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I think you kind of do. Hi everyone, this is Pivot from New York Magazine, the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Cara Swisher. And I'm Sky Galloway.
So I just flew in from San Francisco and I'm where my arms tired. I've heard that type before. I know. I don't know why I keep doing the night flights things.
I just keep getting too old for it. But I had, as you can hear, everybody, I have a cold and I actually was there to interview Gavin Newsom for his book, Young Man in a Hurry, which is now, I guess, Old Man in a Hurry. And so I went in to do that. And it was actually fantastic.
And we'll talk about it. That's got a lot of news. Yeah, I did. I made a lot of Newsmaker, my friend.
Just to be clear, I give you insight into our relationship, someone put out a thing saying that he was in support. He changes tone, he's in support of his name change. And I wrote smart and you berated me. So why don't you give us?
Not publicly. We're going to talk about it. We'll get into it. I didn't berate you.
It just was inaccurately depicting the interview I had just done. Because I wrote the word smart. No, because you were tweeting an inaccurate report. That's all that.
Who would up the inaccurate report? I don't know. It just was weird. It was weird because it was so not what he said.
And so it just annoys me. It just annoys me. I mean, I definitely made a lot of news in that interview. By the way, we talked a lot about his book, which was interesting.
But he's definitely not running for president, because no president ever puts out a book to further run the book. I know. Well, no, he kept saying that he wasn't sure. It was really funny.
And then right afterwards, it's actually, I like the book. It's gotten some type of views. But I think they've just decided who he is and are reviewing it based on sort of that anxious, jody, slick image versus a lot of stuff that he's done that's bright. He's a very complex person like yourself.
I've got to go. It's actually pretty authentic. Yeah. Let me just characterize this discussion.
The book I really like, I have to say. And I think I found out a lot of things about him that he didn't know about his mother. I knew a little bit about his mother's assistant suicide, but it was really interesting to talk about a lot about his own struggles. And not with the dyslexia part.
We didn't talk a lot about that. But a lot about, I didn't know, his wife had had had a miscarriage, for example. He has four kids. He almost had five.
It was all did a lot in there. There was a lot in there. And one of the things that struck me, which brings me back to you, which I know how you like that, is he was the son of a single mom who was not wealthy. And he has a lot of resonances with your mom.
You know what I mean? Like your story with your single mom who's struggling, father who was distant, and who he desperately wanted to be. It was really, it reminded me a lot of you, actually. I think people underestimate, Newsome, and I think they underestimate DeSantis and Rubio.
But I think right now, I think Governor Newsom hands down is the leading candidate on the Democratic side. And all that I think, I know a little bit about his personal story and actually it's quite compelling. And a lot of his personal failings, I think, will come across as a bit authentic. People know about them.
And also, I think California is going to begin, not to peak, but to recover at just the right moment for him. Yeah, I suspect. Anyway, it was really interesting, because I did feel like I was having the same discussion you and I have had about single moms. No, we're the same person, except he's much more talented and handsome and a hard character than we were the same guy.
That's what he suffers from. That's what everybody is sensitive to you and not to him. He definitely played into it. We talked about that.
It's a very personal thing, but we did get a lot of news, too. Yeah, I'm reading about it everywhere. I know. I literally see Gavin Newsom in this 11-year-old boy on stage when I'm going over.
And my voice is so, for those listening to what I apologize, this is a good version of my voice. I was absolutely dead horse three hours before, and I thought I'd have to cancel, but I did all manner of things to my voice to allow it to work. And he got to, and I said, you're lucky today. I've never had a man over talk me, so you're going to get some chance to do that today, which was funny.
And he does talk a lot, let me just say. So let's get right into it. President Trump says the US military intends to continue with assault on around for four to five weeks, if necessary. He keeps changing his tune.
We'll get to that in a second. The US and Israel begins strikes on Saturday, by a tola, as well as several senior officials. Iran is retaliating all over the place with missiles and drones, targeting Israel, the US bases and Gulf countries, Dubai, all manner of places. Four American service members have been killed, and Trump says there will likely be more, but quote, that's the way it is.
Kind of callous way to put it. Three US jets were also shot down in a friendly fire incident over Kuwait. The crew members got out safely. Thank goodness these are $90 million jets, so that's $270 million.
Trump has justified the attack on Iran, which did not receive congressional approval by citing, quote, imminent threats, that we have not provided evidence that it looks like he doesn't have any. That said, a lot of people are celebrating the death of the Ayatollah. Defense Secretary Pete Hegsez held a presser a little while ago. He said this is not so-called regime change war, but a regime sure did change.
Not clear of either of them is true, because Trump has talked about regime change and it doesn't appear as the regime has changed. Hegsez was also asked about the timeline. Let's listen to what he said between here and directly. To the media outlets and political left screaming endless wars, stop.
This is not Iraq. This is not endless. I was there for both. Our generation knows better, and so does this president.
He called the last 20 years of nation building wars at dumb. And he's right. This is the opposite. Well, it's nice to hear from his talk both.
I don't know what he's talking about, but I also want to note about this interview I did with California Governor Gavin News and over the weekend for the latest episode on with Cara Souss It's really interesting because one of the issues was all the misinformation online. It was really quite, it wasn't just something you tweeted, but it was all over the place misreporting where he stands on all this. Let's listen to what he told me, and this was just a small piece of it, because he went on for a while decrying Donald Trump's action. Let's go.
And that's Donald Trump, the chaos president, this wrecking ball president across the board. Destruction is not strength. And once again, we've seen, and not only our allies in relationship to the rest of the world, but we're seeing them destroy any capacity to explain fundamentally what the core American interest is at this moment to declare war to go to war with the regime. And all of this is playing out in real time.
