Kamala's Economic Plan (ft. Martin Shkreli), DNC Report, and PIRATE IDOL 🏴‍☠️

Welcome Back Martin Shkreli to the pod! comm's Economic Policy red lines are brat K's plan to ban price gouging in grocery stores drives me crazy Planned Parenthood also announced they would be providing free vasectomies no but seriously how does the abortion thing work do we know like the actual Logistics of setting up a food an abortion truck just planning on doing abortions that day in the truck or welcome to Pirate Idol I mean the hotly anticipated segment there's a difference between having the right take and being entertaining you failed spectacularly at one of them and um damn Jesus Christ Martin what's up guys welcome back to the Pod we have with us the legendary Martin scy welcome back my friend we are doing uh Martin's gonna be guest co-host and I mean we had a lot we have a lot there's a lot going on in the py war pyate war Universe pirate Wars that's actually how what's his face said it on the The Joe Rogan pod that's our new name actually Tucker oh it was it was on Tucker tuck there was a story in uh pirate Wares Martin is gonna be uh he's co-host today but also a guest judge for pirate Idol pirate Idol um very excited we have a bunch of uh we have four potential co-hosts who are going to come in and battle it out take by take on the topic of nuclear energy in Germany which is extremely it's like a very stupid Nation a very stupid topic we're excited to talk about it we're excited for them to talk about it we're excited to judge them while they are talking about it um something to look up uh look forward to we have a ton of pieces that we've been publishing in Pirate wires Brandon has been just like relentlessly editing stuff so go to pirates.com make sure you're subscribed to the Daily so you're getting the updates on the bottom of like what we're publishing Breadlines Are Brat - Breaking Down Kamala’s Economic Policy um also just there are some great takes in the daily and let's just get on with it um Martin this one is going to be to you uh but I want to teed it up for you so OB there's a lot that we have to cover today but the one that we have to cover is comma Economic Policy you've been talking about a lot online uh for good reason it's very important we finally have a policy uh so bread lines are Brad let's talk about it um we have sort of evolved from coconut season to like the question of maybe is it a coconut Mirage uh and we'll get more into the sort of polling in our poly Market segment which will be coming up uh but she released so KLA explosive people are excited um they've never been so excited not since Obama I'm hearing I mean people are really losing their minds out there on on this topic uh she releases her Economic Policy so a sampling of things that I've seen uh $25,000 subsidies for buying a house uh wiping out literally all medical debt a proposal on uh unrealized gains which I'd Martin you can kind of unpack that in a minute what that means I think it's worth having that conversation um and probably most famously we have uh the question of and I say question because it's been challenged relentlessly now by the media price controls via comm's plan to ban price gouging in grocery stores this is part of her broader and the Democrats broader uh tactic or strategy of trying to um convince you to not ask about inflation which they have caused with their uh spending policies now uh axios is defending this they are saying this is not price controls this is price gouging of price gouging ban very different we can have that conversation let's talk about it it is funny because they got community noted into absolute like outer space over me crazy because they have said they've used this phrasing themselves and also I mean Aus has been caught up in this stuff before we have the Atlantic saying don't trust the it's okay not to trust the economists um which is funny they finally found a class of expert they don't care about only in this one context um and uh and I guess it's just like this overall question of you know I've been referring to KLA for a while as like Lil coconut coconut Queen uh but things have changed is this uh communism with a K they're asking in the New York Post I prefer the question is like is this the rise of Hugo chavala if you will um um but uh I don't know there a lot to talk about here with the analysis um just first reaction to uh Hugo Chava's economic plan Martin what are you seeing out there so so before we even get into that like I actually would take issue with this idea that she is that popular and again maybe this is just me like being a denial but to me I think the media is forcing that Kamala is popular and people love her narrative down our throat people actually loved um Obama when I met Peter teal 15 years ago we actually fought over whether or not Obama was cool and uh he he took the no side uh and I I was kind of like I don't I don't hate him that much uh kamala's really doesn't have the redeeming quality she's like the5 billion pre-money startup that like got like you know is on series D has no Revenue she's magic leap she she yeah she's magic leap I mean she's she is like yes AO put in a lot in series D so we're going to mark it up from you know uh two billion a five billion and then the round fails the company shuts down and everyone was like what what the [ __ ] was that and and I think it's just people forcing this opinion uh in terms of the Eon economic stuff obviously it's a disaster like on its face what I tried to do on Twitter is is I really tried to sort of like try to be uh generous and uh like how could we make this stuff work what's the best possible light we could put this stuff in and there's been a lot of misinformation too about what exactly is her policy because some people say well her 50% cap gains tax is longterm but it only would apply certain strata of income so if we take it on its face that a 50% long-term capital gains would apply on any capital gains I think that's a really wild proposal because most of the wealth and value in this country is created through Capital so there I think there are two big things that people are discussing one is the price gouging ban and I think it's I I think it's a mistake to focus on that one because we don't even really know what she I mean we could talk about it it's very stupid the way they framed it but I this the unrealized gains thing is potentially crazy um can you explain because it's only on gains of I think it's supposed to Target only people with like what is it 100 million something this is a Elon Musk Mark Zuckerberg tax I mean that and so basically you know the the borrow spend and die philosophy if anybody hasn't heard that you basically are you go public this would only apply to like public companies and by the way which would force even more companies to stay private uh as a result but if you're Zuckerberg or Bezos probably a lot of people don't know how much cash these guys actually have on hand and you know it's a lot and how do you get that cash well you go to Morgan Stanley you go to a Goldman Sachs and you say look I've got $50 billion of stock can I borrow a billion dollars against that they say sure and they you borrow the money and you don't pay taxes on that because it's a loan if anything you got to pay interest on the loan so why would you pay capital gains tax and the idea that well you're up on your stock by 50 billion not only uh are we going to stop you from borrowing against your stock but we also want to tax you on the gains you made uh and and there's no idea here as to how how would you implement that and so my charitable view is okay let's say after 10 years of having sat on a gigantic Capital game perhaps then you know you could have a tax of some kind a wealth tax basically and again this is me really trying to make this work but the problem with that as we all know is that what happens when that stock drops 50% you know and you've basically paid the wealth tax which I'm guessing is not going to be a small tax and then the stock's down 50% and you've basically lost most of your wealth yeah does the government pay you back so is government by doing this taking on a crazy liability so let's say you you you start a company and your stake goes from 0 to 50 billion amazing success and they say you know what we're going to deem the 50 billion you made we want we want us we want a Stak in it which is really wild Because by the way there are I mean they can wait for death tax right like it's G eventually that thing's going to be sold no stock in America stays forever so the idea that like we need to get it now we're going to get it some someday there's the only two certain things in life right like so like why do we need to take elon's money now yeah as opposed to like when the guy I hope it never happens passes away gives his stock to a foundation you know something like that is going to happen someday it happens with everyone and in fact you do see the Zuckerberg the Bezos is selling their stock yeah like they eventually do diversify touch on it a second ago you said this is basically attacks on like five people are we're targeting this very small group of people teams who have over $100 million in the stock who are not who are doing the sort of borrow strategy that you were talking about there is this snippet of an interview back in the Obama days that I think is pretty telling here back then they were talking about an increase in gains tax now since then over the last eight years or whatever the Democrats have been increasingly interested in taxing gains um before they realized but this was still a post- realized gains world and Obama so it's like you know this guy is saying listen if you do this it's not going to pay back any of our debt it's like nothing actually like it's actually not that much money it's like it seems to really suck for the top wealthiest in America but you it's not as much money as as you're sort of pretending and you're not GNA be able to do anything with it it's not going to help it's signaling I mean AOC famously had a policy guide that said every billionaire is a policy mistake and and this is the extension of that but she comes from this Obama straight up says well Charlie so it was Charlie Gibson well Charlie uh what I've said is that I would look at raising the capital gains tax for purposes of fairness so now our tax policy is no longer about funding our increasingly blow to government or paying down our like existential debt at this point signal it's it's actually punishment it's straight up like I am going to punish these rich people uh I think that is one in itself dark and like we don't want to go down that road but more importantly too on the gains itself if I mean income tax started this way it started as something that targeted the ultra wealthy and then it it gradually came to Target everybody if they start doing this and this affects now all of all of our all of us let's say even just like reasonably wealthy people people who are worth 10 million or more right people who are starting businesses who is owning who is owning an asset that's you know pregains it's like if you have a company that's worth something that is worth something that you can actually value if you have a home that's worth something that you can actually value if you have to start selling some piece of that that is that's a nightmare that's certainly the end of I mean that is a huge hit to to entrepreneurship generally and then also just I think all of us well imagine imagine somebody comes to America and starts a laundromat company and they build it up and what's the mark to Market I mean do we do a DCF of the laundromat and say well it's worth 20 million congratulations you came from a different country and you came to America and you made it and you owe us 4 million you're looking around you're like what do I do such another great there are a lot of great points here because the idea is crazy and there's a reason that we haven't done it but you're right like how do you value these companies in Tech how do we value a company before it's public it's just like guys saying [ __ ] it is like really it is look at Theos on Theos Elizabeth Holmes owes the government a billion dollars right and what like what is it actually what is it actually worth like we never know this in business until it goes public and the public decides based on what they're