Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar - 2/26/24: Nikki Loses To Trump In SC, Trump Endorses IVF, Biden Donors Horrified At Notecard Reliance, Michigan Voters Stun MSNBC, Zelensky Lies About Troop Deaths, US Airman Self-Immolates, Bibi Freaks During Critical Interview, Woke Google AI Dystopia, And Taylor Lorenz Vs LibsOfTiktok

Episode Date: February 26, 2024

Krystal and Saagar discuss Koch pulls Nikki funding after SC loss, Trump panics endorsing IVF, Biden donors horrified at reliance on notecards, Michigan voters stun MSNBC on Biden criticism, Zelensky blatantly lies about Ukrainian troop losses, US airman self immolates outside of Israeli embassy to protest Gaza war, Bibi freaks during critical interview as Israel crushes protests, woke Google AI reveals PC dystopia, Krystal and Saagar react to Taylor Lorenz vs LibsOfTikTok.   To become a Breaking Points Premium Member and watch/listen to the show AD FREE, uncut and 1 hour early visit: https://breakingpoints.supercast.com/   Merch Store: https://shop.breakingpoints.com/See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Hey, guys. Ready or not, 2024 is here, and we here at Breaking Points are already thinking of ways we can up our game for this critical election. We rely on our premium subs to expand coverage, upgrade the studio, add staff, give you guys the best independent coverage that is possible. If you like what we're all about, it just means the absolute world to have your support. But enough with that. Let's get to the show. Good morning, everybody. Happy Monday. We have an amazing show for everybody today. What do we have, Crystal? Indeed, we do. Lots to get to this morning. So we've got results

out of South Carolina. Nikki Haley losing her home state. Shocked. Not surprised. But there are some interesting poll numbers from the exit polls that we want to dig into, see if there's anything to be gleaned from that with regards to Trump's chances in the general election. We also have Republicans sort of panicked over this whole Alabama IVF situation, trying to figure out where they stand there. So we'll break that down for you. A new report about concerns about Biden's age and ability, this time actually coming from the donor class, saying they are very concerned at his lackluster performances behind the scenes at these fundraisers. We'll get to that as well. Of course, we just had the two-year anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine. And close to that anniversary, we have Zelensky putting forward a claim about the number of Ukrainian soldiers killed that doesn't really pass the sniff test.

Strains belief. Strains credulity, for sure, to say the least. So we'll break that down for you and where we are in that war in general. We have some horrible breaking news to bring you this morning. A U.S. airman, it appears now, has died after self-immolating in front of the Israeli embassy here in D.C. for his protest over genocide in Gaza and his sense that he was complicit in that genocide. He died crying, free Palestine. So we'll bring you that news as well as some updates from what is happening on the ground in Israel and with the possibility of a temporary

ceasefire and hostage deal exchange. Sagar is taking a look at AI and what the future may hold for all of us. It's not good. And we are going to react to the Taylor Lorenz meets Chaya Raichik, the Libs of TikTok lady. Extraordinary video here that we definitely have some things to say about. Yes, we certainly do. And we're going to be handling that a different way. So stay tuned in that video. If you can, go ahead and help us out at BreakingPoints.com. You're going to get access to all of our premium benefits. More importantly, you're going to be helping cover for our election. And don't forget, we've got our State of the Union live stream, including a private live stream that we'll be

doing for subscribers. Afterwards, we'll be able to submit questions live and we will answer them, but only available to our premium members. So breakingpoints.com, as we mentioned. But let's go ahead and get to the big news out of South Carolina. Big or expected, Nikki Haley has officially lost in her own home state. Donald Trump absolutely crushing her in terms of the electoral results. He immediately took the stage after the networks called it for him at 7.01 p.m., literally a minute after the polls closed in the state of South Carolina. He didn't want to be upstaged again by Nikki Haley. So we have a few of their two comments. Keep in mind with Trump, some of this is going to be his

electoral speech afterwards, but also some of the remarks from the preceding days, just because they're hilarious and we want to talk about them. So let's take a listen to the two. I was just informed that we got double the number of votes that has ever been received in the great state of South Carolina. So that's pretty good. So it's a record times two. And I just want to say that I have never seen the Republican Party so unified as it is right now.

Never been like this. I said earlier this week that no matter what happens in South Carolina, I would continue to run for president. I'm a woman of my word. Yeah! Continuing to run on the whole woman thing? Okay. You know, in general, Crystal,

it is a rule that you're supposed to drop out if you can't lose your own home, if you're going to lose your own home state. Marco Rubio dropped out after the Florida primary. And in fact, many people forget, Ted Cruz did win the state of Texas in that Texas primary after Super Tuesday, one of the reasons

why he felt like he could stay in the race, similar to John Kasich, who mounted that campaign against Trump. He won the state of Ohio. And I think that's legitimate. If you can win your own home state and your people support you over somebody else, I think there's a little bit of a case to remain in here. But here we have a case where if we have the results, guys, let's put this up there, please. I mean, it wasn't even close. We have 59.8% for Trump and we have 39.5% for Nikki Haley. Don't get me wrong. You know, she didn't do terribly, but she still lost by 20 points. And it's like when we're talking about a 20 point loss and especially when we're talking about the fact as we go into the crosstabs as to how Trump absolutely dominated amongst

actual Republicans. And if you can just look at the map, I mean, it's the populated areas which are more urban and which are disproportionately more highly educated, not in the traditional Republican coalition. There's just not a lot left here to know what's going to happen in a major primary. And this was, again, the most favorable territory that could possibly exist. She's already been endorsed, you know,

by all the other people who've been dropped out of the race, Crystal. And in Super Tuesday, how can she possibly compete even to the level where she did in her own home state?

She spent six weeks or something here on the ground campaigning and barnstorming the entire place. I mean, it's her right to stay in the race if she wants to,

but I just don't really understand what she's doing at this point. You know? I mean, she claims she's saying now she's going to stay in the race if she wants to, but I just don't really understand what she's doing at this point. You know, I mean, she's she claims she's saying now she's going to stay in through Super Tuesday. I'm a woman of my word. That's what that's her line. Now, she won't tell reporters whether she plans to stay in longer than that, which you couple that with the news that the Koch backed Americans for Prosperity are pulling their funding. They're no longer going to be, you know, putting their millions behind her. I think the writing is more than on the wall for Nikki Haley at this point. To be honest with you, she did a little bit better than I expected. I thought she'd be in the 30s. She managed to get basically to 40, 40, 60. But I mean,

it's your home state. You were governor and this is best you can do. You can see where things are headed. There was a, she once again performed the best with independents. And there was a small percentage, I have four or 5% or something of Democrats who also participate in the primary. She did very well with them. But, you know, in terms of Republican voters, she's getting her butt kicked by Donald Trump in every state that she contests. And the expectation is that will be absolutely the same on Super Tuesday. The only thing I can think, Sagar, is that there's some theory of maybe if she stays in, she'll weaken Donald Trump. Maybe something crazy will happen and he'll drop down. And then her three delegates she got here will matter.

And the fact that she's like there in the race, she'll be the logical second choice. I mean, I don't even that I don't think would really work out. Even if something crazy happened and he was out of the race, she'll be the logical second choice. I mean, even that I don't think would really work out, even if something crazy happened and he was out of the race. I don't know that she would be the one that would end up in the position, but that's the only thing I can figure at this point. You're exactly correct. You could have made that case if you were Ron DeSantis, because there's credibly, I think, enough of a chance for a crossover. And for Trump delegates, let's say in this convention scenario where he's either dead or he's in prison or some scenario where he's not allowed to run. Well, then credibly those people, because remember, it's up to those delegates after the second ballot, their leaders,

where they're allowed to go. Yeah, I could see them going, they're not going to back Nikki Haley. She's decided to permanently plant a flag as anti-Trump. At this point, I saw a good column, which is basically like, congratulations on winning the never Trump primary. The problem is you didn't actually win anything. Now, the takeaway that I've had after this, and I think this is definitely, again, where you agree, is that we are seeing some warning signs for Trump that has nothing to do with Nikki Haley, but has to do with the anti-Trump coalition. So let's put this up there on the screen. As we can see here for the poll prediction of where things were, for the Iowa caucuses, the poll prediction was Trump 37 points over Ron DeSantis.

The final result had Trump at plus 30. For the New Hampshire primary, the 538 average of polls had Trump plus 18. The final result was Trump plus 11. And then for the South Carolina primary, if we can go to the next one, what we saw is that the final 538 average was Trump plus 28, and the estimated result here is Trump plus 20. What we can see there is a consistent underperformance within the polls. Now, the Trump cope, if I will offer it, is that especially in New Hampshire and in South Carolina, we saw a decent amount of the electorate, some 30% or so,

that was encompassing independents and a small number of Democrats, those people overwhelmingly coming and supporting Nikki Haley in the primary. But they're making a primary case. If we were to extrapolate this to the general election, it's a problem. He has a significant issue here with all of the independent voters

that have voted so far in a Republican primary. But of course, there's a lot of self-selection bias. Those are people probably disproportionately more anti-Trump and who want to see, you know, an anti, somebody who is not Biden and not named Trump who was on the ticket. Those people may go to RFK Jr. or something if he's able to get on the ballot or some other independent, they may not vote, period. What I do see is there's a problem here with the independent voters. And to what extent? Honestly, I don't know. There's a lot of people. I just read a very interesting analysis of American non-voters.

And it turns out that American non-voters are very much likely to decide this election in terms of very infrequent people come out every once in a while. They never vote in primaries or any other thing. But they may come out to vote for Trump and or for Biden. They're roughly 50-50 in terms of who they support. But the question is, are those people, you know, in the same vein as some of these independents? There's a lot of, you know, external analysis that's being done here. Yeah. So when you couple Trump's underperformance in each of these primary and caucus states with what we've seen consistently in special elections,

where Republicans are underperformed pretty much across the board. Yes. Especially when you talk about ballot initiatives that have anything to do with abortion. And we'll talk more about abortion and actually about IVF here in a moment. But when you put those two pieces together, it's a worrying sign for Republicans. Now, what you could say, and I think this is a reasonable argument to make, is that when you're talking about primaries and you're talking about special elections, there is a bias towards college educated voters showing up. When you talk about a general election, you know, that's when you get in your infrequent voters and those at this point. This is a recent, you know, year's realignment switch.