News to post on that. So over the weekend, the corrupt and oppressive Iranian regime must never have nuclear weapons. Leadership Iran must go. That doesn't justify the president of the United States engaging in a legal dangerous war.
Very similar to what Senator Warner said. All the senators pretty much said, this guy deserved to die at the same time. This seems like a chaotic mess. Let's talk a little bit about it.
And especially the economic impact that the fighting has effectively shut down the street of Hormuz, which carries one fifth of the world's well-supply as this recording oil prices are about 7% gas futures jumped as much as 9%. Spike and energy places supply chain strained broader ripple effects across the global economy, especially because of the uncertainty. And the last thing I would note is, and it's interesting as Trump does respond to this, is that there's much reporting, including in the Washington Post, about how he was convinced to do it through Mohammad bin Salman and Benjamin Netanyahu and even JD Vance and General Kane did not want to do this. But here we are.
So we talk a little bit about where it's going to go from here and your thoughts. The answer is I have no idea, or I have a vision for where you hope it goes. But I'm sympathetic to Governor's Newsome and Senator Warner, the notion that, we're going to end up, after Trump has gone, we have to be thoughtful about how we improve the tensile strength of our democracy by stopping the slow but steady leak of power from Congress, which is the people to the president under the auspices or cold comfort that they will speak to certain norms. Because effectively, a president should not be able, military action you can maybe justify, but this is war.
He used the word war. I know this is war. It is war. And I'm sympathetic to the notion that the reason we have 535 members of Congress representing, you know, two per state in the Senate and one for every 750,000 people is the American people are supposed to have to say.
But Democrats at 7% are actually in favor of this. So there's going to need to be, the best thing we could do coming out or one of the best things on the coming out of the Trump administration, and this highlights that, is to have structural reform around gerrymandering, citizens united, and that Congress has to be involved or briefed or that we have to go back to this notion where only Congress can decide if in fact we go to war. Now, where could this go? As you know, I'm in favor, loosely speaking around this action because I was like to ask myself what could go right.
Iran is 90 million people, sits on the second largest natural gas reserves, the third largest oil reserves, incredible science, incredible universities, incredible entrepreneurial spirit, actually quite a non secular. It was, that's for sure. Non secular, well, I would argue it's fairly non secular. A lot less anti-West than people have been led to believe by what I think is one of the most oppressive brutal regimes in history.
So what could go right? You could have one of the largest economies in the Middle East become more pro-West. It's been punching below its weight class for 20 or 30 years now because of poor technology and sanctions. You could immediately see it come up and be an economic power that is pro-West, pro-trading, pro-capitalist.
What effectively might be one of the biggest tax cuts in history if you didn't, if you saw more consistent flows of oil and technology in a great trading partner, actually Europe would be the biggest beneficiary and turn what has been the primary agent of chaos and terror in an unstable region into something resembling, I don't even call it pro-West but neutral West. So I think there's a lot that could go right here. And I think the risk assessment provided to the president in my view had a lot of asymmetric upside. Now having said that, what they missed here was part of the pal doctrine and that is you have to have clearly articulated objectives.
More plans for next, to your point, they just haven't been able to articulate in the last 24 hours. What is the offer amp in the objective here? Is it regime change? Is it a more friendly regime?
Is it, I mean, what exactly, and all that you're not gonna get, this notion that all of a sudden we're gonna provide air cover and the Iranian people are gonna rise up and overtake 150,000 members of the RGC who are deeply integrated into. They have outside plans. There's some great reporting on this, by the way, like legitimate news organizations. They have contingency plans in place for what happens if the I told the guys and they're carrying them out.
Okay, but in Syria, Libya, interact. These were autocracies with the central figure head. The RGC is very deeply embedded into the economy. So when you're mortgaging your salaries being paid by the RGC, it's not like, okay, the top guy Assad is gone and boom, it's a new administration.
So there's a lot about the ground game, there's a lot about intelligence assets. And if they had said, we are going to, for example, potential off-ground, we're gonna new to their Navy, we're gonna diminish their air defense capabilities, we're gonna make sure for sure, there is absolutely no ability to create or enrich nuclear stockpiles. And then we're gonna leave it up to the Iranian people, that's technically an off-around. But I have seen in the last 24 hours and talk about regime change, no, this isn't regime change.
So they haven't been able to articulate what is next. Well, I don't believe they thought about it. And one of the things that a lot of people are pointing out is the involvement of Netanyahu and the head of Saudi Arabia who publicly had said he was against this, but privately was quite foreign, pressing foreign. The linkage between the corruption with the Trump family and this coin-operated presidency that I talk about all the time is really very clear because most, I would say, they're trying to come up with a story after the fact, so it hasn't worked, it isn't an endless war, although it feels kind of like an endless war, it feels very bushy and right?
You definitely had echoes of that. I think he thought it was gonna be Venezuela, right? That it was like, just take that guy out. And by the way, he's in business with the Maduro administration.
He didn't regime change that place at all, like speaking of regime change. This is much more complicated. I agree, but I think he thought it was like that. No, I'm agreeing with you.
This is not take out Maduro and this is much more. He just has cowed the regime into it, but it's the same regime. In this case, it's really fascinating how they have put themselves into this economy in a way that's very hard to get them out, right? Of course, this is their point of these very corrupt and I'd say evil and moles in Iran.
But one of the things that's fascinating to me is one that's the continued corruption of Trump's family and Trump within this region. And second of all, have you noticed he's calling, I'm waiting for a call from him myself. Like he called Jake Taprey, called a bunch of John Carl. He's called all the regular old media people essentially, or the people he decries all the time.
