as regulated. New cause, housing, household clothing, cell phone, computers, toys, TVs t not regulated at all, computer software not regulated at all, toys not regulated much, all of them way below inflation. So the things that are dependent on a private section with little regulation price went down. The things that are depending on government prices went way up more than inflation. But there's

another way to look at this. The things that are imported that are actually made in other countries that are imported in the United States or that face heavy competition from the outside the United States are all down, are all significantly cheaper than they used to be, significantly cheaper than they used to be. I mean, TV is basically ninety eight percent cheaper than they used to be. Computers, computers, cell phones, cell phone, you know, self services is not

really importable, right, so that's that's an American service. So that's all about competition and innovation. Clothing, which is all inputs, household furniture all inputs, new cars inputs in the United States, but heavy import competition, computers inputs, toys, inputs, TVs inputs. And then if you look at the top portion, everything's domestic, including food and beverages which are made and produced.

want teiffs. We want competition, or we want free trade, because look what free day trade does the TV prices and computer software prices, and clothing prices and even new car prices. I mean, this is a pretty amazing graph, one of the most important graphs in the world. All right, it's quick that all right. So that is the news. August fifth, Tuesday, August fifth. Thank you to other super chatters.

You guys have done great. Wow, we've got a bunch of stickers and we've got a few questions and yeah, this is good, this is good. Thank you. Let's thank the stickers. Jackson, thank you. As a Turk Economy. Thank you, Barba, thank you, Wes, thank you. Fifty dollars, Thank you Wes for the sticker. And then Dave Dave Dean fifty dollars for a sticker. Thank you, thank you, thank you, Jeremy, thank you for the sticker. Silvano's fifty dollars. You got

a started right at the beginning. Thank you, Silvana. So it's good to see you here. He was on vacation. That's why it wasn't around all right. Let me remind you that this show is sponsored by Hendershot Wealth, hendershot Wealth dot com, slash ybs. They offer product they can help you reduce your tax bill significantly if you have a lot of capital gains, so capital gates taxes can

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basically contains the iron Ran library. Iron Ran talks, Ironran articles and includes then and peakoffs, seminal courses on objectivism, all of his courses Golding the History of Philosophy which is a must listen, but Understanding Objectivism and all his courses on O pah. Just you know, material you can't get anywhere else, an incredible value and you have them

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your contribution to the run book show. I'd say about ten of you are being somehow dropped, and I know that. I know some people who were dropped didn't want to be dropped, and they got an email from PayPal saying something like, we dropped you and we didn't do anything. So PayPal's got a glitch somewhere, So go and check it out, and if you still want to.

become a supporter on patreon dot com. Roberts says, did you know that Lisbon, Portugal it's actually forty two miles closer to Detroit, Michigan than Puerto Rico is the Detroit I did not know that. That seems crazy? Is there a I mean, is the direct fly from.

a question. It's pretty easy to do, all right. Let's start with the profit. The profit one hundred pounds stalling in these days, the pound Stolling is quite a bit more valuable than he used to be Visa VI the dollar. So pound has gone up a lot, one point three to two. I think one point three three. It was down to like in the teens. All right, the prophet says,

how do think about taxes? Am I sacrificing the present by purposefully earning less to stay in the eight point seventy five dividend tax packer with the plan of selling business in the future. Paying twenty five percent corporate tax plus additional thirty five forty percent on same money makes

me feel sick. Look, yeah, it makes you feel sick, but the reality is that you know, let me see, secrific so earning less to stay in the eight seventy five dividend tax backet with the plan of selling business in the future. You'll pay capital gains at that point unless you unless you sign up with Handershut Wealth and to prepare yourself to not pay capital gains.

