Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar - 5/9/25: Woke Marxist Pope? Trump CAVES on China, Loomer RAGES at Casey Means

Episode Date: May 9, 2025

Krystal, Ryan, Emily and Kyle break down the Friday news with a new American Pope, Trump caving to China, Laura Loomer outraged at Casey Means pick for Surgeon General, and more! Damian Mark Thompson: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/holy-smoke/id1163175265 James Li: https://www.youtube.com/@5149jamesli If you need any help, please contact http://breakingpoints.locals.com/contact To connect your RSS feed, use this link: https://breakingpoints.locals.com/rssSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Welcome to Breaking Points. Crystal, good morning. Good morning, Emily. Lovely to see you and lovely to see our guest. Right. We are joined now by Damian Thompson. He is an editor at The Spectator. He hosts the Holy Smoke podcast over there. And Damian, we may see our co-host Ryan Grimm pop up at some point while we're chatting with you. In fact, great timing, Ryan. Here he is. But Damian, I first want to say you are in Rome right now. You have been covering the events of the last 24 hours.

The first American pope has been chosen. So first, Damian, thank you so much for being here. And if you could just give us your initial reaction. This was a surprising pick. Steve Bannon, I think last week, described him as the, quote, dark horse, a potential dark horse candidate. And that's actually what happened. So you're the expert here, Damien. What do you make of all this? Well, I think the first thing I want to say is that there's a mood of real optimism in Rome today. People who had dismissed Cardinal Prevost as Francis Mark II, some sort of hopeless scheming liberal, have been very pleasantly surprised, first of all,

by the sight of him coming on to the loggia of St. Peter's wearing the traditional robes that Francis rejected. Secondly, by the choice of name, Leo, which is a very traditional one, by his style and on checking his record, they discover that he isn't perhaps as liberal as they thought, that he seems to have relatively orthodox views on the sensitive issues of sexuality that have proved to be so divisive in the Catholic Church.

And there are also rumors that he's sympathetic to the traditional Latin mass. So all of that is causing traditionalists who initially reacted with dismay when they heard the name to change their verdicts fairly quickly. And you can see it happening on Twitter. They like the way he's presented himself. They like the thoughtful theological message. They particularly liked his very Christ-centered homily in the Sistine Chapel to the Cardinals this morning.

So I think above all, there's just a sense of relief that the bizarre, quixotic, and often, I think, personally cruel pontificate of Francis has come to an end. There will not be a Francis II. As I've written many times, Francis was involved in so many horrible abuse cover-ups that I think his legacy is profoundly tainted. So one of the things, of course, that people immediately noticed is Prevost's social media profile being the modern era. And several of his recent tweets, actually all of his recent tweets, seem to be quite critical of the Trump administration.

This one in particular, he chimes in here and says, J.D. Vance is wrong. Jesus doesn't ask us to rank our love for others. So that led to that, among other things, led to Republicans like Laura Loomer calling him a woke Marxist pope and really despairing about his liberal inclinations. What do you make about his political commentary with regard to J.D. Vance and also the meeting with President Trump and the Kelly in the White House? Well, he's not a big fan of MAGA, that's for sure. But there's a big difference between a woke Marxist and somebody who doesn't approve of the second Trump administration. And there are plenty of woke Marxists in the Catholic Church,

but there's no evidence that Pope Leo is one of them. He is probably left-leaning on the subject of migration, and it's always puzzled me that the Catholic Church is so keen on advocating mass migration without any thought about its long-term social consequences. On the other hand, and perhaps you guys can help clear up this mystery for me, what's this business about him not being a registered Republican, because I understand that the state of Illinois doesn't have registration in that way. But having voted in a series of Republican primaries, could somebody clear that up for me? Yes. You know, I think that might be Charlie Kirk polled his voting history. Charlie Kirk also is from the Chicago area, polled his voting history. And it might be the case that he's sort of from the never-Trump school of the conservative movement here in the United States.