willing to pay what are people willing to pay for a share of that right like before that you're in VC territory the valuations are very different and like so who are you going to have making these determinations on on what a business is worth certainly not someone who's competent in business it's GNA be I think it's all about signaling right I mean they know they can't you can't actually logically implement this so it's more showing the voter hey I'm beating up Elon I'm beating up you know uh whoever and I think that they're it's also showing themselves because a lot of people say elon's elon's the shadow president and whenever the government's kind of tried to poke a stick at Elon he's now got a megaphone where he says [ __ ] you I don't care I laugh at you you're nobody to me and that's not something that the government likes I learned that the hard way I I I uh was so below Elon but the point is that you know by making that kind of messaging you make a lot of enemies because government people that's the one thing they have they have a little bit of power and they want to hold on to it and anybody tries to subjugate the power it's very scary so the response from them is well what can we do to bother this class of people and under the guise of like P the deficit or under the guise of of equality or fairness I do think that Americans aren't going to buy this I think that Americans look up many Americans look up to Elon and people like him and it's the American dream it's still there it's a reason that we're different from Europe and that people look at this and say well how do we don't these people pay the most taxes to begin with and now we want to tax them before they even make the money man I don't agree with you at I wish that you were right I really wish that you were right but it seems to me that the public is totally B in on the concept of like it is we are being treated unfairly and these rich people are getting away with murder I think it's always been that way and I think there's sort of no way to win against a party that is telling you that if you're confirming that weird suspicion that you want to believe that like none of your problems are really your problems there's this evil minority class of billionaires who have hoarded all of the wealth and like they're treating you unfairly and like wouldn't it be nice if I just wiped out all of your medical debt by making them pay their fair share of taxes I think the average person says [ __ ] yes which is why weird tell me what you think all of you guys I kind of have I've gotten on board with Trump's deranged economic plans also like I think that you do need both parties to be crazy at this you can't have only one party be crazy I think if it's only one party that's crazy you definitely lose because the crazy part is going to win on economics but if both parties are crazy if like the left is saying we're going to liquidate Elon Musk but the right is saying we're going to take all the right saying like we're gonna take every house that politicians own after their first house we're gonna seize it and we're gonna give it to the people to have so everyone gets a house in America we're making everyone gets a house in America promise or something like that like if they get even crazier like maybe there's mutually assured destruction in in in in economics or or in politics for the first time ever in well not ever but probably since FDR I don't know what do you guys think yeah I think you're right this is the way you win elections I I would say first thing it's good that KLA is talking policy for once that's a win um but the second thing for everyone who hates her it's a win which we can talk about our poly Market right right but I do Wonder um yeah like this is the way you move elections or you win elections so I do Wonder um how like for how muchan kamla's policies are like I do wonder how much it's going to move the needle electorally and if not like is it just going to benefit her um because you mentioned the 25k for a house like a lack of uh young home ownership is actually like a really big problem in this country so if people just hear like without getting in the weeds of it if they just hear 25k for a house they think that's a good thing dud she talk about wiping out medical debt like all of it that's I mean that's a I don't know how you you're salad with debt I don't know how you look at that and don't think maybe that the student debt thing also like I mean there are't many people there are reasons that all these things are bad but I'm saying like if if you're just trying to sort of sociopathically gain votes by promising things that are not fair and that you can't do then that's compelling to a certain kind of idiot person who is by the way the average voter in this country it's it's not like a genius I did see a statistic that 10% of Americans are millionaires um so I do think that if if you're not a millionaire which just most people you you may be the dependent of one right like you know it's gotten to a point where there's some sophisticated person in your household ideally that is like hold on you know this is maybe not a Price Gauging great idea and I want to talk about price gouging since I'm I'm sort of the guy there anyway um you know it's a real pet PE mind as you can imagine gouging is when there's Co and your your local Deli or grocery store charges $100 for roll toilet paper that's price counting there's some transient phenomenon that is being taken advantage of price changes are permanent right they're not meant to exploit some weird dislocation of demand and supply and the price increases we've seen in the most mundane [ __ ] right I mean food food markets are like the most like if you ever traded Commodities or anything like that like corn or o this stuff re like um fixes itself to the right Supply demand so quickly because a farmer is like yeah I'm going to grow a orang and he just like like that you know the price normalizes correctly so like these are Goods that they are a little more volatile than normal Goods but they they normalize so fast that this increase we've seen in the price of a vegetable or the price of milk or something it's it's not because of price couching it's because of pure demand and supply and and the supply of money specifically well I have a question on the actual policy so so let's say it was price scouching let's say somehow I guess all of the grocery stores in the country gotten a zoom call and they were like yo we're gonna [ __ ] Americans right now and like we're going to increase the cost of bread by precisely the rate of inflation just sort of coincidentally that's what we're choosing to do um if they did that then you would have to what to stop that you would have to say we're going to set a to determine what is an to determine what's an unfair price you have to set a fair price so that is what a price control you're setting the fair price that's the price control I don't understand so tell me how is it they've done this once they've done this once in Pharma uh so in Pharma if you raise the price higher and I know this because I I tripped this law if you raise that price higher than this than the CPI um you know the cumulative CPI you have to pay back the excess uh if you're if you have medic Medicaid Medicare Medicaid are only like 25% of of Revenue but I had to write a check to the government for a like a excess price increase law and so it kind of exists in in Pharma and so what what Kroger or Walmart would have to do is say all right it raised the price of milk from 2 to 250 but CPI only was 2 to 220 let's say and they'd have to write a check for 30 cents to who the government like it's it doesn't or the government can force you at the price at 220 which is the the price control right there's sort of two ways to do it I guess but it has been done but then of course back in reality where the grocery stores are not price gouging um there is a I think a pretty Common Sense sort of question which is like why if a price is set and that price means that I will lose money selling this product or just not make enough of it to make it worth my while why will I carry that product and the answer is you wouldn't and that is how price controls have led to famine everywhere they've ever been implemented when it comes to food but who do you think sets the price it's the far farmer who sells the stuff so Kroger has to buy it from somewhere and Kroger is just putting a [ __ ] 3% you know markup on it which is their gross margin is like 10% or something and you know Farmer Joe says okay Kroger has to buy my stuff at 220 instead of 250 which is what I want to sell it for well it cost me 220 to make it so I don't want to sell it to Kroger 220 I'm out of business so you know it's going to trickle down all the way down to the the product Creator I guess there is a question of just we have it like is it even is this just them saying stupid [ __ ] and like they're saying it to distract you from inflation they're not actually going to do anything this is maybe why you see goad yeah I think they just basically did this like bureaucratic McKenzie like politician thing where they were just like let's get a focus group and uh 10 people out of 10 people 3.6 people said they were concerned with the price of groceries and they're like okay let's make a policy about that what can we do about that and they just go to go without list whereas like Trump has this like innate Instinct of like you know and sometimes works sometimes it doesn't but he just shoots from the hip of like what his policy should or might be whereas I think they just did like a systematic thing and you know the average American or the average American in the places they're trying to get votes uh is concerned about food food yeah which is just inflation I mean it's it's not the it's the it's it's a definition of inflation right it's like food it's housing it's clothes everything is up and it's like I don't are they all goug as every every entrepreneur in the country literally got on a zoom call from every industry and they were like let's raise prices by 20 to 30% wouldn't that be illegal too yes it be illegal yes it's illegal so who's doing it who's cing sorry brand what was I can't what was your point that's my take like like that type of coordinated action is absolutely got to be illegal and it's on the Biden Administration if they are not enforcing action against these companies that they're saying are coordinating um higher prices for the consumer that would be sweet if the FTC brings a lawsuit against every I see that yeah every company in America yeah I mean just put your money where your M this I think right it's happening let's see the lawsuit I mean it's just so it's so transparently not what they believe they they know that there's not price gouging and started with Warren like it's insulting because it Warren yes Warr well Warren's very good at this I think Warren's really smart I think she's really that's what makes her dangerous she's really good at picking up on things that are going to play well polit like publicly um by making arguments that seem based in reality but aren't and they're they're very cleverly constructed and you could sit there and argue with her for however long but um the average person listening is just going to be like I don't know it sounds like the rich people are taking too much and um and that's the genius of a Democrat who is able to make arguments like this now kamla is not that good at it kamla is let's be honest did she even know this was her policy before one of her AIDS said it was her policy to a reporter unclear um or uh what was the other one the other stupid thing she's doing is oh the gains gains tax which will destroy the tech industry which [ __ ] VCS for comma which we talked about I think a couple weeks ago they in their open letter they're saying that um if Trump wins the industry itself could collapse um they say the the institutions are are that that he threatens you know the lack of them means the collapse of the industry now we're talking about potentially a a pre what is it an unrealized gains tax which actually would end the way that we do things in Silicon Val yeah so I'm an LP and Nea or something and the Vintage uh does this huge you know leap up and then this huge leap down which happens sometimes and I I can pay taxes at the peak presumably and if you know any anything about