Iran Quagmire Questions, SpaceX IPO Plans, and The White House App

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Start building at MongoDB.com/billed. He's got a convent to tell me, can't talk that much, just can't limit his talk it. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine in the box media podcast network. I'm Kara Swisher. And I'm Scott Callaway.

Scott, I have officially left your apartment in New York City. Oh, you moved into your new place. Yes, I bought an a small apartment in Brooklyn in Harlem. All the code kids are. I have to say I enjoyed it.

We went this weekend, we went to a key up for 17 hours, which was fun, actually. But a range of inexpensive furniture, and it's very lovely, actually. We, it's very nice. I miss you, but I have to move on. Our housing relationship.

“So, do you know how many times I've been in Brooklyn in 25 years?”

How many? Twice, about times to be together with the so-how's there. There's no reason ever live the island unless you're going to JFK or LaGuarda. Okay. We're very well known in Park's Lope, I can tell you that. Oh, I don't doubt it.

It was really royalty in Brooklyn. Jesus Christ, I can't even imagine. I think Kara, welcome to Brooklyn. I know, that's exactly what happened. It was like, two other things, let me just say two other phenomena. So, I have all these books that I get from my podcast and probably you do too, right?

I cannot get rid of them here. I put them out on the stupid Brooklyn, they were gone. Like, I have to say, I get all these free books and they're good books, and they're all interesting. But I have to, I like the whole culture of people walking by and taking things and giving

away things. It's really nice. And so, we are now officially somewhat, we don't live there, but it's nice, and anyone can stay. Well, all you listeners can stay at my Brooklyn place, you know, you can stay.

I extend an invitation to you. Scott Galois. Yes, I happen. So, you're going to happen because it has a key of furniture. That's why.

You want to like, yeah. Yeah, I love a key. Why do you like, I care? Because it's, because actually, it's, it's perfectly nice stuff. If you get the, the slightly more expensive stuff there, it's fine, and it's, I have

really nice furniture in where I live, and I just don't need more furniture. And I was there the IKEA sales lady wanted to have sex with me, but all I wanted was one night stand. Ah, I don't believe you have an IKEA joke, I'm ready. I have to say, IKEA's, like, the works really well.

It's in Red Hook, and it was nice. The kids have a good time. We put them in small land.

“Do you know how everything has the weird names with IKEA?”

I don't. I don't think I've ever been to IKEA. Oh, okay. In any case, there's a place to put children while you shop. It's like so.

And then you have meatballs at the end. It's really Swedish meatballs. And all thing is food and, and pair soda, it's, it's very pleasant. So anyway. It's a phenomena.

It's a... I still was making furniture all night long. I don't know.

IKEA for me is, is like a foreign video, and that is all I'm never able to do the same

thing at home. And just, it looks different. IKEA, that's my own. When I try it. Yeah.

Well, I'm a lesbian. So I can assemble it things well. Very good.

“Yeah, I was going to say here, are you building a wood canoe in your living room?”

Yeah. I have to build this bed. I gave up on it. Woodwork? Yeah.

The other thing I did, I didn't want to recommend. I went to my friend, Sean Hayes, a show called The Unknown. And it's a little bit about internet. It's a little bit about, it's really good. It's a one-man show.

It's a mall. I think it's my David Kale. I think it's a playwright. What a wonderful show. I have to...

This is Broadway. It's off Broadway. He started off Broadway. Yeah.

“My Mexican friend builds all my IKEA furniture.”

I call him my instruction, I call him my instruction Manuel. Oh, my God. Just... Oh, God. Okay.

All right. Any way. At least I've agreed to, at least I've agreed to West Elm. I have West Elm stuff. I have...

The other one. The other one. Position the brand of West Elm is one of my first clients. I like West Elm actually. They make...

I have several. I have a West Elm bed here. And I love it. Do you know what the strategy was? Well, I'm patting myself in the back.

My first strategy engagement out of business school was helping position the old Navy brand. And it was pretty easy. 80% of the gap for 5% of the price. And so my big insight, William Sonoma, five years later, was West Elm, 80% of pottery barn for 5% of the price.

Oh, interesting. It's nicer than pottery barn. I think pottery barn is sort of lost. West Elm is...

The fastest zero to a billion dollar brands in history have been that axiom.

80% of the county industry leader for 5% of the price, whether it's Southwest or old Navy or West Elm. It's a... West Elm is a little nicer, and then there's the one room in board, which is nice. I get a lot.

They do a great job. They do a... I get a lot of their stuff. Not really successful financially though. Yeah.

And then with the one that has the big air couch, the big... Well, restoration hardware... Restoring hardware. I haven't... That has...

That has all of my stuff in San Francisco. I get restoration... Well, Gary... I used to be very into merchandise. I think it was in that business.

So the greatest... In my opinion, the greatest merchant of the last 20 years is... Gary Friedman, a CEO of "Prostation Hardware." Yeah, he had seen it cloud couch, cloud couch. Cloud couch.

You know, you know, our friends, he gave me a tour of their space and... In the meat packing industry.

“It was really interesting in the restaurant, which I think does more dollars for square”

foot than the store combined, but they don't serve alcohol, because he said he wanted to save place for women to come and just hang out. And then when people drink alcohol, they get rowdy, and I'm noxious. I thought that was interesting. So they doesn't serve hard alcohol.

Oh. They have a beautiful store in Manhattan and go to lunch there. It's nice. Anyway, I have different levels of furniture depending on the house. Simmerance is goes all restoration hardware.

Anyway, we'll move on before we can get into the furniture. The furniture for a little bit. The furniture for a little bit. No, no, no. I went to a kid.

I sampled furniture this weekend.

Anyway, before we get to the news, this weekend, around 8 million people.

One thing I didn't do, I didn't go to a no-kings rally, because I was assembling a key of furniture over 3,300 events around the world. I went to the last one, I think, over 200,000 people attended the flagship rally in Minnesota incredible crowds. Some signs stand out, including you can't bomb your way out of the Epstein files.

My country went to Hellenol, I got was this lousy ballroom. And balls for grabs with a sign that said free balls for Republicans. They were, I love the signs. I was really into a lot of people, that's a lot of people. Was there one in London?

I mean, I don't know, although they did have a protest here, which I just, which I didn't get to. But I don't know, I did with all lazy people do to virtue signal I reposted. Yeah. I reposted other people sacrificing their saturday.

I thought, no, it was, I looked wonderful and festive. I thought they were also the messaging was excellent. I said it was a fortability, it's about no king.

“It was, everybody has, all the progressives have modulated in a way that I think is very”

attractive. They're moving into the James Talloreco version of Democrats, right? The, hey, what are we going to hear to help you for ability? We want to think. And the one thing I really like, there was a picture, a beautiful picture of Joan

Bayez and Jay Fonda that was with gray hair together was gorgeous. I thought that was, I just thought it was visually very attractive. I think there is a real movement of people of all these elections happening and people are so sick of feeling bad and feeling, like, everything's a grift. It just feels, there's definitely a tide, I don't know if these protests help, but I like

them. And supposedly, well, first off, it just feels, you know, I say this all the time, but my buddy Dan Harris action absorbs anxiety. It feels really good to do things with other people and Timothy Snyder says that protests start to build an infrastructure for organization and taking names and people get invested

in it, so they want to turn out again and they want to register people to vote. And also, supposedly, there's a tipping point where if you get three and a half percent of the population to demonstrate that usually connotes change, so this wasn't that, because

that would be, I think about 11 or 12 million people, just some data here.