But now you're talking about those infrequent voters being more likely to be Republican. And so I do think that's a reasonable case to make here, why a general election for Trump could look different than these primary results, could look different from the special election results. But that is no guarantee, because the flip side of that is these are early indications of who is motivated to come out. And as much as we've talked about and, you know, with good reason, the young people and progressives and Arab Americans and African Americans who are discussing with Joe Biden over Israel and also over a variety of other issues and who may be open to third party,

etc., there are some indications that Trump may have some problems with a Republican base, and especially, like you said, Sagar, with independents who tend to lean Republicans. So let's put this up on the screen. This is some of the exit poll results among Nikki Haley voters. And again, she got 40 percent of the vote here, so this wasn't some tiny sliver of the electorate in South Carolina. So they asked, OK, what's your feeling if Trump wins the nomination again among Nikki Haley voters? 78% said they would be dissatisfied. They also asked if Trump would be fit for the presidency

if he is convicted of a crime. 82% said no. Now, again, people are very bad at predicting how they're going to feel about some hypothetical event in the future when it has not happened yet. Because, you know, the context, the circumstances, which trial is it? What happens? How does it all go down? Those things all matter. And so would I take that, you know, as locked in 82% say he wouldn't be fit for the presidency and they're not going to vote for him?

No. But again, this is a pretty significant warning sign for Trump in a Republican primary, especially among independent voters. I see it the same way. Yeah. Which is if these people were going to vote, the Trump strength in 2016 was not only bringing out the traditional Republican coalition, which came out from Mitt Romney, but it was also bringing out all of these people from the woodwork on top of people not coming out to vote for Hillary. It was a multifaceted victory. Same thing basically in 2020, kept on the traditional Republican coalition, added a bunch of traditional non-voters who were very animated around the issues that were going on at that time. If he's going to strip out a decent percentage, let's say

20, 30 percent of traditional Republican voters, you got to make that up somewhere else. Now, it's certainly possible. It's certainly possible with people who are going to coming out. It's possible with gains amongst Latino men, black men or whatever. You know, you don't need margins to shift all that much, but you can't bet on that going in. So looking at these numbers right now, I do see certainly some danger sign for Trump, where Biden and the Democrats specifically, not just Biden, have had a hidden underperformance very much in the same way that Republicans had back in 2016 and in a lot of the general election polls for 2020. It's one of those where it flips the mind in many ways where you have to, in all of our analysis, you're just going to hear a lot of hedging because you genuinely don't know what's going to happen. There's recent history and then there's not, you know, still recent, but only seven years ago. Yeah. Both of

those are countervailing whenever we're looking at what's going to happen. I mean, we have two candidates who are historically extremely weak. Yes. And hate it. And the American public is disgusted that they have this choice. And yet this is the choice that's in front of them. So for me, it's almost like whichever candidate I'm thinking the most about that day is the one that I'm like, oh, there's no way that dude could win. But they both have things going significantly going against them. But to go back to this electoral trend, I mean, it really starts with the midterms when Republicans dramatically underperform. And the cope then for Trump is, OK, but Trump wasn't on the ballot.

Sure, a lot of his extremism and stop the steal and it was his handpicked candidates, et cetera. But Trump wasn't on the ballot to really, you know, get his base excited and get them out. And it's like, OK, you know, it's a midterm that that kind of holds some water. I could see that. Then you have this whole string of special elections that they're just consistently going for Democrats and Republicans are consistently underperforming their typical performance in these districts, oftentimes underperforming the polls in these districts. And you're going, OK, well, those are special elections, but those are a little weird. Now you do have Trump's name on the ballot and you have some of the same warning signs showing up in the electoral results here. So what does it mean? I mean, we'll all have to wait and find out whether this is enough

to overcome the extraordinary weakness and concerns that you have on the Joe Biden side of the ledger. But the last thing I'll say about this is Trump is sort of famous for outperforming his polls. You know, back in 2016, there was all this talk of like the shy Trump voter, the person who really liked him and voted for him, but they were like embarrassed to admit it. Is it possible there's a dynamic in the other direction now where actually in the Republican Party, it has become like verboten to say you're not with Donald Trump. And so you can have people who feel like, oh, I should be with Trump and I'm going to claim I'm with Trump, but actually I'm kind of ready to move on from this whole era. I have no idea. That's speculation. I don't have any data to back it up, but we have seen the way that some of these polls have undercounted certain it up. But we have seen the way that some

of these polls have undercounted certain dynamics before. And we're now starting to see a consistent pattern where they are overestimating Republican and Trump support and underestimating Democratic support. And that's something we have to take note of. Trump, because he is probably the most electorally attuned Republican, is definitely taking a position which is very against what I think a lot of the pro-life community would like him to see. Let's put this up there on the screen. Immediately after that Alabama Supreme Court decision on embryos being classified as person,

Trump put out this truth. Under my leadership, the Republican will always support the creation of strong, thriving, healthy American families. We want to make it easier for mothers and fathers to have babies, not harder. That includes supporting the availability of fertility treatments like IVF in every state in America. Like the overwhelming majority, all caps, including the vast majority of Republicans, conservatives, Christians, and pro-life Americans, I strongly support the availability of IVF for couples who are trying to have a precious baby. Today, I am calling on the Alabama legislature to act quickly to find an immediate solution to preserve the availability of IVF in Alabama.

The Republican Party should always be on the side of the miracle of life, the side of mothers, fathers, and of their beautiful babies. IVF is an important part of that. Our great Republican Party will always be with you in your quest for the ultimate joy in life. So very politically attuned message there. And it's one where, look, five, 10 years ago, especially in the Bush era, you know, 20 years ago, you could not imagine something like this. This was a country locked in the debate, which seems crazy now, about stem cell research. I mean, remember, these were huge things. The Terry Schiavo case. I mean, these captured the imagination. Now, not only do you have the Republican candidate for president, or likely presumed, you also have the NRSC. This is the National Coalition to Re-elect Republican Senators putting out a memo which was immediately leaked to

the press. Let's put this up there. They say that the NRSC is specifically instructing its candidates to reject clearly and concisely all government attempts to restrict IVF. Key messages I will read here. Express support for IVF. Clearly state your support of IVF and fertility-related services. Blessings for those seeking to have children. Highlight the importance of these treatments in fulfilling the dreams of countless families to conceive, oppose restrictions on IVF, publicly oppose any effort to restrict access to IVF and other fertility treatment, framing such opposition as a defense of family values and individual freedom, and campaign on increasing access, actually, to fertility treatments, including insurance coverage and support services. So, you know, I definitely get behind that, Crystal.

But it does show really some of the Pandora's box that was opened up by Roe versus Wade. And, I mean, I have a couple of minds to this, which is I agree with all this. I obviously support IVF and all that. But I was talking with some very conservative Christian friends of mine. And one of the points they made, which is that, you know, if you really are a believer, like if you are, you know, pro-life in the scriptural sense, like you're not supposed to make concessions. Like the whole point of that movement is we don't make concessions. We don't make political concessions. Like we wholly believe in this movement. And even if it's unpopular or whatever, they spent some 40 odd years crawling over broken glass to vote for people like Trump to get the Supreme Court to reverse their decision. So they're not exactly of the mind

to make concessions for their beliefs, especially when they basically won one of the craziest victories in modern American politics. So I guess I have sympathy with them in that the Republicans were definitely willing to use them for their votes. But now when it's very unpopular, they're being thrown under the bus per se. But obviously, I don't agree with them in the first place. So it's one of those where I don't feel bad for them at the same time. Well, it's just it's just the pickle that they're in by signing a deal with these people. If life begins at conception. Right. Exactly. And, you know, which is what many of these Republicans have said they believe, then how are you going to have a carve-out for IVF?

Exactly. I agree with you. If it begins at conception, it begins at conception. And the problem is, yeah, they've opened Pandora's box. They haven't thought through the consequences. It was all fine and good to say things like life begins at conception when there were no actual stakes. There were no women and families who were, you know, trying to conceive and using IVF, something that is incredibly, you know, normal and regular and accepted and popular

in American society. Back when there were no stakes, it was okay to say things like that. Now they're having to deal with the logical outcomes of the positions that they have claimed to support over years. And so, you know, when you have politicians like I saw Kerry Lake put on a similar statement of like, oh, I support IVF. You look at the comments below that. There are a lot of pissed off conservative activists who I think justifiably are like that is inconsistent with what you people have been saying for years and years and years. Again, this is just the logical outcome of what they have claimed to believe. And it doesn't take a genius to see how wildly unpopular this position is.

Put this up on the screen. This is a poll. You know, some of the polling was actually outlined in that NRSC memo. It's not like it takes a political genius here. But this poll says that only 7% of Americans believe that IVF should be more difficult. Only 10% of Republicans, by the way. 5% of Democrats, 6% of independents. This is as fringe a position as you could possibly find. Yet because the pro-life activist community has been so active, so organized, so influential in the Republican Party, incredibly fringe extremist positions like this have found widespread support among Republican politicians. So you actually have,

if we can put, I believe it's the ninth element here in this block, guys, A9 up on the screen from Business Insider, you actually have 125 House Republicans who have backed a life at conception bill that does not have any carve out for IVF or anything else that would, again, have the same impact nationwide as this Alabama court ruling. So now Mike Johnson's, oh, I support IVF. No, you don't, because you're signed onto this bill that would have the exact same implications. They are the dog that caught the car. Now that they actually have to deal with the consequences of their positions, they're running away as quickly as they possibly can. But, you know, this is this is kind of out of their hands at this point because you have this happening in courts across the country.

The courts are ruling in line with what the legislature has passed before Roe versus Wade was overturned. And, you know, enacting the logical extension of what these insane fringe policies ultimately were with really, and I don't want to lose sight of this, this isn't just about political games, with really horrifying and traumatic results for women and families across the country. Yeah, let's put A11 up there just to show everybody the consequences, at least so far. You know, you have the major embryo shipping company is halting all of its business in Alabama. The three clinics which are in the state have all paused their care as they evaluate what the ruling means for their patients and for their legal liability. Now, as I understand it, what it comes down to is that the store of embryos and the legal liability that the clinics may incur as a result of this ruling make it such that doing business or operating it in the state could leave them potentially open in the event of an accident or something like that.