And it seems like he's workshopping different reasons. Like it's, that's so disturbing. Yeah, he's trying to figure out what people want. But there is, again, what could go right here?
The most powerful instinct of survival. And what we pulled off here, when I say we, I actually think it was more than the most than us, we effectively, and I don't think people really register how profound this was. Within about two hours, we took out the equivalent of the president, the secretary of defense, and the head of the joint chiefs. Right, they were all in this place, but yes.
And then, and what has got to be the strategic mistake of, I would say the last five years, other than the decision by Hamas to go into Israel, geopolitically, they started attacking civilian targets with an adult. I've got an idea. Farid Zakaria noted that this is a mistake. I mean, that's just, okay, you want to isolate yourself from who should naturally be sympathetic to you.
Now, going back to this notion of survival instinct, at some point, you got to think the next level down. And I don't know if it's 1000 or 10,000 or 150,000, or 50,000 RDCs say, okay, we too, really like our families in this thing called life. Maybe we need to come to some sort of accommodation with the US and the West. So that would require, as boots on the ground, and Trump didn't even roll that out again.
Like, here's the way to really drive me crazy. This idea, they're like, it's not endless war. The other presidents were just dumb. It's the same thing.
They're just trying very hard to spend it. By the way, you noted a poll that half Americans supported. It's actually not the case. Many of the poll is trying 25%.
Usually- I didn't say 55% of Republicans and it's about 30%. Now amongst Democrats, it's 7%. And I'm amongst the 7% of Democrats who support this. But it's a little bit different because, okay, what they're hoping for, and maybe it's a hallucination, that it's not boots on the ground, that it sandals and sneakers and slippers that the Iranian people, based on the problems, the 30,000 people that have been mowed down with the front lines, they were the Marines, they were the shock troops who were willing to risk their lives.
So the reality is kind of what the off ramp will be, or how this plays out. Or how it will play out in the next week, in terms of the Iranian populace's ability to foam and change on the ground, because the American public does not have any appetite for boots on the ground. But what I talked to a senator this morning, I'm like, isn't a reasonable off ramp? That you would say, okay, we're gonna diminish their ability to wreak havoc to a point, you know, 0.1, we're gonna chop skies, we're gonna diminish their navy, we're not gonna clear out their minesweepers from the Straits of Poor Moose, we're gonna absolutely ensure there's zero capability nuclear, and then we're gonna declare- Liberated in June, just let's point that out.
Fair point, again, more inconsistency. Why did we need to go back in to to diminish their nuclear capacity when you said it was done seven months ago? So there is inconsistent messaging, but I think- In my opinion, the opportunity is here to diminish the capacity to continue to levy this depravity and oppression amongst its populace, and potentially liberate one of the great cultures and civilizations history that sits on unbelievable economic potential, economic prosperity. There is a real potential upside here.
You know where else there's a potential upside? Is Ukraine the same thing? Like this. So what's really interesting here is he yells that you're up for not pulling their fairs here in defense, fine.
I can see that argument, even though he makes it in the crude and repulsive way. Why isn't Saudi Arabia and Israel paying for this? We're doing their cop duty, and we happen to have a corrupt cop on the beat. How is Israel sacrificed?
Sur sacrificed. I'm talking about, you don't hear the same language, right? Saudi Arabia wanted this to happen, they should pay for it. Like if that's really the thing, why do I have to pay as an American taxpayer?
$270 million for three planes, like that kind of stuff. And so why isn't this money deployed elsewhere that I think isn't not me, I'm not running this show? But like why isn't Ukraine the same thing? Like that's what's really interesting is there's a country that is full of like economic, talk about economic opportunities, same thing.
Let me focus you on the, we've told on the US economy because all these, the free, well, first of all, every attempt at regime change in the Middle East has failed almost miserable for the United States, or a version of regime change. Afghanistan everywhere, everywhere we go. Well, it didn't, to be fair, it did work in the Balkans. We have had successful interventions.
In Kuwait, we successfully failed at different stairs, we did it multilaterally, which he's stupid to do here. Already Britain, our closest ally, is humming and honing about letting us use the airfields. He wants to go it alone, which is stupid. Anyway, I interrupt you, you talk about the economics here.
So I want to know about the effect on the economy, because one of the things, because when people start a war, it tends to be in the 60s period, right? It's 25, and I get that the Democrats don't like it, but 25 is a bad place to start when you're doing a war, which if you remember the studs got, and everyone being vaguely excited when they were doing, I mean, I even myself, which is grotesque, because I now have children, I'm like, oh, no, no, no. But they talk about the toll on the economy, because every, and the maga people, green, Carlson, even more heinous people, are talking about this is not what we voted for, right? This is not, and they're trying very desperately to pretend it's not an endless war.
Whatever word they're going to use, he's not going to work with these people. He's already struck seven countries, seven events, like he's done more war, like it was interesting because Hillary Clinton was so prescient about exactly what he would do here. He seems to like and have an appetite for military action, because everything's going so badly for him. So talk about the effect on the use economy, oil prices, right?
Inflation, more danger for the US in terms of attacks on our own soil from the Iranians, the craz, I mean, if you back these Iranians into a corner, they might do something really dire here in this country. What is the total in the US economy? And let me add in that people were using this word of cash in online betting markets, which was repulsive. And Calche reported he saw $36 million in bet volume related to whether or not there will be regime change in Iran on polymarket 529 million was traded on contracts tied to the timing of the strikes.
And some of them seem rather suspect, polymarket defended decision to allow betting on the start of wars, saying it's invaluable source of news and answers. It's feels like profiteering to me. But talk a little bit of the impact on the economy. What's next, if under, I think of three, two scenarios, what's next for the economy?
