After Party with Emily Jashinsky - Trump's Greenland Deal Reality, and Obama Third-Term Talk, with Cenk Uygur, PLUS From Woke to Camp in Hollywood

Episode Date: January 22, 2026

Emily Jashinsky opens the show with her takeaway from a new article in Compact, “The Truth Behind the Groyper Panic,” that explains why fears of widespread bigotry driven by figures like Nick Fuen...tes are overstated. Then Emily is joined by Cenk Uygur, Host, Founder, and CEO of “The Young Turks.” They discuss President Trump’s trip to Davos and his announcement that a framework has been reached on Greenland, the TACO theory surrounding Trump, and what it means for America’s economy. Then the conversation turns to questions about former President Obama potentially running for a third term, reports Gayle King could soon have her salary slashed at CBS, new vs old media, and what leaked text messages involving Taylor Swift and Blake Lively tell us about cancel culture. Emily wraps up the show with a look at a New York Times essay that argues Hollywood’s “woke era” hasn’t cleanly ended but has morphed into camp. Lean: If you want to lose meaningful weight at a healthy pace and keep it off... Add LEAN to your diet and exercise lifestyle. Get 20% OFF WHEN YOU ENTER EMILY at https://TAKELEAN.com Masa Chips: Ready to give MASA a try? Get 25% off your first order by going to http://masachips.com/AFTERPARTY and using code AFTERPARTY VanMan: Discover VanMan’s Pearl Eye Cream—real, nutrient-rich ingredients for skin and eye health; visit https://vanman.shop/afterparty and use code AFTERPARTY for 15% off your first order. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

Transcript
Discussion (0)
Starting point is 00:00:07 Welcome to After Party, everyone. Thank you so much for being with us on this chilly, chilly Wednesday night. And it's going to get colder throughout much of the country as well. It's January. I guess that's what happens. We're going to be joined tonight by Jank Yugar, of course, host of the Young Turks. And I have a lot to get to with Jank. These news cycles have been relentless. Donald Trump seems to have, I mean, depending on how you see it, either a little taco situation, which you may remember Trump always chickens out is the phrase that was, popularized on Wall Street around those Liberation Day tariffs earlier last year. But is it possible? That's what we saw on Greenland. Some people are saying it was a taco. Either way, we have all kinds of news. Other people are saying it was a master stroke.
Starting point is 00:00:52 So I'll be eager to get Jenks perspective on that because the last couple of days at Davos, which is basically that show House of Villains. It's like it's on E, right? Davos is just House of Villains where all of these billionaires and, and bureaucrats come together in one place and act like they're the good guy and the other billionaire slash bureaucrat is the bad guy over the last 48 hours as boring as Davos can be. This one did feel a bit different. It seems like there was this internalized acknowledgement that the world order, so many folks at the World Economic Forum and Davos worked for years to maintain is kind of permanently in the rearview mirror. we'll be eager to get Jank's take on that. We have Taylor Swift and Blake Lively's text messages because of a lawsuit. Big news and some of them, I'm going to force Jank to talk about them.
Starting point is 00:01:50 Zoran Mamdani talking about abolishing ice on the view where, honestly, people in the audience at the view were cheering for abolish ice. So there's a lot to get to on that. And a fascinating New York Times essay on what's going on with the culture of Hollywood when you look at films like Eddington, and shows like Landman, the hypothesis, which I think is accurate in some ways, is that the culture wars have given way to camp. And I have some thoughts on why that might be. First, though, I wanted to start with this compact magazine article that went live yesterday. It's from Professor Eric Kaufman, who's one of the sharpest people to follow on the stuff, period. But we had these conversations.
Starting point is 00:02:38 And, you know, when Nick Fuentes was in the news a couple of months ago, we were covering the media panic over him. And I remember Bacha Unger Sargon came on and talked about how she believes. So it was an interesting perspective for somebody on the left to hear Bacha say, she believes in the fundamental goodness of the American people when it comes to questions of of bigotry that the American people are not broadly bigoted that we've come a long way in this country. And as noxious as what Fuentes says is, the moral panic over it will overstate the problem of actual bigotry in the hearts and minds of the average American in a way that's not fair and not at all helpful. Well, Eric Kaufman studies this stuff. And in Compact, he wrote a bit
Starting point is 00:03:32 about what he found after conducting a survey recently. And he wrote in compact, quote, just 3% of adults and 7% of Trump voters under 35 tune in to Fuentes regularly. He did a study of Fuentes viewers, Tucker Carlson viewers, and he found another 4% of young Trump voters occasionally consume his content. Second, few of Fuentes' regular followers are white nationalists. Only 13% say immigration should be cut to zero. Just one in five say you have to have an American accent. or be white to be a true American. Almost a quarter say that a non-English-speaking America would be no less American than the country is today.
Starting point is 00:04:13 Almost a quarter. Look at these numbers. They rate blacks, Coffman writes, a relatively positive 57 out of 100 on a feelings thermometer. One in three Groyper's are minorities, and a similar share are women. So I think he's defining Gropers as people who follow Fuentes, watch his show. the definition of what is actually Groyper is in and of itself differs, but depending on who's talking about it,
Starting point is 00:04:37 talking about people who actually are activists, Fuentes followers, people who think he's funny when the TikTok and real videos are going through their social media feed or people who occasionally find him compelling, but don't agree with everything he says, it's always been difficult to define
Starting point is 00:04:55 that label in and of itself. But that's how Eric, was going through this. And he goes on to say, one in three grippers are minorities and a similar share are women. Just nine percent of Tucker's regular followers, Tucker Carlson, say immigration should be cut to zero, while fully 40% of them think a majority non-white America
Starting point is 00:05:13 would be no less American than the country is today. On the feeling thermometer, Tucker's audience feels a warmth of 57 degrees towards Jews, only modestly lower than the 65 degrees felt by Ben Shapiro's followers. It's pretty interesting. I'm sure they share, a lot of the same listeners, by the way, though well above the 43 for Fuentes' audience,
Starting point is 00:05:35 Eric notes, when controlling for other factors following Tucker Carlson has a weak association with anti-Jewish sentiment and then only among his young regular followers. So while people are right to be concerned, and I think that's a good point, and I think it's worth noting from Eric Kaufman, there's no two things can be true that can be a problem and not this huge problem that is worth a complete moral panic. he says while that let me find this part again he says so while people are right to be concerned I don't want to paraphrase him I want to get this precisely correct Eric says quote the effect in scale the problem is limited and goes on to note that trust in institutions is at rock bottom the online
Starting point is 00:06:17 right is having a bigger impact on sentiment toward Israel though even there their force can be overstated Nick Fuentes' young followers score Israel a frigid 26 while Candice Owens and Tucker Carlson's ring at a cool 34. Notice the gap there between Israel and Jewish people on this feelings thermometer that Eric Kaufman and others in social science used to rate and try to dig into sentiments of bigotry, a gap, of course. So that's another important thing to note. And he goes on to say, even Ben Shapiro's young Trump voting audience only gives Israel a lukewarm 50. That's what a lot of this panic is actually about, and by the way, it's fine if you're a supporter of Israel to be panicked that support, this lukewarm sentiment is at 50 among even Ben Shapiro's young
Starting point is 00:07:05 Trump voting audience, as Eric Kaufman found. And I suspect that's actually what people were picking up on. And they see in Fuentes and Tucker Carlson proxies and ways to project their anxiety over dropping support for Israel because Fuentes says crazy stuff. And so they look at Fuentes and say, well, he must be channeling anti-Semitism. And that's what explains the drop in support for Israel. But if you're looking at these numbers, it looks like it's actually just a drop in support for Israel that may potentially have a little bit of an effect. It may be causing a bump, a slight bump in anti-Semitic sentiments on the right, totally possible, totally possible. I think some of the numbers bear that out wouldn't deny it, and I wouldn't say it's not