In addition to storage to like a literal manslaughter charge, meaning, of course, that they don't want to be going through it. I mean, I'm especially horrified at some of the people who are probably going through this right now. I mean, as you know, Crystal, it ain't like peachy and easy, you know, from what I've read so far, like you got women who are plugged up full of hormones and all of a sudden probably expecting treatments and medical procedures. And now they have to rebook and it's a nightmare. I can't even literally imagine it. The entire purpose though, and the point of the bill is where I, again, have a lot of frustration where now some of the pro-life community are politically pragmatic. They're like, well, you know, sometimes, obviously,

this one doesn't necessarily, it's like, guys, you either believe it or you don't. And it's like, and you said you did, and that you wouldn't make any compromises, even though it's the most historically unpopular thing that's ever happened to the Republicans in modern history. You believed it then, but now you're willing to make some concession. And then the problem again with the concession is that then you're just opening yourself up to the same practical understanding of all of this issue that all Americans are, even secular ones, whenever it comes to the issue of abortion. And that, you know, is really what, it really bothers me in terms of how it all works. You have, of course, you know, for the ones who

are consistent, the Catholic church is straight up against IVF. You have, of course, you know, for the ones who are consistent, the Catholic Church is straight up against IVF. You know, it's like, so which one is it? You know, whenever in terms of what's consistent with the teachings and not. Once you open up your door to the political pragmatism, then you're in the same boat as people who are, quote unquote, reluctantly pro-choice just because they understand that when you live in a dynamic society and all that, in terms of having choice and restricting access, et cetera, it's not always, one, that you can be 100% adherent to your principles.

So anyway, that's kind of my major analysis of how here they're willing to be pragmatic. But other times, never. Some of them anyway. Did you see Tuberville getting asked about this? What did he say? I know that he didn't have a response, basically, like short-circuited. And I think this is emblematic of the fact that, again, if you say life begins at conception. Yes, I agree. Yes. Then this is the logical outcome of that belief. And so he was really sort of trapped by that situation. Also, I think was like confused about

what had actually happened. But Huffington Post asked him his reaction. And initially, he said that he was, quote, all for it. I was all for it. Then they told him, you know, women are losing access to IVF treatments. Health clinics have stopped IVF treatments. Then he insisted that people need to have access. Then he started to try to backtrack. And he was like, ah, this is really hard. Again, you want people to have that opportunity. We need more kids. I'd have to look at the entire bill, how it's written. I have not seen it. Of course, this isn't a bill, it's a court ruling. So he just had no idea how to navigate like, oh, I'm supposed to be pro-life. I'm supposed to support things like this. But then on the other hand, ah, IVF, this is really unpopular. And then he just sort of bails on

the conversation altogether saying, oh, well, I haven't seen the really unpopular. And then he just sort of bails on the conversation altogether saying, oh, well, I haven't seen the bill. You know, it's just one more indication of where Republicans actually are on this issue and how, you know, what they're claiming now of, oh, of course we support IVF doesn't match up with where they've actually staked their ground politically across years and years. Tammy Duckworth actually has a bill that would guarantee access to protect IVF nationwide. She's been looking for Republican support and has apparently not had any success finding it. Let's take a listen to what she had to say. If I can get personal, I know that you turned to IVF for your daughters, age nine and five. What was your reaction when you saw the Supreme Court

decision in Alabama? Not at all surprised, unfortunately. I've been talking about this 2018 when it was very clear that Republicans were working to eliminate women's reproductive rights. Well, the decision is very clear that a fertilized egg is a child, is a human being, which means that, for example, in my case, when we had five fertilized eggs and three were non-viable, when my doctor discarded those with my consent, that would be considered potentially manslaughter or murder. Basically, Republicans have put the rights of a fertilized egg over the rights of the woman. And that is not something that I think the American people agree with. You introduced a bill last month to safeguard IVF access nationally. The National Republican Senate campaign arm is instructing their candidates to, quote, clearly and concisely reject efforts by the government to restrict IVF. So do you think you can now get Republican

support to pass your bill? It's been crickets since the Alabama ruling. And let's make it clear, Republicans will say whatever they need to say to try to cover themselves on this. But they've been clear. And Donald Trump has been the guy leading this effort to eliminate women's reproductive rights and reproductive choice. And so this is the next step. And by the way, not a single Republican has reached out to me on the bill. I've introduced a bill multiple times, now multiple Congresses. But frankly, you know, let's see if they vote for it when we bring it to the floor. So there you go.

That's a good question. I agree. By the way, everyone, please vote for that. Also, what they talked about insurance. Yeah, we should cover that, obviously. Especially, you know, I support fertility. I support it. I want our birth rate and all that to increase.

How do you think that's going to happen in an age where people are waiting way later to get married and people, you know, look, there's all kinds of hormone problems and all this other stuff. This is a very, you know, obvious option for a lot of people. It should not be purely accessible to the wealthy. And that's actually what a winning position, you know, on something like this looks like. But don't leave it to them to square themselves up. Yeah. Well, and the last thing I'll say on this is I think Republicans had sort of hoped that after Roe versus Wade has overturned, after the Dobbs decision, that, you know, eventually things would kind of calm down, people would move on. I mean, we're probably going to have more rulings like this, more situations like this. Certainly this conversation

about IVF is far from over at this point when women in Alabama basically have already lost access to this procedure. And there are other states around the country with very similar legislation on the books claiming that, you know, life begins at conception with the very same, you know, potential outcomes here. So this conversation is far from over. And Republicans are dramatically on the wrong side of public opinion in a way that, I mean, I don't think people can really wrap their heads around. No, you're right. I mean, this is like defund the police.

And honestly, maybe it's actually worse. I mean, 7%. You're on the side of 7% who want to make IVF more difficult. That's where you are. Good luck. All right. Speaking of good luck, let's now talk about some of Joe Biden's problems. They cover both sides issues here.

So a new remarkable report coming out of the donor class that they also are a little worried about Joseph Robinette Biden here. Let's put this up on the screen. This is from Axios. Headline here is Biden's cheat sheets at fundraisers worry donors. President Biden has apparently been using note cards in closed door fundraisers, calling on pre-screened donors, then consulting his notes to provide detailed answers, according to people familiar with the routine. Most of Biden's conversations with donors are shielded from public view. The president begins his remarks with reporters but not TV cameras in the room. There's frequently a teleprompter to help him stay on track. After his opening comments at fundraisers, reporters are then ushered out before donors are allowed to ask

two or three questions vetted by the president's staff. So just to sum up here, he's doing these fundraisers. He's obviously not accessible to American people at all, done far fewer interviews, press avails than basically any other president in the modern era. Okay, so there's that. But even when he gets behind closed doors at these fundraisers, he reads from a teleprompter his comments while the reporters are there, ushers them out, and then can't even handle three pre-screened questions without note cards and cheat sheets. So that's where we're at. Even behind closed doors, he is not freelancing here whatsoever,

not able to speak off the cuff whatsoever. His aides clearly have no confidence in his ability to speak extemporaneously on any issue, again, even with two or three pre-screened, pre, prescripted questions. I don't know. This is wild. It's just funny, Crystal,

when I see the standards that we hold these people to. Like, for example, we both do this for a living. And sometimes whenever you interview people, they will ask you for a list of questions that are beforehand for people what they're going to be in an interview. My rule is I will never participate in that. And in general, unless you're like somebody

who was like tangentially involved and now we're in the public realm, if you are a podcaster or something like that and you can't just show up extemporaneously and speak, I'm talking about an actual list of the questions, you don't belong in this business, period. Right. And that is what we do, which is like the lowest possible stakes. Yes. Now he's the president. Higher standards for random run of the mill podcaster than we do for the president of stakes. Yes. Now he's the president. Higher standards for random run of the mill podcaster than we do for the president of the United States. Yeah. That's my standard for a guy with like 200,000 YouTube subscribers or something, not the president who's in charge of

running the entire country. And I mean, it's trite, but it's like a daily reminder with this man of he's just not fit for the job, period. You can't he was in public life for four or 50 years. Ask him 20 years ago if he would have allowed anybody like this to be president. I mean, I've seen him speak off the cuff, you know, 10, 12 years ago. It was something that a lot of these people actually pride themselves on, the ability to do it, to have a spontaneous moment. I've seen him, you know, at a campaign rally and all this. That's the mark of a sharp politician, somebody who really belongs in public life. And this is the most friendly audience that exists. And yet he's relying on this and enough that they're leaking it and being like, hey, this is a

real problem. They are dragging him across. And at this point, like we're almost entering like criminal territory, at least morally for me, for the people who are shielding the public from this. Like we need to see this. It's FDR fourth term level stuff where he's drooling out of his mouth and they're dragging him, you know, across just because they want to still remain in charge. Listen, FDR was doing some good shit and had a whole program of people behind him. It was a different deal. It was very anti-democratic at that time. And this is the closest analogous

that we have gotten to something like that. It's been, I mean, it's very similar to the Dianne Feinstein situation. Is he as far gone as Dianne Feinstein? You know, I don't think we would put him quite in that category yet. He's only 10 years younger. Yet, but we've still got, you know,

if he gets reelected, we got four plus more years to watch this decline. That was one of the things that struck me. I don't remember if it was Ezra Klein or Nate Silver in their analysis of why they thought he should drop out, who pointed not to him as vice president, you know, back a decade plus ago or whatever. They pointed to his announcement speech when he ran for president back in 20, you know, the announcement speech was in 2019, not long ago, and said, look at this difference. Like, look at the decline in just this short period of time. What is this going to look like over the next number of years? What does

it look like now when you already know that he cannot handle the very basics of campaigning? He can't even handle the fundraising circuit, right? Let alone campaign rallies, let alone any sort of remotely contentious interview. He can't do any of it. That's why he says no to the Super Bowl interview, because he can't do any of it. And his aides have no confidence that he could do any of it. But to go back to the Feinstein thing, you know, some of the cope that I see from Democrats is like, oh, well, if there was a real problem, we'd know it. There's all kinds of reporters in this town who would love to report on Joe Biden's decline, et cetera. It's, oh, really? How long was Dianne Feinstein in grave decline before we ever heard a word of any of that? And many of these reporters knew

exactly what was going on, but they thought it was a little uncouth, disrespectful, et cetera, for the American people to know the truth. So do I put it past any of these people to lie and obscure and cover up the reality of the situation here with regard to Joe Biden? Of course not. These are the very same people who covered up how far gone Dianne Feinstein was. And we really only got a glimpse of it when she was practically on her deathbed. He would have to have a stroke on camera for them to even really take it serious. I'm serious. Or he would have to be hospitalized. And, you know, you found this crystal. I feel gross even setting this up. But there's been a more recent leak from Biden to show how virile

and strong he is. Let's put this up there on the screen. It's exclusive to the Daily Mail from an excerpt of a new book leaked by staff. Biden 81 sees the key to his marriage is good sex. How Joe Biden infuriates Jill, his wife of 47 years, with a very risque joke to staff about their private life, even though they aren't shy about their PDA. I mean, it's pretty clear. Apparently, like many presidents apparently before him, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon B. Johnson, many others who've occupied the Oval Office, Bill Clinton, he likes to brag about his sexual virility to his staff. Imagine having to work for this old man who can barely put a sentence together, which I guess probably fits with

some nursing home behavior, and have to sit there and just be like, oh, sure, Mr. President, like very uncomfortably like laugh at these jokes. I feel bad for them, the people who are subjected to this. But I think it was very clearly leaked. Oh, yeah. In an evidence, as you said, to show like, nah, he's fine. He's just, you know, he's like a big, he's still like, he's still got it. He's like Al Pacino.