Well, just a go on reverse order. I actually would argue that we have diminished. I mean, you have what is, what was the superpower in the region with their proxies, Hezbollah, Hamas, the Houthis, wreaking havoc economically, and in terms of oppression of different people in the region. And their organizing principle was death to Israel and death to America.
And I would argue that even if we don't have the regime change or a quote unquote liberated capitalist, West friendly Iran, that their ability to strike at us in our proxies overseas on our basis is actually been diminished. That they're not now, we need to be more worried. I think we need to actually be less worried. There are two scenarios here.
One scenario is we end up in another forever war that explodes our deficits. And we keep incrementally making excuses for trying to impose democracy which is an oxymoron. And oil prices, the Strait of Hormuz gets blocked off and oil prices skyrocket. Now, to a certain extent, if you wanted to be really Machabelian, that doesn't hurt us that much because we are energy independent who this really is hurting, but Venezuela and Iran is China.
80% of Iran's oil was going to China, the same with Venezuela. So we can survive an oil shock, but you could have an increase in deficits of a forever war disruption in supply chain, straining our relationships with the allies. I personally think there's more asymmetric upside where we unlock stronger oil flows, better technology, a potential trading partner for Europe in the US. And I would argue, I would bet, I believe in six months, that oil prices will be lower than they are today.
Now, to your point about costs and economics, I am sympathetic to the left's view, many people on the left, that these forever wars and foreign intervention and imperialist imposing our own values on other cultures and other nations is not only wrong, it is just really fucking expensive. I'm sympathetic to that, but I'm not sympathetic to it. Can I make a correction? It's Charlie Kirk talked about this.
The right, this has been an animating issue. Well, I was just about to get there, Cara. The right has a very strong isolationism. What is inconsistent for me?
It is consistent to say, let's focus on our problems domestically, let's spend money domestically, let's not run out deficits with tax cuts and forever wars in a macho military. And let's stay out of other people's knitting, recognizing that we respect the right, their right to govern themselves and shape their own future. What is totally inconsistent is the far right or the right's isolationist rhetoric while approving a $1.1 trillion military budget. Because my view is the only rationale for having a $1.1 trillion military budget is quite frankly, on a regular basis, you're going to go on your toes.
Because if we don't want to get involved in this kind of foreign adventures or misadventures, whatever you want to characterize it, there's no risk of Canada invading us. Let's take our military budget down to $300 billion and pay off our deficit. So I've never understood the right fascination with ridiculous military spending and this isolationist complexion. I personally think the upside over the medium and the long term here economically, with a peaceful Middle East, once its primary sponsor of terror is neutered here, I think actually I think this over the medium and the long term could be really good for Europe.
And if we could figure out a way to end the war in Ukraine, figure out a way to have a neutral West Iran, I think you're going to see the largest tax cut in history because I think the flows of oil will cut oil probably in half and you'll have an incredible trading partner with what is one of the most productive capitalists in many ways societies in history and that's the Persian people. Yeah, that is true. I understand. One of the things that troubles me is this, one is that he really doesn't seem to have a plan and he's the president, right?
And that people within his administration, he'll call you and ask me for your plan to happen. He's going to, my plan is for you to step down but then I would get you to advance. But that's my suggestion. And you should go off and spend all this money you've stolen from people.
But one of the things that I think about a lot is what that this is done in such a haphazard way without the involvement of Congress, right? That really is troublesome. And that these Republicans who are against these things immediately get in line. Now look, Lindsey Graham, that's Southern Bell has always been wanting to do this, right?
And now he wants to go, he is Southern Bell. And he's wanted to do this. He wants to do Cuba next. Let's do Cuba next, right?
That's the whole thing. This is all, he just in his mistaken. Cuba isn't blinding its women. It's not hanging teenage girls and then sending rape.
He said Cuba, he did. I'm saying that makes it. In my opinion, as much as a war hawkers, I see no logical reason to invade Cuba. Well, I think that's next.
It seems like they're just going to get bored over here and come over here. But this is something Lindsey Graham has wanted forever in his endless and sad attempt to be more masculine in some fashion. So fine, fine, Lindsey, that's fine. But one of the things that really drives me crazy is these people are so, they shift.
These people say one thing one week and then shift it the next week. Like, look, I know you like to talk about, but they're sticking to their guns on these kind of things. I like to talk about it. That was a left a lot.
But the right just shifts it. Like, it's like we're against it, we're against it. Charlie Kirk said, let's not be dragged into this by, so let's focus here. Okay, then let's cut our military budget to 300 billion.
I get it, I get it, but I just don't see why. They shift this way. It's really, it's sad because I like when there's argument over what we should do here in a way that everybody gets to. And it's meant to be a discourse in the Congress.
I agree with that. Very gold, very gold order call this in the 70s. He said that we have become dangerously used with slow leak of power from the co-equal branches of government and Congress to the president. And what kept that mostly in check was a series of norms where the president would go and inform the Senate Intelligence Committee, or the defense, the people on the defense committee, that he would give them a heads up.
He'd invite them to the White House and say, this is what we're thinking, what do you think? Those norms are gone. And so there's gotta be, unless there is structural reform around what it means to have co-equal ground, Republicans are resigning from Congress because they're like, what the fuck am I here? Yeah, yeah.
The Speaker of the House is not Mike Johnson. He's the Speaker of the White House. He's there to run roughshod over. People in the minority party are used to getting fucked over.
They're used to having no power. But Republicans are like, let me get this. I stuck around to be in the majority of sets. I could represent my people and get policy through.