Starting point is 00:07:55 irrelevant or it's not a problem at all. But the degree of the moral panic, if people remember that we were like swirling in every single day for weeks several months back, as clearly I don't think borne out by these numbers, Eric says, being young, much more than following right-wing influencers is what core relates with skepticism of Israel, data from the long-running social survey and ANES national survey show that as of 2024, just 8% of Americans under 35 say that other people and the federal government can be trusted. These numbers are the lowest in 50 years. Trust in institutions is at rock bottom. And just to show his chart here, this is Eric's chart. He says Fuentes and other
Starting point is 00:08:38 infotainers with very little impact on public opinion is what he found. These are media sources for under-35 Trump voters, according to his survey. And what you see here is all the way up at the top, Fox News, New York Times, New York Post, Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens, Ben Shapiro, and then all the way down for the list, Nick Fuentes. This is, like, I think, a pretty helpful bit of data to put into perspective, the broader conversation that was everyone was mired in a few months ago, and I can tell you here in D.C., conservative institutions are still mired in. I think it's good to look at these numbers and recognize that this institutional distrust among a lot of independence and a lot of new people who came into politics through MAGA and are kind of considered right of center might be
Starting point is 00:09:30 pick up votes for Republicans and people who would join the conservative movement, as it's called. It's, I think, helpful to see the numbers themselves and to recognize that. that there is, I think, appropriate perspective that when you have a low level of institutional trust, as Eric mentions here, these are numbers are at the lowest in 50 years. The problem that needs to be solved for people who are upset about even Ben Shapiro's audience coming in at 50, an average 50 in their thermometer towards Israel, that's what this is really about. Win support back for Israel, if you want to, on the merits. If you want to convince people to be supportive of the Israeli government, Benjamin Netanyahu, win it on the merits and don't do it by smearing people
Starting point is 00:10:16 necessarily as bigots because that's actually not accurate. And because it's not accurate, it's not going to be helpful to your cause. And it's in the process going to be more and more divisive. So I thought this study from Eric Kaufman was well worth discussing putting some numbers on. You may remember a couple of months back. I did some my own reporting and talked to staffers and people around the conservative movement, White House staffers, people around the conservative of movement asked them if they know any like legitimate groipers, which I was defining as like activist types who consider themselves to be part of the griper movement and the Flintas movement. And basically everybody said no. The estimates were around like 10%. I think maybe one person said
Starting point is 00:10:56 20%. But all that is to say, we have even more like this is this is hard data, which is very, very helpful. And I wanted to highlight it, even though the conversation has largely kind of faded to the rear rear mirror. All right. Excited to bring a drink yogurt in just one moment, but first, by the time the average person hits 60 years old, think about this, they have lost and regained several hundred pounds. So doctors call that weight cycling. Half of Americans do it. It's when you lose 10 or so pounds, but then you put the pounds back on, plus a couple more. So it's very tough on your body, and it probably leaves you really frustrated. The bottom line is most people need help losing weight. And here's a great way. Non-prescription lean was a
Starting point is 00:11:40 actually created by doctors. Lean is an oral supplement, not an injection, and the science is really impressive. The studied ingredients also target weight loss in three powerful ways. One, lean helps maintain healthy blood sugar. Two, it helps control appetite and cravings. Three, it helps burn fat by converting it to energy and burning fat helps keep the weight off. If you want to lose meaningful weight at a healthy pace and keep it off, add lean to your diet and exercise lifestyle. Get 20% off when you enter Emily at Take, Lean, dot com. That's code Emily at take lean.com. We're joined now by Jank Yugar, who is host of the Young Turks, where he's also, of course, founder and CEO. Jank, thank you so much for coming back on
Starting point is 00:12:22 the show. No problem. Thanks for having me on, Emily. I want to start in Davos, unfortunately, where all of the villains of the civilization are gathered basically and yelling at each other and blaming each other for ruining the world without having, it seems like, a dose of self-awareness at all. Donald Trump now seems to have made a deal over Greenland. I'm reading from the CNBC report. They say he said Wednesday that the framework he reached with NATO on Greenland involves access to mineral rights for the U.S. and its European allies, as well as collaboration on the Golden Dome. Trump says they're going to be involved in the Golden Dome and they're going to be involved in mineral rights. And so are we. Let's roll this clip of Trump himself talking to Caitlin Collins of CNN.
Starting point is 00:13:09 including especially real national security and international security. How so, can you give us some details, please? Well, the deal is going to be put out pretty soon. We'll see. It's a deal that everybody's very happy with. Does it still include you? Does it still include the United States having ownership of Greenland like you've said you wanted? It's a long-term deal.
Starting point is 00:13:32 It's the ultimate long-term deal. And I think it puts everybody in a really good position, especially as it pertains to security and minerals and everything else. Okay, so if you're just listening to this, you missed Jank rolling his eyes. Let's put F4 on the screen. This is Aaron Dubia who put on X, the taco cycle. The markets want to price in taco, but Taco needs Trump to see stocks tank. That's, of course, Trump always chickens out,
Starting point is 00:13:58 the term that became popular on Wall Street over the last year. He continues. So we get these cycles where Trump does stuff and nothing happens because the market is priced in Taco, which encourages him to do more stuff until the markets actually thinks he may not taco and prices start to fall, which restores taco. Here's the really bad part over time this will lead to bigger and bigger crises because the markets are updating about taco. So it will take more extreme action to make Marcus think he may not actually taco. So butterback a lot fundamentally problem is taco undermines itself.
Starting point is 00:14:26 Junk on the other hand, some commenters are seeing a masterstroke in Trump's Greenland deal. What say you? Which Trump cuck is calling this a master stroke? I mean, there, can we put the Mark Halpern post up? So Mark Halperin, I would call him a Trump cuck at all. Mark, we'll have you debate, Mark. He says all this discussion about Greenland and NATO is another extraordinarily revealing moment demonstrating how many people do not understand Donald Trump.
Starting point is 00:14:55 If you think he is bothered by European countries showing more independence, you have it backwards. He would love NATO nations to show more independence. What's going on, Jank? God, it is so wrong. Okay. Okay. So let's take one at a time. There's three different issues here. So number one, this idea of attacking Greenland, which he's now taken back in his usual taco style. But even doing anything with Greenland is mental. Everybody knows it's mental.
Starting point is 00:15:26 I don't have to convince regular people because a poll came out and four percent of Americans were in favor of attacking Greenland because only four percent of Americans. apparently are mentally ill, right? So this is not popular with anyone. The only reason why it's being debated in Washington is because if the president says it, we have to debate it, right? So that's point one. Point two is, what did he do there in that deal? So we haven't seen the deal yet. We just saw his description of it. And I guarantee you what the deal is, is just the biggest nothing burger you've ever seen in your life. All they had to do was appease him. They had to tap him on the orange head and go, okay, but little boy, Oh, yes, you got such a good deal from us.