He's fathering a kid at 83 years old. Oh, my God. He's part De Niro. You know, these people, 80 is the new 20. That's what they want us to do. Yeah. No, that's very much the clear intent of this league of like, well, he can't he can't even sit for like a basic interview with a friendly reporter. But look at this. Look at what a man he is behind the scenes, making his wife uncomfortable with his risque jokes about the sex life. Exactly. Oh, please stop. I feel bad for this lady. This is not helping your case.

No one wants to hear about this. Absolutely. Those are not the only issues that Joe Biden has, though obviously there are concerns about his age. There's also concerns about the way that he has destroyed his previous winning coalition out of absolute fealty and unconditional support for Israel in their assault on the Gaza Strip. John Fetterman, though, unshaken in his support for Israel in their assault on the Gaza Strip. John Fetterman, though, unshaken in his support for Joe Biden and saying that anyone who would criticize the man, and by criticize, I mean just like literally describe his policies or his current condition as evidenced by what all of us can see and hear with our own eyes and ears, anyone who would criticize him should just go ahead and fly

the MAGA flag, put the MAGA hat on. Let's take a listen. The president is going to win here in Pennsylvania. And I've always believed that whoever wins Pennsylvania is going to be the next president as well, too. And this is going to be it's going to be difficult. And we all have to lean in on that. And we also have to start having all kinds of Democrats criticizing the president too, publicly. I don't understand why. I don't know what's in it for you to do that, whether you're just chasing clout or you wanna make it in the news or anything like that. But if you're not willing to just support the president now and say these kinds of things, you might as well just get your MAGA hat because you now are helping Trump with this.

Love how- I love how Mika's, yeah. Yeah, I love how Mika, who holds herself out as a journalist, oh yeah, if you're not just engaged in complete propaganda and denial of the reality in front of all of us, then you might as well put your MAGA hat on. These are the same people who love to, including John Fetterman, loves to talk about democracy. Yeah, of course. Could you be, I mean, this is North Korea style propaganda. This is like you cannot question or say one critical word of the dear leader or, you know, you are an enemy of the state.

That's basically the position here. That's what he says. And, you know, we have an MSNBC panel. They actually did a focus group of voters in Michigan, many of them Muslim Americans or activists around Gaza. And, you know, these are not MAGA people, folks, but they are just Democrats. They're very upset with Biden and they've got some choice words for him. And I think for the John Fettermans of the world, let's take a listen. Is there a pathway forward for you with Biden? Oh, absolutely not. You cannot keep killing people with our money and just keep thinking that, oh, we are stupid enough to

elect you again because we'll fall in line. We'll forget. How can you, how can, like, this is an insult to me as a voter. For you, Biden has a pathway forward. Biden has a pathway forward. And what does that look like? That is him calling for a permanent and immediate ceasefire. The straightforward, simple answer for the Biden administration is push for a ceasefire, stop aiding Israel in their war crimes. And I guarantee you there are enough people who would be willing to deal with it and vote for the man. It is, in so many words, insane to me to have the Democratic Party and the Biden administration sit here and essentially say, if Trump happens, it's your fault.

If you don't want a Trump presidency, then are you not worried about what he could do domestically to this country? I am. You know, it's like a vaccine. I'm willing to take short term pain for a long term vaccine. I'm willing to take short-term pain for a long-term gain. I'm willing to let go of Joe Biden and oppose Joe Biden, make him a one-term president, punish Joe Biden by making him a one-term president and pairing his loss with the genocide in Gaza. Why does our democracy, why is having a Trump presidency more important than those people's lives?

Why is our democracy more important than thousands of men, women and children being killed? All right. I don't know, Crystal. I don't see a lot of those. Well, OK, that one guy, he said he's like, yeah, I could I could see a pathway back to him. But, you know, one of the points that some of the other voters made, and I think you've made this one, too. Some of the political press of this is baked in, period. And it's like a lot of these people, they may never come back. You know, even at this point, if there is some change in U.S. policy, just because of the initial actions in the first 100 days or so. So I am increasingly convinced this is going to be a problem. And I think it's not just because of Michigan. I think it really is an overall depressive effect of chaos, a weakening of the coalition across the board.

In the same way that Biden's decline really happened in the polls after Afghanistan, it wasn't really just because of Afghanistan. It was because nine different things all hit at once, but it was a precipitating factor. I think Gaza and Israel has now entered that territory. Yeah. I mean, for a lot of people who see this as a crime against humanity and as Joe Biden, you know, facilitating being directly complicit, spending our tax dollars on these, you know, bombs to kill children in the Gaza Strip, like it is a moral red line. And so the consequence of, oh, but you might, you might elect Trump. It's like, that's not on me. That's on, that's on you. That is on you. And what you have done in our name

and with our support and backing from the previous election campaigns. So I think a lot of people, this is just a red line beyond which they will not cross. And even for the gentleman who said, oh, I can see my way back to him. The series of policy changes he laid out are things that are not gonna happen. So, I mean, even for the gentleman who said, I can see my way back to him. The series of policy changes he laid out are things that are not going to happen. So,

I mean, even for him, I think it's very unlikely that he's able to be persuaded at the end of the day to come back to Joe Biden. But, you know, there's a much more immediate question right now this week, which is how many votes is uncommitted going to get in this Michigan primary, which is on Tuesday. I mean, Joe Biden at this point, you know, obviously is going to be the Democratic nominee unless he drops out or dies or is thrown in prison or whatever. The black swan events that are on the table for him are same as Trump. He's going to be the Democratic nominee. But there is a quite organized and effort with now quite a bit of relatively mainstream support to register a protest against Joe Biden by voting uncommitted. Actually, one of the most telling things I saw

soccer was Gresham Whitmer has been sent out to the Sunday shows of CNN and wherever to try to make the case to affirmatively vote for Joe Biden in Michigan. I believe it was in an interview with Dana Bash where she was very, she would not say, she would not set any expectations for how she thought Joe Biden would do in the state against uncommitted, which showed me a level of nervousness that I was frankly a bit surprised by. But one of the latest supporters of the uncommitted campaign is a lifelong Michigan resident, Michael Moore, who whatever you think about Michael Moore, he has been very prescient in his political analysis, especially in the state of Michigan.

He's had his finger on the pulse of how people are thinking there. And he went on MSNBC and a variety of other places to explain why he is backing the effort to vote uncommitted. Let's take a listen to that. I guess I'm a recovering Catholic at this point, but Joe Biden is, he's one of the few presidents in my lifetime that actually, when they went to church, like he means it, you know, Jimmy Carter was like that. I think, you know, but very few presidents, I think, and I think he does mean it. And I'm just, if I had a chance to talk to Joe Biden, the first thing I want to ask him is what do you still go to mass? I mean, what's going on here? Why are you participating in something that's killing civilians and children and 30,000 now dead? He's going to cost himself the election. He's going to you know, if Trump has any chance, it's the decision that he's made to embrace slaughter, carpet bombing, incubator, babies in incubators, dead, because they cut off the electricity, on and on and on. explaining their his horror and how Joe Biden is responsible for potentially getting Trump reelected. Michael Moore, someone who has the most maximalist views of the potential danger

of another Trump presidency. So and that's important to keep in mind as well as some of the people who are saying they're going to vote uncommitted in Michigan or supporting that campaign are people who, you know, really believe in the harm of a Donald Trump presidency of him getting reelected, feel it is very existential, but also feel that Joe Biden himself is imperiling his reelection chances. This one surprised the hell out of me. Put this next one up on the screen, guys. Beto O'Rourke, blast from the past, is supporting the uncommitted campaign in Michigan's Tuesday presidential primary. He says he agrees with the aims and the goals. We should have a ceasefire.

There should be a return of each and every single one of those hostages. There should be an end to this war, and there should be a negotiated solution to Palestinian statehood. All of that needs to happen, and I share that concern that the U.S. is not doing close to enough to bring those things to pass. He goes on. He lays out some history here in his thinking. He says the campaign to vote uncommitted is not without precedent.

When Martin Luther King Jr. and Andrew Young first approached Lyndon B. Johnson about passing the Voting Rights Act of 1964, the president told them he didn't have the political power to get it passed. King and Young spent the weeks and months that followed organizing to get Johnson that mandate. It culminates in John Lewis leading that march across the Edmund Pettus Bridge in March of 1965, almost being beaten to death in the process and really galvanizing the conscience of the country. Within eight days, Johnson convenes a joint session of Congress and by that summer has passed and signed into law the Voting Rights Act of 1965. I know that Joe Biden is a good man. I don't know that. But anyway, he's saying that.

I know that he wants to do the right thing. Also don't know that. Sometimes political pressure helps a president get there and that may be what's needed now. So that is Beto's thinking here. And Sagar, many people have commented on the extraordinary turn of events that has Bernie Sanders endorsing Joe Biden, including in the Michigan primary and Beto O'Rourke coming out for a ceasefire and for voting uncommitted. I didn't know that he endorsed him in the Michigan primary. That's pretty, that's crazy. He did, remember he won Michigan back in 2016.

That was a big deal. Yeah, wow. I have to toy with that one. Did not see that one coming. Certainly did not see that one coming. Like I said, I think Biden is probably going to win. It's really just a question of whether they're going to get a decent amount there on the ballot. If they can crack anywhere between, what do you think, 10 percent?

That's extraordinary. 10 percent would be a lot. 10 percent would be a lot. I think what I heard from the organizer is that their original goal was 10,000 votes. OK. 10,000 votes. I don't know what that would be as a percentage, but I would think that they're, I don't know. But I would think that they're I don't know, but I would think they're in line. But I mean, given the level of national attention and support, given the number of college towns in the state of Michigan, given the sizable Arab American population, you know, had the mayor of Dearborn come out and say vote uncommitted.