The October protestor roughly 7 million and Saturday's turnout was 9 million, so it's building. What's interesting are the most recent piece of data I thought. Is it 2/3 of the RSVPs came from outside major urban centers and including conservative leaning states such as Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, Utah, South Dakota, Montana, and Montana.

Yeah. And then protests. That takes some things for people to do things like that there, like the villages. Did you see all the little villages, carts? Yeah.

That was kind of cool. And what is traditionally very conservative.

And also the kind of the flagship was that Minneapolis were almost a quarter of a million

people turned out, Springstein performed, you mentioned, John Bias and Jane Fonda, Maggie Rodgers and Senator Perry, so just some context. The women's March in January 2017 previously considered the largest single they protest in U.S. history drew an estimated 3.3 to 5.6 million people, so this was bigger. The BLM protest in June of 2020 drew an estimated 15 to 26 million people, but over several

weeks, but that was spread across multiple days. So if the 9 million person turnout estimate hold, Saturday's protest would be the largest single the demonstration of American history. People are tired and they want to do something, it's not hopeless, it's not hopeless. I went to the women's, what I actually, I took my sons to that, I made them more pussy

hats. Well, that's the way it goes. Anyway, we had to actually at a wonderful time. I like doing things like that with my kids because they can see things in action. Okay, moving on, President Trump says the U.S. is in serious discussions with the new

regime and around, but he's also threatening to completely destroy key energy sites of the deal is not rage. That's a nice way to negotiate. This is the Pentagon preparing for what could be weeks of ground operations in Iran, according to the Washington Post, total number of U.S. troops and the midies are now 50,000 around

50,000. That is insane amounts of people roughly 10,000 higher than typical levels. The Iranian military is warning that any U.S. occupation would lead to captivity dismembered and disappearance. It is worrisome with all those people.

There's always something bad going to happen.

And as the war drags on markets are sliding down with Nasdaq and Dow falling into correction territory last week, and the S&B down about 7%, the markets are sort of a trailing indicator of some of this stuff, I think.

“But I think it creates a jittery feeling just because of the shifting back and forth.”

And if you notice, a lot of Trump people, especially Mark O'Rubio and JD Manz, were not on any of the Sunday shows. They're avoiding all the cabinet members who are avoiding the Sunday shows. I had a really interesting interview before I went to New York with Tom Tillis, which I think you should all listen to.

It's up today. I mean, he was expressing great distaste for this whole action. He's a very conservative senator from North Carolina. He's leaving Congress so he feels like he could say what every once, what you did. So what do you think is happening here, Scott?

I mean, the back and forth, and the people are sort of trying to get out of the Trump blast zone on this situation, I'm sorry to use that metaphor, but. Well, to say it's complicated as an understanding, but I'm one of the people that would argue that we've been at war with Iran for the last four to seven years, the first act of this regime in 1979 was to take the American's hostage.

The question is, is this escalation in the war?

“Was it a smart idea, and I think if it had gone 72 hours in terms of getting some”

coordination with European allies and even the allies, you could have potentially declared victory and really had a win. But this is kind of the definition of a quagmire, and that is, I'm not sure at this point he has any choice, but to put boots on the ground, because I, and I had Senator Warner on my podcast, I would argue at this point, Kara, Iran is winning.

That the, that the RGC has shown that they can, they can push back the, you know, the great Satan's Israel in the United States, and what is, at the end of the day, I think this is an enormous failure of our intelligence director, Tulsi D'Abert, to not contemplate or consider a scenario where they cut off the straits of her moves. But she probably advised that she didn't want to go.

She's the America first great, her invians are on the, maybe not so much kind of group. You have a, okay, but they, they're, they're claiming now that they're going to try and work with their allies. We're all saying, fuck you, if you're going to be this much of a practice to us. But they've, they're doing shit in reverse order.

They should have secured the fights in front of us before doing this. Of course. They should have contemplated, well, what happens if they start firing Shahad drones, they cost $20,000, and it costs us $2 million to shoot them down. What if they start firing them into Dubai?

“So, some basic scenario planning and intelligence from the people to try, I mean, I think”

he got that. I think some guy told him to do this, like, I, the, the, the, the, the leadership, that, it doesn't matter if it does bubble up, which is what Tila said.

Tila's was like, I, he always tries very hard not to insult Trump himself, but he's like

the advisors. And he's particularly, for example, when after Stephen Miller on immigration, he particularly goes after the advisors. He's like, he's either you have an advisor who's stupid and just like tells them dumb things or you have an advisor who knows better who says nothing, right, who doesn't, who tries

to, like, assuage the president versus, and it goes either way his advisor's suck, you know, and I think that's true, but at some point it's treating Trump like a toddler, oh, we managed

So it's a complicated situation there is this guy wants to do what he wants to do now and

“he has advisors who are either too weak to tell him the truth or tell him the truth and”

then get fired or slap for it kind of stuff. I don't know. It's a problematic situation. Not certainly not the group of rivals that Lincoln had.

Well, but a lot of people would argue, on the opposite side, that basically Secretary

Rubio's a shadow president making these decisions and so is a son-in-law, a customer. So, you know, which is it, is he listening to people or is he not because to me, this is just such a striking intelligence failure to not do some basic scenario planning around what if. And we are now in a position of weakness where, I mean, the general, not the consensus, but when

I speak to people in the intelligence community, there is a feeling, okay, the most obvious next step here is that he feels to say, face because the RGC has said, fuck you, you can pretend you're talking to us. We're not talking back. Right.

We have this first. We did scenario planning. We just, we anticipated what if our leadership is killed and they have dispersed military and executive authority out to the various regions. So they're like cut off the head of the snake.

That's okay. Next, we're going to keep moving.

So there was no basic essential basics scenario planning here.

And the general feeling is that he will land troops, potentially, on car island and then try and secure car and do a deal to exchange car for opening the streets of Hormos. Right. I know, but that's what we had before. Like one of the things.

I'm not arguing. We're in a good spot. I agree. One of the things when I talk to Tillerson, when I also talk to Warner, is that the same thing you're talking about these drones and everything else.

The word obliterate, that he obliterated it months ago, the nuclear facilities. But now he's obliterating more and, you know, Tillerson's sort of hat seems to have run out of facts. It was like, yeah, we obliterated it again and then we obliterated it. Like, you know, you can't, that's like, to say you obliterate, all right.

“So essentially, you have fun of Trump, I believe, and that's what's happening there.”

Again, the keyword and all of this coming out of Ukraine and now this war is asymmetry.