He's a Chicago guy. It's very interesting, Damien. I guess we'll see. And, you know, it's always difficult to map. Go ahead. We know that he's pro-life. And it's very, very hard for an orthodox pro-life Catholic, and the new pope certainly is orthodox on the subject of abortion, to support the Democrats, who, you know, who are incredibly dogmatic in their support for abortion,

including late-term abortion. So, you know, I would have been very surprised, for example, if the new pope had supported Kamala Harris. He'd probably support either of them. What do we know about his time in Peru relative to child sex abuse cover-ups? It's an open question. I don't know. I've just seen some talk about that. This was why my jaw dropped open when I heard Robert Francis, I immediately knew who it was

because I had just been reading some very detailed coverage in the influential Catholic investigative publication, The Pillar, which is very highly respected, about allegations that Cardinal Priebus, when Bishop of Chicago in Peru, brushed aside complaints by women that they'd been abused by priests. And he was also accused of watering down the severity of their accusations. And therefore, you know, before the conclave, abuse survivors organizations were drawing attention to what they claimed was his bad record on this.

And there's also a case dating back to 2000 in which, as an Augustinian prior or whatever he was in Chicago, he was accused of allowing a pedophile priest to live and operate near a school. And as I understand it, the new pope has merely invoked some sort of formal excuse for the Chicago, for the Chicago. Excuse me if I get involved for the Peruvian complaints by these women and and offered no explanation for what happened in Chicago so that is being followed up I saw it was followed up in the Daily Mail um today and um it won't go away but I think I would make a distinction and it's a very these things have to be taken incredibly seriously but I would make a distinction between failure to deal adequately with abuse allegations, which is terrible, and of which vast numbers of bishops have been guilty, and the sort of grossly negligent and culpable covering up of, in some cases, convicted abusers that Pope Francis indulged in. Which I think, you know, I regard his pontificate as a disgrace for that reason alone,

and the failure of the press to follow that up. So it would be a little bit strange if the press concentrated so much attention on following up this absolutely legitimate story, and ignored the fact that the late pope has a record which, you know, had he been the head of state anywhere in the Western world would have forced him to resign years before he died. Damian, what do you make of the politics of choosing an American pope? What is the significance of that? And, you know, do you have any, have you heard any rumors about some of the internal politics about how he was

chosen from an ideological perspective as well? Well, I'm not so sure that the cardinals thought of him as an American pope. This is a guy who spent nearly his entire career, certainly his entire Episcopal career, in Latin America. And before that, he was a missionary in Latin America. So I suspect that it was the Latin American voting bloc, which might perhaps otherwise have gone to Cardinal Tagli, that carried him over the two-thirds majority. So I'm not so sure. I mean, obviously people are aware that he was born and brought up in America. But he is, you know, he has a mixed ancestry

and had spent so much of his adult life in Latin America that I think it was the Latin American block that really backed him. But that's conjecture. I saw something about the name Leo potentially signaling some type of reference to Leo XIII's labor encyclical. I'm deeply out of my depth when it comes to this stuff, but I understand there was...

So am I. Okay. Leo XIII was doctrinally orthodox and in some ways the founder of modern Catholic social teaching. Interesting. if it refers to Leo XIII, some of the many other great popes called Leo, including some not so great popes called Leo, but if it is a reference to Leo XIII, then that might indicate some sort of balance between doctrinal orthodoxy, and it does seem to be doctrinally orthodox,

more so than Francis's bizarre and haphazard mixture of impenetrable spirituality, I think, and a very pronounced social conscience, one that has, whether you agree with him or not, already led him into conflict with the Trump administration. But on the other hand, I think President Trump is actually very keen to, in as far as he possibly can, have good relations with the Catholic Church. So I think Trump will take insults, but there won't be the same sort of insults and sniping and, you know, goading that Francis directed at Trump. If Pope Leo wants to criticize the Trump administration, he will do so in an honest, straightforward and civil manner. Damian, one thing that people like myself, I'm not a Catholic,

but people who are on the left who appreciated Pope Francis, really respected was his commitment to and focusing on an anti-war message and especially vis-a-vis the atrocities committed in Gaza. I wonder if you have any insight into Pope Leo's perspective on that conflict. I want to ask you something. You're talking about respecting a man who protected a serial rapist of nuns. How does he earn your respect? I'm not having a go at you, Crystal Pussley, because I'm a fan of yours, but really, a man who doesn't that, I mean, really doesn't that overshadow everything? So many abuse victims had their stories ignored and their abusers upheld and protected by this man,is how can any anyone well i mean i'll i'll answer that i think that people who are not intimately involved with are familiar with the catholic church and don't know the details of it assume that pretty much everybody in cath you know

the the leadership there is involved and to some degree with covering up media that's a gross failure of the media imagine and there are third covered up i think maybe chrysal knows the most recent number something like 13 000 children have been killed by israel and so anybody who speaks out against that is going to get a hearing from people who are opposed to that. It's unprecedented for a pope to abuse his personal authority to protect a Jesuit, ex-Jesuit, accused of abusing and raping 20 young women, including religious sisters, in an order he founded, an order which is basically a sex cult, and for him to enjoy the personal protection of the Pope

who kept his vile artwork on the door of his, on the wall of his apartment until the day he died. This is Rupnik that we're talking about? This is Rupnik, exactly. This should have been a very good story, but there was a corrupt Vatican press corps who kept the story out of the headlines.