Starting point is 00:16:10 Yes, we will give you some metals. We'll sell it on the open market. Look, I don't know if he got any concessions at all. Like, he's like, oh, we're going to be taking him with Golden Dome. Golden Dome doesn't even exist. It's a pipe dream that would cost trillions of dollars, okay? So that's like, that's just nothingness, right? So, look, the only reason we're even having a conversation about Greenland is, well, two reasons.
Starting point is 00:16:32 One is Elon Musk and the other tech bros want the lithium and the mineral rights. and they're like, hey, bro, we bribed you $250 million. You got to give us something. And Trump likes anyone who bribes him, et cetera. And number two, Stephen Miller or whoever got into his head, oh, you could own all of the Western Hemisphere and be King Trump from Greenland to Venezuela. And he loves that kind of talk and he wants to be a king and he's a child. He's a total child.
Starting point is 00:17:00 But most importantly, Emily, there's actually a significant downside to this. Because normally he'll say stupid stuff and the right wing would go, oh, he's just trolling. He doesn't really mean it. No, he means it. He's not trolling. He's an idiot. So we can have that conversation, discussion, et cetera. But the bottom line was to, but normally when you taco, the markets have adjusted.
Starting point is 00:17:22 Everyone's adjusted their expectations. The president's a child. I got it. Right. But in this case, what it led to was the beginning of a very dangerous movement for the American economy, which is, I. I don't know if you saw it, but it was called Sell America. And they started selling American treasuries, American companies, American debt.
Starting point is 00:17:43 Everything related to America, the entire world started selling, right? And that's what caused the huge dip yesterday in the markets. Now, you can say, hey, look, markets more largely came back today. It was just a taco, we're past it. No, no. what happened was especially in Prime Minister Carney's speech, the Canadian Prime Minister, when he said, no, that's it.
Starting point is 00:18:09 We got to get around America. Because America is such a pain in the ass and so unpredictable. And then they come in and they elect these madmen who are like, oh, I'm going to double your tariffs. I want to invade half of you. I want to destroy NATO. What is this? So he's like, let's just go around them.
Starting point is 00:18:25 Let's make deals with China and India and other powers. and that makes a lot of sense if you're them. I'm an American, so I'm super worried about it. And once they start doing alliances and trade deals and switch off the dollar, by the way, they're now selling the dollar, then we're screwed. Our interest rates are going to go up.
Starting point is 00:18:46 Inflation's going to go up. It's going to have a massive impact on the economy. And Trump will run away and go, it wasn't me, it was Biden, and it was Biden Jr. And it was everybody but him. But it's definitely him. And we keep playing with fire.
Starting point is 00:19:00 And I guarantee both on this and the nonstop wars and the bombing countries, we're going to get burned. It's a guarantee. So let's actually go to what you were talking about. We have F5. These are a couple of posts that you made. I do find the SEL America question really interesting. You said SEL America trade has started in the markets. That means other investors are attaching a premium for investments in the U.S.
Starting point is 00:19:21 Because we are now considered an unreliable trading partner. This is spurred on by the insane Greenland talk and more tariffs. There was no need for this. You also mentioned legendary investor Ray Dalio said we're entering the quote capital wars. People are starting to sell off U.S. companies, U.S. government bonds, and the U.S. dollar. All disastrous developments for our economy. And since it involves global investors, there's nothing we can do about it. And, Jake, when I was watching Davos, it made me just, let me put this up on the screen.
Starting point is 00:19:50 It made me look at this post from, this is from the rapid response team at the White House, by the way. they called Gavin. They said Gavin Newsom was sitting in the quote, Cuck chair at Davos as he watched Donald Trump's speech. The failing governor of California ramp it with fraud watches from the corner cuck chairs. POTUS delivers a true masterclass in Davos. Embarrassing. And then I listened to Mark Carney, who's like central banker, UN guy. And it's just on the one hand, I don't think that Donald Trump is in like 100%
Starting point is 00:20:26 the right. I don't think they're in 100% the right. And it just makes me hate everyone. They all suck. Because what's happening is the world is burning to your point. They're selling off as all of this is happening. Selling off America. I don't think that's good for Canada, by the way. I don't think any of this is like Canada wants to partner with China. I don't think that's much better for Canada either. It's just, it seems like egoism and stupidity, uh, an orgy of both of them. No, actually, look, I hate this as an American, but China is a pretty good trading part. partner. They usually invests into the countries that they trade in. And what are they doing? They're doing something rational. They're looking for a way to buy minerals, oil, all the natural
Starting point is 00:21:08 resources that they need, a little bit cheaper, right? We do the same thing except we bombed them and we attacked them and we kill them. Like, there's no need for it. There's just like Chinese model, unfortunately, in this case, is a better model. And we just like we've already tried coups in so many countries. And by the way, Emily, none of this helps the American people. None of it. It's all for the donors.
Starting point is 00:21:32 Oh, the oil companies and in the old days, the banana companies, et cetera. Our government never works for us. And so that's, of course, the meta issue that hangs over all of these. So when you say, I got no love for either one of these people, like either the Trump critics or Trump in it,
Starting point is 00:21:48 there's a lot of that I agree with, right? So the Trump critics are often the establishment, especially the ones we see in mainstream media. And the establishment are the people who got us into this best in the first place. And so that's why people were so desperate. They're like, I don't know, let's try the man child, right? Because he was the only one saying, let's not do this, right? He's a disruptor.
Starting point is 00:22:12 He said he would be a disruptor. And so that becomes the question for him is, does he disrupt in a way that's helpful for the average American? So I got to say this, I interviewed a, I actually debated about half a dozen conservatives right before the election. I didn't focus on Kamala at all because that was indefensible. So he just mainly talked about Trump. You said Biden should keep running.
Starting point is 00:22:37 That's what you want to drink. You want to Joe Biden until he's 90, emperor. Yeah. So for those of you at home, we don't know, about two years before everybody else caught on, we were like, you've got to dump Biden. Do you not have eyes and ears? The guy can't finish a sentence. He can't talk.
Starting point is 00:22:54 So, I mean, that's an old story, but one last quick thing on it. What I never understood Emily about Democrats was apparently I was the only guy who wanted to be Trump. Like, their need for obedience outweighed their desire to be Trump. And their desire to be Trump was pretty significant. But they're like, no, Democratic leadership and CNN and New York Times are telling you that Joe Biden is young and dynamic. And they were like, yes, sir, he is young and dynamic. We now we believe that he has lost 50 years in age. And it'll be great.
Starting point is 00:23:29 So like, yeah, I get it. On the other hand, Emily, too, back to your comment about Greenland. No, there's no really, there's no percentage here. And sometimes the establishment is right. It's very rare, but it happens. And so there is no percentage that is correct about attacking Greenland or trying to get Greenland. By the way, and I'll say that with a big asterisk. If we could actually buy Greenland, like remember that thing he said, well, why don't we just give
Starting point is 00:23:55 $100,000 to every citizen? Oh, that wouldn't have been a bargain. We would have gotten Greenland for like $6 billion. Then I say yes. Then I say yes very aggressively, right? But we asked. They're not interested in selling. So we're done with it. There's no validity. Your broader point is one that as somebody who's I think of myself as a fairly protectionist person supportive of the idea of using tariffs to protect American workers and American national security interests. But your broader point about China is so important in that if Mark Carney leads this revolution, which basically is what he sounded like he wanted to do when he was talking about a, quote, rupture in his speech at Davos before Donald Trump, that ends up with the potential.