Is it money that is growing at a reasonable rate of return, So that one day, because you're not pulling money out now, because you're not taking a bigger salary, now, that money will stay in the business and grow, and therefore you'll have a lot more when you sell the business one day, if you can sustain, if you're happy with the quality of life that you sustain at a low income, You're going to pay the taxes at some point, right, maybe a little less, but when you sell the business,

you'll pay capital gains. So you're paying twenty five percent corporate tax. So how exactly, Now, Remember, if you pay yourself salary, that reduces your profits at the corporate level, which means that you will paying on that money. You won't pay twice, right, you deduct it at the corporate level. You only pay it at the individual level when you take it as an individual unless you're taking the money out as dividends, and then it's eight point seventy five.

You have to do the calculation. What makes more sense? Right, if you take it out as dividends, maybe it's less, but you're pushing yourself up to the higher tax bracket. Look, there's no definitive answer here. The bottom line is you have to figure out what the trade off is. The trade is a low standard of living now for what is it for something beneficial in the future. And if it is for something beneficial in the future, is that worth Because it's in the future, anything in the future

is worth less than in the present. If it's of equal size, is it worth a delayed gratification? And I can't answer that question. That depends on your time preference. It depends on how much you value the present visa the future. You know, the business is risky. Every business is risky. There's a chance that money won't be there in the future should you invest it now? Right, So you've got to introspect, figure out the true cost of this to your own quality of life, stand of living.

Figure out the true cost of this in terms of the future, the riskiness, the value of money in the future, and you're delayed gratification, and figure out what makes sense. You know, if you pull the money out, you could invest that money and be diversified, not all your eggs in the same basket, which is also a positive. So you've got to weigh all these considerations. There's no one answer to this. It depends on your values, your preferences,

your time value preference. For example, I hope that's helpful. If not, let me know and I can dig a little deeper or try give me more details. If we do that, not you have, I'll GOORITHM fifty dollars, thank you. I'm many advocates of socialism rich because socialist policies make the rich richer and the poor poorer, at least in the short term. If you look at Western europe socialistic models, wealth is more intergenerational than dynamic. Yeah, but it's also

very old wealth in Europe. You know, it's a lot of it's tied to old businesses and old real estate and old investments, and in that sense, it's in the generational. But no, I don't think that's why socialists are socialists. I don't think people are motivated by some supposed self interest in maintaining their own wealth. Socialism sustains their wealth for them. You know, a lot of socialist countries have

wealth taxes. Wealth taxes have to drain your into generational wealth, so maybe they still stay wealthy.

early eighties because it was socialists they left. And it's just not the case that one can attribute these kind of motives to wealthy people. You know, what motivates people fundamentally, and rich people are different model ideals, I know, it's hard to believe or the lack of them. And most socialists are motivated by guilt, by guilt of the wealth that they are particularly see, it's the cause and effect

goes the other way around. If you have wealth that comes down from generations, you're going to feel more guilty about having their wealth than if you earned it. The more guilty you feel about having the wealth, the more likely you are to vote for socialist policies that redistribute the wealth that you have. So it's the other way around. It's the fact that the wealth in Europe isn't a generational makes them feel more guilty about it. The bebo socialists, right,

will a Grave. I'd like to see future talk on the new EU regulations called DSU created under the pretense of protecting children online, lots of subjective rules, trusted in flagger accounts for EU appointees and disinformation. I will look at that. The challenge, of course with the EU and keeping track is just the extent of the bad regulations that they have. I mean, they are just all over the place with bad regulations, and you know, it's it's

just hard to keep track. But I will, I promise I will take a look at this particular one, you know, together with any other ones you guys flag. But yes, I don't quite pay as much attention to Europe as they do to the US, partially because it's so hard, because they do so much crap, so many bad things, and so much of it is done under the guise of paternalism. Europe is much more paternalistic in that sense

than the US. But the US is pretty paternalistic too, quite a bit, uh, you know, But it mostly is just a power grab and an attempt to control our lives and the lives of business. Cyrus JMG for what I've seen, Gaza shows both deep poverty, tense slums and signs of normal life shops, bakeries. Cause is there a class structure And while Gaza rules officially are warlords of factions using jahamasus officially are warlords and factions those in control. Okay,