And that is wars and shaping of, you know, energy routes and ability to solve things with when diplomatic means have failed have been based on very expensive platforms and technology no one else had access to. It has gone the entire other way. And now you can essentially build a drone for $20,000 with a two stroke engine similar

to what's in a motorcycle. And that's like to say you're going to obliterate it. Okay, if we all of a sudden declared war on Texas and most of the Southwest, actually which Iran is bigger than that and said, okay, how do you find every little factory that's pushing, pulling together lawnmowers?

That's what you're up against. You're not going to be able, and then they launch 40 of these things and the defense systems get confused and all you need, it's similar, similar to the Department of Homeland Security or the FBI, they have to stop every terrorist attack, right? And the notion that just one ship is set on fire or the verse Khalifa is taken down

and divided by, that's all they need and what's actually stopping us and you can imagine. If you're transporting tens or hundreds of millions of dollars of a product called oil through a dangerous area, there needs to be insurance against that payment, against that that substance arriving at its destination. In other words, there's cross-party collateralization and insurance.

And right now, I would argue it's actually holding up the streets of Formos as I don't believe any insurance companies willing to ensure these tankers right now. Yeah, I don't know what I would do if I was running these companies anyway. We'll see what happens.

“It's still confusing and it's gone far too long, this confusing and I think that's the real”

problem. He's really stuck in a quag. A quag? A quag? This is the definition of a quag.

If he had after 72 hours said, we further diminished their ability to fund proxies. We have substantially integrated their launch capabilities. We have made the leadership infrastructure much more insecure and diminished at vastly. We are now going to work with our goal foul eyes and your pinnations to try and maintain a sense of security and keep them in a box.

He probably could have declared at some level victory. Let's go. Chaos follows this guy. Chaos is his brand right now. Anyway.

Great. Let's move on. The boys are really back together, speaking of which he is speaking of chaos, Elon Musk probably joined a phone call with President Trump and India's Prime Minister Modi about the straight of hormones.

It's unclear whether Musk spoke on the call and neither government mentioned his presence in the official readouts. Meanwhile, as we all know, SpaceX is preparing to launch a largest IPO of all-time reporting targeting a 1.75 trillion dollar valuation, which is kind of a lot over their revenues, but okay, fine.

That's a Musk company. Musk reportedly wants to have investors come to SpaceX's seat facilities and market launchers. He does that a lot. He invites people into show-off his wares, impressive wares.

The company is also considering limiting share sales by early investors, a preferential

treatment for investors in Musk's other companies, which is why they suck up to him. So, that's why they buy Twitter so they can get into this and reserve a large portion of the shares for individual investors. That's fine. That's great.

Speaking of making a man's with this enemy's text released as part of Musk's lawsuit against OpenAI, I showed that Zuckerberg testing Musk saying, "Looks like DOGE is making progress. I've got our teams on alert to take down content, doxing, or threatening the people in your team.

Let me know if there's anything I can do to help." Oh, he does want to content moderate. Musk carted the message and then asked that Zuckerberg would be open to bidding on OpenAI with him, which the two seem to have spoken about on the phone. I mean, these people say one thing in public and another in private, but talk first about

the phone call, then the IPO, and Mark Zuckerberg will talk to anybody.

“It means it deals, so that's what I think about that.”

I don't have a problem with the president in inviting people into a call that he thinks can help achieve the objectives, whether it's someone who has domain expertise, whether Musk is the right person to have a call, but I think the president should bring to bear any resources he thinks is going to result in a more productive conversation. Sure, I guess.

And Modi is probably wants, probably wants, you know, starlink or maybe Modi and Musk have pre-existing relationship who knows, or maybe like you said he's just showing them off. The staggering thing for me is I can't wait for the S1 because the target valuation of 1.8 trillion dollars, this company, you know, it's projected or generated roughly

15 to 16 billion and about 8 billion in profit in 2025.

That means at the IPO, it's trading at 109 times trailing revenue. That's a Musk company, right? Are you going to do like you did with we work? Well, but that's more than pound, oh, no, no, this is a real company. It might be overvalued, but we work as it scaled lost more money.

This is a company with unbelievable product and votes. But two things can be true at once. Is it an unbelievable company with I think probably the widest votes in the business world right now? Absolutely.

Now, but everyone feels like a distant number two, like who's the number two here? I don't know. I think people will catch up in this. I think everyone said no one had catch Tesla, everyone caught Tesla, and it was a lot faster when we thought it, right?

But manufacturing, manufacturing, EV versus launch capability.

“I just, I think, you think someone's going to catch up?”

I think, but Jesus is working on it, and I think a lot of countries, there's one's happening in Europe. I think, look, it's not going to be the only one and everyone's going to be like, why are we, you know, it's sort of like the Lockheed problem, right? I think a lot of people think it's an attractive thing.

90% of launches. I get it. It was curly. They're the only company. They're the only company in the world right now that it's capable of putting humans

into space. Yep. Yep. When you look at, when you look at space and whether it's energy, connectivity, or or space, military, space defense, they're all for a while going to have to come

through space X at the same time. No question. At the same time, is it worth 109 times revenue? I don't think so. I don't think so.

The Tesla is declining precipitously, and yep, it still trades at it. But the Muskons, roughly 42% of space X, so this IPO could make him the first recorded trillionaire in history on calcium, the odds that he'll become a trillionaire this year are 71%. So there's almost a three and a quarter chance, according to a lot of people, that Musk is

“about to become the trillionaire, and that is, in my view, really troubling, because I think”

as a species, we need guardrails and money directly translates to power. And I don't think any unelected person should have this much power. Yep. He definitely pushes himself into every single aspect of our lives, you know, in some way, and he'll do it more so politically.

Well, with a trillion dollars, say he takes, say, says, okay, I'm going to die soon and I want to be worth five trillion, and I'm going to, I want to, I want to decide who the next president is.

I'm going to take three percent of my net worth, which would be $30 billion.

There's evidence that he had it been influenced on Trump's election, but 250 million. So with the 10 in Wisconsin, with 25, that's a lot in that state. Like I think it's a mixed back, when he shows up, it's a lot of money. When he shows up, it's a lot of, yet no. You know, I think.

Citizens United and a guy being worth $1 trillion is really scary. He also has effects of, if this guy is, he's like the sorrows, or he's the sorrows of the right, essentially now, right, and some level. And I do think it has a negative impact and alerts people to this situation that he, I don't think money buys everything.

He's failed in a number of areas, like, do, he's failed in, like, he fails quite a bit,

I think in a close election, which most presidents of Clarkson's are, he could absolutely

swing in. He already has. He already has had more impact than any individual in recent history, especially killing people across the globe, but those, I mean, again, it'll, we'll see what happens here, but they certainly, it's going to be the Blockbuster IPO, and it will be overvalued by

a lot, given, you know, they'll have a lot of skis to cover, and then they'll have the money to do so, right, to, to sort of create that mode, even more. Incredible. It's an incredible. I won't even call it a product, as what it really is, it's global infrastructure.