Starting point is 00:24:39 And you're seeing it play out. I don't think it's clear that it's going to go fully in one direction or the other. I don't think we know 100 percent what happens by the end of Trump's term. But there's obviously momentum for people moving away if you decide to implement tariffs in a fashion that is so unpredictable. The bet that Trump had was some people would say, well, it's not worth trying to go over there to China because everyone knows, you know, Canada would rather do business with another English-speaking country that's really close by and doesn't have debt trap problems and all of that in the way that had allegations that have followed China. But that's not what's happening. We're almost a year post-liberation day, and there's evidence that the momentum is going in the other direction. And I think that's an important context to the point you're making, Jen, that gets lost when you just hear, oh, win, win, win. Well, you can look over there and see loss, loss, loss.
Starting point is 00:25:32 Yeah, look, unfortunately in politics, not a lot of people understand business. And so I went to Wharton business school. No big deal. But more importantly, I actually- You and Trump have so much in common. don't don't you dare okay so I actually went to warn he attended it
Starting point is 00:25:52 so but no kidding aside look I run my own company I know a little bit about business right and so the bricks are coming the bricks are coming so the bricks alliance with you know all the major countries outside of us
Starting point is 00:26:10 and Europe basically that's a super powerful alliance like really powerful and and people are beginning to understand that and they're excited about China they're excited about India they're excited about not having to listen to what America has to say and those are giant markets and so it's probably a matter of time before Bricks passes us but we are expediting it we're speeding it up big time under Trump, he's basically telling like almost every nation on earth, we're wild, we're crazy. Don't do business with us. We can change tariffs and rates at any time.
Starting point is 00:26:51 Meanwhile, Briggs is like, we're open for business. So he's going to expedite them going in that direction and really hurt our economy. Let me just going to, I don't want to do this, Jank, but I'm going to roll this clip of Scott Bessent talking about Gavin Newsom because it is, it is. It's so hard to watch the billionaires fighting in Davos or the centimillionaires versus the billionaires fighting in Davos. And here Scott Bessent was getting some pats on the back. By the way, Scott Bessett was working for George Soros for however long, doing all of the deals that created the structure that MAGA doesn't like and that Besson says he doesn't like. Let's roll S4 here.
Starting point is 00:27:35 You know, Governor Newsom, who strikes me as Patrick Bateman meets Sparkle Beach Ken, may be the only Californian who knows less about economics and Kamala Harris. He's here this week with his billionaire sugar daddy, Alex Soros. What if his economic policies brought? Outward migration from California, a gigantic budget deficit, the largest homeless population in America, and the poor folks in the Palisades who had their homes burned down, He is here hobnobbing with the global elite while his California citizens are still homeless. Shame on him.
Starting point is 00:28:18 Response, drink. Okay, first of all, brov, you're also there. So doesn't that make you part of the global elite? He's like, can you believe he's meeting with people like me? A well-known dirt bag. Okay, well, that's a fair point. So number two is he's like, I use. wasting his time here you should be in California.
Starting point is 00:28:39 Well, then dude, what are you doing there? Right? Okay, so I get it. You're the Treasury Secretary. Makes sense to go to Davos. But for the government, California is like the, what is it, the fifth largest nation on earth economically if it was its own nation. So should he be a governor of California be at Davos?
Starting point is 00:28:55 Yeah. Are you? Sure. So that's not, none of those are the real issue. What's interesting is that Scott Besson is taking shots at Gavin Newsom. because Scott Besson is not known for being a, you know, a political fighter in the trenches or anything like that. And now all of a sudden he's trying to say that Gavin Newsom's like the psycho character and Kendall. Like these seem like zingers they'd write for Trump or something.
Starting point is 00:29:24 And he's like, and Scott Besson is like the most elitist guy on planet Earth. He has like, you know how the rock had the people's eyebrow? He has the billionaire eyebrow. Like, I feel like he's going to finish every sentence with, I do declare You need a top hat Yeah for sure No as I said
Starting point is 00:29:41 On eggs Like if Sir Topham had Had a boss It would be Scott Bassett So Anyways Look All this talk against Gavin
Starting point is 00:29:55 Just means they're a little nervous about Gavin And they wrote those lines for them And that's the main thing I'm getting out of it But Gavin went there and criticized Trump pretty heavily, and he did a pretty good job of criticizing him. That's why he's getting under their skin. So I guess well played by Gavin Newsom. Just as, you know, I want to roll this clip before we take a break of Michelle Obama talking about
Starting point is 00:30:20 the idea of a Barack Obama third term, Michelle Obama went on, call her daddy and took some questions about this. But when you were talking about Gavin Newsom, it kind of reminded me of the argument that Michelle Obama made, which is interesting, but it just, again, leaves me with looking around the room and feeling like the average American. has nobody to root for here, whether it's Gavin Newsom or Scott Bessent, it's just all around a disaster. That's not to say one person is less corrected. It's just to say that they're all, it's not unusual in politics to be surrounded by corrupt figures, but this just feels like it's camp. It's so, it's like camp levels of corrupt corruption. So let's roll S7 here. Listen,
Starting point is 00:31:00 Michelle Obama. So if, this is all hypothetical, if, if, Trump does change the law and ruds for a third term, hypothetically, do you think your husband would consider running? I hope not. Why are we even asking this? I would actively work against that, you know. The whole world starts crying. I would, I wouldn't be, I would be at home working against it, you know, and maybe a lot of people would be like, good, we don't want them anyway. And I'm like, yeah, that's what I write. So Alex Cooper also asked if Michelle Obama was interested in running.
Starting point is 00:31:41 And she didn't completely say hell no, but she was saying we need younger voices, younger generations are more. They've traveled more places and they think about things a different way, which is a, I guess, a refreshing bit of self-awareness from somebody in the Democratic Party. But, Jank, I just can't even believe that Alex Cooper is asking about Barack Obama. No offense to Alex Cooper, but I can't believe that anybody would take the idea seriously of Barack Obama running again. Does that speak to the dumb bench being weak? Why is that even a figment of anyone's imagination? Looks like we might have lost Jenk briefly. I'll probably come back soon.
Starting point is 00:32:23 All right, we'll see if we get Jenk back. I'm actually very curious for his answer to this question. You know, it's not like Alex Cooper is trying to make a new show necessarily. But if you have Michelle Obama on, I don't even know why you would waste. I mean, I don't know why you would waste time thinking about whether Barack Obama would potentially run for office, to be honest. While we wait to get Jake Brack, going to take a quick ad break here in 2026. I'm focusing on practical changes, but of course, nothing too extreme because, you know I love chips. One easy win, you can replace processed snacks with masa chips.