so a few things. One, Gaza right now is mostly in ruins. So if you look at area photographs of Gaza right now, most of the buildings, a significant majority of the buildings have been flattened. Gaza today is rubble. So the places where the idea has been too and the places where the idea is bombed are basically have basically been destroyed completely. And if you lived in those places, you have to either live in tense or you're living

among the rubble. And it looks that way. On the other hand, areas where the idea of has not been to and maybe the idea is not bombed because of fear that the hostages might be there. They're the ones where there's relatively normal life. They are using the hostages as human shields. They're also using their own civilian population as human shields to prevent the idea from destroying the buildings there. But the Gazza looks like dress and did

after bombing. It's been flattened, or like Tokyo, it's been flattened much of it. Now there is a portion that hasn't and that's where you see relatively normal life in terms of now. Always the crass structure. There was not so much a class structure, but the were poor and rich in Gaza. The rich tended to be first of

all hamas officials, people in governments. Second, people who always lived in Gaza, so families that have a long history in Gaza, versus the people who are kept in poverty, the so called refugees, people who might have lived in what is now Israel and ran away from that in nineteen forty eight, So refugees from seventy something years ago, seventy seven years ago who have never been accepted into Arab society, including in the West Bank and Gaza, and

had been kept as refugees in poverty and in shanty towns and so on. So in that sense there's a class structure. And then finally Hamastazrul officially all warloads and factions those in control. Yes, there are warlords. There a variety of warlords, gangs basically organized criminal gangs that are also stealing food. And one of the gangs in the south in Rafa is actually working with the Israelis UH and they are actually protecting food convoys and helping these

Raelis and they're anti Haramas. There are other gangs out there that are anti Haramas, and some of them are pro Hamas, but yes, they're definitely. Once you have a place like this where Ramas cannot rule the whole place, and where there's anarchy and where there's weapons everywhere, you're gonna have gangs and you're gonna have factions fighting over stuff. But Tramas is the biggest gang of all of them. Liam are there certain levels of authoritarian control Mixed economies

won't tolerate. Even the Chinese are used to being pushed around once she out because they have reached mixed economy, middle class level of comfort. Yeah, I mean you saw that with the with the real demonstrations, real differents, sizeable demonstrations in China during the COVID lockdowns or towards the end of the COVID lockdowns. Where was it twenty twenty two, twenty twenty three, wasn't it into twenty twenty three? I think?

And she had to had to cave, He had to open up the economy in spite of up until that he had refused to do so because of all the demonstrations. So, yes, there certain level of authoritarian controls, and that will increase the desire people to be free, increase their willingness to take risks, their willingness to rebel against the authorities. And I think that China is experiencing that to some extent. Unfortunately, for example, Iran is not yet experiencing that.

position to others? Per se yeah. I mean you have to think about what independence really means, and dependence really means is using your mind. It really means making decisions for yourself. It really means that your mind is responsible for your decision about what is true and what is not, what you should do and what you shouldn't do. And that does not mean you don't deal with experts. It doesn't mean you don't get advice. It doesn't mean you don't go to the doctor, the dentist to get expertise.

But it means that even in there, if a doctor gives you a diagnosis, you need to figure out if it makes sense to you. You need potentially to get a second opinion. You need to do some online research. You need to make to make sure you are making a decision that's educated. You need asked Adoctor a lot of questions. It's your life, is your responsibility. It's your responsibility to use your mind to make decisions. That does not have any implications about being other people. I mean

implication is you shouldn't be a secondhander. You shouldn't just follow other people. You shouldn't do what they say blindly. You shouldn't join tribes, you shouldn't join collectives. But should you trade with other people? Should you interact with other people from mutual benefit? Well, absolutely, as long as you're doing it on your terms. So there's just nothing, nothing in the virtue of independence that suggests Jeff to isolate

yours of Quite the contrary. Virtual independence gets you to think about the value of trade, the value of other human beings, the value of friendship, the love you, value of the value of sex, and all those suggest not living alone but interacting with other people. So it practice properly. You want to be with other people, You want to engage with other people. You want to gain the values that other people represent for you and can provide.