taxes you know that your losses carry forward but you can't apply them against ordinary income so like you traditionally you know they take at the top but they don't refund you at the bottom and uh that's something that just never happens if I make $10 million capital gains this year and I lose 10 million capital gains next year I pay on the the first and I don't I don't get the money back on the second and so the LPS of these funds would be completely torched if if this happened I think it's more difficult to make an argument against raising the gains tax even though I think it's unfair and it shouldn't happen but just raising the gains tax like realized gains you sell the stock now we're raising it we're we're gonna we're going to do some stupid Draconian like 60% thing because we hate rich people that's really [ __ ] up and I think it's a dis it disincentivizes building companies but what it does not do is make it almost impossible to build them in this way which an unrealized gains tax I think would actually do and it's also it's transient like if if they did that they could see with how the experiment worked did it actually generate tax revenue did it actually do this or that and I can wait four years to sell my company right like I could just you know okay eventually the tax rate's going to drop but the Traders like a lot of us don't give a [ __ ] about what happens with the Traders anyway so the short-term tax gains it's like okay some hedge fund buys a stock this week and sells it for next week are they really creating value in society who really gives a [ __ ] what tax you know they should be there but the entrepreneurs of the world that build things I think that we could all probably wait four years uh for a long-term tax and I do think a new Administration would fix it and I also think these things move marginally which is again goes back to the old Obama argument that you know he raised T capital gains tax like 2% or something you know uh nominally from like 35 to like 37 or something and it it didn't stop any of us from from building legendary companies and it's you know something like that it's totally fine like I I don't like it I'm an anarcho capitalist I want taxes to be zero so when I said this on Twitter a lot of people are like how taxation is theft and it's like yeah I know but we have to compromise here I mean if they want to take cap gains up 2% or 3% cool I mean like that's not that bad maybe they wanted maybe they wanted to compromise all along but I don't know I don't think they're that clever I they've been asking for an unrealized gains tax for a long time now um and uh let's see how all of stuff so I want to um I want to move on to our betting Market segment which is supported by our partner poly The Latest Polymarket Report Market uh there's some pretty interesting stuff here so both related to the economic policy of klas that was released and also I think the DNC which Riley you're going to break down in a second sort of what's been going on this week at the uh Democratic National Convention um so in the span of seven days Trump has seen a 9% bump in his odds to win the election launching him back into the lead uh the booth seems to be coming from Democrats own efforts um so Kamal Harris released her first major platform proposal a 45% tax on unrealized capital gains meanwhile the chaotic Democratic National Convention has a 40% chance of mass arrests during the event on uh on poly market right now the time of our recording so a couple of things here um obviously it seems that the more kamla talks and like actually gets out there and says things and the more the Democrats reveal about their proposed policies for AA presidency the more people remember that she is not actually just a meme which seems to be what fueled a lot of the early excitement it was like Biden has dementia and that was really demoralizing because Democrats knew there was really no way he could ever possibly win against Trump he's gone now we have the coconut sort of floating in the sky like you know that star above Jesus his manger or whatever in uh in the Bible and people are like hell yeah there's some hope here and what they did was they just projected their own [ __ ] onto her and they deluded themselves in like a the last month of fantasy basically I wrote about this a lot in a piece Called Death by Vibes this week in Pirate wires it was just a weird crazy projection of ideas onto DNC Recap - Including Land Acknowledgements, Vasectomies, and Free Abortions this woman and we lived by the vibe now I was a little bit more nervous it seemed like a Vibe was enough they started talking the Vibes changed pretty quickly and now there seems to be a giant question mark over what Democrats were very excited about moments ago um part of that certainly the convention and Riley I would love for you to uh to to break down what we've been seeing there this week sure thing so I would be remiss if I didn't mention first the uh land acknowledgement that the Democratic party uh announcing their party platform at the start of make you better make a land acknowledgement right now where are whose land Are you standing on Nevada I'm sure we have some tribes but um but anyway so they said um while we meet in Chicago uh we recognize that this is the traditional homeland of before listing all their uh Native American tribes that I'm not even going to try to pronounce um side note we looked up on chat gbt how many times those tribes went to war with each other and turns out it was several but anyway um but apparently the uh the DNC is going out of their way to cater to influencers as well at their convention um at the expense of traditional media which is a little bit of a funny wrinkle there um but as for actual speakers uh it seems from clips that I've seen um the person who's got the best reception so far has been Michelle Obama um some notable things I saw from her speech uh there seemed to be a subtle shot at the uh Pro Palestine wing of her party uh sort of telling them to like get in line um she said we cannot be our own worst enemies uh we cannot get a Goldilocks complex about whether or not everything is just right um essentially telling her own party like if you have issues with your candidate like pipe down just enjoy The Vibes enjoy the joy um but she also didn't mention Biden's name once which was interesting um but after her Barack spoke uh right after echoed similar calls for Unity um notably though he also joked about Trump's obsession with crowd sizes while making a gestured to imply he was not in fact talking about crowd sizes um but I guess last observation on the topic of sort of phallic things um Planned Parenthood um also announced they would be providing free vasectomies um as well as abortions for all DNC attendees great I am in favor of that at the Democratic National Convention was it an abortions or abortion vouchers I think literal abortions out of a abortion voucher is imagine being handed an abortion voucher that's there's no context hand you an abortion voucher where you would where I would I am shocked just talking about it to be honest they're in Happy Meals now if you open the McDonald's Happy Meals one one one one party wants the the birth rate to decline I mean I think it's you know tacitly or or you know uh not you know it's kind of scary and then we have to clarify the the nuclear Arsenal that's also part of the part of the process no but seriously how does the abortion thing work do we know like because you have to you want me to give you like the medical breakdown no no like like the actual Logistics of setting up setting up a a food an abortion truck and just uh planning on doing abortions that day in the truck or what what is can a democratic Congress person preferably a congresswoman give me my vasectomy you know the vasectomy is more straightforward but like you have to sure they would to you have to be pregnant I'm sure they would they would love to give you a b they want to give all of us vasectomies but Mar I have two just before we can talk about the abortion vehicle of it all I mean I have thoughts you guys all have thoughts I do just want to on Riley's like the the sort of facts here I would like to introduce two one cons one more of a wild Theory but that's popular online and then one that is less of a theory and more of just like a well supported I guess piece of drama um so the bidens and the Obamas hate each other like absolutely from all the reporting I've seen uh the bidens blame the Obamas for stealing this presidency from Joe uh they have a lot of background leading up to this where the Obamas have gotten in the way of Biden um previously on different runs for the office they didn't want to support him necessarily uh four years ago even Obama thought he was too old KLA Harris last night was was she actually had to she left the convention and uh did an event uh some kind of fundraising event or something to not be on the premises with the Obamas I believe to um appease Joe and his rage for these people who kind of stole this from him now what did the Obamas want what they did not want also was Kamala they Obama's statement was like we're g to have a a process um here to determine who the presidential candidate is going to be after Joe stepped down and he was they say pressured to step down by Obama and Pelosi but mostly Obama talking to fundraisers talking to all of his political allies Obama sort of quietly been orchestrating this entire thing so now he gets to the final moment Joe does step down um but what Joe immediately does is he endorses kamla Harris and once the president endorses KLA Harris KLA is like the presumptive nominee and that happened overnight everyone got got everyone was like oh I guess she's running the donors the public that was it it was over um why did Obama want a process uh now here's where the conspiracy gets it's not really conspiracy but the sort of wild theory is that Michelle Obama is in the running and she has been speaking so on I've noticed that she's been in the poly Market odds forever uh she's one of the top after Biden but when Biden was still running uh even before everyone realized he had dementia officially during the debate even before that Michelle Obama was always like 3% chance of being the Democratic nominee and that's because Democrats are obsessed with her they absolutely love her we've done this before with um the bushes to an extent certainly with the clintons uh we we repeat this this like this like oligarchical family thing where like when there's a popular family member we want the other one in there because we sort of know that they represent the same thing uh and I I wonder if if we had had a fair like process would Michelle Obama have thrown her hat in the ring I think it's actually possible and everyone was obsessed with that she gave last night I I I should say sort of like finally wrapping it up I think that's some sort of important additional context of what's going on with the convention right now you know I I sometimes track influencers just for some like data you know stuff I do for investing Michelle Obama has some of the most amount of influencers like top I think she's in the top 100 um on Instagram and it's a really remarkable thing because right is that she has the most follow followers yes thank you um it's a really remarkable number um she's wildly popular I don't think just with I mean probably within Democrats but like just like 40 50 million followers and compare that to like Joel Stein I'm sorry Jo Stein Joe Biden or someone like that um it really is a very different you know uh adoration for her yeah she was really popular during barack's presidency she was considered one of his like most powerful weapons to bring out she had broad bipartisan appeal um no matter how much right-wing influencers online want to pretend that's not the case case you know posting like weird ugly pictures of her and calling her a man and is she actually trans like that's you can have all fun in games or whatever online trashing whatever political person you want but she is people love her um Jill has three million followers on Twitter on X and Mike has 22 million so it's a really big big difference uh Mike sorry [Laughter] Michelle um yes I think that uh I think that it's coming and I think that she wanted it to come do I think that uh I really do I really think I really do think that had there been