And I'm not even consulted on this yet. No, and on the Democratic, I'd say, Center is conservative. I've never seen Senator Warner, who I've considered pretty moderate, moderate more than moderate. I mean, I think he's often we often disagree on a lot of stuff.
He was incandescent, you know, because he sees these things. He knows he has so much experience in Senate intelligence, et cetera, et cetera. And to watch people who had said the very opposite shift was really something because at the very bottom of this, it puts people's lives at risk unnecessarily. And not just American troops, which is terrible.
It's people on the ground there, Iranian citizens, which American troops, and I worry about American, you know, people attacking here. And it just creates a situation that when you, there's just a, this guy, this guy's gotta have a better reason than to call someone and have a different reason every minute. And we'll see its effect on the stock markets, not loving this at all. But we'll see, we'll see where it goes.
But you brought up Calche. And what's fascinating about these things is they tend to be right, that those are wisdom of the crowds. And when you have Senator Warner, who has just had a lot, this is not his first rodeo, he's had a ton of presidents and joint chiefs come before him and explain their plans. And when you have Senator Mark Kelly, who's actually flown these missions, if you don't take advantage of the benefit of their insight, even if they don't agree with you, you're not taking advantage of the greatest depth, the greatest IP depth of knowledge and experience in military history.
And that's amongst quite frankly, many of our members of Congress. If you're not bringing Representative, Representative Seth Molten in and saying, hey, when you were on the ground in Iraq, instead we're consulting with a Senator from Florida, a former Fox TV host and a reality game show host, they're making these decisions. And the FBI is being run by a guy who likes to party in the middle of a possible terrorist action in this country. So they're just going to make, and this is, I was like to try and reverse engineer to a personal learning here.
One of my biggest flaws, biggest flaws as a man, is I thought that masculinity and leadership was making a quick survey of the situation and then making a decision. And then it was my job to talk everyone into my decision. No, it's not. Leadership is listening and occasionally going, oh fuck, I got it wrong, we need to switch course.
I don't make now, I didn't learn this until I was literally 50. I don't make a big decision personally, financially, professionally, without talking to three or four really fucking smart people. Because you can't read the label from inside of the bottle. And the US Congress is full of some of the most impressive experienced smartest people in the world.
And beyond that, there's the people of the world. And also they have this incredible task of representing their constituency to not check in with them. I think Senator Warner is apoplectic because he's like, for God's sakes, we can save you from yourself. That's right, that's right.
He wasn't out of ego. I mean, I'm doing that. It was really interesting. Anyway, we have to move on.
This is a developing story. We'll see what happens. It seems like a very, as Gavin Newsom said, a chaotic White House, it might be trying to get us away from the Epstein files or other issues at home. We didn't even talk about the distraction.
But we're going to quick break. We come back, Trump targets anthropic, another incredible tech company in what former Trump official calls attempted corporate murder. Hey, I'm AppiShel, comedian, writer, and floating head. You may or may not have seen on your 4U page.
And I'm starting a brand new podcast. Wait, wait, don't swipe away. It's called That Sounds Like A Lot. As in, that feeling when you check your phone in the morning, I'm going to be like, oh, that sounds like a lot.
I can't deal with all this. But guess what? I can deal with it. And I'm going to get into it every Friday.
I'll break down whatever chaos is happening in the world. Then I'll sit down with a comedian. You can be progressive and not be like fucking annoying. Maybe an actor.
They go coming in and going too far. You go, why? Does the Sadie Hawkins dance happen? Maybe a filmmaker.
Since leaving that show, I'm challenged to spare him. I just got to hang out and try to do it. Here's the one with a charmed line. Could be a politician, basically anyone who responds to my cold DMs.
We're recording the whole thing in a beautiful studio. So yes, you can watch it on YouTube. You can listen wherever you get your podcast. This is not the place to get the news, but it is the place to feel a little better about it.
That sounds like a lot part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. So we are 250 years into this American experiment. And I'm saying it's going OK. I give us like a C plus.
There is no perfect past. But there is also no exclusively negative past. Because humans are going to human. That's what we do.
I think the story of America is the struggle of people who have not been included in the promise of America to expand those principles to include more people. What's going to determine the next 250 years of America? And how do we write a new social contract that can give us the democracy we deserve? OK, so I'm just going to be a jerk here because I'm a historian.
So we have to have a prologue explaining, you know, we the people. OK, you guys, you still remember it from Schoolhouse Rock. We the people that don't even form a word for beauty and establish justice. What is it?
Ensured domestic tranquility? So you're talking about a foundational document. So I'm building a document that will protect American democracy. That's this week on America, actually.
This week on Network In Shell, I'm joined by Tanksin Atra, the meme king with over $50 million across Tanks Good News, influencers in the wild, and his personal account. Tank is breaking down what the meme economy really is, how much a single sponsored post pays, why major brands are throwing serious money at jokes, and how mean culture, think preparation, age, starter packs, and a perfectly timed screenshot is actually reshaping how we think about money and value. Get ready for a conversation that'll change the way you scroll, make you rethink what going viral is really worth, and prove that sometimes the most serious money moves are wrapped in the silliest of jokes. Listen, wherever you get your podcasts, or watch on YouTube.com slash your rich BFF.
Scott, we're back, President Trump, appointed federal agencies to stop using anthropic after it did not come to a deal with the Pentagon and Safety Defense Department will phase out the use of anthropic products of the next six months, which will, I will tell you, hurt national security. Anthropic plans to challenge the supply chain designation in court, good for them. When it comes to the App Store, anthropic is winning. Claude is the number one spot in the Apple's Free Apps, as we tape.