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Starting point is 00:33:33 Masa, you'll also want to check out Vandy Crisps from the sister company. They have these amazing three ingredient potato chips. I love them. I really love the barbecue flavor. So if you're ready to give Masa a try, go to Masachips.com slash afterparty and use code after party for 25% off your first order, or simply click the link in the video description or scan the QR code to claim this delicious offer. If you don't feel like ordering online, Masa is now available nationwide at your local Sprout supermarket, stop by and pick up a couple of bags before they're gone. Jank Yuger is back with us. He's a host of the Young Turks, where he's also, of course, founder and CEO. Jank, we were just talking about Alex Cooper asking Michelle Obama, whether Barack Obama would ever run for president again.
Starting point is 00:34:13 I'm just wondering whether it's even on anybody's mind. What do you think? Yeah, I'm a little less harsh on it than you are. I get it. Trump is talking about running for a third term because, A, he does respect the U.S. Constitution at all. B, he's mental. And C, his donors are encouraging him. I don't know if you saw the Miriam Aedelson. Yeah. Like that humiliation ritual where Mark Levin puts his hands all over him, which he hates. And then Miriam comes in and goes, maybe I'll give you a $250 million to run a third time. Okay, yeah, I get it.
Starting point is 00:34:45 I get it. He's working well for his hero. I got it. So since he's saying that, you got Michelle Obama there. People are all thinking, oh, yeah, he's going to run for a third time. Then Obama run for a third time. And when he's it? But look, overall, though, your main point I totally agree with, which is let's get past all this nonsense, right?
Starting point is 00:35:07 So like, I don't want Barack Obama again. No, sorry, if you're a diehard Democrat and you're like, oh, that you dream about having Obama? For what? No, by the way, if you tell me that you dream about having Obama back, you're basically saying, A, all I've ever watched is mainstream media, right? That's just like, you've never been online. and B, you were already pretty well off. So you didn't mind that he didn't really change very much at all. Like, oh, he tweaked health care where we slept to buy private insurance.
Starting point is 00:35:40 It's not even a public option. It was originally a Heritage Foundation plan. It was originally Romney Care. And you're like, yeah, but I didn't really want any change. I'm already rich. Then you love Obama, right? But for the rest of us, no, I don't need that BS anymore about change and hope when you have no intention of carrying that out.
Starting point is 00:35:59 And I also don't have much of an interest in any of the current Democrats. So look, I don't agree with Besson's shot at Gavin, the real person responsible for the Palisades. And my kid was, you know, was affected by it because of the high school. And so I'm plenty pissed about it, but it's Karen Bass. Karen Bass is deer in the headlights incompetent. And so that was not on Gavin. But like you look at the overall Democrats, they don't get it. other than Rokana, they're all corporate robots.
Starting point is 00:36:30 And I don't know how clearly the American people have to tell the Democrats, we don't want robots. Maybe we should speak in their language. We would like real human beings, right? So, like, don't go in that direction. Let's go find a populace, Rokana, John Stewart, someone who's going to actually give us change that we could hold. for. Oh, that's a good line. Let's put this variety headline up on the screen. This is about
Starting point is 00:37:01 Gail King, because we were talking earlier, Jank, about how you've run your business for a long time, and you're the perfect person to give insight into this because you're way ahead of the new media trend. This is, according to variety, Barry Weiss believes Gail King's $15 million salary is no longer viable in a weaker media economy per sources. King is reportedly weighing her next move with the network, a special correspondent rule, or a one-year farewell deal at a lower salary. There are also some expectations. Weiss might overhaul the news division streaming service, potentially relying more on talk-heavy podcasts. Jank, a lot of people will point to the CBS News YouTube or even the free press YouTube and kind of chuckle at the idea
Starting point is 00:37:42 that Barry bringing in a more talk-heavy podcast is going to be super useful to CBS because whether she actually is able to spearhead something like that is probably a valid question. Netflix is, of course, acquiring podcasts and taking that more seriously. I don't think there's anything wrong with taking that more seriously. But I'm very curious what you make of these, you know, a lot of people will compare a situation like this to Iran and Iraq. Like that's what the colloquialism is like, oh, it's an Iran or Iraq situation. I'll never forget Gail King partying on whose yacht was it?
Starting point is 00:38:13 It was one of these billionaires yachts with the Obamas and then continuing to cover the Obama's like she is a perfect avatar of the elite media highly paid journalist class so no no tears lost for her no love lost for her I should say I think a 15 million dollar salary for her seems ridiculous and I kind of think Barry Weiss might have a point here Jake yeah don't make me agree with Barry Weiss I was just going to say I'm so sorry to do that don't do that that's yeah that's not fair all right no seriously there's three different issues here so number one is I remember when Fox News came out, whether you agree with them or didn't, I thought, that's going to work, okay?
Starting point is 00:38:58 Why is it going to work? Because there's a huge hole for conservative opinion on television. I mean, it's gigantic whole. There was no conservative opinion at all. And so when you give 50% of the country something that they really want and never had before, well, you're going to make a lot of money, right? And they're like, oh, but they're shutting down their international bureaus. I'm like, yeah, because the American people can't wait for.
Starting point is 00:39:19 for a report from Pyongyang, right? Nobody cared about the international bureaus. So I was like, yeah, that makes sense. So in a sense here, she's doing something similar. So if you go towards the podcasters, that's the better strategy. On the other hand, the average age of somebody watching CBS is 70. So like they might not have ever even heard of a podcast. So it might be a bad fit on demographics.
Starting point is 00:39:45 Plus, it's not rescuable. It's just the dynamics of that. industry are terminal, which I can explain in a second. But most of all, the $15 million for Gayle King or any of these guys is
Starting point is 00:40:00 from an ancient time. That was the time that television built the town I live in, Los Angeles. Half of the $20 million homes here are from TV. But we don't live in that time anymore. TV's dead. So giving these guys $15 million a year
Starting point is 00:40:17 is mental, mental. Okay. Now, having said that, that's not why Barry Weiss is making any decisions. So she has only one litmus test, and she puts up like an Israeli barometer to any given person. And they're like, Tony Docapul, do, do, do, do, do, do, do, Israel, yes. Okay. You're getting promoted, way promoted. Oh, my God, you're the CBS Even News anchor. Gail King, I don't know if it's just like, I don't know what it is, but like maybe she didn't yell enough at Tanaheese Coates when he was on or whatever. whatever, so she's got to go. So Barry Weiss makes decisions on only one factor, Israel, period.