They have the largest commercial satellite constellation, which, by the way, is no longer NASA at SpaceX, and as of May 2025, Starlink controlled more than 7,600 satellites, or two-thirds of all active satellites in orbit. The majority of new satellites launch globally in late 2024 were Starlink, and SpaceX plans to scale to 42,000 satellites, that's up six-fold, making global global information

system. Making Starlink the De facto Broadbound Backbone in space, and projections for the end of

2025, six million subscribers, and 62 percent of global satellite broadband revenue, going

to one company, and most competitors can match SpaceX's price, cadence, or reliability. I know, Facebook is tried, Amazon is tried, they're all trying.

“If I always feel like these are these high watermarks for these people, but you have to”

hand it to them. I remember when he talked about it for the first time to me, that creating the two people were talking about this at the time, him, and oddly enough, Jerry Yang had an investment at a low, and it's the first time I learned it, so I got real. I got caught up on the topic, like what it was going to do, but Jerry Yang had an investment

in one, and he's the first person who talked about it, and then must that same year started talking about it. This was a long, long, long time ago. It was really, at the time, I remember thinking that no one's talking like this, like everyone else was like doing a fucking dating service or some dumb thing.

It comes down to some very boring numbers, and that is the cost to launch a kilogram of material, usually a satellite, into low earth orbit. And this is what SpaceX's Falcon Heavy rocket can launch into a kilogram for it. They can launch a kilogram into space for $1,500. Ariane's 5G, it costs them $9,200, they're a lecture on product, cost 19,000.

Their launch of SpaceX's launches occur every two to three days, no other providers within range, so they are 6x less expensive. They certainly have capabilities here, so anyway, if you do that, I don't know how much about things. They do.

One of the things, it'll be interesting to see what happens here, and what these forces are really powerful, and he is a very powerful, single person. It does put him at great risk to not just at not a physical target, that's not what I'm

talking about, but when something like this happens, there's always forces against it,

“but I think that we'll start to build, he becomes sorrows, he becomes sorrows in a weird”

way. I feel much more benign about sorrows, why don't we read it? I do too, but I'm talking about to the right, or the Koch brothers, like pick whatever one who's or Henry Ford back in the day, there was also a Texas billionaire, and I can't remember his name, a millionaire, like in the 20s, that did stuff like that.

But there's a different source and core, the Koch brothers, they were all quite philanthropic. Well, I mean, not me, not for sure. Musk is not, and Musk is infinitely more powerful, and that's a technology that can basically decide wars, and this is a guy who is reportedly addicted to catamines. Yeah, that's what I mean.

There's a lot of-- What could go wrong? Things are wrong. Let me tell you, I'm lying. It does feel like a bond film, but less believeable.

Careous swisher is glad she's in Park's loathe. I'll be protected by the list. Oh, yeah, you're safe in Brooklyn. Yeah, a nuclear device gets detonated 500 meters above mid-town, yeah, Brooklyn's going to be fine. No, what I mean is that if he's coming after me, he's not a fan of care of swisher.

But maybe you should make nice with it. That's what I don't get about. I talked to one of these guys that is building the bunker in New Zealand, your guy, you know, and I'm like, you realize if shit gets real, and you fire up the G650 and head to peace

“out to New Zealand, you realize your pilots are going to kill you and fuck your wife, right?”

That's correct. And a table went quiet. I know. I said that to one of them who had a plan. I said, I think what's your plan? I said, I'm going to kill you and take your motorcycled

out to you. And fuck you. I was like, of course. And then they were like, you could see them calculating how do I stop care of from killing me?

I said, you won't see me coming. You think, if the shit goes to where do you think people think it's going, the people die right away are the lucky ones. Exactly. I sometimes think that living in Washington, I feel okay about that.

Anyway, let's go there. I'm not going there. Congratulations, Elon Musk on your SpaceX victory.

unlikable. Anyway, I have to say one Brooklyn thing. So I was, there was this crazy cyber truck parked across the street. I thought, oh, who's doing this, right? Where my apartment is.

And it was tricked out. It was all manner of shit on. I didn't know. It was some sort of commercial thing. And, you know, there's a bunch of teen boys and they weren't, they were just hanging

out.

And I thought, first, they were like admiring it.

And what was really funny is, and they weren't. They weren't sort of typical parks. I'm trying to, like, they were sort of sitting in front of it, like, talking about it. I went over and I'm like, what do you think? And I wasn't making a opinion.

They're like, what a douche. And it was, like, they were like, it was interesting because I just interviewed Louie Thoreau

“through, uh, who's just, how you interviewed about the Manusphere?”

Yes, exactly. You're beating me to my content. I'm so sorry. I'm way ahead of it. How was it?

Fantastic. I know. It's just, and it's cousin. He's also a great filmmaker. But I got to say it was really interesting as one at the point thing you pointed out

is even though a lot of these Manusphere guys are really popular.

There's also a whole group of young men who are like, they, they mock them and enjoy being in on the joke and mocking them at the same time. And also liking some of it, but mocking them. And that was going on in front of the cyber-track. They're like, you know, I'm not such a douche, but, like, whatever.

And they were so cool. And I was like, oh, I feel so much better by you after talking to these guys. They were so cool, and they also were in on the joke, and I don't know. I just felt better. Anyway, yes, Louie.

Yes, it was great. And we talked to you. Oh, I'm stuck to have them on. I wrote a, in my numberous mouse, I wrote a review of the show. I loved it.

Yeah, it was really illuminating for me. Can I tell you the one line I loved the best? Of course.

I liked his, I like his interview style and I was obviously looking at it as a professional

how he does the interview style. Yeah, I agree. He's worked when he, H.S. whatever, T-D-D, whatever, Tiki, Taki, whatever, Tiki, Taki.

“He was working out and he goes, is this your leg day?”

He's British. And the guy goes, of course, it is because, you know, like an asshole, and like shows off his thigh, which is quite a beefy thigh. And Louie, Louie looks at him and he goes, you could work on those calves. And the guy just melts.

And I was like, I love you, Louie. The room. I love him. I love the room. I like Justin.

They pronounce it differently. Anyway, he has all these lines like that in there that he just eviscerates these people with kindness in a way that's really great. Yeah, I agree. That's a really good show.

Anyway, Elon, good luck. Elon, you could work on your calves. Okay, Scott, let's go on a quick break. We come back and thropping scores a win against the Pentagon. Support for this show comes from Framer.

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Good for all.

The judge didn't mince words in her ruling saying this is a classic illegal first amendment

retaliation. Exactly. She also called it a quote or wellian notion to brand an American company of potential adversary for expressing disagreement. The Pentagon is pushing back and expected to appeal, of course, with senior official

Emil Michael, another loastem character tweeting the ruling is a disgrace. Oh, a meal. Get over it. The final decision in this case could still be months away. There's also a second lawsuit pending in DC.

The traffic won the battle. You know, it's problematic to be in this ridiculous fight.

“I think it'll be over by midterms when things they jack hegs at out of the place.”

But also a potential factor anthropic is really considering going public as soon as it's over. That is problematic for them.

So what he what he related a federal judge has put on hold a 6.2 billion dollar

merger between next to our own techno, which would create the largest operator of local TV in the country 69% over the former 30s, some percent amount you're allowed to bring together. The judge granted a request from direct TV arguing the merger. Violet's antitrust laws.