Anthropic also faced a major outage on Monday with a company saying it's been dealing with, quote, unprecedented demand. Meanwhile, open AI, of course, ever the opportunist, open AI, Sam Altman, reached an agreement with the Pentagon, the company claims it's not a way to ensure its technologies would adhere to its safety principles by installing technical guard bills. However, when Sam Altman was asked on ask whether he worried about their beef future disputes with the Pentagon and what's legal, he responded, yes, I am. Oh, my God, Sam, I gotta tell you need to stop talking.
A former Trump official called it anthropic order, attempted court murder. It's a backdrop of open AI raising $110 billion in its latest funding, including $50 billion of Amazon and $30 billion from both NVIDIA and SoftBank, and these continue round-tripping kind of deals. I read a lot this weekend about this, and one of the people involved was a guy named Emil Michael, who used to be an executive at Uber, who was possibly one of the most bullying and awful executives, and full of all manner of bad behaviors. He left the company, we wrote some stories, the thing he was involved in that was just so not a good behavior, I would say.
I have spent time with him. He was the one that was negotiating this, not a surprise. He kept calling Dario Amodi from Anthropic, God, God, he thinks he's God or whatever. I've never met anyone who thinks he's God more than Emil Michael, and he's usually a toady to more powerful people, in this case, Pete Haggseth.
Anyway, it seems a ridiculous overreach on the behalf of government, probably anthropic will win. I think it probably will benefit from this, as you've noted many times. Any more thoughts on this? I don't think we're any safer as the people for having done this.
I think what people miss is that over the last 12 months, out of 23 markets, were the 21st, best performing, or the third worst. And what has changed? We've had incredible innovation. The debt was up $50,000.
We still have credible innovation. We dominate the most tectonic shift in technology. The thing that's changing is, I believe, we're experiencing a rotation out of US stocks and a compression of multiples. And the reason why is the following, the underpinnings of why so much capital flows into the US from every other market in the world is our incredible IP developed mostly through funding of research at universities, an incredibly risk aggressive culture based on immigrants who take huge risk to get here.
And also, I think more than anything, probably, or chicken and egg, it attracts the deepest pools of capital in history. There's $5 million in venture capital for every startup in the US. There's only 1 million for every startup in Europe. Anthropic started six years ago.
If it was in Europe, it'd be one of the most valuable companies. But when government starts selectively punishing and rewarding companies based on political favoritism, that capital gets scared and starts withdrawing. Because why do you invest in open AI or anthropic if you don't know who you're waking up next to in terms of its ability to raise capital based on the blood sugar level of whoever's president? So this is not only the wrong thing to do and makes this feel less safe and is probably illegal.
It's going to hit your 401k, folks. And even a place like the Gulf that are run by autocracies, they have a real respect for systemic laws in the market because they recognize the moment they start fucking with companies based on their own who's in or out of political favor, which has no stock market because nobody wants to invest and then find out that CEO got a call from the wrong person or got on the wrong list. And as all of a sudden, how to business? So even in China, people, I think they learned their lesson a little bit with DD where they got angry at DD and basically crushed DD.
They're now, they have a lot of respect for essentially regulatory bodies, consistent application of rule of law trying not to play favorites. So this will, the immediate reaction will be, okay, they're wrong, this is illegal, fine. And also from a commercial standpoint, I've been saying for the last year that someone has an incredible commercial opportunity to say, enough, we're the good guys. We do not buy into this.
If this costs us money in the short term, fine, but the very American values that gave us so much opportunity are under attack and we're just not down with it. And I don't know if you remember me saying this, I said six months ago, the biggest opportunity for Nike, which is trading at a 10 year low was to run a bunch of ads saying, we're about American values. And what's going on here is wrong. What's interesting is the corporate American needed a hero and it looks like it's Dario.
I know, it's interesting. What's really interesting here is I think, and it's finally happening, they're shaping up to be Joe Frazier and Muhammad Ali here. And I think that Dario's been very smart. And I think it's up to us in the media or progressive.
And I'm obviously stitching this into the rizzas and unsubscribe thinking, I think it's time to start figuring out if there's a way to be more commercially supportive of anthropic and less supportive of open AI. Basically, open AI has decided to enable and be complicit in the Trump administration's efforts. And Dario and anthropic have said, no, we're not going along here. We're not going to be intimidated.
This is quite frankly, Kara, I have been waiting for this match up for a year. I know, yeah, I know. Let me say, I don't know Dario and Modi. I don't actually, and you might be arrogant, which is in line with most people in tech.
That may be true. But I do know Emil Michael, who did negotiations. And I do know David Sacks. And both of them are Aryan operators, Cisless bullies and anxious toadies to the powerful, in my experience of covering them.
Sam Altman is a little more complex, but he's a gifted opportunist, which doesn't make him that different from anybody in Silicon Valley. And has made his choice here, right? That's he wants the business. And so it's a really knowing the characters involved here.
And then on the top of it, you have an idiot, like a moron, like Pete Haggseth, who doesn't know what's happening, communicating to someone who's even more moronic on these issues, which is Donald Trump, who I think just, I suspect, Sacks is whispering in his ear, and Emil Michael's whispering in Haggseth's ear. And this is all a Silicon Valley beef, right? Between and among these people. Emil was, was had to leave Uber under very, not great circumstances, was pushed out.
I think all these people is payback for other people. It's just, there's a lot of Silicon Valley drama happening here. And I don't know, I really don't. It's unusual that I don't.
And I've asked for interviews with him. He has not agreed to do an interview with me. Thanks, Chris, and Elty. But I do, and he did a very good interview with CBS News, actually, which I thought was interesting.