Starting point is 00:40:56 Right. So overall, I come back to not agreeing with her. You really landed the plane there, Jake. It was masterful. I wanted to get your take on, I'm going to make you talk about something else that I know you're really excited to talk about, which is Taylor Swift and Blake lively, because I see in this, these released text messages. something I think it is kind of an interesting culture story. Let me put this up on the screen. Here's some messages. There it is. Okay, so here's some messages between Blake lively and Taylor Swift
Starting point is 00:41:30 that were released as part of. This is the woman Anna Bauer who writes for lawfare. She says, we have these court records. They're public because they were filed in Lively v. Wayfarer. Lively brought the suit against actor Justin Baldoni and his company Wayfarer, alleging sexual harassment and retaliation on the set of the 2024 film. It ends with us, Swift and Hes, her texts were pulled into the case because she is a close friend of Lively. And the two discussed Baldoni's alleged behavior in some of their texts, one of Swift's songs, My Tears Ricochet, was also used in the film's trailer. The New York Post pointed out this does seem to confirm that Taylor Swift's song
Starting point is 00:42:03 canceled was about Justin Baldoni, but this all sounds very silly. Actually, the story was serious because you, I'm sure, remember, Jank, how Blake Lively clearly orchestrated this New York Times hit piece on Justin Baldoni. that was alluding to him having Me Too problems over and over again. Justin Baldoni's counter dissuaded a lot of people that he did actually have Me Too problems. But what I see in these text messages between Taylor Swift and Blake lively is celebrities talking about personal stuff aside. They were working in the background just like Justin Baldoni was doing to create, to kind of exploit cancel culture, to exploit decent people's concerns about corruption in Hollywood and the business world to get their version
Starting point is 00:42:54 of a movie made. I don't know. It sounds like a silly story, but that's kind of what I was reading into these. I'm curious what you made of it. Okay. So I have to admit, and with great shame, that I don't know much about the Baldoni folks. I thought that Baldoni was some sort of Italian dish. Yeah, I'll take a Baldoni. Probably knows. Okay, but overall, I love your point. I think You're right. I think that this, I loathe cancel culture. And this partly goes back to the first story you did before you brought me on about Israel. Like there's, Israel's the kings of cancel culture.
Starting point is 00:43:32 And so, like, Barry Weiss was doing that on college campuses before she even got famous. In fact, that's how she got famous. Like, if any Palestinian or Arab or Muslim professor was teaching real history, she'd be like, How dare you? You have to fire him. And like she loved getting people fired. She loved cancel culture on college campuses. That's who she is.
Starting point is 00:43:57 But is it just about Israel? Of course not. No, no, no, no. Like this is a giant phenomenon. It's, it got weaponized. Like, for example, related topic, right? So anti-Semitism is real. Are they real anti-Semitism?
Starting point is 00:44:10 Of course there are, right? And, but at the same time, it's been weaponized. for political reasons. So, oh, you criticize Israel 1%. Anti-Semi, fire him! Shut him up! Cancel him! Right? That's like every time. 100% of the time.
Starting point is 00:44:28 And I've gone through it about 2,000 times. So what that does is it, first of all, it creates anti-Semitism, right? Because people are like, oh, so we're not allowed to talk. And we have to give Israel all of our money
Starting point is 00:44:45 and we have to obey them. and if we say anything, we're going to be called an anti-Semite, et cetera. It makes you kind of hate that person, right? So just as an aside, please stop. It's a really bad idea. I've got Jewish family. I got nothing but Jewish friends. Stop saying if you're not pro-genocide, that means you hate Jews.
Starting point is 00:45:07 It's terrible. That's terrible. That's not true. And don't say that, right? But why do they use cancer culture? Because it works. it literally eliminates your opponent. It does it in the dirtiest, most backhanded way.
Starting point is 00:45:23 And it's almost always done when you can't win the argument. So look, I'm kind of the perfect person that asked this question to because almost every part of the political spectrum has tried to cancel me. And if you're never seen the Young Turks, you could probably tell from just this interview because I don't give it crap. If the Democrats suck, I'm going to tell you. that the Democrats suck. If Trump sucks, I'm going to tell you that Trump sucks. And if you don't like either one of those things, it's called hashtag suck it. Okay? And by the way, you'll get
Starting point is 00:45:54 canceled for saying hashtag suck it. So, so left and I've had the radical left hates me. The radical right hates me. And do they say like, hey, you know what? I think Jenks ideas are bad. No, because when they try that, they get annihilated in debates, right? So instead they go, Jen Cates, fill in the blank, women, Jews, you know, like beloved Trump fans or whatever, right? So they're like, he should, you do cancel a culture when you don't even want the other side to talk. And it shows great weakness. It hurts the national conversation. It's intellectual surrender.
Starting point is 00:46:38 It's at the same time being a bully and a thug. if your ideas are so great then have at it hoss step on up I'll debate you Anna Kusparry from the Turks will debate you mean you'll regret it but but we're right here and most
Starting point is 00:46:55 importantly Emily free speech freedom I like that's not a punchline for me and my family came here for the freedom we love the freedom and I don't want anyone taking our freedom away so if you tell me I can't criticize Israel
Starting point is 00:47:10 you got another thought coming to you, right? And if you tell me I can't criticize Baldoni or the anti-Baldoni or whoever it might be, not going to buy it, not going to work, okay? I'm going to double down, I'm going to quadruple down, and then I'm going to give friends of mine on the left and friends of mine on the right now to quadruple down and kick your ass together. One of the things I found so interesting in this little, this is probably a good place to wrap up, Jank, and you've seen this up close for years,
Starting point is 00:47:38 is if you're an average American news consumer, you don't necessarily know the machinations behind the scenes of how these narratives get built. And I think to see a little bit of the raw process, just text messages, emails between billionaires or I should say millionaire actors, powerful, influential people. It's interesting because, again, you've seen this up close, I've seen this up close. The narratives are being built, like they're being fabricated, It's just like any common good is in a factory behind the scenes. And it's just not, there's so much more to it that's business related than people realize. And it's so cynical and disgusting.
Starting point is 00:48:19 And it really did hurt the culture a lot. And it still does. But I mean, it's not at the peak that it was probably five years ago. But it's so gross. And it's a good glimpse into that, I think. You know, Emily, that's actually the best point of any of this. So I'm a little bitter at you for making a better point than me. Once in a while.
Starting point is 00:48:39 But no, seriously, that's so true. And I did this big interview that's going to come out next week. I can't talk about it yet. But you'll see it. And you'll go, oh, that's what he was talking about. And then we started that with me talking about how media is an illusion, especially the establishment traditional media, right? And so I think what's happening in this country is because we legalize,
Starting point is 00:49:07 bribery, not just Citizens United, but Baladi and Bakli v. V. Vallejo. These are earlier Supreme Court decisions. And so those basically Supreme Court had a plan to give the country over to the Chamber of Commerce. It was Lewis Powell's plan. He worked for the Chamber of Commerce or he wrote a memo for the Chamber of Commerce. And then Nixon put him on the Supreme Court and made that happen. They legalized bribery. It's called money in politics. And ever since then, we've, been awash with money and we lost our government but we most importantly we lost our media so the media creates an illusion where they distract you from the real issue the real issue real issue is the robbery that's going on right so all the donors get everything they want oil companies get 35 billion
Starting point is 00:49:56 dollars a year in subsidies that's 10 times bigger than Israel why why they're the most profitable companies in the world mental that's a robbery okay big farm farmers We can't negotiate drug prices. That costs us potentially trillions of dollars. That's a robbery, okay? I think what Israel's doing is a robbery. But I get this.
Starting point is 00:50:18 Guys, don't get overfocus on any one issue. I can show you 200 robberies going on. But they don't want you to see the robbery. So they create a distraction. Just like a real robbery. What's the distraction? Identity politics, culture wars, cancel culture.
Starting point is 00:50:34 Look over there. Look over there. Oh, my gosh. Shiny object. shiny object, white, black, Jewish, Muslim, creature, bro, look over here. Meanwhile, the robbery goes on unabated here, okay? So they're trying to make sure you don't see it. And that's mainstream media. And hence, mainstream media is the getaway driver.