It makes one hundred dollars, Thank you, Dave Andrew. When lefties say they feel unsafe in response to speech, I don't doubt that they do feel it, although it's despicable that the answer is for others to be silent. How does that phenomena intersect with motivation by fear? Well, I mean, I think that the feeling unsafe from speech is basically a result of the fear that they have. Fear that they have generally metaphysical kind of fear, because speech does

not threaten them, if it's just speech. It's also the case that remember that they have been raised on valuing their emotions more than anything else, and when you elevate emotions above all else, when you elevated emotions above all else, then fear is all you're left with. Because emotions will not tell you how the world works. Emotions will not

tell you what good and bad is. Emotions will not tell you if to cross the street now or not, so you face the world bewildered without any knowledge because emotions don't give you knowledge suddenly, not knowledge about the outside world. So you are you know you. The emotion that comes to dominate is the emotion of fear. What's going on Here'll say, something got screwed up here weird? Huh night, Uh sorry the uh something w g went weird on my web page. Kay, All the questions are

back up and they're covering each other up. Okay, sorry what I'm saying. So, as I said, I, you know, I think that's connection. The connection is that fear leads to then emotionalism leads to fear, and then they fear everything around them. And they of course they've part of that is they fear. They fear.

real estate. Yeah, that looks about right. I mean, I like that portfolio. I don't know if the value tilt is a US value tilt to a global value tilt, but I generally like that it gives you. It gives you some biotech in tech exposure that's about ten percent and which you market fifteen You know, I don't know what's in co Global. I might go to forty percent co Global and put up thirty percent into the value tilt,

given that you've you've got biotech in tech there. That would be the only change I would make if I was gonna do it. But of course, nothing I say here is investment advice. I just think value is really cheap right now has mean for a long time. It's underperformed for a long time, and usually there's mean reversion,

so usually it overperforms. And I think in a period of stake nation, which I think we're heading towards, uh, there's a good chance that value out performs, not does well, but outperforms kind of broadly speaking, growth, even though tech might do well and biotech might do well, biotech and tech is basically for the for the possibility of of of you know, things going really really well. That's why only thinking, But basically I think you've got it right, Daniel,

I built automated machinery for a living. Nearly all the materials and parts are imported, and that's for American manufacturing. The male laths and tooling are built all over the world. Yeah, I mean that's the reality. And that's why these these tasks are so dumb, stupid and evil. Really, they're really im all. This is really really immoral what he's doing, And it just makes no sense. There's no thinking, there's no strategy, there's no economics. Daniels, Do the bank is

have to bake the cake? Do the bankers have to bake the cake? Well? They do, and then Trump takes a slice for himself without paying for it. That Dodo will, and regulators take up even biggest lives that Dudo bunny. Do specialists change a culture faster than generalists in terms of philosophy, in terms of ideas, No, I mean you need both, and you need both at the same time. And the ultimate generalist are the philosophers. And the ultimate generalist here is Iman. So in a sense, you've got

the generalist Iman the philosopher. You've got a philosophy. And now what you need as specialist to apply it, apply it, apply it, apply it, apply it, apply it, apply it so that people can start seeing connection between things and connecting it to that philosophy, to those ideas. So what you need is a bunch of specialists, not one specialist. He can't change the world.

transport to a benevolent culture period is through observing its artwork. Yes, I mean art is a way to experience a different, a different time, a different sense of you know, and to reinforce the positive sense of life that hopefully you have the positives within yourself of life, and to experience other cultures, other worlds in which life was more benevolent.

of trade. I know it's hard to believe, but Trump really has a zero some view of the world.

than a standard redistributionist. He did an interview calling for the abolishment of private property in order to provide universal housing.

and a Republican candidate. I mean they should choose one, and everybody else should quit. That's the way to stop him. But people in New Yorker's cool young New Yorkers, including the Jewish young new Yorkers, they hate Israel. They like that he's standing up against Israel. They hate capitalism, even though they're all making nice, really nice incomes off of the jobs that they have. They hate capitalism even though they love living in New York. But they don't like

paying a high price for living in New York. They want Iowa prices and still live in New York. They think socialism would give them that, and they're just not thinking. They're not thinking the I mean taught to think. They have the mentality of, you know, an emotionalistic five year old join the club, not to have a joagorhithm. Every time the idea of gets closer to defeating evil, the media gets louder with lies. Yeah, the lies are constant.