I saw a Detroit councilwoman come out and say vote uncommitted. You've got Rashida Tlaib. You've got Michael Moore. You've now got Beto O'Rourke. So it's got some momentum. What does it amount to? I don't know. But, you know, it's at least an attempt to send some kind of a Democratic message to Joe Biden. Whether or not he is concerned by that or heeds their calls to change policy is another question altogether. Absolutely. The two-year anniversary of the war in Ukraine has now come and gone. President Zelensky of Ukraine giving a landmark speech in which he pleaded for more Western aid, but in which he also made a comment, which we simply can't just let pass by because it really demonstrates the level of delusion right now inside the Ukrainian government and really the willful lies that are

being propagated to the American people. Let's put this up there then on the screen. In the speech, President Zelensky claimed with a straight face, Crystal, that the tally of the number of Ukrainian soldiers who've been killed is 31,000. Now, as even the New York Times remarks, quote, U.S. officials have said that the number is closer to 70,000. I would say that both of those estimates are dramatically underestimating the number ofation numbers, in terms of the fact, if you've only had 31,000 people who were killed, then why is the average age inside the Ukrainian military 50 years old? Why are you kidnapping disabled people off the street who are like 45 with one leg or whatever, who've been previously dismissed and allowing them to serve? Why have 650,000,

you know, prime age males have also fled the country? And that's how we know that the remainder of the population is not there. So if we know the fleeing estimate and if we know the previous population of Ukraine, the number is very likely in the hundreds of thousands. That is far more, you know, likely of an estimate. I would just put this up there from the New York Times, again, only a few months ago, which they seem to have forgotten. Even according to U.S. officials, the death toll, and well, they include death and injuries,

this was back in August of 2023. So there've been several, probably thousands, tens of thousands since then, was near 500,000. Now they're claiming, you know, a little bit more for the Russians. That's probably likely in terms of what the overall number is, but we don't know what it is. We don't know if it's 300,000, which is what the Ukrainians claim. But at the very least, Crystal, the reason why I felt so compelled that we had to cover this is that there are people in this country who believe that, including, I mean, the Times, the media, people are pointing to this as some sort of evidence of victory by the Ukrainian forces. Like, again, they are claiming with a straight face, Crystal, that they have had 31,000 killed and the Russians have had 300,000. So either they are the greatest defensive force known to man,

or they're lying. And that's unfortunate because they're pleading for more weapons and for more support when they are barely able to recruit 50-something-year people who are old. They have people who are 70 in the Ukrainian Armed Forces who are on the front line, many of whom just mass surrendered in one of their biggest strategic defeats in years on the battlefield. It's like the reality on the ground and the propaganda narrative is diverging at a historic level. And yet a lot of people in the establishment of this country, including the media, are buying it hook, line, and sinker. Yeah. I mean, even again, to underscore the U.S. official assessment is more than double what Zelensky is claiming here. And I think most estimates are that the Russians have more killed on their side. They outnumber Ukrainians on the battlefield almost three to one.

They also have a massively larger population in order to refill their ranks. Right. So, you know, yes, they have probably suffered more casualties. They're also in a better position to continue the fight and send more soldiers to the front line. I mean, the manpower issue for Ukraine is just as critical as the ammunition shortage is for Ukraine, if not more at this point. I think the reason why it's important to talk about just like the brazen nature of this lie

is because it's consistent with some of the domestic criticism that Zelensky has faced, including from some of his own military commanders about this propaganda bubble that he has created and persisted with. So it's one thing, look, you're in wartime trying to, you know, trying to prop up the population, keep them positive, you know, showcase whatever victories you're having on the battlefield, keep morale up, et cetera. I mean, I think anyone would expect any country to do that. It's another thing to just out and out lie about the reality of what's happening on the ground

and the defeats that are being suffered and the level of suffering that occurs. I can't imagine that, I mean, Ukrainians are the ones who know the people who are dying and being killed, know the people who are coming back with limbs lost, know the men who are having to flee the country to avoid getting scooped up, know the people with intellectual disabilities who are being sent to the front lines, et cetera. I can't imagine that they buy this crap either. So that to me is what's so noteworthy is just how even the New York Times can't take this with a straight face because it is such a brazen lie and so at odds with the realities that actually exist. Yeah, and that's the U.S. estimate, which, again, is dramatically undercounted.

Let's put this up here again, which is on the screen, because I feel really compelled, if Zelensky is not going in August of 2023, the number of Ukrainians who had lost limbs had already reached the levels that four years of the First World War had incurred for Germans and Britons who went through the entire four and a half year war. This is a war which where we learned about the devastating effects of artillery, of modern machinery, machine guns. And this is what they incurred in just a year and a half. It's been six months or so since this piece came out. How many more tens of thousands have then suffered amputations? It just doesn't, it flies completely in the course of, like it strains credulity, as you said in our beginning, that we could have First World War level amputation

and tend to have more than what's half the number who have been killed in action. Not even the most, you know, strenuous Ukraine believers would privately admit anything like this. And yet that's what they want us to believe. And the reason why, again, we're spending so much time on this is that they are in pure desperation right now. And it appears that we are going to enable that with some of the most devastating consequences. Let's put this up there, please, on the screen. And the very same time that Zelensky is giving this speech, then Secretary General of NATO, John Stoltenberg, is now hinting that Ukraine, this is from a Ukrainian outlet,

is hinting that Ukraine could use F-16s, quote, for strikes on military targets inside of Russia. So let's make very clear that President Biden allegedly extracted a promise from the Ukrainians that they would not do that. And yet, here's the NATO Secretary General who is saying that he would endorse such a policy. We have also seen in recent months, Crystal, the use of U.S. weapons by the Ukrainian forces deep inside of uncontested Russian territory. For example, in places like Rostov, well, they claim it's a military depot, and yet they're using the exact same tactics of the Russians. They're hitting civilian infrastructure, and they're killing kids in some instance. I'm not saying that, you know, they're on the same level or whatever, but if you're going to drag yourself down into that and you in the last gambles, as you're losing these major battles on the battlefield are going to be

throwing things out like that, that's probably the scenario most likely to lead to some sort of war. And then on top of, it's like, I can't stop. We have more inclinations that people want to, like the new candidates for NATO Secretary General, because this man is outgoing. Many of them are committing to a policy that Ukraine will eventually be in NATO. And President Putin gave a speech just yesterday. He's like, let's be very clear. If that happens, we will be in a full-blown nuclear war. And maybe he it's, and, you know, maybe he's lying. I'd rather not find out. That's one of those, we just have to be real here in terms of the manpower situation, the ammunition situation, and desperate people often resort to desperate things, which I don't blame them.

I probably would too. But if, you know, just like in the Israel situation, if we're going to co-sign, we're going to give you the weapons to do it, then we could be considered an active combatant in the same thing. No, that's absolutely right. That's absolutely right. And I think part of why Zelensky felt the need to put out there such a brazen lie that even the New York Times isn't buying at this point is because he needs to, for the U.S. audience, mask the incredible suffering of his own people. Because I think if people really understood what the costs have been of prosecuting and continuing to prosecute this war, that raises some very uncomfortable questions for the continued level of support going forward, which doesn't mean that people don't have sympathy for the Ukrainian cause.

That doesn't mean that it's justifying Russian actions. But, you know, this is the other cost of having a president who is so infirm and unintelligible that he can't sit for a single basic interview is there is no accounting of how they think this is all going to end, how they think this is going, where they think this is going, what the, you know, ultimate endgame is. We used to have some theory of the spring offensive and their hand will be strained, then maybe they'll come to the... What is the theory now? What would this additional aid package, what is that going to get us? What is that going to get the Ukrainians? Where is that going to put us all at the end of the day? So, I mean, that's

the piece that has long been missing here is you may hate the idea of a negotiated settlement that would include some sort of, you know, giving up some portion of the previous, you know, the Ukrainian land to Russia. You may absolutely hate that idea. I think that it is incredibly unjust. I'm not claiming that it is. But what's the alternative? What's the alternative at this point? What is the theory of the case for how you're going to get to a solution that you find to be better, that you find to be superior? And that's how, I mean, that's the logic, Sagar, of how these wars always continue indefinitely. It's the same thing. That's why we ended up staying in Afghanistan forever.

These other presidents weren't stupid. They knew that it was not a good situation. They knew that if we left, it was not going to be a good situation. And so they just, the easy logic is, all right, we'll just keep it going. We'll just pass the buck rather than actually try to bring this you know, literal egotism, fanaticism, and now delusion is that they are in a way worse position today than they were at the beginning of the war. No doubt about it. Now they have lost their entire generation of Ukrainian men. I just saw a video today of a single local recruitment person in Ukraine. They pulled a million dollars out of shoeboxes that he had in his apartment because he was taking bribes to let people out of the draft. I mean, this is one guy in one depot inside Ukraine.

And they're all US dollars too, just so we're all aware in terms of where that currency is coming from. That's just one guy. The grift, the graft, it is extraordinary to a degree that you can barely understand. And on top of all of that, our major Russian battlefield victories are a Russian, you know, moving away from conscription, successfully backfilling all of the 300,000 people that have either been killed and or injured. They've had a very successful program by basically bribing people in the Caucasus regions to come and join the military. Very willing, it appears, to be fighting to use attrition-style warfare. In terms of Navalny and all that, he basically, you know, somebody died, his major political opponent. He's never been more in control of Russia. They are going to produce 4.5 million artillery shells in 2024,

according to the Estonians. It could actually be even higher. Our best estimate for Europe and the United States, couple hundred thousand. It's like between the manpower, between the power imbalance, between the will, it's a devastating situation. The longer they keep this going, they're going to lose even more of their country and they're going to lose even more of their people to be killed. It will actually put them in a position where Putin is the least likely to negotiate. If he has breakthroughs on like, I was reading one military analyst that compared some of these recent breakthroughs that have already happened to the initial opening gambles that led the Germans to capitulate in the First

World War, just to put it into perspective. Many of the gains from their original counteroffensive that have been now won back by the Russians. And you can't blame it just on artillery because we don't even have the ammunition to deliver if we wanted it, which would only lead to F-16s, missiles, and other things being launched into Russia, which would only bring us all into a worse situation. So bleak, bleak situation that's happening over there. We have some horrifying breaking news this morning. A U.S. airman by the name of Aaron Bushnell self-immolated in front of the Israeli embassy as an act of protest. He streamed this live. He said in part he did not want to be complicit in genocide. And as he was on fire,

he was screaming, free Palestine. His family wanted the video to be released. Obviously, Aaron, as part of what he was doing, wanted people to see what he had to say. We're going to show you a little bit of the video so you can hear his words. We're going to cut it off before he begins to douse himself and set himself alight. But just a warning, even this portion is very disturbing. So only watch if you want to see this. Let's take a look. Is Aaron Bush now? I am an active duty member of the United States Air Force, and I will no longer be complicit in genocide. I'm about to engage in an extreme act of protest, but compared to what people

have been experiencing in Palestine at the hands of their colonizers, it's not extreme at all. This is what our ruling class has decided will be normal. So he then goes ahead and sets himself on fire. Paramedics rush in as well as, I don't know if it's a cop or some sort of law enforcement or Israeli embassy security who is pointing a gun at him as he is potentially burning to death. There are conflicting reports this morning. Some outlets say that he has died from those injuries.