Starting point is 00:50:52 While you're distracted, they create this illusion for you, and the robbers get away with it. So to me, the number one answer is stop the frickin robbery. Get money out of politics so we get our democracy. democracy back, our government back. So we're not having Biden, you know, give $50 billion the semiconductor industry Intel gets
Starting point is 00:51:16 $8 billion and then fires 12,000 people afterwards. So or Trump comes in and goes, well, Miriam gave me all this money. So I'm going to give her Israel a hundred times that money because I got bribed. Like, I hate it. I can't stand it. And if you're a good American, you should
Starting point is 00:51:34 let's all fight together. to get money out of politics and please stop getting distracted by all this nonsense with identity politics and last thing i'll say is emily you can sometimes the mass slips right and we mentioned scott besson earlier in the show he's a great example like they they don't realize that they live in this enormously wealthy bubble and that they've lied to everyone else and and they don't so they've lost track of reality. So in that same Davos appearance, he said at one point, you know, we just
Starting point is 00:52:10 got to get people, you know, like modest people who are retiring like my parents. And they only have five, 10, or 12 homes. Yeah. I was like, what? Who's got 10 or 12 homes? What do you?
Starting point is 00:52:26 Like, he doesn't, they don't even understand. We're having trouble paying the rent, brother. It's about having, whether 10 or 12 homes is enough in retirement. And so that's it's always about the money. Remember the old adage of journalism. Follow the money. That's what everything is about. The rest is just an attempt to distract you. Jank Yugar, host of the Young Turks, where of course is also founder and CEO. Thanks so much for stopping by the show again. No problem. I appreciate. By the way, Young Turks 6 to 8 p.m.
Starting point is 00:52:59 Eastern every day, Monday through Friday on YouTube. And then afterwards, Emily, I'm doing a show called The Revolution. Like you get it. That's where I invite right wing, left wing, every kind of wing. Let's crowdsource a peaceful, nonviolent revolution and get our government back. No, Jank, you've really been at the forefront leading on that, especially since Charlie was assassinated. So I think it's healthy and I really appreciate it. Thank you, Emily.
Starting point is 00:53:24 I appreciate you. All right. We will be back with more in just one moment. But first, hey listeners, the skincare industry. has just been gaslighting women for decades, pushing those 200, 300, even $400,000 jars of chemical sludge that just will barely even penetrate your skin. You should be done with it. Why not? Van Man's pearl eye cream is skincare that harnesses the best of nature at an affordable price. They ditched the garbage and went straight to grass-fed tallow combined with wild-caught
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Starting point is 00:54:49 at once. That is my regular disclosure. You may not get the results that show you their lovely pearl eye cream. All right, let's move on with the show. I wanted to cover this New York Times essay that actually found to be quite compelling. It was published actually just today. Just today. Look at this beautiful art accompanying the New York Times article. It's just how often am I at this complimentary of the New York Times? Not that often, but I didn't agree fully with everything in this,
Starting point is 00:55:21 but the broader take, I thought, you know, I have an opinion on the opinion. I think the opinion in this is directionally correct, and I'm going to then just bring in a medicine to my opinion on this writer's opinion. It was written by Casey Michael Henry, and the headline is Hollywood's woke era is over. Now it's turning the culture war into camp. This is a little bit related to what Jank Yager and I were talking about earlier in the show, actually just earlier in the show when we were going through the Taylor Swift, Justin Baldoni stuff. But in particular, this essay goes on to discuss Landman and Eddington, Landman, one of the best. memes is like this is the the worst show that I can't stop watching. I feel like that's a really, really apt way to describe landman that resonates across the board. I think also Taylor Sheridan
Starting point is 00:56:10 hates women as much as I do. Like that's a rare thing to find representation, hashtag representation matters. But the lines that he puts into the mouths of his female characters are stunning. You won't believe it. If you haven't watched Landman, if you have, you know exactly what I'm talking about. It's really something. And New York Times article goes on to talk a little bit about, it refers to that as I think conservative burlesque at one point. Let me find that part of the article. Yeah, he says, all of this feels in reference to Landman, less like a roughneck triumph
Starting point is 00:56:46 of the will and more like some kind of burlesque of the right wing. The oil workers are at various points, gas, poisoned, maimed, and killed. Conservative hand wringing over birth rates is given a bizarre manifestation. in the lead character's Daffy Cheerleader Daughter, who airs a quasi-eogenic theory about how cheerleaders mating with jocks will produce the human equivalent of super retrievers. But then again, if you watch Taylor Sheridan shows,
Starting point is 00:57:09 you know that the politics, I think this is why Camp is such a good word for what's happening post-woke, I guess we have to call it, post after the woke revolution, Camp is such a good word for it because it's not in, like Sheridan appeals to conservative, But actually, there are a lot of conservators who get frustrated sometimes with Sheridan's shows, whether it's his
Starting point is 00:57:35 depiction of treatment of Native Americans or other things. Like, conservatives are not necessarily embracing Taylor Sheridan as some type of political champion, but he culturally depicts parts of American life that just don't really even always get depicted at all in Hollywood. And so this writer, I just will go on to read a little bit from this. So bear with me here goes on to say, for anyone fantasizing about Hollywood as some liberal bulwark, the 2024 election brought that idea to an abrupt halt. The industry's era of progressive sincerity and much of its wariness towards conservative coded content has evaporated. Well, I'm going to stop right there on that point.
Starting point is 00:58:18 Because if you just watched the Golden Globes, if you've been following along with award season, one battle after another. And if you consume any tabloid media period, you know that this is only true to the extent it's on a spectrum. So saying that, you know, Hollywood is some liberal bulwark was brought to an abrupt halt by the 2024 election because some of the businesses, you know, David Ellison, who we were talking about with Jank, obviously did the skydance merger. Skydance was his company, he merged it with CVS. There are examples of people on the business side, I mean, especially post-top gun, which was a huge wake-up call to the industry, becoming aware they had a problem
Starting point is 00:59:07 with attracting conservative audiences to their products because time and again, they were putting tons of money into content that was divisive in ways they didn't realize because they were living in bubbles, socioeconomic bubbles, where they just couldn't even they didn't know what they didn't know about how the other half, more than the other half, but about how the rest of the country lived. And so they were no longer able to produce content that resonated and connected with those audiences. And they didn't even know why, because they couldn't tell how thick that bubble was. That's how deep, that's how in deep they were. So yes, it's true that there has been a course correction and there have been moves towards appealing to the rest
Starting point is 00:59:49 of the country. But to say that the idea that Hollywood is, quote, a liberal bulwark is now at an abrupt halt, that that idea is no longer viable is, I think, wildly overstated. Also to say the industry's, quote, era of progressive sincerity and much of its weariness toward conservative coded content has evaporated. What, because there was a scene that had a non-binary villain in Landman? Is that what we're talking about? Is it because the left didn't get great treatment in Eddington or what was the Saffty series with Nathan Fielder and Emma Stone. That was called The Curse, right, on Showtime. Yes, it's been a more open environment.