some kind of actual formal process I think Michelle would have been in that ring and I also think Gavin Newsome would have been in that ring just based on what Gavin was doing leading up to that season and I think the only reason Gavin slowed down at the last minute was not because he was worried about Kamala or Biden but because he was worried about the Obamas I think he knew that in a fight against Michelle he would lose and he would sort of maybe lose his chance uh to your point I think uh Michelle is sort of like a foil to kamla in the sense that every time like kamla Gets behind a microphone and says something people kind of like cringe and are like what what strange thing is she going to say now every time Michelle speaks PE like Democrats are glowing like she got the best reception at the convention by far so I think yeah she is adored among her party for sure there's a lot of people in the DC politics circuit that talk about and think that Michelle is the architect of Brock and that there would be no Barack without Michelle not just this old Trope of like every behind every man is a strong woman but like behind every male president named Barack Obama there's a puppeteer named Michelle Obama and um you know there's a lot of feelings like that and I I don't think there's a single person who's ever been in the White House that says they want to leave right I mean there's just just this constant whatever happen happens there I have no clue but once you're in you seem to want to stay there and and to go back a third time I think would have been you know seemingly something they would wanted I guess I wonder well I have an answer to my question but it does seem at face value sort of strange that she didn't go and run for office in the way that Hillary did but then again Hillary lost she didn't become president and what Michelle Obama is right now is not politicized entirely in the way that Hillary was when she ran for office Michelle gets to be popular generally speaking and even among people who don't agree with her husband there's some insulation there from that because she's never held political office she never actually her her when Hillary was uh in the white house as the first lady her first lady's project famously was Healthcare which immediately politicized her Michelle did the like let's get fat kids to move thing which had brought appeal people want to see fat people exercising they want it they like deeply in their bones they want to see it and she gave it to them um I think that's pretty interesting uh I think that she's learned from Trump as as well as Hillary's losses she learned from Trump's Victory you don't have to have been in politics to win she has a very good chance I think that she's probably gonna run for president and um I think she's gonna be hard to win uh to win against to beat Randon what do you think yeah I think the question is if Cameo wins what happens in four years is do we I think she's another one term if she if she if she wins um I think you your instinct about or everybody's here here's in Instinct about k sorry um Michelle being the better candidate than kamla is correct and so um yeah I'm curious about what happens in four years given that Kamala is going to accept the Democratic nomination tonight and doesn't it just feel that way doesn't it it it feels like she's losing right now in the way that it didn't a week ago I really we see how many more days yeah we have like what 70 more days 80 more days until November I think I think once you have the first debate you're really going to sort of force this issue of like well how do you defend price controls how do you defend unrealized tax gains how do you defend all the other batshit stuff that that she's gonna say and I think it's sort of like the Biden debate all Trump has to do is just shut up and I think he's kind of been doing that the last few weeks maybe it's just because the DNC is going on but I think like the more you know Trump's we've had enough of trump for years we know what his policies are like he doesn't need to say anything you know we all we need to do is listen to to Kamala for the next sort of 60 90 days and watch a debate I do think she'll bring up the black like he he said he just found out she was black or whatever she'll bring that up and it'll be her one sort of huge Zinger um Trump has a lot of time to figure out how he's goingon to answer to that I will say to to that sort of thing that he said I think what happened there if you look at black Trump supporters um on Instagram or whatever and I get lot of reals and I'm I'm always seeing this stuff and there are tons um this is very it's like a common thing that that black like right-wing influencers were saying not even right-wing influencers I saw the Don Lemon clip the other day uh where he goes to Atlantic City and he interviews a bunch of people in Atlantic City but all of them except for one I think were black Atlantic City is a very uh black city um so he's on the boardwalk he's interviewing these people one of them actually brought up the comma black thing thems and they were like they were like clearly in favor of that and I think Trump made a miscalculation there like that's something that black people have this conversation themselves I think that as a white guy doing it it comes off really different including for black people who maybe even agreed with you and we're like who is this person or whatever anyway not endorsing that I'm just saying it's gonna come back up to haunt him um and that's maybe the only thing that he has to worry about in that debate I think the left is is very has turned out to be extremely formidable when it comes to the information more that we're seeing online like the the price controls conversation I think is kind of working out in their favor because every time somebody freaks out about price controls they can just say yeah only if you are in control of assets over1 million you're sing for G the unrealized G sorry yes yes unrealized gains so and I and I also have this feeling that the right is actually less capable in the information War than the left when the left is activated they're pretty good at just being super semantic engaging in a vicious war of semantics and always sort of somehow turning these issues in into their favor and so that's what I worry about for um for Trump's chances I don't really worry about what happens in the real world I think the the the information war is where is where a lot of it's happening and um again I think the left has been pretty consistent about how good they've been on that front yeah it's just that they have to be excited about a candidate and once they are you have all of the the word cells and the word chats I consider myself among them uh they become activated and what was happening with Biden is they weren't I will say I've noticed online a little bit of demoralization uh I I've seen plenty of journalists we're always like the media is totally in the bag for k or whatever I don't I think largely yes that's true but then I The Washington Post had a whole from the editorial aboard a critique of kamla's price control thing and the economic policy stuff um I see everyone on uh what is it CNBC constant constantly going after kamla on all this economic plan uh I see journalists in the Washington uh in the Wall Street Journal I just saw earlier today on on X going after her for this stuff I when I click on the New York Times like yeah there's lots of support for her but there are lots of questions like light on policy Pro like like strong on Vibes or I forget what the actual headline was the other day but they're not saying nothing about this um The Washington Post thing was like apostasy I mean it was like a true break and I also think that I mean this might be just something that bothered me but the there's a the volunteers for Cala input form has about 82 genders on it and nine exactly nine including fa f f is real F fair f is f is real but uh regardless the uh you know that that kind of stuff does have an impact because I think that the original thought is like camalo and the left would step away from woke but you now have this increasing like again this queer ing the nuclear agenda or Arsenal between that the input form you you do seem to have wokeism creeping back in and I do think wokeism is one of these things that almost became bipartisan where even the left has sort of had enough of it and I think kamala's embrac remember she was the first vice president with pronouns in her bio that was really big deal well she went up on stage with Cuomo and she introduced herself as she her and then Cuomo said ha like me too and the audience was just like what did you just say CUO Chris both cuos I have a new theory on the cuos there's a new clip going around of Chris Cuomo he's on the floor of the DNC complaining about the rich people up in the box and he's like this is the uni party and this is how it works and blah blah blah and there I was watching I'm like is he a trump supporter now or is he a communist I can't actually tell the difference and I think increasingly that's just politics in America but one thing is certain he's no longer Pro whatever the blob thing is as his brother who was the governor of New York I mean he did a lot of damage there on the co stuff but why did he really go down why did Chris also at the same time really go down I think it's because they were no longer part of the machine and I think that was kind of wellknown and I think that all of this um so his brother actually the governor went down for sex stuff I think it was like a sex scandal of some kind that is onar right when he becomes politically useless and used against him to get him out and then Chris I forget the reason I think it might have been actually just his brother he was like too friendly to his brother air and that became a huge Scandal but in hindsight like was it that big of a deal I don't think so um anyway let's come back to the cuos one of these days I think that there are interesting things coming from the Cuomo Brothers in the days ahead might be communism not entirely sure but I am interested Brandon last topic related to this um the sort of you were just Media Attacks Ben Horowitz and His Wife For Supporting Trump talking about how good these people are information War uh there was recently the story of the uh SF standard wrote a hit piece on Ben horites his wife and I would love you to break that down for us yep so last week um this the the the the title of the article that you just referred to is called how ex- liberal billionaires Ben and Felicia Horwitz made a Maga U-turn um it it was pretty scandalous on our corner of Twitter but maybe our listeners haven't read the piece um but the the lead to the piece kind of says it all the lead reads they once hosted KLA Harris and handed out food at Glide now they donate to Maga candidates and live inside a for gated mansion in Nevada and essentially pause really quick four gated describe that to me uh there are somehow there are four Gates like you have to there's like a sequence of four Gates each one taller than the next cuz I am I want to know more about the four I I played a video game like that once you need it like you need four Keys like they they B Siege the the compound to get in well be to wait like months or whatever starve them out I don't know I have no idea what it means frankly um I I mean you know we can kind of skip the content of the article because it's pretty it's very obvious what it is it's it's basically just like a master class in the type of hit pieces that are served as punishment for like when somebody ideologically defects right like I happen to know the the reporter very well Emily sug yeah recently fired from The Daily Beast or something like that is right that's right so so she was a hit peace Rider and and uh she did about five or six of these numbers on me so I she the one that she's not the one that you had the thing with in prison no no no no um so I would have clutched my pearls right now sorry continue she's a very pretty uh young lady uh she's lesbian um and I uh her her boss basically commissioned all these articles the editor at The Daily Beast who was also fired was this sort of like 400 PB social justice Warrior lady that you know was basically like look we hate Martin scy we're you know here's the hit piece you should write Martin sky and basically you know