Which helps to explain why I think, yeah, why people like us don't think that there's a whole lot of difference in the choice. Like, okay, whoever you're going to get is going to be protected by the press. But Damien, I do want to get back. There's a huge difference.

Both are appalling, but there's a difference between cover-ups and the sort of very, very active protection of convicted abusers that France has indulged in. So Damien, fair enough. I hear your point. I hear your point. And I confess to being ignorant on many of the specifics about who covered up what and what their level of culpability was. But I do want to know if you have any perspective on how Pope Leo may orient himself vis-a-vis war and peace and specifically with regard to Israel's atrocity in Gaza. And also Ukraine. I think there's a question of that as well. I just don't know at this stage. My assumption is that he'll want to be a peacemaker. My assumption is that he would condemn some of Israel's actions as well as, of course,

condemning the appalling slaughter of Israelis by Hamas. I wouldn't expect him to align very clearly with either side, I would be surprised if he was as indulgent of Russia as Pope Francis seems to have been on occasion. But that's speculation. And Damien, my last question, just to actually kind of wrap all of this up, is I've relied a lot on your reporting over the course of the last papacy. And I know that Leo front and center of the discourse about what was happening in Vatican City. Does the new Pope have any complicity in Francis's regime of covering things up and silencing and indulging particular guilty parties? It's a really good question, because in a sense, I mean, he was a very senior member of the Curia.

In a sense, every cardinal who failed to speak up about what they knew was happening, which was that the Pope was covering up for convicted as well as credibly accused vile sex abusers, really has some explaining to do. And Pope Leo, like the cardinals who elect him, not only has some explaining to do, And Pope Leo, like the cardinals who elect him, not only has some explaining to do, I would say, on that count, but has to do something about it. And what everybody's been saying to me in Rome for years is, as soon as Francis dies, it will all come out.

I hope it does. And when it does come out, the level of complicity of Francis in covering up sex crimes all over the world, if that really does come out, then that will be a huge diplomatic problem for the new Pope. But at least it will be confronted, which it desperately needs to be, because the fact that the general public doesn't know the extent of the depravity is shocking in itself. Damien, we are all non-Catholics here, so we really appreciate you coming on, especially someone so well-sourced, literally in Rome right now, to help us understand.

A great pleasure. Let me just emphasize the mood here is upbeat. Thank you, Damien. We really appreciate it. Thanks a lot. Camp Shane, one of America's longest running weight loss camps for kids, promised extraordinary results. Campers who began the summer in heavy bodies were often unrecognizable when they left. In a society obsessed with being thin, it seemed like a miracle solution. But behind Camp Shane's facade of happy, transformed children

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podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Over the past six years of making my true crime podcast, Hell and Gone, I've learned one thing. No town is too small for murder. I'm Katherine Townsend. I've received hundreds of messages from people across the country begging for help with unsolved murders. I was calling about the murder of my husband at the cold case. They've never found her, and it haunts me to this day.

The murderer is still out there. Every week on Hell and Gone Murder Line, I dig into a cold case. They've never found her and it haunts me to this day. The murderer is still out there. Every week on Hell and Gone Murder Line, I dig into a new case, bringing the skills I've learned as a journalist and private investigator to ask the questions no one else is asking. Police really didn't care to even try. She was still somebody's mother. She was still somebody's daughter. She was still somebody's sister. There's so many questions that we've never got any kind of answers for. If you have a case you'd like me to look into, call the Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145. Listen to Hell and Gone Murder Line on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. All right. So interesting perspective from the right