Starting point is 01:00:37 Like, it's been less politically correct and there have been efforts to reappeal to conservative audiences. I think that phrase progressive sincerity, I think it's probably fair to say some of that has faded, this idea that we're just going to earnestly be out here wearing all of our or injecting all of our content with social justice political agenda. Like if you're calling that progressive sincerity rather than, I mean, there are other descriptions that come to mind. Let's see, Maoist propaganda. If we're calling it progressive sincerity, then yes, some of that has faded. but I think Hollywood is still pretty clearly a liberal bulwark. Still, the author goes on to say,
Starting point is 01:01:22 instead of a hard pivot from progressive to conservative, so in fairness, the author is clear about this, it's not as though Hollywood is conservative or fully anti-progressive. It goes on to write, quote, something stranger has followed. Suddenly both sides of the culture war are appearing on screen. Only in deeply artificial grand guignol fashion, their messages in issuing from characters who feel like,
Starting point is 01:01:45 Gauch parodies. The culture war, in other words, has gone camp. Hollywood now makes frothy, delirious shows for bipartisan audiences in which political causes that once seemed life or death are taken up as easy targets. Ideas that once felt incendiary become punchlines or dizzy memes. In many cases, it is hard to tell whether the left-wing talking point issuing from the character on screen is actually the product of an irony-poisoned right-wing writer, or inversely whether right-wing dialogue comes from a mean-spirited member of the democratic socialists of america these are camp aesthetics in the old sense they take the exterior trappings of once serious beliefs and produce chintzy knockoffs with deadpans solemnity um and you know i was having this conversation
Starting point is 01:02:27 with some friends today actually about charlie kirk memes so if you're on tic-tok or instagram wherever sometimes you can't tell if the charlie kirk memes are from irony poisoned what is the phrase that they use to just get it precisely correct if it's quite quote the product of an irony poisoned person on the right or if it's like a person on the left who is obviously engaging in satire sometimes it's genuinely hard to tell if it's like maybe sometimes a sincere you know coming from this place of like reverence from someone on the right for charlie kirk the the jokey memes or if they're coming from somebody on the left that is again, engaged in satire. And I think that's starting to capture this cultural moment really well. Obviously,
Starting point is 01:03:18 you know, 10 years ago, we saw this rise of the, as borrow the New York Times word, the woke revolution. And that is what we were using to describe the moment. We could call it left of liberalism, corporal liberalism, but it was clear that that was beginning to capture elite institutions and was trickling down to the broader culture, what it was being forced on, the broader culture. And now we're not necessarily seeing like a woke lash, but we're seeing what I would describe as this flagging moral confidence. I think what we're looking at when so much of this just becomes camp, it's not necessarily bad. It could be a step in the right direction. But what it suggests is that people who are creating this art, or to use another word, this content, lack moral confidence.
Starting point is 01:04:08 they see that nobody has the moral high ground. They're black-pilled on the left, black-pilled on the right, and then their corporate bosses are afraid of angering either the left or the right. And so rather than being paralyzed, which it felt like we were for a long period of time, and especially in that in-between phase, like the last year was kind of unclear where the culture was going. There was maybe like a paralysis. But now it's we're just going to have fun with it because it's so ridiculous. And again, it's not quite nihilism.
Starting point is 01:04:41 It's something, it's something different than nihilism. It's, because nihilism would suggest that none of it matters. And it's all, I think there are some people who have genuine nihilistic tendencies, probably more people. It's probably a rising portion of the population. I don't know how significant it is, but it's something that's like we don't know, people are looking for the answers. And in the meantime, they're just making fun of everyone. And I think everyone deserves to be made fun of right now, right? Like, that's not necessarily bad. And it's not necessarily immoral, right? It's not ideologically incoherent to turn the self-serious culture warring of the last 10 years, which was obviously whipped into a frenzy by the left in these elite institutions pushing ideas top down about the culture wars. And then the right responded to it, you know, reasonably in many, many cases, from my perspective. on the right, of course, and then unreasonably in some others. But there was just this seriousness,
Starting point is 01:05:43 then this paralysis. And so long as we can dispense with political correctness, maybe it's for the sake of business from the executives, but from this place of moral confusion, lower moral confidence from the writers and the artists, at least we're in a better place where we can take a breath and laugh. So I don't think camp is necessarily a bad thing. I think camp is the culture that we deserve. It might also be the culture that we need. So this New York Times article, though it didn't necessarily address where this is coming from, and I would diagnose it as this moral confusion or this low moral confidence. You know, we should have a culture that has a high degree of moral confidence.
Starting point is 01:06:25 And I think that's something we lost in this country, but it doesn't come back overnight. And if this is a stepping stone toward getting back to having some moral confidence as a society, then it's good. And camp is always good. So final thoughts, by the way, before we wrap, I just want to say thinking more about Jenks' point and, you know, post-liberation day, I've been back and forth a lot personally on where this was going to go. And I feel like there are a lot of people who want to say it's definitively this or definitively that. And what I still feel like we're in the middle of is a tug of war between, as Jenk was pointing out, the Bricks guys, and then the Mark Carney's who are intentionally trying to use their leverage to pull investments
Starting point is 01:07:14 away from the United States are now seeing the U.S. as an unreliable trading partner. And not, by the way, without reason. I think Donald Trump has intentionally showed that the United States can be unreliable and still have a lot of leverage. And that was part of the point was to say, this is so uncertain. You're just going to want to make your bets on the United States. You're going to want to do manufacturing in the United States. And for some companies that's worked, Sharpie is doing manufacturing again in Tennessee.
Starting point is 01:07:40 There's a great Wall Street Journal piece on how they managed to do that. And it's happened with some companies. And we still don't know exactly to what degree it's going to happen by the time, you know, all of the dust settles on this particular element of the trade war. But I do think there's an argument that the method to Trump's madness here, the method to point that the, the, the, the, from point A to point B, which if point A is where we were before Trump, and point B is a protectionist, just taking my own ideological argument, it would be like a more protectionist country
Starting point is 01:08:19 on national security and for domestic manufacturing, domestic job protection. The road does really matter because you want to obviously not spook investors that would otherwise be putting their money in the United States. And that really does, like, that really can end up being the difference between a black and white outcome here. So that's one of the things that I'm paying attention to, though I continue to be supportive of, you know, more protectionist agenda. And finally, on Greenland, we didn't get to talk about this with Jenk, but the nuclear ramifications of having more control over Greenland, I think are significant. Maybe we should have someone who someone on who's an expert in this space to talk a little bit about the Greenland question more.
Starting point is 01:09:09 But if Donald Trump just worked out a deal with his wild Greenland threats, I mean, I don't even, like, again, the tariff picture of this in the long term is still uncertain to me. But I could see it being one of those things 10 years from now. We look back on. And if it is a fair deal that Denmark's happy with, that Greenland's happy with, that Greenland's happy with and that, you know, this administration is happy with and is actually something that on paper at least would benefit the American public. I could easily see it being something you look
Starting point is 01:09:43 back on 10 years from now. We're like, this seemed so insane when Donald Trump was doing it. Some of the things did turn out to be insane, but this was not one of them. So I don't know. Who knows? Just wanted to make that point as we wrap up this week's edition, this week's Wednesday edition of Afterparty. Make sure to get your emails in to Emily at Delawaremedia.com tomorrow afternoon because I'm going to record another edition of Happy Hour, which you can only get on our podcast feed. Speaking of which, please subscribe wherever you get your podcast. Subscribe on the YouTube channel. It helps us a ton. Leave us review. Leave us comments, likes, very helpful. So grateful to all of you for listening, for watching, and we'll be back here next week with more after a while.

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