They basically the sympathies of the media with tramas. They stage photos, they lie about photos, they lie about information that they have the reporters on the ground or programas. So it's very hard even for editors who don't want to be programas to filter and figure out what's true what's not. I mean, the world is programas because the world is altruistic, almost everybody's programas. Michael Destiny is on a cross country anti Trump tour, definitely worth trying to

do a live event with him. I'll try it, but I have to have a schedule first, because I can't just say I'm going to do it and then not do it. And you know, given where I am, I'll see if I can walk something else, blaze guitar lessons. What would you say Thomas Soul was wrong about? Oh, I don't know enough about all of Thomas OL's writings, but he's wrong about Christianity. He's wrong about economics being

the science a science that deals with scarcity. He's wrong about I think he's I don't the term scarcity should not be applied to economics, although everybody does. He's he's wrong for not being totally lafay.

You know, if you define scarcity right, it's true. But the problem is nobody holds it right. Blaze guitar lessons. How would you debate some about China's economy. I don't understand the question. What does it mean debates some? I mean is the question of why Chinese economy is doing relatively well or done relatively well in the last forty years. I'd say because they liberalized, because they opened up the economy, and those parts that will opened up, those parts of

liberalized have done phenomenally well. And I could give lots of examples of that. So the state sector, the area where the state is involved, has not done well. It's not done anywhere near well. Most of the wealth, most of the employment has been created in those areas of the economy that were that are in the private sector versus those that are state controlled. And they had a

huge boom in tech when they left tech alone. When they left tech free, which was in the two thousands until about really until about twenty eighteen twenty nineteen, and tech flourished in China, and I think I think it's stagnated since relatively speaking, Brian, I'm one hundred percent of zero US tariffs. The US might lose leverage to negotiate low time and US goods. But since government should not be in a business of negotiating any trade policy, should we care. No.

become even faster. We become richer if there was zero taffs everywhere in the world and zero trade restrictions everywhere in the world. And I think we have other leverage, other mechanisms by which we can incentivize countries to reduce their terists to zero. But look, if I believe that Trump was using tariffs in order to reduce other people's tasts on our goods, and ultimately what he wants and what he's moving towards is the zero tariff world, including

the United States, I'd be mildly sympathetic. But that's not what he's trying to do.

But you know, look at the look at the real estate crisis in China, real estate prices in China, look at the debt that they that the provisional governments have. China isn't very very, very bad economic state right now now South America because the debt we've accumulated, but China's feeling it in a way we're not. And and again people's wealth is being affected in the way American's wealth is not. Not yet all right, I think this is the last question. H Andrews says, you mentioned how one's

circumstances don't ultimately dictate one's ideas or actions. Ran referred to that notion as an alibi for weaklings. Yeah, I mean people are constantly trying to make excuses, trying to you know, shift responsibility, shrug off responsibility for their own lives. And that's an alibi for for weaklings, and and and absolutely, and you know, it's my circumstances, my parents, it's my neighborhood. It's it's uh, it's my genes, it's my and and people do it all the time, and and you might

I catch yourself sometimes doing it. Don't give it to it. You in control of your destiny. You get to decide, You get to choose you need. You get to make your own future. You get to make your own soul. You get to shape who you are and what you are. Don't use genetics or environment as an excuse. They're a very bad one. All right, guys, I will see you tomorrow,

probably at twelve noon. If it won't be a twelve noon for some reason, it'll be late at night because I'm giving a talk tomorrow at a jazz club in Lisbon. They've got a book club thing that they do. I'm gonna talk about an Affla shrugged, So that'll be fun. I'll tell you about that on Thursday when we do a show Thursday. All right, everybody, I will see you tomorrow. Bye. Yeah,