He handled himself really well. He handled himself really well. He starched his hat wide in that interview. Yeah, it was a good interview.
But one of the things that I know is the people on the other side of him are very, people I covered for years who are just not good. How can I say this nicely? They're the worst of the people I had to cover over the many years. I have to say, they're literally the worst.
And to see them in these positions of power is making these decisions and hurting a company that just doesn't want to do business with them. And actually, Michael tweeted out against a Modi weeks ago, it's so unprofessional as a government. It's such based in beefs that were happening elsewhere. And I mean, I had ended up having drinks with him after he was sort of jumped out of Uber.
And he said something to me. It was so strange. He goes, well, I'm so glad we can be friends. And I remember saying to him, we're not friends.
I think what you did there is terrible. I don't know where you operate. But let him just do what he wants. And don't bring your stupid insecure beefs out on the thing.
And it will benefit in anthropic. It will. I think he's handling himself. And he may be arrogant.
He may have a God comes. I don't know. But he's certainly not like these people. And in that case, the bar is low.
I've had my say. I think it's a big opportunity. I think Americans and consumers are so ready to vote with their pocketbooks. And Sam, I don't think Sam has acquitted himself well.
I'm not going to have advertising. We would never do porn. Well, I need to raise money, never mind. And the largest customer in the world, which is the US government, needs to have a series of systemic laws that don't, that these are the rules you get to play by in a full stop.
Everyone is entitled to and obligated to the same set of rules, not who you like or who you don't like, which kind of leads to our next story, which is Netflix and Paramount. Right, Netflix. Speaking of that, Scott, let's take a quick break. We come back.
Netflix emerges as a winner after losing the Warner Brothers battle. Scott, we're back. Netflix may have lost the battle for Warner Brothers, but it's looking like a winner. Boy, this is incredible.
The company Sock Search, 14% of it formally exited the bidding war. It also now has $2.8 billion in the bank after Paramount paid the Warner Brothers breakup fee. When I have to plan all along with the saddle Paramount with debt, drive up the price and walk away with more money. Tense Rando said there are easier ways to make $2.8 billion.
It's very funny. He's also trashing it so beautifully. I have to say, what a pro the way. It's ridiculously expensive.
He's dropping all sorts of bone mows in that Bloomberg interview. I'm hoping to do it relatively soon. He noted that Paramount deals depended on cost cutting leading to less production, less people working. He's 100% right on the Paramount front CEO, David Ellison, who got strafed by Barry Deller as a stunt pilot in the speech.
Another thing, just announced that Paramount plus HBO Max, we combined one streaming service, he also said there would be a lot of cuts, $6 billion in cuts that he can quickly deleverage it. Nobody believes him or thinks he's capable of doing it. Sorendo said talk more about $16 billion. Let me just tell you Hollywood.
Look out below. This is, I don't think Allison means to be incorrect, but he is incorrect about what's about to happen here because the pressure is on this much data. I talked to as you know, Bill Cohen, because you weren't around us, but this much debt is enormous amounts of debt. It's like crazy.
They don't have enough income. They have barely enough income, so they can't grow. They have to cut. There's obvious duplication that they will cut, but even more than that, anything they say at this point is just absolutely untrue.
It's just, again, I don't think they mean it that way. I think they believe it, that they can, you know, turn shit into a chicken, chicken, chicken salad, but most smart math people don't think they can do it, especially with competitors like Netflix breathing down on YouTube, laying down their neck. Your thoughts? Well, I think I've been consistent on this.
The big losers are the creative community. They don't realize it. I don't know, half a million of them just got lined up in shot. I mean, the amount of AI slop are going to come out of paramount and Warner, trying to pass for, you know, great breakthrough content.
It's just going to be, like I said, you know, in space, no one can hear you scream. Oh, trust me, you're going to hear a lot of people scream. And the biggest winner hands down. And I told Ted this.
I said, if you walk from this, you realize your stock's going to go up 10%. I was wrong. In the last five days, the stock's up 30%. Back to other levels.
Okay. So let's look at it this way. They quite, quite technically save $120 billion by not acquiring it. And their stock's up $100 billion.
Cara, they could go by Disney right now for walking from Warner Brothers. So, and if I were them and I was Ted and I'd be pissed off, I'd be firing up my lobbyists and my lawyers and be like, delay and obviously make it create so much havoc for this deal to close. And by the way, every studio, every creative, they're all going to want to go to work for one place. Okay.
Do I want, if I'm pitching, I just had my latest book option for a series and for documentary, which means absolutely nothing I've figured out in Hollywood. Your man? No, it's not big a man. Yeah, for original scripted series and a documentary.
Anyways, think of it as an R rated wonder years. Who's playing me? Everybody. Everybody.
Everybody. Everybody. It's in a little tiny. I see.
With a puppy German Shepherd. No, he looks like a teenage boy too. I'm just kidding. So these guys, the amount of money, let me go this way.
Say, say here in the creative community and you have the hottest script or the hottest actor and you have offers from, from the Paramount studio, from Warner or for Netflix. Who are you absolutely going to pick? Netflix. Oh my God.
They're going to every day of the week and twice. HBO. HBO. HBO.
HBO. You all hated Netflix. Now you're going to love them. It's really, and by the way, when the Democrats come into power, that's going to be good for them too.
HBO just lost 30% of his time because HBO's asset was always able to punch about the It's two billion in content relative to Netflix is 18 billion. But if there was a show people were talking about around the water cooler, whether it was girls or euphoria or Game of Thrones or succession, it usually was HBO because HBO's culture and ability when I'm talking a lot about me, my favorite subject, but when we pitched my big tech series, everybody, all the creatives and all the stars, they all wanted to go with HBO. They love Netflix, but if we had our choice, we would have gone with HBO. Guess what?