she was this Hired Gun so to me I point the you know kind of uh finger up here to you know who asked her to write this piece because it just doesn't come out of nowhere like somebody has an act to grind says Ben and Felicia write the story yes sir or yes ma'am and I'm going to go and she's I think Emily's actually kind of like a decent investigative reporter but she's also a Hired Gun and and I'm not sure you know I mean she fits fits the bill but this is how the the Democratic this is the Democratic party's immune system in action I don't think this is out of character for how they've been treating anybody who ideologically defects over the past four years or so rather than engage in the issues that Ben and Felicia supposedly Felicia has um with um the Biden Administration and and by default the Harris Administration um they just try to shame and embarrass them right they put them in Maga hats on the on the pi kind of crazy because I saw that and I actually was like damn they why would they wear those hats out in public they're obviously going to get roasted for it it took me a second to realize that was Photoshopped it it's very funny in the context of the AI deep fake conversation we're having where the most believable deep fake I just saw was like a cheap Photoshop job by someone who just hated another person um yeah that was wild they were definitely upset about that over at a16z uh I do think that the point of who are these people who are assigning the pieces though just like let's get niche in the media stuff is pretty interesting the idea yeah the idea that like they're kind of invisible they they are this invisible and bology talks about this quite a bit in the context of the souls burgers and I don't think I agree with him kind of roughly that that's why aren't we talking about the souls Burgers more than we are obviously important they're obviously influential they obviously have a lot to do with everything to do with what's going on with the New York Times but the writers are writing pieces and I think the New York Times is not as bad as some of these others the other outlets like you you I don't think you would have ever seen a piece like it would have been better than this it would have been harder to attack uh if it was in the New York Times but there are editors who are signing this and those are the real players th those are like if you're on a chessboard right like the writers are the pawns and then maybe maybe the editors are like they're like the bishop or the Rooks or something and then the owner is the King right ultimately not doing a lot of the the like how much has Bezos done at the Wasington post like he's he's pretty constrained the the owner of the standards is this is this guy Moritz right who used to be at SEO but is not anymore so this is what Ben Horowitz alleged yeah right so they came out they they they sort of sniffed out that there was going to be a hitpiece published imminently Horwitz and Andre and basically tried to play offense for for like 24 hours before the piece came out um and they were claiming that like this is a this is essentially top down from where it's um and the reason was because they're these two groups are in competition with each other somehow um the editor of the standard I can't remember what his name is but it's a guy he actually he he totally went to bat for Moritz I don't know what's True by the way I have no inside information but he was like very vocal on Twitter saying like you know it was me and only me who sign who assigned this hit piece was it Jeffy I know him I don't know if it was him I can't remember his name I I I tried to look it up and I can't find it while we're recording but his name might be Adam something but I don't know the other thing that's kind of interesting is that you know Emily's very good at hit pieces which are generally kind of have these Hal truths that are a little salacious and don't have context and just makes you kind of say oh what a terrible person there was none of that here there was nothing in here that was like bad it was just they changed their mind they don't support Democrats anymore and it it really lost its oomph there because usually there's some oh he grabbed your ass or you know all a sudden you know he's he's hiding this or hiding that this none of that exists here the sort of implication that she was betraying black people I thought as a black woman was gross but I agree that it could have been actually worse um I still think it was bad I control left for the word black in the article and it is mentioned 14 times the word black I mean this is like she's totally coming at this angle of you know I have a certain way that I think black people are supposed to act and Felicia is not acting in that way and therefore she's bad um so absolutely a a uh an element to it which is kind of implication and that's the game that she's trying to play um and it hurts the reason it hurts Felicia is because Felicia's done so much on like over the last few years I think the a6z had the culture fund like Ben Horwitz also like they're very invested in Black Culture and stuff so it was a very sensitive place to poke I think so white newspaper owner white editor white reporter tells the black lady what to think and what to do many such cases we've seen it it's also like why did she get Dragged In to begin with like they point to like her uh she like removed some pictures of her with like liberal politicians on her social media that was their justification of like she's the farri mega person to like why did she even have to be involved she retweeted the endorsement and retweeted the end you're right it's crazy like she's not she's not Ben who did a 60 Minute YouTube with Mark on why he was supporting this person and giving money to them and then you went after his wife is it's it's just it's really interesting the she changed her Twitter profile or X profile to say Escaping The Matrix which of course is like this Andrew Tate idea but she's not the first black person to do this there are many black people in Hollywood who or in in Fame and wealth that have said Gee I've kind of been forced into this decision by lots of people around me that I have to be a Democrat and so many of them like Little Wayne and others have said maybe I want to just think for myself and I I don't I'm not I'm not signing up for this anymore and I think that that's sort of like not atypical like so to focus on her that much is is again I I I'm not surprised I wouldn't be surprised if Moritz or you know kind of there was it may may not directive but kind of like this understanding that hey wait the two biggest VC firms qua a16z it it certainly didn't fall on anybody's uh excuse me they're not the two biggest VC firms let's just calm down they're they're up there they are they are a handful I mean there must have been I guess I guess one question maybe to explore or might be fun to think about is why does Ben and and Mark you know sort of defecting from the Democratic party mean so much to people who read the standard or people in that orbit what what is the meaning of a16z or at least the leadership of a16z mean well we did reporting on remember the if you look back at the donations the a16z was right in the middle they had not gone left or right like Founders fun was out there right like we know where Founders fun we know where Peter te stands um seoa was on the opposite end of end of the spectrum we know where seoa stands a16 in is in the middle and so there's a war for the middle and where the middle goes that's it's very threatening if the middle if the middle leans right it's always we like I always want like fish fun never gets targeted ever by any of these people I mean Peter got it relentlessly in 2016 but like recently everyone kind of knows it's not worth it in in my opinion with them you know is there a chance that you can scare them back into the center or back onto the left possibly and then on the the question of race specifically yes Martin do your point we've seen this before with famous people but right now in this election we're talking about the black vote in a way we haven't talked in my entire life it is in we talked about it right after Trump won it was like oh that's odd like there was a bump in in black people voting for trump it was still a minority but it was it was the most that any Republican had gotten uh in in many many many years maybe in our lifetime now we're seeing a lot of black people supporting Republicans they're still not g they're still going to be overwhelmingly Democrat I think but this is a trend that if it continues really I think existentially threatens the Democratic party like that it all throughout these like the all of the South all of the even the Rust Belt states like to lose a like what 90% of the black vote which is what you're counting on to lose that is very threatening to the party and I think that you're going to see probably nasty attacks like this increase uh targeting black people who waver I also wonder if you have a doppelganger effect with with uh Miss harwitz in the sense that here you have a wealthy intelligent black woman with a white husband and Cala is sort of you can superimpose that and the de facto opinion again if you saw The Breakfast Club with with Biden you ain't black if you're if you don't vote for me you know this sort of approach uh and he takes brings out the a't you know to to connect with the black person that you know this 85-year old man or whatever is thinks he can connect with um and so I wonder if like you know you have this uh again de facto like how could you not be Democrat you have a mirror image woman running for president and you're you're not with her it's it's insane um and what's interesting is there are also families prominent families that are against each other she could still be a Democrat um you know so the fact that she's willfully you know and and if anybody's sort of like uh okay with a little bit of you know PR Strife or something a16z I don't think it would have been a problem if she said you know what I love you Ben but I'm still a Democrat I'm G to keep a photo of myself and Obama on my Instagram instead of deleting it she clearly made up her own mind of this it's not uh in my opinion like oh husband's Republican I got to be Republican I can't embarrass him I don't think that's maybe like an oil family or something but not here maybe Mor realizes that she's actually the one pulling the strings like she was pilled first and she dragged Ben she was like we got to get rid of we got to get rid of these Democrats man um who knows story for another day what we have to do right now is I mean just prepare yourselves we're about to start pirate PIRATE IDOL - Who’s Going To Be The Next PW Star?! Idol [Music] welcome to Pirate Idol okay guys uh we I mean the hotly anticipated segment um I've announced it on Twitter I announced it on last week's episode we are on the hunt for a new co-host or a contributor we'll see how it goes um but certainly someone to kind of regularly occur uh regularly occurring guest on the show uh we had tons and tons and tons of application way more than I expected I was like whoa people are down to join the Pod many of whom I wonder are they going to be allowed to join the Pod you have real jobs some of you are competing media companies we'll worry about all of that at a later date for now what I'm interested in doing is just actually going through the group really quick uh sort of welcoming each of you and I'm just for a second I was like wait are we missing someone no you're all here let's welcome each of you I want each of you guys to sort of tell us who you are um and then is going to break down the topic and we're going to get to the competition I'll explain the rules uh after introductions actually [ __ ] it I'll explain the rules now so the rules are going to be like this um Riley's going to break down the news idem you are each going to deliver a take you are allowed to respond to each other's take to sort of like cross talk to ask questions to dunk if you want a dunk if you're ready for a dunk back I mean that is sort of on you uh at the end of the take when I sort of feel the take has been delivered I am uh the panel of Judges it'll be me and then Martin's Our Guest this week so I think it's probably mostly going to be me and Martin this week we'll deliver our sort of Simon Cowell Paula Abdul esque