A 14-day restraining order has been issued in a hearing schedule for April 7th, eight attorneys. General have filed a separate lawsuit. I'm going to just play this. Let's listen to what our least favorite FCC chair, Brenda Carr.

I'm sorry, Brendan Carr had to say it. CPAC. President Trump took on the fake news media, and President Trump is winning.

Look at the results so far, PPS defunded, NPR defunded, Joy Reid gone from MSNBC.

Sleepy eye, Chuck Todd, gone, Jim Acosta, gone, John Dickerson, gone, Colbert is leaving, CBS is under new ownership and soon enough CNN has got new ownership as well.

“Oh, boy, this guy is just not doing his job, honestly, it's seriously, he's such a suck-up to the”

Trump administration. He's just explicit about it, and he's also not very smart, he's a moron. So talk about these next star, the anthropic thing, it looks like everything as usual Trump does, he does something aggressive and stupid and loses in court, but he still does damage.

So, talk about Brenda if you want, but that's up to you. Well, I'm going to reverse sort of, Brenda Carr has no business in the federal government. You're not supposed to go into the government to use it as a means of attacking your political enemies and freedom of speech. Yep.

I mean, just the notion, this guy makes gobbles look thoughtful, and that is directly calling out people who don't agree with your political views and then weaponizing government to try and get people who's used you don't agree with, off the air, that's, it's like, it's just so blatant, it's, okay, so when we get to a point, an FCC chair, we're going to go after Hannity, and is that, is that what we're headed, if you want us to start?

That didn't blather on this idiotic stuff. I don't care. You know, it's just not qualified to be a government with respect to anthropic. Most majoria companies have bent the knee to the government and worked with them in any military context on the last year, Google dropped its ethical guidelines that included a list of applications

that would not pursue, including weapons and surveillance, but it used to be able to do so without a problem. Is that right? And then they put in guidelines, and they, they were, they relaxed their guidelines. They did relax them, but I'm saying they used to be able to say no, and nobody had a problem.

They just didn't work for them. That's all. Well, that's the whole point of private enterprise.

“You have to choose your, you can fire your clients just the way consumers get to pick”

their companies, companies get to pick their consumers unless it's based on sexual orientation or race or whatever you, meta-change its policy to allow US government agencies and contractors to access its Lama models for national security purposes, open AI, which once stated its goal was to benefit humanity as a whole, now has multiple contracts with the military and defense contractors.

And by the way, I don't, I don't mind when companies like Palantir say we're going to work with the government on in the defense department, I get it, but you should also have the right to not to. I don't. So, anthropic is really, they're the only major AI company that is trying to public line

on autonomous weapons and master valence, and now it's the only one being punished for it. All right, but it's also winning in court, which is good, but it's still, is it problematic for the IPO from your perspective? Well, it depends. Well, the, the threat to the IPO is a bunch of companies say there is, there are, there

We appreciate your stand, Dario, but for the time being, we're not expanding our enterprise wide relationship with you because we don't want to be put on a list.

“Now having said that, having said that, again, see above what I believe is the biggest”

commercial opportunity in decades is to say no. And if you look at what's happened to anthropic, they're now getting 70 cents on the dollar of every new AI dollar being allocated to AI from the enterprise. So it looks as if their ability to say no and get a court to say, yeah, this is bullshit. This is socialism, colonialism, whatever you want to call it.

I think anthropic right now, I'm so, I think anthropic, at this moment is worth more than open AI. What happens is the mark that people invest at is a bit illusory because if they get a preferred return, meaning no matter what happens, they get their money out sooner or they're getting a guaranteed 17 and a half percent return, which is what Sam is offering to private equity

firms.

Then that $850 billion dollar number is a bit of a head fake because as long as I'm getting

17 and a half percent, regardless of what it goes public at. But I would argue right now, the momentum around anthropic is really strong in the momentum around open AI is really, is really ways. So you think it won't affect it? What about the next star thing speaking of more on Brendan?

Well, we heard, I was actually really moved. A lot of people push back on my comments about how local news is a dying business.

“A lot of people push back and said, I hate to hear this, it's really important work.”

And also to be fair, there's a lot of local corruption in the only check on it as local news. I remember seven on your side, seven on your side. From the hills to the sea to the San Gabriel Mountains, I'm Jerry Dumphi. Yeah.

Yeah. Who, by the way, Ted Baxter from very time, where was based on sposily wasn't supposed. Bosily, Jerry wasn't very smart. But he had broad shoulders and just made you feel safer. I love local news.

I used to watch it all the time. I love Dorian Gensler and DC when I was in college. And they also have these Hirschensen and Jim Toney and Point Counterpoint where they would have. And that 27 minutes of real news was bested by the three minutes of two people arguing like crazy.

Yeah. And then basically. And then basically. It had been that era you and I would have been a good local news team. I would have predicted hail the size of canned tomatoes.

I would have loved me in a weatherman. I actually took Meteorology for senior year. When I was trying to figure out what the fuck to do with my life. My senior year in college, I thought, I could be a weatherman and I took Meteorology. I definitely thought I was thinking about a weatherman.

I was going to go on the military and you were going to be a weatherman. Perfect. Perfect. I would have been an admiral, not standing next to the president. Yeah.

David Letterman started us a weatherman. Anyways.

“But we got pushbacks saying how important or I got pushbacks saying how important local”

news is. And so I agree, they do a great job. That, you know, God be with you. Yeah. So next our techno.

Okay. That's not really blocked. What is it?

A six billion dollar merger?

Yep. Between next our in techno, which would create the largest operator. And so a list of numbers from 30, some percent to 69 percent. Yeah. Two thirds.

It's basically the hub of lock on it. And a US district judge. I think it's in Sacramento, granted. Yeah. Temporary restraining order.

Exciting with Directive V, who are going to Directive V got their still around. Which argued the merger violates federal anti-trust laws. And eight state attorney generals led by California's Bonta filed a separate lawsuit. And then in the ruling, he noted that companies do not contest the merger will increase next our bargaining leverage to extract higher fees.

And what does the ruling mean? It means the next aren't techno can integrate operations for 14 days. A hearing is set for April 7th to decide whether to issue a preliminary injunction. So like you said, if the merger goes through, next our would own roughly 260 television stations across the country.

We're reaching about 60 percent of US households.

And like you said before, it was about 39 percent. And the deal does violate FCC rules limiting how many stations a single company can offer. Well, Brenda let it through. Look, I had. As we said, look, it's not a great business to be in unless you're in a swing district where

they just basically start trying to advertise like crazy. Less than half of television stations report generating any profits from news. And last year, about 40 percent of surveyed local television stations reported decreasing their news budget. And local television has lost get this, about half of its media spending market share

since since 2017, the business has been cut and half in the last nine years. And as of June last year, local TV accounted for just 6 percent of total media spend digital video on the other hand, accounts for about 50 percent. So like, I don't, I mean, we're going to, I think at some point we got to end up with

And troubled right now. We should talk about that, but later another time. A certain amount of public funding for what I'll call local.