there. I, you know, I have, listen, I have no idea what the reality of how Pope Leo is going to position himself. But, you know, I will say the reaction I've seen has been quite different. You know, the left is very encouraged by even the choice, as Ryan was getting at, of Leo as the name, certainly the sniping at J.D. Vance, the upset from much of the right, including the Laura Loomers of the world. So, you know, a lot to be seen about how he positions himself. But also, to your point, Emily, I mean, he was someone who was close to Pope Francis and had been put in this position of selecting many of the cardinals and bishops, which also may have put him sort of in the pole position to achieve this position,

you know, not knowing anything about the politics involved here. But what do you make of this, Emily, before we let you go? Because I know you've got things to do today, too. A little flight to catch, so hopefully the real ID doesn't mess that up. But yeah, my Catholic friends are, I mean, I would put it this way. I think one of the things that Damien said is really interesting, that the initial reaction was pretty uncomfortable as soon as people started scrolling through his Twitter feed, Pope Leo's Twitter feed. And it's extremely political.

It was as though the only times he was tweeting or retweeting was to make political statements. Now, that's not exactly accurate, but it accounts for probably 50 to 60 percent of the tweets over the last several years on his feed, which means that he has a well of frustration with MAGA as an American and with the Trump administration, with J.D. Vance, who is a Catholic convert. One of Francis's, I think, points of tension with J.D. Vance and others is that there's this wing of Catholic converts, particularly in the United States, who do like the Latin mass. And that's what Damian was alluding to. And they see that as kind of a proxy for this anger at the modernization attempts in the Vatican. And so all this is to say, I think the Latin mass sort of codes right wing. Correct. Yeah, this is like J.D.D. Vance version of Catholicism.

Yeah, like tradcast. And I don't know if J.D. does Latin mass, but it's sort of seen as like a proxy for that. But Leo comes from that sort of strain, the Francis type of strain of the church. And so I think what Damian pointed out was interesting, that over the last 24 hours, some of the people who were hoping for a more conservative choice have come to reconsider whether Leo might have things that they really like, and they're now feeling, quote unquote, upbeat. We'll see. But my last big thought on this is just, I think my Catholic friends might not like me

saying this, but there's a desperation for a breath of fresh air, because Francis has mismanaged things, whether you're liberal or conservative. The guy mismanaged things whether you're liberal or conservative the guy mismanaged things he was complicit in cover-ups is such a intense character that I think there's a some of my conservative friends who get really frustrated with mapping contemporary American politics onto the Vatican left right it doesn't work perfectly that's absolutely true the same time this guy was posting seemingly only to make a point against the American right over and over again. So I get that it's complicated, but I think he's probably closer to Francis than some of my conservative Catholic friends

probably will. They'll probably find this out in ways that are unpleasant to come. Yeah. So there's some coping going on potentially here. Possible cope. Everybody got Francis wrong. The first day or two after when Francis was named, everybody thought he was kind of a conservative.

Oh, really? I don't remember that. There was a 24-hour period where the right was celebrating and the left was freaking out. And then he went around like, you know, kissing people's feet and people like, oh. Wow. Francis was like really, really, really anti-abortion. I mean, but isn't any Pope going to be anti-abortion?

Yeah. For him, it was like he had, you know, everyone has sort of like a suite of issues that are their priorities, and that was definitely one of his. So that's what the rights were reacted to immediately when it came to. So they got that wrong. Yeah. All right. So I guess we'll see. Anyway, Emily, I'll let you go for the day.

Great to see you as always. Have a great weekend. We'll see you next week. Thanks, guys. See ya. Ryan, how are you this morning? Wonderful. How about yourself?

Good. Thank you for standing up for my honor with Damien. Like, well, you know, yes, this is obviously the sexual abuse scandal is an incredibly important one. But also, you know, there are other issues that we could discuss here as well. So in any case, speaking of other issues discussed, there's a ton that I want to get to in the show. And also, by the way, guys, Ryan's going to have to jump about 10 o goes on the Abundance Caucus, newly formed. And if we have time, we'll get a little bit of your thoughts on Casey Means. She may be right up your alley, Ryan. I don't know. You have-

Shrooms and crystals. Yeah, man. Talking to trees. This might be your gal. Is she talking to trees or is she just listening to them? Because if you're listening to trees and hearing from them, I'm with that. If you're talking to them, then you've got it. That's too far? That's too far. Okay.

All right. We'll investigate. We'll investigate. First, I want to, let me see what I got here first. I want to get into this trade stuff. And in particular, there's some news this morning. I don't know if you've seen this yet. I'm sure you probably have.