um I guess assessment of the take it's not clear yet who is going to be Paula uh Martin or myself but we'll figure it out um Riley step on up and uh and deliver the news item that we are going to be discussing in today's Final SE segment um of the pirate wies spot sure thing so to set the stage for our contestants here so Germany's decommission nuclear power plant graphin reinfeld NPP uh was demolished last week uh this plant was constructed in 1975 um and Commercial operations began in 1982 um though it was closed in 2015 as part of the government's policy to transition away from nuclear power um the demolition of graph and reinfeld was delayed slightly um after a pro- atomic energy activist named Andreas vickner scaled one of the pylons in protest of its destruction there have so many questions so with wind energy also experiencing slower growth in the country of late the suggests that Germany um will be increasingly reliant on crude oil as well as coal something that already makes up 19.5% of Germany's utility scale energy generation so listen I want to start by just saying we don't like to cover European anything generally speaking who cares right I understand that but this is funny and I think broadly it is an issue that is sort of broadly relevant uh here at home so I I think it's worth discussing on the pirate Wares pod um and the first person to do it is my man Chris um give me a few before we get started on uh just like what you think about this uh where are you from and uh like what are you all about what's what's who who are you what brings you to yeah yeah definitely first thanks for having me I'm very excited to be here a big fan of power poweres you got it man originally from Iowa um I spent a little bit time living in Japan I've kind of lived all over spent 10 years in California been in Texas now almost eight years so kind of popped all L around have always been in technology um it's kind of like first got started in venture capital and Technology selftaught programmer designer so um very passionate about technology but also how the implications that it has on Broad topics like energy sick well the view is spectacular can't beat that um I don't know man what do you make of this uh what do you make of the what was the word that you use the dystopian job Riley I believe it was Prof professional nuclear activist was that what it was pro- atomic energy okay yeah yeah broadly speaking I think nuclear energy is the mother of all litmus tests for cognitive dissonance is just unbelievable to me that a climate activist would be somehow praising you know the idea that uh we're going to take away a good energy source and when we do that typically when we take away nuclear we traditionally replace it with coal uh or natural gas uh which from that perspective is way worse for the environment I think it was also some the things that I was looking at from um from the perspective of German is that they might also have to now rely more on energy from France uh who produces the most amount of energy of uh in terms of like their production from from nuclear sources uh so just from a broadly speaking standpoint I think that it's a great litmus test for people that uh struggle with cognitive dissonance yeah I mean Riley I have some I have a follow up on the news item I was sort of confused about the actual news item itself while I was watching it unfold so they're tearing down the nuclear plant because of anti-nuclear sentiment but then what were the people protesting the protester is pronuclear he's a pronuclear guy he is he wants nuclear he scaled the pylon in protest of taking it down he was trying to prevent it from Tower he's a pronuclear so I actually so my original when I just I mean this is a problem I got to stop doing this but I I kind of just absorbed the headline and intuited what the story was about rather than um and I sort of for some reason suspected that it was like another environmental concern about blowing up the tower so it wasn't really about being pronuclear but about like maybe there was asbest or something in the towers and he was like no we can't do that um I guess this is a a little bit more sane uh I guess I feel bad doing judgment now I don't know that we should do that is it weird I wish that we had I wish we had a live interaction from the a audience to decide right now I think it was a great I think you did a good job Chris I don't I don't have a problem with the c I do think here's what I think though about it I'm going to give you a little bit of not really push back on the take but just my thoughts on this in general we have to get better I'm Pro nuclear obviously maybe not obvious I think probably obvious to anyone who listens to the podcast I I do think that a couple of years ago maybe even like like four five years ago nuclear became the take that was safe to take it became the sort of contrarian take that was safe to take and it was a rational take um it was just it's obviously correct if you care about the environment or just more energy or really almost anything uh there are these little drawbacks like nuclear waste and things which we can talk about but but on net it's the the like the thinking man's take is to be pro-nuclear and what's up with these idiots who are against nuclear that was important 5 years ago because there were not many reasonable takes you could take 5 years ago so like 2019 201 20 was a very different landscape than 2024 and so now I find myself a little bit bored with the pronuclear take not like I want to switch it up and be anti-nuclear but I think that we need to do more we can't just be like we should do this while nuclear plants sort of keep collapsing as we go I don't know Martin am I like roughly correct about that what are what is your gut on that yeah I think you're right um but if if we're judging are we here to judge Chris I think we're gonna like judge but like not say we're judging it's like we're actually having a conversation with Chris I don't I mean you just you know what [ __ ] it judge judge him pirate Idol like you got to you got throw it out us a little bit there's there's a difference between having the right take and being entertaining and um ideally you do both you failed spectacularly at one of them and um the other and it it keeps me from even bothering to look at the other one so well I think you're I like I like the thoughtfulness I liked the I mean I love the I'm damn Jesus chist Martin I think I think though yeah maybe the the take on this this specific activist uh delaying I I do believe that on the outskirts there was a lot of people there um that were watching the demolition who were Advocates of it being taken down so um yes maybe this specific act activist was uh saying hey I don't want this thing we I am pro- nuclear um there are tons of photos I think of people that were very excited about the idea of this thing being taken you have this whole continent shooting itself in the foot committing suicide you know as we I mean we're watching EUR burn and shooting itself with you know let's dismantle nuclear let's stop ourselves from using AI let's put cookies on everything I mean it it is really like a a Continental suicide and that's interesting and I think to to you know when when you're up and trying to entertain people as well as be interesting and intelligent and inform them you you have to find something like this guy scaled the uh did he actually scale the thing I mean that's pretty amazing I don't know can I just tell you that like what I think happened is entirely divorced from reality I've created an entire elaborate fantasy of what was going on at that power plant that I I'm increasingly learning is not tether to reality I will say Matt if you could pull it up this is another story I'm about to invent I don't know what it is but I I think I remember I remember a a weird there was like a lesbian sex thing as in Germany there was like was it two lesbians talking about it's better than sex like anti is that what it was Grant what was it do you remember yeah yeah they were basically like oh sex is good but have you ever like destroyed country's industrial baits good that what in this ongoing and now s joh here so I feel like I can't harp on this one too much I think she gave me some plot armor so to speak um but I there is like this subtle evil lesbian thing that's been going on at pwi lately and so I'm like very ke into it's not always listen there have been all sorts of evil people right the last couple months there have been a lot of evil lesbians um but that's a throwback and is funny and Matt please just throw up our stupid tweet about that she got ratioed into outer space but that's when I learned also or reaffirmed this knowledge that I have that um that that powerful dunks and ratios are not enough because they she W she won it's and I hope it's better than sex uh Jesse what I would love from you after a little hello is uh I want the Steel Man I mean you said you were going to bring a steel man I if you have it in you I would love to hear the anti-nuclear take yeah so real quick hi everyone my name is Jesse I am based right outside DC in Northern Virginia I work in Tech I've worked in tech for the last 11 years in pretty much any sales role you can think of I've been inside sales outside sales I've been in Tech in California been in Tech in Boston I moved over to Dublin Ireland for a while to work for a tech company so um really wanted to just be a part of the conversation I love the podcast I listen every week so that was why I reached out um and I think like the first thing I want to say about this is like first starters just to set the stage Germany has a history of just making terrible decisions when it comes to their power and energy like like this is a country that notoriously gave up like their self-reliance to Russia um so you know like I think that it's easy to come on here and say yeah it's so dumb of Germany to blow up this plant and they should be pro-nuclear like you said that's a boring take what I immediately thought of when I saw this this morning I actually think like the context of how Germany got here is the most interesting part of the story right and what America can learn from it so a lot of what got us here is like this emotionally based decision- making in Germany that is rooted in guilt from World War II that's it and America needs to like learn like this guilty decision- making isn't helpful so if you throw back to 1989 Berlin Wall Falls and Europe is in this moment and especially Germany right like they've just been United of Oh yay like peace has come to Europe right this is their like insert we did it Joe moment for for them and uh Germany then makes this crazy decision that they're gonna tie themselves to Russia for their gas supply I think it comes from Hope misguided but I'm not the most hopeful person so it's easy for me to say that and then two I think from guilt right like I see you want to jump in go ahead me yeah oh you look like you're GNA jump in no I'm trying to get better at that because people are always attacking me for talking too much on my own [ __ ] podcast not you guys com I'm like excited to talk to you take it I'll have plenty to say once you're done but like finish your okay yeah so basically you know they they made this decision and I think in the the context of nuclear like they're not Germany is not being logical about why they're anti-nuclear it is a you know if there is the smallest probability no matter how remote it is that there could be another catastrophe in Europe because of a German nuclear power plant they don't want it it's like a non-starter for most Germans and so I don't know if any of you have like actual German friends not Americans with German Heritage I lived in Spain briefly um I lived in Barcelona and it was in the bush years it was during the election of Sarah Palin so everyone was very anim not everyone Americans were en I would read about it on the news and you're in Barcelona no one gave a [ __ ] about anything when it came to politics except this except this German who I lived with who was relentlessly wanting to talk to me about politics and really like blame me for Bush um and then I was trying to explain to him I was at my most Anarchist at that point and so I was trying to explain to him like the principles of anarch capitalism in broken English which is what he spoke and it just perfect it didn't