Others say that he is in critical condition, in very, very bad shape. A few things that we have learned. First of all, it has been confirmed he is, critical condition, in very, very bad shape. A few things that we have learned. First of all, it has been confirmed he is in fact a current active U.S. airman. We also know, and this is crazy to me that we had no idea about this, this is actually the second act of self-immolation in this country. There was another individual who set themselves on fire for very similar reasons outside of the Israeli embassy in Atlanta, I believe. So I'm not sure how that got covered up and we didn't hear about

any of this. We can put some of the details here up on the screen. Again, disturbing image of Aaron here on fire. The breaking news headline here from Mario Nafal is an active duty member of the U.S. Air Force set himself on fire in front of the Israeli embassy in Washington. Quote, I will no longer be complicit in genocide while on fire. He repeatedly yells free Palestine. I don't even know what to say about this. The media, of course, fell down completely on the job here in reporting exactly what happened. We can put this up on the screen.

New York Times and other major outlets. First of all, it took them a long time to cover it at all. Second of all, in their headlines, they don't explain the reason why Aaron gave for committing what he described as an extreme act of protest and likely, you know, ending in at least critical, critical injuries and very possibly in his death. We can see these headlines here. New York Times, a man set himself on fire outside the Israeli embassy in Washington, the police said. U.S. airman sets himself on fire outside Israeli embassy. Active duty airman sets himself on fire. U.S. airman sets himself on fire. Again, nothing about his stated reasons for why he did this, Sagar. It's just, it's horrifying to watch. It's just horrifying.

Yeah, it's horrible. I really recommend to people, do not watch that video, the full video of it, unless you really, like, you need to know exactly what you're getting yourself into. And it's just one of those where

headspace and all of that. As you said, this fits with the second one, which again, I did not know about, about the Atlanta, the U.S. Air Force, confirming that the active duty U.S. airman was involved in the incident. We're not yet sure as to his condition in the hospital. There have been sustained protests outside of the Israeli embassy here in Washington, as well as many other Israeli consulates and other diplomatic outposts around the world. But yeah, it's just horrifying.

The entire situation is just devastating, especially to think he seems to be a very young man. As you said, apparently his family wanted the video and all that released. But it certainly, I mean, this is reminiscent of the very likely why the act of protest was taken. The monk who set himself on fire in protest of the Vietnam War, which became one of the most iconic, you know, images of that time. So very likely trying to recreate something like that. But I don't want to glorify or, you know, anything like this just because, you know,

this man very likely is going to lose his life as a result of this incident. Yeah, if he hasn't already. Or, you know, the fruit seller in Tunisia. Yeah, that's right. Another, you know, extreme act taken there, a desperate act taken,

which had massive geopolitical consequences. And as you said, Sagar, I'm sure that's what Aaron, who was clearly desperately trying to do something to stop what he sees and what I see and what much of the world sees as a genocide and as an active duty service member feeling that he was being made to be complicit in that genocide. You know, our thoughts are certainly with his family. I hope that he and his family are able to find peace and comfort in a horrifying time, horrific situation. Yeah. All right. Let's go ahead and move on to the very latest from Bibi Netanyahu. He was on one of our Sunday shows over the weekend. Margaret Brennan pressing him pretty aggressively on whether he is losing support for the United States.

Let's take a listen to how he responded. The IDF has only destroyed 30 percent of Hamas leadership and that the amount of tunnels that Hamas uses have really only been tiny in terms of what has been destroyed by the IDF. There is growing distrust of you personally, sir. You know this in the U.S. Congress and within the Biden White House. When your closest ally is telling you things like this and telling you that you need to reconsider a strategy, isn't it worth considering? Look, I think that the U.S. agrees with us on the goal of destroying Hamas. Yes. And on the goal of releasing the hostages.

The decisions of how to do that are left with us and with me and the elected cabinet of Israel. And we're doing that. A lot of things that we were told by the best of friends initially turned out not to be true. They said you can't enter the ground war without having enormous complications. They said you cannot fight. You can't enter Gaza City. You can't go into the tunnels. It will be a terrible bloodbath. All of that turned out to be not true. Sure. But the former head of Central Command was on this program just a few weeks ago and said basically you have not articulated any specific endgame here. But putting that aside, I want to come back to a few different things you said.

Wait a minute, Margaret. Margaret, hold on. You lob these grenades at me and you keep on moving. Well, first of all, you say there's no confidence in me. Well, the Israeli public has confidence in me. Last week, the Knesset voted over one. There were massive protests throughout Israel yesterday. Of course, we have protests. We have protests. Israel is a democracy. We've had protests. What Hamas has done is horrific. But President Biden has said

your actions, sir, are over the top. Aren't you concerned that Israel is creating more terrorists than it is killing? What would America do? What would America do, Margaret, if you face the equivalent of 29 11s, 50,000 Americans slaughtered in one day, 10,000 Americans, including mothers and children, held hostage? Would you not be doing what Israel is doing? You'd be doing a hell of a lot more. And all Americans that I talk to nearly all say that. I'm sure the Americans he talks to does say that. That's certainly true. I'm just, this man is living in a delusion, like in a pyramid of his own construction. He's like, the Israeli public supports me. How in a straight face can you possibly say that? You know, the other part of this thing, Crystal, he continues to do only interviews with U.S.-based media outlets. He won't face his own people in Hebrew to face any critical

challenge. Go and sit with your own media outlets who will actually ask you very detailed questions. They're not nearly as afraid as our people are. I mean, look at that. It's the most tepid, like, hey, you know, some people say President Biden. And, you know, Haaretz and many other Israeli journalists and others that we have covered here are far more critical of the Netanyahu government than most of the people in our own country. So that was my big takeaway. I thought she did a decent job of pressing him. But, you know, the Biden administration gives him every out because, first of all, their criticism of him is so tepid. Oh, Biden said it was over the top.

Oh, my gosh. Wow, that's unbelievable. It's so tepid. It's so lame. It doesn't come with any sort of pressure. And you have multiple U.S. spokespeople who have now repeated basically what Bibi says there, of like, hey, it's their country. They can do what they want.

OK, but we don't have to ship them the weapons of their genocide and of their atrocities. Okay. We don't have to ship them the funding. We don't have to provide them diplomatic cover, both at the UN and at the ICJ, like we have done over and over and over again. We don't have to block and veto multiple ceasefire resolutions as we have done now. So it just is so, it's the peak of gaslighting to pretend like, oh, well, it's just up to them and we've got nothing to do with it. Bullshit. You don't want to use the leverage that you have. And so Bibi feels perfectly comfortable to go on American television and say, oh, the Americans, yeah, they've pressed us on some things. But ultimately, actually, they've been wrong about all of the criticisms that they've lobbied at us or all of the suggestions that they made about how we should conduct this offensive. I mean, he said, oh, they told us it would be a terrible bloodbath if we want. It has been a terrible bloodbath.

It has been a terrible bloodbath. No one was wrong about that. Now, did the U.S. actually, you know, fully express those concerns that we've been willing to do anything about that? No, absolutely not. But, you know, it's just another humiliation for the Biden administration to have Bibi on our television, basically like throwing in their face any sort of concerns or objections they have. And Bibi getting a little bit testy there with Margaret Brennan, because as you said, Sagar, he's not used to being challenged or subjecting himself to anything approaching a critical interview. We're going to get to the protests in Tel Aviv in just a minute, because as you said, it is he's not delusional. He knows he's just a shameless liar. He knows how precarious his

domestic political situation is. That has driven a lot of his war making decision making is how precarious his political standing is. I mean, you have an overwhelming majority of Israelis for a variety of reasons, most of which don't match my disgust with Bibi Netanyahu, but for a variety of reasons, want early elections and want him gone. So insane and delusional and just a flat-out lie to claim otherwise. But let me just also update you on, we've been telling you there have been ongoing negotiations about a potential new temporary ceasefire. This was the reason the U.S. gave for the most recent blocking of a resolution in favor of a permanent immediate ceasefire. Oh, well, we can't do that because we need to negotiate this other temporary potential ceasefire. Here's the framework as best we know it that is being worked on. I don't

know how close they are to actually securing this deal, but reportedly the updated U.S. framework includes the release of several hundred Palestinian prisoners in exchange for the release of 35 to 40 Israeli hostages, including civilian women, female soldiers, men over 50, and hostages in serious medical condition. The number of Palestinian prisoners released for each of the female soldiers will be higher than for the other abductees that will be released at this stage. For each hostage who is released, Israel will agree to a day of ceasefire when in total, in the first phase of the deal, it will be possible to reach six weeks of ceasefire. The number I saw floated was potentially like 60 days. The U.S. framework includes an initial and limited return of Palestinian citizens to the north of the Gaza

Strip that will start during the implementation of this stage of the deal under conditions that will be defined during the detailed negotiations. Of course, there's next to nothing to go back to in the north of the Gaza Strip, which has been utterly destroyed. The U.S. framework also includes a significant increase in the scope of humanitarian aid that enters the Gaza Strip. Well, previous frameworks have called for that as well to no avail. We'll get more on that in a moment. And the next phases in the deal that focus on release of soldiers and exchange of bodies were left very general, as in the previous framework. So no clue if they are actually close to securing this deal, although there seems to be serious efforts to engage with this framework. Although

Bibi also making clear that even if they do agree to something approaching this framework and this temporary ceasefire, he's still fully 100 percent intends to continue the war after that, including going into Rafah, something that the Biden administration has also expressed concerns over. And our own spokespeople and national security advisors like Jake Sullivan have said that they have not received any plan for keeping civilians in Rafah safe. 1.3 million Palestinians have been pushed into Rafah. Also, with know, provision of aid, that is where the overwhelming majority of humanitarian aid flows through. You already have people dying of starvation in incredibly desperate circumstances. So that's where we are in terms of this potential hostage

deal and Bibi's intention to continue the war that has already incurred such an unbelievable cost on Palestinian civilians after that deal's conclusion. Yeah, so the hostage deal, I think the major headline out of it really was not only in terms of the upcoming Rafah operation, which could be delayed, but it was the unwillingness, at least on the part of the Israeli side, not yet clear really on the Palestinian side, that they're like, this has to be a time-limited hostage deal that doesn't leave it open-ended. That said, the framework as, you know, what we have for six weeks or something like that, we did see a resumption of hostilities after the last one.