But Trump posted that he thinks that an 80% tariff on China seems right, up to Scott B., being Scott Bessant. So basically, China's strategy of do nothing and win seems to be working out, Ryan. Yeah. And markets jumped on the UK trade deal yesterday because it was kind of a nothing burger of a deal. Yeah. Basically, apparently the UK makes cars and they're going to be allowed to sell like 100,000 cars into the US at a reduced tariff rate. And in exchange, they will reduce their digital tax that they were hitting our big tech companies with. And there's some tariff reciprocity, basically like a free trade steel zone that we're creating with the UK. And we're still going to then hit other steel with a 25% tariff.

And because there wasn't really much to it and Trump sold it as this like historic deal with our best friends across the pond, that sent a signal to the markets that he's looking for face saving ways out of this trade war and so the hope then from the markets is okay he understands he's lost and he's going to wind this down and so i think that's why the markets popped i think the markets might be a little wrong like we should probably you, you know, dial up Jeff Stein again, see what he thinks. But I think he might be more committed to continuing this until he gets a real punch in the face that he doesn't recover from him quickly. Knocking tariffs on China down to 80% is also silly because anything above a pretty trivial percentage is a meaningful tariff. So the difference between 80 and 145 isn't that significant because in either case, most importers, most businesses that rely on Chinese imports are out of business. So whether you're out of business at 80% or out of business at 145% doesn't really matter to the company that goes bankrupt, but it's a move in that direction. Let me show you this, which is kind of shocking. So China apparently reported bumper April exports

ahead of crucial trade talks with the U.S. China's exports actually grew sharply in April despite Trump's Liberation Day tariffs on shipments to the U.S., strengthening Beijing's hand ahead of crucial trade negotiations due to start this weekend. Strong performance came as Chinese companies diverted trade flows to Southeast Asia, Europe, and other destinations,

following the imposition of prohibitively high tit for tat tariffs between the world's two largest economies. Exports rose 8.1 percent in dollar terms compared with a year earlier. China's custom set on Friday beating analysts forecast in a poll by Reuters of 1.9% growth, but slowing from 12% growth in March when figures were buoyed by exporters seeking to get ahead of expected tariffs by front-loading shipments to the U.S. So in spite of a dramatic reduction in trade with us, in fact, China's exports grew post-Liberation Day and grew sharply year over year because we are not the entire world. And it turns out that they had other options available to them, especially as we did everything we could to piss off all of the countries around the entire world. Contrary to the proposal, I think Scott Besson had laid out of, hey, we're going to have this encirclement strategy and we're going to try

to isolate China. And then they go about it by basically pissing off everyone that they possibly can. Right. And I think one thing that is underestimated is the role of kind of inertia in global affairs. Like China has been selling stuff to us because that's what they do. Like the relationships are set up, the contracts are in place. It's smooth. It works. We've got it figured out. And that doesn't mean that they didn't have other options where they could sell stuff.

And we kind of took that to mean that we were the only buyer in the world for these products. And what China is showing here is that actually, if they're forced to do the work to find other buyers, Southeast Asia and Europe do have some consumers who are willing to buy the $28 that we're not going to have anymore. This is kind of contrary to what you were saying about the UK trade deal. So let me get your reaction to this. Charles Gasparino says, Now you know why Powell didn't cut rates after the UK deal. If the 10% tariff is in the UK deal, not sure how we escape some economic repercussions,

i.e. inflation in the short term at the very least, since UK is a friend where we sell more stuff to than we import, i.e. 10% on the UK means much higher on countries we have deficits with. That's the tariff investment calculation you're hearing on Wall Street right now. So basically, like you said, the UK deal, I mean, first of all, we should be clear, it's not even actually a deal yet. It's like, you know, concepts of a plan kind of a deal. But it leaves in place most of the 10% tariff, which is what it was already at. Now, there were other provisions involved as you laid out some of them previously. But basically, what Gasparino was saying is like, okay, well, 10% is the baseline. That's the best deal you're

going to be able to get. Then that indicates some significant inflationary pressures on countries around the world. Again, so it's like irrationality layered on top of irrationality. And it's this weird game theory where everybody is trying to figure out what irrational thing and unpredictable thing is going to happen and trying to predict that. So in this case, what I think is going on is that the market and the markets only ended up up like 80 or something. They were up significantly

throughout the day and then came down. I think what they took from it is that, OK, he's not really going to keep that 10% on them. He's saying that for now, but he reached a deal

and the whole point of the deal is that the tariffs are going to come down. And so, you know, once they start to bite a little bit and have real world consequences because we've got the deal he's going to use the deal to quietly just get rid of those now they could be totally wrong about that and this is why i'm saying it's irrationality layered over irrationality but i think that's what they're i think that's the assumption there because gasparino is right that if that 10% is solid, then yeah, that signals everyone's going to get at least 10 and other people are going to get higher.