work but that's my exposure to Germans that and also I learned that they have a weird thing on vacation with Brits where they both try and steal the the chairs at the beginning of their vacation that's all I know about them though so if you want to educate me further I'm open well I had a similar experience to being how you got blamed for Bush I was in Ireland when Trump was president and so I got to be like the American spokesperson I remember showing up to a meeting and my client was like oh are you here to buy us because it was the day that Trump tried to buy I I would have been like you you wish you actually [ __ ] wish well I was in the UK at the time and I was like isn't brexit supposed to happen for the fifth time today and like just kind of went back and forth with them so they're like actually cool but that's side note but anyways so when I talk to my like German friend it it blows my mind how much like this World War II guilt like still influences all their policy decisions today and so the I mean they should be pronuclear to your point right like it's better for the economy it's better for the average German person it would bring down costs they could be taken a you know breaks some Reliance on Russia but now they're just going back to Cole and it's like I think it's kind of funny because they're very like Pro environmentalists over there they they want to stop climate change um you know BR thorberg is oh yeah I mean I don't what turn she's like Scandinavian or something she feels German to me I think it's like she does but she like will say you should do nuclear over cool like that's just like how much everything is divorced from reality it's just like I I mean we could I wish we had a separate segment on Greta because the fact that she feels German for us is interesting and it plays into your point right now that you're making about guilt because what do we associate with Germans is like Nazism it's like this person wants to put me in a gas chamber and when Greta thumberg is talking I get that I like get that Vibe I get like a very Mar you off to the gas chamber of vibe from that little autistic Swedish girl whatever she is um who's now I guess Pro Palestine uh you guys feel free to jump in at any part part of this um Chris Grant cardic I would say you know one thing is is you know how do how do Americans how does the US learn from this there's might be some argument that we are learning from this you know I think one of the proposals in the infrastructure bill was reopening a nuclear reactor in Michigan um so and while there is sentiment to close nuclear reactors in America we don't seem to be on that path so uh I would hope that while we're not expanding our abil ility to generate energy from uh uh nuclear power plants at least we not uh shutting them down in the same sort of rate that a place like German not yet and I think it's it's the Germans seem so much more I guess I'm I'm not fully convinced I agree with you that Germans have this weird guilt thing that defines almost everything that they do uh but also the anti-nuclear thing is Broad and deep and even countries where there is none of that and it's like I wonder if maybe they are clocking the they're clocking the anti-nuclear thing as the way to be a good liberal because that's what it was in like the 70s and they just grabbed onto it and they're trying to sort of show people how good they are and uh even at their own their own expense Martin what what do you what did you want to say on that no I just really clicked for me for a second that you know when you have two sides political sides some of them will co-opt kind of the movements and say Ah that's ours and uh it's kind of scary that's that's sort of happening nuclear um anyway on the judging side I think Jesse was a lot more fiery and interesting uh than the other dude I don't even remember his name is bring andness and I don't want to hear this this is let's let's not get too bitter I brought some all of you are truly here by the way all of you are truly here because I opened your video and I thought oh I like this person I want like and You' all have done a good job so far let's just I can't believe I'm the [ __ ] Paula Grant can you please introduce yourself and I didn't think you were GNA be the Paula either I'm not gonna lie don't think about people think I'm this [ __ ] because of my Twitter and then they get to know me and they're like oh I could totally get away with murder as of like you as my my I mean in relationships let me tell you one I have one I Mike okay Grant go ahead before I jump into like my like hot take I just in responding to this I just want to say that zero people died due to radiation in Fukushima so as far as being terrified of like the worst case scenario if there's a people I trust to properly engineer and uh run the nuclear plants safely it would probably be the Germans like for all of their faults like that's something that they'll get right um so I'll I'll lead with the kind of pro I got to respond to that though because two actually interesting things there the first is Fukushima is what actually like helped even push them further down this route right so like in 2011 when Angela Merkel was looking at Nordstrom 2 they were like oh maybe and then Fukushima happened and they were like we don't want any part of this like the Japanese can't handle this we can't handle this and so we're going to tie ourselves to Russia that's like a super smart plan so they they actually double down there and then you have to think about chernobyl's impact on Germany compared to America right like we we think it's interesting we like to learn about it but Germans actually had like radioactive particles flying towards them they were calling their sand boxes like death boxes they had contamination scares in their M I don't know man were they really worried about it I don't buy that they actually cared about I think they were so desperate to be like look the the Germans are or the Russians are worse than us that they were like oh it's so bad these nuclear particles look how dare they I think but I'm not saying they're actually scared for themselves they're scared of the outcome like that's my whole point is like they can't risk a nuclear issue from I just don't agree I really don't think so I don't think they believe in that I I really don't think that I really think it's more about the idea of nuclear and what it represents I agree they're guilty I agree that's probably motivating this somehow but they're not afraid of a disaster I think they want to show people like we care about the environment so much that we're willing to like kill ourselves over it and then somehow there's a cognitive distance there with Cole I genuinely yeah then they're going back to Cole though so it's like they just won't face that I think it's like it's this weird thing where they're so committed to the idea that they're they're pretending the Cole thing has got to be misinformation it's just too insane it can't possibly be true they love to Double Down Grant where are you from and give me your take so I am Grant de I'm from Rochester New York currently based in Austin but moving home uh if you want to become a podcaster you know and have long hair and a mustache you have to choose choose at some point so I can't be a podcaster in Austin I'm willing to sacrifice that um all right uh I think I'm I may be repres there may be other representation here but I am a German American my grandmother grew up in Germany so I'm willing number two I'm willing yeah yeah that Germany too so I'm willing to just go go in on this one I just want to remind people that um the United Nations exist for maybe a couple reasons but the major one is that every couple decades the Germans whip themselves up into a frenzy and try to make it everyone else's problem so um so I think that uh you know we should be uh sure to I I don't think we should let them completely uh destabilize their their country um but you know so far at least their uh bad policy and their current frenzy is mostly just uh eroding their own industrial base which is still not good but um you know they've done work is your take that yes it sucks but it's a good thing because if if they were like succeeding in a really smart way it would be sort of scary to have like a a sort of competent pro- German Germany on the map they could I mean they could have a worse Friendzy I don't think it's good I'm mostly just poking fun at the fact that Germany seems to get some radical political ideas and take them in directions that are disadvantageous for their country um which you know has happened a couple times in the in the last hundred years um and then I I do want to comment on the uh the activist it was really refreshing to see climate activists that I agree with and also who engaged in um you know an act of uh physical courage risking his body risking jail time he was briefly jailed um you know and this was kind of the nuke bro equivalent of like a hippie climbing up a tree uh to save an endangered species um unfortunately you know this this actual act wouldn't have saved an operational reactor it was basically the ter DET whether or not they destroyed critical infrastructure that could be reused in in the future um but either way uh you know they didn't listen to him they're not listening to his other great takes uh and they seem pretty intent on having their industrial base go the way of the doo so my uh my my uh my two takeaways completely different country different political economy um but two things that I think Americans should take away from Germany's failures is one uh don't shut down your exist nuclear plants just like hard stop worth investing in them just to keep them alive the a little bit of money you got to put in to keep that sweet sweet Bas load clean power especially as we pass all kinds of stupid regulations to make it even harder to um create new power um can't let that happen and then two we cannot allow the United States to become dependent on a geopolitical rival for our energy Supply or expanding our energy Supply and that's something most people just refuse to talk about instead we want to show us graphs and be like everything's okay don't worry about China I guess we're s of we're now like buting up against another like the whole like NATO man like like I don't want to be paying to defend these people anymore like they're really I would say aggressively stupid about some of this stuff and they're not I was thinking the other day like if China invades Berkeley okay which I don't know that it will happen but wouldn't it be funny wouldn't that be [ __ ] funny uh if they do that you think that France is sending troops to America to defend us like not in a million years I don't think that for the rest of this country's history France will ever be back in our hemisphere defending Us in the way they were during the Revolutionary War which is the last time that we got an assist from France so I just I'm kind of over it I there's a global trade piece that's kind of interesting you know do we just net benefit and I think probably you know that probably like our economy certainly benefits but that comes with all sorts of I don't know we're running out of out of time here I want to get through the nuclear takes but I'm just like I don't necessarily I guess what I'm saying Grant is I don't necessarily care about them getting closer to Russia if that means that Russia at least is now taking care of Germany rather than us and paying for it maybe I don't what do we get from Germany that we need I don't think anything do well I I mean the other thing is you know right leading you know one of the leaders of NATO in Europe like to your point it's more their problem than our problem right and then the other thing that's insane is even after Russia invaded Ukraine uh Germany was still getting natural gas from Russia for seven months after that and then like they did pause the nordstream 2 pipeline which someone blew up I don't know we PA I like the pause it's a good way well it was they did slow the like basically they used the bureaucracy to like slow it from being opened up and then someone was like well what if we just blew it up you know who do you think blew it up well they're saying it was a Ukrainian oligarch I don't know like I don't know I've read different things I've read that it would have to be someone who has like a really