That just changed overnight. Completely. I wouldn't do a thing with them. I have to say, I got some shows.
I don't have no interest in them. What so they can figure out how to produce it for a third of the budget using an eye? I can't. Also, one of the things that's interesting is that there was an interesting movement.
Also, I think the CNN part of it is a smaller part of it. It's going to be a lot of news, right? It's still because it's CNN, the merger. They've already made a massive CBS, but they're going to make a bigger massive CNN.
I have heard from so many HBO people that are like, fuck, like fuck was everything and a dozen HBO people, CNN is losing its ever-love in mind as they should. They're like, what do we do? I'm like, I'm not going to be here. So it's not like.
I was like, I don't know what to tell you, but I wouldn't work for those hacks. But one of the things that's interesting is the idea that Netflix takes a little bit of this money and hires the Anderson Cooper and the best of them and creates a little news service. They should. Like a really good one.
I talked to the one who runs Content and Netflix and I said, I have an idea. Bella? Bella. Bella.
Yeah. It starts on something called the hour and higher the two thirds of the people from 60 minutes, they would like to leave right now and have a show, a weekly show called the hour or 59 minutes. I offer, I'll tell you who's good and who's not. You don't think all of those people are looking for a way to get off the, on the last helicopter out of Saigon right now?
Yeah. So it's interesting that they do see the need to change out. I mean, obviously the economics of a lot of broadcast and cable television is out of whack with the revenues clearly all through the industry by the way. Netflix is up 30% Netflix.
Netflix should be out. The market has decided the Netflix is worth $100 billion more. More. By now.
Without Warner Brothers. They could spend a very low amount of money putting together a really interesting news offering. At the same time, you know, as obviously CBS is going to go, it's going right in a really weak sauce way. It's really kind of wimpy right and stupid right.
But I mean, if you're going to be right, go all the way to Fox, that's my feeling. And it's an ever dying audience, by the way. I mean, my mom's average listener essentially. She's 92.
But one of the things that I think will help is- Fox is doing really well actually. Yeah, that's right. You're not going to get, you're not catching Fox. Here's a crazy stat.
It's more moderate to watch Fox and CNN right now. Well, I'm not surprised. It's anyway, one of the news parties, I mean, Jennifer, and there's several people who are quite good over there. But there's a lot of great people to see that.
Let me be clear. There's a lot of great reporters throughout that organization and they do a great job. People tend to focus on Scott Jennings at night when there's lots of people. I mean, I feel stupid or with Abby Phillips.
Okay, stop. Scott Jennings is the problem over there. Oh, no, CNN is the problem for putting him on him on him and crossfire. That show is- I'm saying there's a lot more to see in than that show.
So it gets a lot of attention. But one of the things that I think is interesting is it really opens up an opportunity for MS now because they're by themselves over there on the left. It's a great business, right? It's just sort of like the Fox that the left.
And so they have a huge opportunity. You are in love with your- I'm not. You're in love with traditional media. This is who it's an opportunity for.
I'm saying a small opportunity. It's an opportunity for Bill Cohen and Ben Thompson and Cara Swisher. I know that. You're about to see a massive diffusion of power from these industrial brands.
It's already happened. I'm saying money is probably most expensive. I'm saying I'm not going to see a large-sized company he's been selling. I couldn't see a massive diffusion of power from him and I was only saying he's now a student at it.
I think CNN should have given me an opportunity to be innovative. They have an opportunity to be innovative. But they're all by themselves over there. popular Gavin Newsom and he stacks his cabinet with CNN anchors.
Danabash has made a great vice president. Yeah, it does a great job. There's a lot of really great. There's amazing people.
Michael Smerkhanish, I think he could be Secretary of Defense. There's a lot. Anderson, I think, does a good job every single. Caitlin Collins, I have so much admiration for her.
She can be ambassador to the EU. OK. Literally, I can pull together a cabinet that looks like a fucking Kennedy administration from CNN. Well, and it would be so much higher than D-Dagsev on NBC.
Well, look about it. Janine Piero, that's, I mean, look who are competing. I am down for networks as cabinets at this point. I think the CNN people are so impressive.
But they're all about to, and they've been doing this last few years. I'm thinking about starting a podcast because they're having uncomfortable conversation right. I used to make 7 million a year and they've offered me two. Yeah, and if you had every conversation with all of them, not just CNN, it's throughout the year.
It's everywhere. It's everywhere. It's all the media people. They, I could have a business.
People anchor off the most money they've ever made and think that's what I'm worth. No one ever thinks themselves, wow, I'm overpaid right now. I can prove to you statistically at any moment in time, there's a 50% chance you are overpaid right now, relative to the market. I'm not favoring media.
I just think it's, I always see it as an opportunity. I always see it as an opportunity. Like you can still do well. It's a good business.
It makes a lot of profits. You could do well here and it could give you an opportunity for MS now to have a lane all to itself. And I think that's always a good thing. Always a good thing.
Who's MS now stars? Rich, she's only one day a week ago. Rich, there's a whole bunch of there. But let me say Rebecca Cutler is Stephanie.
There's a whole bunch of people that are very talented. And they're hiring a lot of great reporters. And Rebecca Cutler, who you know about, is amazing. Like she's, she's, she's.
She hired me at CNN Plus. She did at the Blue. And, and you know, I think there's lots of opportunities. You know, I think the, the, the, the, the, the, Alison's will bollocks it.
And coming to you soon, a Cara Swister's docuseries, Cara Swister wants to live forever. I'm singing on, no kidding. That's good. I just got to close it before then.