It is certainly possible there could be some sort of diplomatic opening, however, in the interim that would either delay or significantly change. Because you can just imagine, Crystal, if you have six weeks of no headlines and a change in the diplomatic situation, of a release of the hostage, continuing deteriorating domestic political conditions for Bibi inside of Israel, and if they double down on their military operation, it could change. I mean, that doesn't mean I don't think it's not likely. I think it's probably the most likely course. But if there is some sort of framework, in general, when the guns stop firing and there's some sort of release, that's net positive for everybody who's involved. Yeah. The only time that there's been significant hostage exchange was in the previous short ceasefire.

I mean, the people of Gaza, the Palestinians, are suffering so, so much. So you have to cheer for even a temporary ceasefire. But Bibi at least is making it pretty clear right now that he fully intends to go into Rafah. And, you know, this also does get to his domestic political standing because they haven't come anywhere close to eradicating Hamas. They haven't even been able to take out the top leaders that have been on their target list. So he has every incentive to hold on to power by continuing this assault on the Gaza Strip and going into Rafah. So I fully expect that will be the case, you know, as evidence of just what shaky political ground he is in. Tel Aviv experiencing some really wild protests and met with a violent police reaction. We can put this

on the screen. You can see the size of the protests here, the number of people on the streets in Tel Aviv. These are protests directly against Netanyahu, people who have a variety of criticisms of him, also concerns about the failure to secure release of the hostages. You can see some of the police response here, which again, very violent, very aggressive. Here you see a water cannon being shot at people. There are some incidents from the police here that are already being investigated. So that's a reaction to the protests that are going against Bibi. Now, let's take a look at the protests that are have been going on a bouncy castle and, you know, celebrating, dancing, waving the flag. I don't see that same aggressive response here. up at this crossing, unable to pass because of these protesters' desire to starve Palestinians

more than they're already starving. And make no mistake, they are already starving to death. Of course, it will be the youngest, the weakest, the infirm who succumb to starvation first. And again, very difficult video to watch, but let's put this up on the screen. This is a two-month-old baby. So this baby was born after October 7th. And here he is, his name is Mahmoud Fatouh, breathing some of his last breaths before dying because of starvation. That is the direct result of the U.S. administration's policy of unconditional support. That is a direct result of Bibi Netanyahu and his government. That is a direct result of those protesters blocking aid from getting into the Gaza Strip and imposing collective punishment on the entire population, including this baby that never saw a day that wasn't comprised of

this horrifying assault on the people of Gaza. Yeah, it's terrifying. The hospital said that he died of acute malnutrition. The reason that really what comes through in terms of the Israeli government is that they loved, and you would even notice in the interviews, like, of course we have protests, we're a democracy. I'm like, yeah, loved, and you would even notice in the interviews, like, of course we have protests, we're a democracy. I'm like, yeah, dude, but you're spraying those people in, it's called Democracy Square, actually, in Tel Aviv, of these protesters. But then the people who are blocking food trucks, you're building, you know, you let them have bouncy castles. Not only that, they're being visited by cabinet members, including the defense minister of the government.

That's disparate treatment of people who are protesting. Remember, the official position of the government is that those people are not supposed to be there and trucks are allowed to let in, according to their framework negotiated with the United States and with the United Nations. And it's like, well, OK, if all protesters are treated the same, I actually have no issue with that. But you're not treating all protesters the same. You're selectively allowing some and then selectively suppressing others with the ruling coalition to keep a lid on how unbelievably unpopular we're. And what's even crazier is what, you know, Israeli media is reporting. Some of the people here who were sprayed and who were in the democracy square were the families of hostages who were being held in Gaza. These people, look, obviously we're all the same and all that, but their voices, I would, you know, given the Israeli public, those are some pretty important people. We don't spray

them in the face, but you know, these pro, these pro-war, like anti-food people who are just allowed total impunity. And that's basically the policy of their government. They're held hostage by the most fringe elements of their society. They're green-lidding settlements and all this other stuff. And if you protest against it, which again, let's be clear, not a lot, not all Israelis support this stuff. I know plenty of them who do not and would cringe and are horrified specifically by the settlements and all that in the West Bank. What are they going to do if they take this street? So governments can throw their asses in jail and spray them in the middle of the square. Yeah. It's unreal.

That's exactly right. The Washington Post actually had a very good report on those protests blocking food, blocking the food trucks, the ones with the bouncy castle and the dancing and whatever. And they reported on how, you know, there were IDF soldiers present, there were police present, and they just let it continue. Let it continue. Even as those aid trucks are backed up, even as that little baby boy is starving to death. And there are more and more reports every day of people who are dying of starvation at this point, again, as the direct result of all of this.

And so, you know, you look at things like that. You look at the settlement policy, the Biden administration, oh, they put sanctions on four settlers. Oh, my gosh. It's an attempt to frame it as if it is the actions of a few fringe extremists versus the explicit policy of this government and not just this government, by the way, I mean, the settlements have expanded under every Israeli government since the 70s, every one. So to pretend like this is some fringe project project or it's just coming out of the Netanyahu administration even is really inaccurate. This is the explicit aim of the Israeli government, has been for years and years and years. You know, as long as Joe Biden has been in Washington, this has been the policy of the Israeli government. And to pretend otherwise is incredibly, incredibly dishonest. You know, if the Israelis didn't want those food trucks to be blocked, if they wanted those food trucks to get into those starving Gazans, you can damn well bet they would be there.

Well, yeah. I mean, then that's the other thing is you have a cabinet minister who openly goes to war with his own government and supports these people who are protesting. It's just he's an incredibly weak prime minister. Every act of his is weakness, and it's just a bolster, his coalition. And you're basically allowing 8 to 10% really of the population to hold hostage the entire country. I honestly, this is an intolerable situation. I don't know how the people there aren't protesting even more against the government for something like, especially if you want to see the hostage release, you should be out there, you know, in major force, which is, you know,

supposedly allegedly, you know, what the vast majority of that population actually does believe whenever it comes to this deal. Yeah. I mean, the overwhelming bulk of the Israeli population believes very much in this war, thinks it should be incredibly aggressive. And we saw those polls early on saying, oh, the IDF, if anything, isn't going far enough. There was only, I think, 1.8% that said they had gone too far. So we shouldn't delude ourselves about what it is that the population supports. But there is genuine friction with regards specifically to the efforts to secure hostages. At least one poll showed a majority of Israelis thought that should be the primary goal of the war. And of course, what we've seen is that Israel has killed more hostages than they were able to rescue in the course of this offensive, and that the only time that there was significant hostage release was during the ceasefire.

That's where the pressure to secure some sort of a deal comes from, and so we'll see if this temporary ceasefire framework that the U.S. is pushing, rather than a permanent ceasefire, they've decided they want this temporary ceasefire to be very likely to go in after the conclusion of that. If that is to come to pass, we'll see if that's able to come together. There you go. We'll keep you guys updated. All right, Sagar, what are we looking at? Well, last week we had a fun segment about Google's Gemini AI image generator. By this point, you've probably seen it, but just so I can have a laugh too, let's relive that saga. The basics of it are that Google's AI generator on launch day

seemed genuinely incapable of creating an image of a white person, even when it was actually called for, like with prompts about America's founding fathers, Polish soldiers in World War II. It injects Asian or black people into images of what a European family was supposed to look like. The images took over social media in a matter of hours. They quickly prompted an apology from Google, who then halted the product as it updated its software and even were shuttering it for some time. This prompts two very important questions. First, how does this happen? Second, what are the actual stakes here at play? And then, if we accept those stakes, what, if anything, should be done about it? So I'm going to answer all of those. Let's start with the first.

How does something like this happen? If you watched our original segment, we got at some of the basics, that Google is a bureaucratic nightmare of an organization infected by political correctness. The way that a product like this gets shipped is that people are too afraid to say something like, hey, why can't the image generator produce white people? It would rather embarrass the company in front of the eyes of the world than flag it internally and face some problems. Quickly, after this entire fracas became to light, videos began to surface of some talks from Jen Jenai. She is an Irish technology executive at Google who heads up the, quote, responsible innovation team for artificial

intelligence and is responsible for programming in the social parameters at Google. Let's take a listen to some of her HR philosophy in the past. We do work together day to day to try and advance the technology and understanding around responsible AI. So today, I won't be speaking as much from the Google perspective, but from my own experience. I have worked at Google for over 14 years. I've led about six different teams, mostly in the user research, the user experience area, and now in the ethical user impact area. So I'll be sharing some of my learnings from across that time,

but also some of my failures and challenges. I think it's okay to talk about things that you've made mistakes in because we will make mistakes. When we're trying to be good allies, when we're trying to be anti-racist, we will make mistakes. The we're trying to be good allies, when we're trying to be anti-racist, we will make mistakes. The point is, though, to keep trying,

to keep educating yourself, and getting better day to day. Okay, not surprising. Anti-racism, DEI, HR, gobbledygook speech. If you're a right-wing internet pundit, most of the analysis, it stops right there. You laugh at these woke idiots, and you move on. But I would urge others to not think about AI images, which don't really matter all that much,

and instead thinking about the lurking assumptions in the text models that we are missing and what a future with these hanging over our heads will look like. For that to happen, we have to close our eyes and envision a future. A future of AI does not necessarily mean replacement. It more is an altering of our total interaction with machines. Instead of typing something and getting a response, we may use our voice. Instead of asking for a definitive response, we will ask for aggregated recommendations. As we all know, good recommendations are derivative of our knowledge base and assumptions programmed in, and that is where the danger lies. As Brian Chu has deciphered in his Substack

newsletter, From the New World, the Google paper itself demonstrates the nefarious principles that are programmed into the model. Humans explicitly filter data fed into the Gemini to comply with the diversity standards at Google, and quote-unquote harm reduction is programmed in when the AI is considering questions. Finally, the model itself has a rule, I'm not kidding, where stereotypes should be opposed whether those stereotypes are true or not. So the stereotype rule is that one responsible for generating the ridiculous image, but it demonstrates how dangerous the language of this type itself is. The model is designed for image and text to do its best to produce false information,