skilled um like underwater charge team and then I've seen people be like no this was an easy job like you could do it but it's so tough like I I don't know anything about uh underwater explosives you're on a podcast don't let that stop you don't let don't let expertise you know I I would guess it was NATO I mean I I can tell you I don't think it was the Russians I don't think that makes sense um who did it beyond that well maybe actually maybe Russia did it to because it looks like really B uh no Russia didn't do it we probably did it you guys don't think America did I think we probably did it that's a conspiracy so the reason that we maybe probably didn't do it is because we can't really do anything I don't know that I don't really I have not seen any signs of Confidence from our government so I'm a little bit skeptical that we would have gone and and done that I mean mostly what we're able to do right now is give them money I don't but maybe I'm wrong Martin what do you think start with with Grant I'm like nervous now for you know no Grant did did all right um I definitely think uh you know this this is a space that's outside of my comfort zone and and bringing NATO into it furthers that but I uh yeah I mean nobody knows who who blew up the pipeline but uh I I would agree that this Administration is was it under this Administration did happen during Trump yeah it happened during ours during yeah it it's hard to say but you know I could you know who knows I think the CIA kind of independently operates from the government anyway yeah so you know it's a little bit hard to know uh but that's that seems like something that would have to have come from a government Martin can you tell me about but tell me about Grant's mustache what do you think about that I I think his I think his German background uh you know is very sus um and uh I agree it's a point it's a it's a point worth considering but otherwise I I like the guy I'll claim I'll claim Irish when it's convenient oh you're 5050 so you lied at the you don't it gets really ambiguous okay Lie by Omission I see interesting um carik my man take us way sure yeah I mean I'll keep the intro short I'm an investor in Social graph Ventures and I'm a new dad in San Francisco just you know trying to stay safe out here uh that's about it congrats um for thank you stay safe where in the city are you uh I'm in like Knob Hill okay well crime don't climb yeah exactly I've said that aund times since I moved so yeah basically my take here is like I'm really worried that nuclear is becoming a partisan an issue and i' love to avoid it so I'm going to kind of talk more about nukes but then get back to this specific German situation so I think what I'm really worried about is that basically like this like do we really want to live in a world where okay Trump wins we get tons of nuclear power and everyone has Bitcoin or Camala wins and now you know there's wind turbines on top of my house and we have a central bank digital currency um you know I that sucks and I don't want that to be I don't want this to be a partis an issue so how do we avoid that and uh kind of learn from some mistakes that crypto Community has made with Bitcoin I think if you look at this Global green party it seems that they're really just anti- capitalists and Anti-Imperialist I don't think it has anything to do with clean energy or saving the Earth and it's very clear from all their actions every time they're successful okay we just get more LNG we get more n gas like so obviously they're not trying to save the environment it couldn't be more clear and then on top of that have you ever seen them protest China or Russia on building more nuclear reactors no the worst part is they're not building just for themselves they're building in Turkey Hungary Egypt usbekistan Argentina Iran Romania UK so like this going to be a situation with like Huawei and 5G Towers where we fight them and then you know build our own but that seems to be the most concerning thing for me is becom it's be very partisan but the one glimmer of hope is it it doesn't have to be so if you go back to the 70s and 80s uh the German Socialist Party actually supported nukes realizing that oh this will bring tons of jobs Soviet Union famously is like the best at nuclear after us yeah the state can control it and we give everyone a job with the plant and it's going to be amazing in a turn so I think we can get back there and I think this Andreas guy who went and climbed these towers was amazing I actually talked to Mark Nelson before the recording this podcast a big nuclear guy on Twitter he was telling me that Andreas built a ladder with his hands like a homemade ladder to get up that Tower and so we're seeing this tree hugger inversion which why did he have to build a why do he have to build a ladder they don't have Amazon in the same way they hate capitalism Euro Euro moment and so he built a ladder and he climbed it to save this great technology down all they have is twine and like you you get some sticks but like they got nothing man sorry I keep cutting you off it's just the idea that he had to build a ladder sorry if I could challenge you cik I mean why do you think that we can avoid partisanship I mean the 70s are a long time ago and we we seem to live in a world where everything has to be partisan and the the crypto I think so too I I agree with you but basically this point I'm trying to make is like this guy climbed this ladder to save a nuclear plant when's the last time you you know when was the last story about someone climbing a tree to save something and he actually made demands too which may have not been reported on so he actually said the CEO has to come out and talk to me of this nuclear plan he he just wanted pretty pretty ballsy and uh I'll just point so like basically we we had a woman named Laura lomer here in the US do that for X so sort she not have Twitter I remember she changed herself to the door dude when I first started writing pirate wires the world was so much more exciting to write about like it was like crazy [ __ ] every day we forget how [ __ ] I mean I was depressed I thought the world was ending in 2020 but like was she on top of the x or chained to the front door she was chained to the front door and she I think she like handcuffed herself to the door or something it was a crazy day on the internet I was like what I but I was sort of I was like yeah like answer for your sins like bring him out I want to hear why he's censoring us sorry finish your point we were like we got to wrap this one up yeah the very end of that point is yeah I mean he climbed that ladder he got him there made these demands and basically you know this can't be confirmed the COO is like hey dude like the reactor has already decommissioned like maybe do this you know wink wink do this somewhere else where it might actually make a difference um and I think it's interesting to take this kind of left leaning clothing of climbing a tree and like just take that stance to to save nucle I agree with Martin that maybe with I am sort of um I agree I share Martin's impulse towards skepticism on the part question because as you yourself said at the top of your take um this is not about energy and it it's about capitalism and if it's about capitalism and in America at least one of the parties is I mean as we were talking about earlier today in the Pod before you guys showed up um I mean the new Democratic plan is not capitalist is not pro business um and I think that the nuclear thing is perhaps being resisted as strongly as it is here not really Germany that's a different set but in America because it solves a problem that's that's a useful problem for the Democrats to have so if they lose the problem of of uh of global warming to wave over people's heads and scare you out of more production that's a that's one less weapon they have against against business I think that's my sort of push back on you it seems like you have somebody to say Grant I I just want to say that it it's trended being less and less of a partisan issue particularly over the last like 5 years years or so um Congress just passed the advance act which passed uh like overwhelmingly in like a bipartisan way basically Senator Bernie Sanders and Senator Mary were the only people who oppose that that's a bill that basically gives more authorities and some you know a new mission statement and it's basically trying to be a bipartisan signal to the NRC that hey we're actually we want to build nuclear now we need to build it coming from both parties I think that's a big step forward because nominally the last like four administrations have been pro-nuclear like but at the same time next Generation uh power companies are running into all the regulation in red tape that slung down so I I agree that I think there's things that are being done but there are also things that are holding back some of the latest and greatest from an innovation standpoint that is interesting I I wonder it sort of does prove that the left's overall hostility to I think there's I I maybe doesn't prove I'm like it proves it proves the opinion I'm about to give you um it seems to me that there's a general hostility on the left towards new innovation because they correctly understand that that generally leads to new industry and Industry generally speaking is like the only check on government power in this country and it maybe isn't even supposed to be that I I think that's actually what drives the government industry tension there there is real power and especially Tech now like that's a natural F of of real power that in has real influence on people's lives that exist for the most part outside of the government at there's there's always a a fear of the next thing that's going to disrupt their power which is what a lot of almost all of the AI conversation is really about it took the government five minutes to understand enough about AI to realize like okay this is another thing that's going to challenge our Authority potentially and we got to do something about it I I once did business with a company in Germany I went to leveren and uh there's a company called buyer it's uh sometimes called bear here the company is about 400 years old like that's the kind of company they they want like a company that's like really Ines in government and not new in breaking things and changing things and the auto in the auto example you see this with with Biden's uh you know talking about every Auto Company other than Tesla that's a really good point um well you guys uh wait Martin you gotta judge you gotta lay down the gauntlet here I like Jesse the most you know I think in this business show show business you have to be interesting you have to be exciting you can't put the people to sleep you're putting the people asleep uh Grant's you know second best I thought cardig was brilliant guy but again you know people want Pizzazz look at look at the the average you know talk show it's it's not boring and I say this um thank you Martin but I want to say that on pirate wires we have played with a lot of different things like on the on the different groups and Sanja you know just left and uh and she'll be back we'll have her as host probably as a guest judge eventually um I one of the things that sanina brought that I don't have and that nobody else on the team had was like a thoughtful introspective facts-based just like laying down something that we could actually speak to and I really relied on her for that um I agree with you generally Mar about like what makes a good show but I also need other stuff not just that um I uh I don't know where Brandon okay I thought Brandon like I'm [ __ ] over this um to the people listening um I don't know how we're going to make this selection process I think that you should vote in the comment section tell us who you want to join who who is your favorite this week we're going to go for a few few more weeks and I'll probably bring back people who ranked high in each episode and like have another one um tell me who you loved tell me um I don't know tell me something about Greta thumberg uh tell me you love us just tell me something rate review subscribe tell everybody um what else I have a note here oh conclusion right cuz this is the end of the episode uh it's been real Thanks For Watching! Like & Subscribe guys another great week on the pirate wires pod touch grass goodbye see you