“Yeah, how local public news I think there's, like what Craig Newmark did, I think it's”

really important. And I don't know if it's a philanthropist. I don't know if it's government funding like we do with the BBC here with a house tax.

I don't think anyone should on 60 percent of any industry, even if that's just going

comfortable. I don't care. They can, they can eat out a good little business from it and influence things in ways. And they're also, they're the ones that sort of sucked up to Brenda during the chemical

thing. Yeah. You know, I just, nobody, I don't want a liberal running 60 percent. I don't want anybody. Like, I just feel like it needs to be dispersed, even if that problem is, like, a lot

of media, it's a bad business if you don't have monopolies. And then it's just an okay business. I don't know. Whatever. They stop it, but they're not going to, but nonetheless, I hope, then they industry

dies. And I hope there's. I'm too high. I just wonder, I just wonder. On the entrepreneurial local efforts going on.

And there are a lot of them, by the way, across the country in Mississippi and Baltimore. So let's just have new stuff and forget these, these compromise. I'm sure. I'm sure. You didn't bring up Vox.

Are companies in play? Oh, yes. Oh, yes. Would you like to discuss that? Well, I have, first off, let me say I'd absolutely no insider information here.

And I have a lot. You have a lot. I'm on the outside, but it's basically Vox's in discussions with Comcast, who is an existing shareholder to take. First.

Not Comcast. I'm sorry, first song. Yeah, which is on Amazon. It's like Quasant. MSNBC and CNBC to take the pods, then they would sell the digital business and also sell

off, then why mag. And the way I would loosely describe it is the digital stuff is a shitty business, getting worse. From your dependent upon Amazon, meta and Google, eventually, they will screw you and take all the margin.

Those are difficult businesses. The New York magazine is a trophy asset. What do I mean by that? There is some crypto or hedge fund douche that will pay an extraordinary amount of money to own New York magazine.

There's a lot of people. It does well, too. It doesn't. It's not like a big smile. It'll trade it in a rational price.

Yeah, people. Football teams make no money.

They get sold for five, seven and ten billion dollars, because some guy wants to go from

being an overweight tech guy to the sexiest man and Cleveland by owning the Browns overnight. Okay, can I just say it's also a really good journalistic enterprise and it does okay. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. It won't go for no pay price.

No. I'm saying it'll go for now. It'll go for an irrational price. It's a nice price. The new owner is not going to be into it for the cash flow or for journalism.

The new owner is going to be someone who wants to say I own NY Mag. It's like the only billionaires on football team's Democrats on media companies. It'll go for it. So Scott will be buying it soon. It's a trophy asset.

It's a, no, I'm sponsoring the Met Gailad, I don't know if you heard it. And I'm taking Emily right a casket. That's what it takes. I am sponsoring Met Gailad. I'm sponsoring Met Gailad.

I'm sponsoring Met Gailad. Because you didn't introduce yourself when you were in her business.

“I got as I got texted Vanessa Friedman, who I think is a wonderful writer every fashion.”

Text me, it's like, do you have any thoughts on the Met Gailad in Japan? I'm like, that has way too much money, way too little cool, fashion has way too little money, way too much cool. This is an exchange of value. Yeah.

A good thing to quote. This is the most expensive midlife crisis in history. Wouldn't it be easier for these guys just to buy a Ferrari and start banging their assistance? Our penis and handover.

Versus sponsoring the Met Gailad, but anyways, back to, I'm here for it. We'll sell. We know this. So I want that. We'll go for an irrational price.

And then the trophy assets, and I'm not talking about unboker because property is independent. We just sell our ads through Vox, but pivot is co-owned by you, me and Vox. Well, no. They don't want it. We own it.

And they're a partner for the next few years. I wish you would do that correctly. You people think they own it, but they don't. We don't. We own it.

And we can't do anything with it for the next three years. But anyways, those are the assets. Podcasting at Vox, and I'll just talk about us, is growing, you know, 25 plus percentage a year, maybe 30% a year.

And when they get scaled, they're amazing businesses, because, quite frankly, there's just

not a lot of costs involved in these things. And you're seeing, and quite frankly, I also think we're benefiting from Trump to the extent

“that I think people are really hungry for thoughtful, I don't want to call it progressive,”

but a thoughtful push-tock. But we also do good at, you did, Warner, I did tell us we do all kinds of manner of things. The crown jewel is the Vox Media Park Network, but the thing that makes the most sense here, which Jim is doing, is that when you have a conglomerate, that doesn't have really obvious synergies, which, quite frankly, I would argue this one doesn't.

People, the market, looks at the Shidias asset in the portfolio, which is these digital properties, and it assigns that valuation to the entire thing. So the disposition of assets is a creative to shareholders. Jim is figured that out, and he's going to split up the company and he's going to have a very

Podcast video, I would say, because podcasts are a video now. That's a great point, because effectively what you have is podcasts of the new TV shows with a lower means of cost of production.

But I would argue, if he sells, he'll get an amazing, and I don't, I, again, I see

above, I have no insider information here. He'll get an amazing, irrational price for New York Mag. He could sell the digital stuff for a dollar and just be a podcast company growing 25% a year, and it would be worth more. So this, it makes all sorts of strategic sense.

“Comcast is probably, Comcast, I think, invested.”

I'm very sorry. Comcast didn't invest. Yes. And so did. Comcast was an initial investor.

Yes, but the investment went over to Versant, just so you know. OK, the Robert's family is ready to get some money back. They've been in this thing for 10 years, 11 years. They've probably said, OK, we want some money back. You need a strategy here.

I think it's going to be very interesting to see. Yeah, we'll see.

One of the things that I think reporters have gotten wrong about it.

And I'm not going to say much more because I do know a lot is you can't, one of them is like, you can pick off these podcasts or what's it worth because you can, you actually can't. Once you have a good, and Scott and I went out in the market and looked at lots of people. They were a lot of them were great.

But a lot of them don't have stuff, right? And so this would be attractive to people who it's really hard to sell advertising well. It's really hard to do distribution well. It's very hard to do production well. And Vox does that well.

And there's a couple of companies like that that do it well too. There's a crooked, I think, does a nice job. So it's valuable and it's not as easy to replicate as you think and getting picked off is you sign for your deals, everybody. And some of the people have guarantees.

We don't happen to have that, but because we wanted more revenue to us. But it's harder to do than you think. And even if you're not satisfied with the advertising sales or whether you've got bigger or not, Vox is one of the better ones, which is why we stayed, right? And we could certainly sell our own advertising.

It's just a slog and it's hard. It's really hard to do it well. And so it is an attractive asset. And there's a lot of people that could plug into a lot and just use your imagination. And also not just companies, but individuals who want platforms.

Who want to be seen needs to do something. Exactly. I mean, you know, you're seeing CNN trying to get podcasting with Jake Tapper and Anderson. See NBC is welcome to those with sleeveless dresses and Andy Wassorkin. I mean, by the way, why does Joe Karen and get sleeves and none of the other people do.

Anyways, we do not want to see them or Brian Robertson, Comcast, they are very concerned.

“Not Comcast, you have to say verse then, whatever.”

Whatever. Whatever. It's not the right. They are only a certain portion of the same shareholder. It's similar.