let's say on racial stereotypes, even if they are literally true, like in the case of skin color. You can imagine a myriad other ways that this could manifest itself for questions around affirmative action, test scores, crime statistics, and more. But this is where we reach a crossroads of how do we fix this problem. First, if we accept it's a problem, I think it is. I think people of all stripes should. Yes, the examples I've highlighted are very coded right wing, but you should be terrified of the principle of a future where information presented to you as fact is explicitly curated to comply with political correctness in vogue at the time, especially if these are models and systems through which we will solely interact with the digital world and which will have a huge impact in teaching our children of the future. Second, if we accept that problem,

we have to grapple with the system design itself. Effectively, what we have here is an AI arms race. The sheer cost of servers, chips, and staff have only the biggest players right now that are open AI, which is backed by Microsoft. You have Google, you have Amazon, you have Meta, probably Apple sometime in the future. There are multi-trillion dollars of money and market cap and investment with little ability right now for startup entries to meaningfully enter into the space right now. So if we accept then that there's this path to fixing this, the first preferred solution of the establishment is going to make the same mistake that we did when it came to social media. We let massive monopolies arise. And then when the problems began to arise, we created a censorship industrial

complex through which the government, the NGOs, and ideology individually pressure these companies to censor their enemies. The counter argument that comes back, they say, no, no, no, no, don't censor us, censor our enemies. And then we enter a natural race to the bottom where government becomes all-powerful and it works with just a few of these entities. The other way is to declare now that we should not repeat the same mistake of the past. The way to get there is through decentralization and open source. Currently, the reason why quote-unquote woke Google, woke chat GPT, and all these others are bad is because they are inside a controlled system. Models that are controlled by Sam Altman, CEO of Microsoft, the DEI team at Google, the future AI team at Facebook.

When you have an open source version of this, however, none of them are actually cutting edge themselves. Open source AI instead would allow for these models to become available to everyone. So instead of guessing as to whether something is programmed to be bad, you can know by simply looking at the code. It can be audited. It can then be tweaked by another. Open source would allow a first principles approach where we start from democratic grounds and we would build from there rather than allow mass centralization and jockey over who gets to pressure the oligarchs. It is genuinely vital that we act soon or the exact same network effects that took place with Facebook and Google

in the early days of the web will happen again with all the attendant massive social costs. Worse, if the AI optimists are right, it will replace a huge part of our digital life. It is the same current tech monopolies that will become stronger and more intrusive into our daily life, it is the same current tech monopolies that will become stronger and more intrusive into our daily life than ever before. We will have to play catch up and only further and further get away from the dreams of the early internet, which was a more connected,

a more democratically informed, empowered society rather than a subjugated one. We know what our elites would prefer, which is why we should have to take it into our own hands. That's something that I spent a lot of time kind of thinking about this, Crystal. And if you want to hear my reaction to Sagar's monologue, become a premium subscriber today at BreakingPoints.com. All right. At the same time, we had to put something fun in the show just to give us all a smile. A friend of the show, Taylor Lorenz, a great journalist, of course, probably a great admirer of this program, had a sit-down interview with Chaya Raichik. She is the founder and the person who runs the Libs of TikTok account on Twitter, previously of TikTok and of social media fame, which, of course, both of these individuals have become lightning rods on social media.

And so there was a great summit between the two, which occurred with some interesting moments, which I think revealed something about the two of these people who are, for better or worse, central to our online politics debate and all of that. We've pulled some of this. We will be gating some of our reaction for our premium subscribers. So if you want to hear fully what we have to say, breakingpoints.com. With all of that, let's watch the video and we'll react on the other side. If you eradicate transgenderism, which I believe you suggested in a post today. No, I never suggested that. Oh, okay. You reposted

a post that was advocating for that. What would happen to the people that have already medically, socially completely transitioned and are leading happy lives? What would happen to them? I mean, what's your plan for that? If transgenderism doesn't exist, which it seems like that's what you believe, what happens to all the people living happy lives as trans people? Well, first of all, the whole trans is,

it's based on a lie. You can't change your gender. Okay, but- So they could go live their life. I mean, I can't tell someone what to do in their house. Sounds like you do want to tell people what to do in their house. I never said that. So you're totally okay with people being trans, just not as long as they're in public?

No, I never said that. They could, the whole thing is based off of a lie, and I think that this lie cannot be mainstream in our society. It's just, it's a lie. And what harm is it causing, do you believe? I like the truth. I like truth. Right, but I'm saying, what's the harm of people expressing their gender identity differently than you believe it to be? What harm are they causing?

Like I said, we are a nation of truth and I seek the truth. But I'm asking about the harm. What's the harm? You might believe it to be false, but what's the harm? The harm is that there's a lie that is very mainstream and is being embedded into every institution. I guess I'm wondering what the material harm is. Aside from it's maybe something that you disagree with, as in your version of the truth is different than their version of the truth, what is the material harm of them living their life as a woman or man or gender that you don't agree with?

Not anything that's wrong is their material harm, necessarily. So there's no harm? I don't approve of. Not anything that's wrong is there a material harm necessarily. So there's no harm. I didn't say that. Okay. I have a lot to say about this. So it's funny because I think I said this to you. I think that the most midwit, like right-wing Gen Z poster on Twitter could have given a better articulation of the quote unquote case against transgenderism

than apparently the lives of TikTok founder could have. It's for a person who spends all day aggregating and pushing out all of these videos to not have apparently better formed views about this is genuinely stunning. I don't know what it takes really to make Taylor Lorenz look like an intellectual in this entire discussion. So Crystal, I don't know. I'm genuinely stunned by this interview. And we watched the full thing, just so we're clear. None of that was edited, or at least that was put out by them. It hasn't been disputed yet by either of the parties that were involved. So I truly these two people deserve each other. That's that's my general take.

I mean, for Chaya to not be able to. I know. I'm stunned by it. Even articulate what her view even is. She keeps saying I'm for freedom. It's like, what does that mean? She keeps that. Well, OK, so do you want to eradicate transgenderism like you liked or reposted?

I didn't say that. Okay, well, then you're fine with it? I didn't say that. I mean, so what do you actually even believe? Let's start there. And then you can't articulate the basics of why you believe that. And to your point, Sagar, like this woman is obsessed with trans people. This is like her number one.

This is her whole shit. She's doing this all day, every day, and apparently won't even fully articulate what her views are. Which, by the way, I mean, so the initial, you know, moral outrage panic on the right about trans people is very focused on kids. Right. And this was like what's being taught to kids in schools and what procedures that are open to them. And, you know, that's our focus. That's what we're concerned about. And in the beginning, there was a very clear attempt to say, grownups can live your lives, do what you want. And I believe that to be clear. But as things have progressed,

now you've got people like the Matt Walsh's of the world and others who know we also want to impose our view of how you should act out your gender roles on all of the country, including, you know, consenting adults, just living their lives, however they want to live their lives. I think that part of why Kaya has a hard time even saying what she even thinks, is she knows that that piece is like very extreme and wildly unpopular with Americans who will instantly have revulsion to you trying to tell an adult how they should be and what they should do and what decisions they should make in their own lives and with their own bodies. And so she's stumbling over that and so can't even articulate the basics of her position, let alone how those adults living

their lives create any sort of quote-unquote material harm to other people in the world. So that's how you end up with this just embarrassing, incoherent display in which, and that's the other thing, Taylor's not asking her hard questions. Yeah, these are the most basic and easy questions. Explain your philosophy. That's it, basically. And she can't. She can't do it. She keeps asking about the material harm. This is the easiest question on earth. We can talk clearly about the detransitioners, about people and all of that who have identified as transgender, underwent life-altering surgery, and then now find themselves in an irreversible position. And they believe they were victims of social ideology. Which is a tiny, tiny percentage of the population's agro. First of all, it's a brand new phenomenon. So that's, and even if it

is harm reduction, quote unquote, as the Europeans have found, have found that that means that it's not necessarily something that you should just cavalierly come through with. We have a massive explosion of 300,000. Adults make all kinds of decisions. I agree. That they regret in their lives and we don't ban them from doing that. I agree. If you were 18 years old and you want to fundamentally alter your body chemistry, be my guest. Honestly, you could do what you want. I don't think tax dollars should pay for it. And if you find yourself, you know, on the other side, literally sexually dysfunctional, that's your fault. That's like people who get tattoos and then come to regret them

later on. But if you're under the age of 18, I think there should be a total and complete ban on it. Now, also, in terms of any puberty blockers, I've basically become convinced of that just because of the irreparable harm. Should we ban puberty blockers for girls who have early onset menstruation that has, it's been used in that context for decades? Well, that's not the same thing. It is the same thing. But it's being used. It's the same drug. No, but it's being used for medical purposes. It's the same drug. Well, no, but it's not chemically castrating them. But it has the same irrevocable harm because it's the same thing. It's the same drug. No, but it's being used for medical purposes. It's the same drug. Well, no, but it's not chemically castrating them. But it has the same irrevocable harm because it's the same chemistry. Okay, but that's a decision that can be made based upon a medical decision, not one based on a social explosion where we see 300,000 youths between 13 and 17 now identifying as transgender. Who is more likely to litigate the medical decision?

Politicians and Kaya Re Reichik or doctors and medical professionals in conjunction with families? I believe that the most of these decisions should remain within the family. When I said here is that a within the context of a social ideology and explosion for 300,000 people now between the ages of 13 and 17 identifying as transgender, which has been some 1000% increase in the span of just 10 years, it is so obviously a social ideology that is coming and being pushed, I think, by some elements of our society. But you completely discount also, though, that there's increased acceptance, which can lead to more people identifying. You think it's 1,000%? You also are ignoring the fact that the vast majority of people who identify as non-binary or transgender don't go through with either the hormonal treatment or any sort of medical treatment.

It's just more in how they present to the world, which Haya and others like her seem to have a problem with even that, which was something that in another part of this, Taylor was trying to press her on that piece of like, all right, well, where do you draw the line? And what if someone says like the way that you're expressing your womanhood isn't appropriate? Like, where do you draw the line on these things? Which is another thing that she just had no answer for. Hey guys, Ready or Not 2024 is here. And we here at Breaking Points are already thinking of ways we can up our game for this critical election. We rely on our premium subs to expand coverage, upgrade the studio, add staff, give you guys the best independent coverage that is possible. If you like what we're all about, it just means the absolute world to have your support. But enough with that.

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