But what about Trump's approach to any of this suggests that any of this is solid? That anything is solid? Yeah. So that's what I think is going on. They assume that this is all soft. I want to get your reaction to J.D. Vance got asked about the number of dolls that that anyone will be permitted to to have here. So let me go and pull this up because his his answer was interesting. Let me go and get your reaction to this. Right. So the president said, you know, maybe American kids should have three dolls instead of 30 or whatever the number was.

Do you agree? Do you tell the people of this country that you need to make some sacrifices in order to reorganize this bad trade relationship? Well, I think the president's point here is that, yeah, we do need to become more self-reliant. And that's not going to happen overnight. And it's not always going to be easy, Martha. But what I'd ask people is not whether they want $2 or $5 or $20 for their kids. I'd ask American moms and dads, would you like to be able to go into a pharmacy and know that the drugs your kids need are actually available to you as an American parent? Would you like to, God forbid, if your country goes to a war and your son or daughter is sent off to fight,

would you like to know that the weapons that they have are good American-made stuff, not made by a foreign adversary? What President Trump is talking about is bringing self-reliance back to the United States economy. We haven't- What do you think of that explanation here?

You know, I wish that it didn't feel like this stuff was reverse engineered. You know, and what I mean by that is Trump seems to now understand that, oh, the shelves are going to be empty. Now I have to come up with a rationale for why I support why the shelves being empty is actually a good thing.

Right. If you actually start from the principle that we consume too much junk, it's spiritually degrading. It's bad for the environment. It doesn't make us feel better about ourselves. It's empty. And then you flow from there and try to bring the whole country together around that idea. To me, that's delightful. A spiritual regeneration of an entire public. Wonderful. Agreed. But there has to be not just, you're not going to have dolls, but there has to be a replacement for that consumerist ideology that we've been sold for decades and decades.

Right. Which we don't have. We do not have. Consumerism is the thing that stitches us together. Yeah. And you pull that apart without replacing it with anything. You know, god save us you know so it could so uh but if you know the the process of getting to that the process of working it through if we did it collectively you know could result in um you know less you know lower levels of unhappiness

less plastic in our bloodstream like All of these things would be good. You've got young kids. It should be a crime that every single little kid's birthday party they have to give you a giant bag of plastic when you walk out. That the kids play with for 30 seconds in the car on the way home and then don't touch again. And it's genuinely awful. Like, that's horrible stuff.

To me, the deeper worry, and I suspect you share this, is actually about social media and specifically with regard to AI. And, you know, this administration is running a million miles an hour to Wild West AI. We're just gonna take off all the brakes. We've gotta win the AI race. We're just gonna unleash this potentially extraordinarily destructive force on society without even contemplating what the impacts will be without planning for them,

without creating any sort of a safety net if there's mass job replacement. I'm sure you read the, what was it, a New York Magazine piece about everybody cheating on their college tests. And like, you know, that particular like narrow problem, you could figure, okay, well, now you just have to write essays in class instead of you can't, you know, there's no taking out your phone. Sounds like we're not going to bother trying to figure that out, though. Yeah. But to me, it speaks, correct, but also to me it speaks to the same way that I used this example with Emily yesterday, that GPS made us unable to navigate that part of our brain just atrophied completely. AI is going to do that for basically

everything. And if we were a functioning society, we would be dealing with that, right? We would be thinking about it. We would be planning for it. We would be reining it in. And so, you know, that's just an example of how. Contrary to the idea that there's some plan here from the Trump administration to remake the social contract in a way that is going to be healthier and more fulfilling and spiritually regenerative, I think is the word that you used. It's the exact opposite. We're running a million miles in the other direction and not even looking to consider where we might be headed. Go ahead. And doubling our energy usage in order to do it.