There's others. And it's a really helpful person, which also needs to be innovative. So in that regard, but there's lots of others. MSNBC. MSNBC.

Now, I'm sorry. MSNBC. Now. MSNBC. Need a growth strategy.

They are in businesses and structural decline. The average age of MSNBC. Now, viewer, I think it's 64, CMBC at 67. The average age of a podcast listener is 34. So the average age of pivot listeners, 42, they need an audience that is going to be around

for another five or ten years that by shit that is in the midst of buying homes, having kids,

“making investments, buying mutual funds, and they are smart people.”

So they do. I mean, CMBC doesn't have an amazing job, they have some of the finest financial journalists in the world. MSNBC now has some of the most talented people in the world. So but what they need is they need a structural growth engine, they need to find platforms

that are growing and are attracting a younger audience. And to help their talent too, and they've been trying, but they've definitely been trying with more than I know. I know who probably inspired this whole idea. Me.

What else? Other than you, is Nicole Wallace because Nicole, who's got a very popular show on MSNBC now, started a podcast that immediately went to the top of the, I would bet Nicole's podcast is probably doing seven or 10 million year in ad revenue, which doesn't seem like a lot,

but I bet six or seven of that is got close to the bottom line.

So you got to think of folks at Versant, Comcast, Roberts, Joey Bagadona, SageBio. Now, whatever you want to call it, it has to be looking. They've got to be looking. We need to be in this business when you look at the charts. You and I are near the top and pivot individually, both of us are, all your market stuff

are. Lots of box podcasts are near the top and over all the network ones. We're often, we're always higher than all of them. So anyway, it's interesting. It's an interesting time.

We'll see what happens. And we're nothing at all. Nothing at all might happen. We'll see. Anyway, it makes sense to us, though.

We'll go on a quick break and when we come back, the White House launches an app. Hi, I'm Renee Brown and I'm Adam Grant and we're here to invite you to the Curiosity

That's the place for listening, wondering, thinking, feeling and questioning.

It's going to be fun. We rarely agree.

“But we almost never disagree and we're always learning.”

That's true. You can subscribe to the Curiosity Shop on YouTube or follow in your favorite podcast app to automatically receive new episodes every Thursday. This week in two different courtrooms in the United States, Jerry is handed down verdicts that suggest that social media platforms, while not responsible for the content on their

platforms, may be responsible for the way their platforms actually work. And that might change the way that social media works. This week on the broadcast, we're exploring all of the ways that social media could change and might not. Plus, the 50th anniversary of Apple and why, after trying every other phone I could find,

I wound up just buying another iPhone.

On the Vergecast, wherever you get podcasts. [MUSIC] Scott, we're back with more news. The White House just launched an official app for iPhone and Android featuring press releases in affordability tracker and an ice tip line, of course.

The Trump administration says the app offers a direct line to the White House letting people text the president sign up for newsletters. But those features just linked to White House context forms that are already there, letting the administration access users personal information and some additional privacy concerns. People digging into the app, it took five seconds found that it's tracking GPS location

data every four and a half minutes. It's a privacy nightmare, do not download it. >> I would rather give my ex-wife access to my text message history than going up for, I mean, who is talking stupid enough to do that? >> I know, it's not trustworthy.

Don't sign up for it. >> Oh, we have bank? >> No, but I mean, I wouldn't mind that the White House as an app. It's just this one, isn't it? >> No, he has people were like, okay, a company doing this.

You call them scummy. The government doing this to its citizens. >> The same people that are demanding voter roles that are targeting people, that are hiring Palantir to surveil people and you want to sign up for their app. >> Don't, and it's really sad because a White House should have direct communication with

people, but to help people not to take advantage of their fucking information. These people, like, literally, but someone who does apps is like, I would think this is scummy for a scummy person, right? Not our federal Fragon government, very typical of the drum administration, do not get it,

“do not get it, and also an ice-tip line, what kind of person are you that you tip on people?”

Ugh, that's my grandfather was, you know, mom, mom, adjacent. I would say, not really in the mom, but like, I hate a rat, a rat, a rat, a rat, like, you know, it's fine to see something, say some, you see a bag in an airport, yes, reported, but reporting on your fellow citizens is, especially if they're not criminals, but they haven't, they haven't committed a crime.

>> They're not criminals, fuck you for doing that, you terrible people. Anyway, one more quick break, we'll be back for wins and fails. [MUSIC] >> Okay, Scott, let's hear some wins and fails, there's so many. >> I think I shall start.

>> You go. You know, I really, I have to say, like, perhaps love, I didn't think I'd say that, but I do, I'm a Manhattan girl, but I really enjoy being there and spending time there. I like going to different places, but I mostly want to say the win is Scott Cal, if we're being such a good landlord to me when I was in New York.

>> All right, thank you. >> I have been generous, and I love his apartment, it's wonderful, but I really, I love being, like, I feel really good about cities, and I feel like New York feels great, Washington does feel great, I'm going to San Francisco soon. I just, I'm very, I'm very up on cities these days and, like, kind of, the creativity

that you see everywhere in them and just, kind of, just, I just love a melting pot of people, I really do, so I really, I'm, I'm wins or cities again, I feel. >> I'm melting pot of $3,000 a square foot. >> Yeah, who's melting? >> No, it's melting, but I'm just saying, I went all over the city, I went all over the city,

and it just was, I just love a city, I just love a city. >> I just so could have predicted you to end up in Brooklyn. >> I know, I would have done, I would have done the West Village, but Amanda really likes that variant, just friends there, and I get it, and I get it, I get it, I get it, anyway. >> Are you going to have Birkenstock?

>> No, I'm not, I never wear Birkenstock, it's never happening, no, I wear vans, let's

be clear.

“All right, and my fail is, oh, God, there's so many, but I think the worst one is, I mean,”

I was going between Melania Trump's robot for teaching children, which I'm, like, worst idea ever, I'm sorry, like, I don't mind robots folding laundry, and I'm sure we'll have them, and I don't mind delivering things, fine, whatever, but teaching children should be done by people with help from technology, that is fine, but this personalized educators from American children, and her walking out there, I couldn't tell which was the robot and

She's really, wouldn't a moronic thing to feature at the White House is a featured stage, and if it's stage, the idea, and insulting teachers, my kid just got into the same public school, Claire, is in for next year, and I went walk by the teacher day, and I said, yeah, Saul got in to the class, and she was like, yeah, go, and I just love, I just love the teachers, they really are dedicated and committed the ones we have dealt with, especially in public

schools, but all the schools, the kids have been to, and so I just hated that thing, and

Trump's signing the U.S. currency, it was always been a treasury secretary person, just

another grotesque, like look at me, mommy didn't hug me moment, so just gross, just, just, oh, I can't wait till we get rid of all this stuff, off all the gold in the office, which has gotten out of control, and the whole thing, I can't wait we tear it all down every bit of it, so including getting a signature off the dollar when he puts it on anyway, it's not like this, so my win is, and you mentioned this, I watched Louie Theros documentary

the Manisfierra, and I really, it was very illuminating for me, and a few of the takeaways. First off, these clinical, you know, icons of the Manisfier, these podcasters or the folks portrayed, they're grifters, and they don't even buy the things that they don't even

buy into the ideology, there's always a crypto scam or a trading platform, or, or, you

know, buy their course, or whatever it is, and they themselves, this is not about ideology

“for them, this is just, this is just purely a grift, and I think a decent living ideology”

as a product. Well, and they're also trying to sell masculinity, and what I would argue is a decent proxy for, or a decent query for masculinity is simple, and ask yourself a question, are you optimizing for attention or for service? And these guys are optimizing for attention, full stop, and the other takeaways, I thought

that Louie really did a good job of exemplifying that, strength is more about, he's the

slight guy who's a bit awkward, and he owns the room when he's in it.

He does. Because he's quiet, he asks hard questions, he's not mean, and the other thing, the takeaway, I think, for younger men watching that is it's okay to occasionally absorb a blow, and that, and I didn't learn this until I was older, I thought if someone was rude to me or come out from traffic, I had to restore equilibrium to the universe and get back in their face, and at one point in the documentary, his subjects are making

a fun of him, mocking him, and he just takes it, and it's like, I got a job to do, I'm

“in service here, the other thing that kind of rattled me was, and I think this is true”

of the manosphere, and it's a lesson for the left, I don't think, I think a lot of the young men who were quote unquote in the manosphere or drawn to these men or these, I don't know what you would call them, gristers. It's not that they'd necessarily buy into this bullshit ideology of dominating women or, I mean, actually some of these, some of the stuff that actually starts off fine, be fit, take control, be aggressive, initiate your life, manifest

success, and then it comes off the fucking rails, and it's usually about just dominating women and being a total misogynist. But what you found, I thought what was most interesting is when they interviewed some of the accolites, the people who really drawn these people, it's really upsetting because what these kids, what these boys, and they aren't boys, what they're looking for, they're not, it's not that they're drawn to this ideology or

this political viewpoint, it's not even their drawn, I don't think to the misogyny, they're drawn and they're so desperate for community. They want a reason to hang out with and have a common bond among other young men. Yeah, they want to get better, they want to feel better about themselves. And this is where the left has failed. I agree. What orthodoxy or ideology on the left creates a community for young men? What is it? You said that early on when

comlliers didn't have stuff on their thing about men. Well, if you tell young men they're the problem, that's not a community to round your room. Now I'm really appointed that out,

“and I think what we have to do is like feel like the questions I got, you know I have expert”

questions. One was for the guy who did adolescence, Jack, and then I had Gretchen Whitmer Asker question, which was doing a lot of manned boy stuff in the state, because she understands it. And so you're right, you're 100% right. Anyways, my win, I thought Louie Thoreau's "Dark Man in the Man" is true. I found it so rattling. I thought these young men just so set one of the young men, you've signed about his brother took his own life. You could tell

people who it's not even the ideology they're bonding over, they're just bonding.

“Bonding, that's right. Anyways, that's my win. My fail is that I can I believe that”

the Democrats continue to show a lack of creativity and leadership around a series of incentives of what they are going to do and spell it out very specifically what they are going to do when they get control of the house and potentially the Senate. And it should be something along the lines of the following. Everyone is saying, "Oh, we can't go after these individuals despite their crimes because they're just going to get a part in bullshit." If you look at the law,

once, once Democrats control of Congress and Senate, they have subpoena power. Once they get subpoena power, they should go after specific individuals for crimes, and then they should coordinate and this is the key with the Attorney General's in blue states and start going after these individuals who are no longer protected by federal partis. So for example, the Attorney General in California might decide that if a trade on crypto went through and that family members

of the Trump administration were illegally manipulating markets or engaging in any sort of insider trading that California AG can coordinate with Democratic representatives to bring a case against them. And that case is not subject to the productions of a federal pardon. They need to soon rather than later put these people on notice that if you are murdering people under the auspices of a secret police, if you are lying under oath, if you are engaged in crypto scams,

if you have companies that overnight get contracts in the military, violating the emoluments clause to be clear and a candidate for president or a senator or Democratic representatives should outline specific cases. They are going to bring against specific individuals and coordination with specific AGs and specific states that are not protected by a presidential pardon. And then who's done that? Fucking no, but some of these Attorney General's are working

“at a Scott. I think that's unfair. I think they are preparing them. We got close with what was”

a name Fanny Hill, Fanny in Georgia, the full and county. Yeah. But unfortunately, she like Christina was fucking her number two, which blew that case apart. Yes, that did. But there is real opportunity here. There is. I think there's more to I'm being contacted by a lot of it. I think Attorney General's are really starting to coordinate quite a bit on around these things. One of the

things that's critical for all of you people waiting for a Trump pardon remember he's not going

to give it to you till the very end because he's loyal only to himself and he's going to extract something from you. And that might be too late. I'm saying take that off the table. Yeah, I know, but I'm just saying it just I think a lot. If the Aegean Minnesota saying you committed manslaughter and you lied under oath and as a result, we have an ICU nurse who is who is buried we can come after you. The presidential pardon or not. And these are the people we're coming for.

And these are the subpoenas we're issuing when we're in control of Congress in the Senate. Anyways, that's my that's my fail as I think that Democrats need to start punching back more creatively and more aggressively. I like it. I like it. I like it a lot. Anyway, we want to hear from you, send us your questions about business, take whatever's on your mind. Go to nmymag.com/pivots. I'm going to question for the show or call 85551. Pivot elsewhere in the Karen Scott universe

from the latest episode of "On With Care," I spoke to a North Carolina Republican senator Tom Tillis. We talked about his upcoming retirement and how he can more freely criticize the Trump administration right now. Let's listen to a clip. I have expressed my concern in the past. Not no longer have to worry about what language I use to communicate it because I don't have to go through the cause. You can be clear than some of your colleagues because I have to tell you,

when I talk to some of your colleagues after record, the Republicans are much more critical of

Trump or. Of course, but look, I mean, you know what all martyrs have in common. What they're dead. And in politics, that's losing elections. Perry, smart guy, very interesting guy, but some people call him too late. Tell us that he's done. He always thought this and didn't say it. Other people think, well, good for him. And he is actually holding up the fed chair thing because of the bullshit thing and he's holding up a lot of stuff. He helped get Kristino out of there. So I'm

saying, you know, whatever. My friend Neil Brennan. He said something very co-gen. And he said, despite the temptation to say, you idiots, we told you so or whatever, we need to be really good at welcoming anybody and praising anybody. Yeah. I agree. I agree. I think he's been, he's going to be very effective through January getting stuff because he's, he's a very complex politician who is very behind gay marriage. And so

“like it's, he's a complex conservative and that's what we should. And you say behind gay marriage”

made against it? No. He helped pass it when he was in North Carolina or something of protections. He's, he's much more complex as, as a politician. And we should allow our conservative and liberal politicians to be complex and maybe not fully be on board with the purity tests on either side.

subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'll be back on Friday. Today's show was produced by Laira

“and Amin Zoy Marcus and Taylor Griffin, earning her child engineered this episode rich.”

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