Yes. Yeah. Naomi Klein talks about how this is like a vampiric technology because it eats up the resources that you actually need for not just humanity, but for creation. Your body, your mind, your soul, and your energy. Yeah. That's right. In order to create this mirror world. And it's endlessly disturbing to me. And I don't know what to do about it other than to complain and worry. The last economic piece that I wanted to, I actually really want you to make, I want to make sure I'm thinking about this the right way, because the media has been saying, oh, Trump wants to lift taxes on the rich. He called Mike Johnson. He

told him he wants to hike the top tax rate. But as I was reading the details here, it's not exactly as it's being portrayed. So the change here would roll back one of the tax cuts that Trump signed into law in 2017 as the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. That measure reduced the rate on income earned in the top bracket to 37 percent from 39.6 percent. This year, the top income bracket starts at roughly $600,000 for an individual. Mr. Trump is effectively seeking to restore the previous top rate, but at a much higher income level. So just so people know, if nothing happens, the Tax Cut and Jobs Act, those tax breaks expire and taxes go up on everybody, but especially because they got the biggest cuts on the rich. So what we're talking

about here, what Trump is proposing is still giving a tax break to the rich, but not as much, quite as much of one as he had previously given. Am I understanding this correctly? That's right. Except for, so some, you could imagine a rich person who makes $20 million a year, which is, you know, there are, I think there's in the hundreds or maybe the thousands at the most of people in the United States who make that amount of money. People can look it up. It's that, that number's available. Those people would pay a little bit more because everything above a certain threshold there, you know, they're jumping from

whatever it was, you know, 36 something to like 39. And so those couple points would then hit everything above that level. But that's a tiny number of people. So if you're a typical... But if you don't renew the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, which is the whole $4 trillion that they're trying to do, then taxes are going to go up on them far more. It's a huge cut relative to not doing anything. Absolutely. Yeah. So it's still a cut.

Even on the richest people. It's just not quite as much of a cut as what he had originally planned. Yes. He's still giving a big cut to the very rich, but a little bit less than he gave to them the last time. Yes. Okay. All right. All right. All right. Let me get your take on this abundance caucus because you've been you've been you had some interesting insights on this. So you have some Democrats now who are starting an abundance caucus and abundance inspired caucus. Josh Harder from California says House Democrats are getting Ezra Klein pilled.

Bipartisan group of lawmakers led by Josh Harder is launching a new roughly 30 member block claiming inspiration from abundance movement championed by the liberal commentator Klein. I guess my question is, like, is this really necessary? Because I feel like we have ideological groups that are already pretty abundance pilled. Well, I mean, you've got to seize the abundance caucus. And maybe they hope that they'll be able to get Ezra to come speak to their caucus. He spoke to the Senate retreat recently. This guy, I forget who, was it Sirota maybe that flagged it? The funniest thing that one of Harder, chief accomplishments was blocking this water project. I think it was Stoller.

Was that Stoller? Yes. I think so, yeah. Which is just hilarious because that like the whole, like to the extent that abundance, you know, has a villain, it's like, you know, environmentalists who are standing in the way of these types of infrastructure projects. And here he was blocking one of these water projects on environmental grounds. I have it here. Congressman behind the Abundance Caucus, Josh Harder, has as a signature accomplishment stopping a water project from getting a permit. There you go. So, yeah, we'll see who winds up.

And this is what I said yesterday. Like, we'll see who winds up joining this caucus. But here's a prediction. And you can map this prediction then against the analysis of whether this abundance is, you know, seriously aimed at, you know, lifting everybody up or is actually just kind of rebranded neoliberalism. My suspicion is that the abundance caucus will eventually be populated almost exclusively by people who are also in what's known as the new Democrat coalition, new Democrat conference, new Democrats were created by the DLC, the democratic leadership council which itself was created in the 1980s uh as a as the vehicle for the faction that said we need deregulation we need lower taxes we need we need to end big government we need to get democrats away um from civil rights environmentalism feminism uh big unions big government you know tax and spend liberalism. We need to basically do Reaganomics light. And that was the DLC. That was the New Democrats. So I think everybody who joins this abundance caucus

is probably going to be New Democrats. And if I'm wrong about that, then maybe I'm wrong about my whole analysis of abundance. But let's check back in in a couple of weeks and see who harder has been able to recruit into this caucus. Now, you're definitely going to have some, there are some progressive people in the Progressive Caucus who are also in the New Democrats.

And there are... Which is an embarrassment for the Progressive Caucus. People in the Progressive Caucus are really underneath that kind of neoliberal, you know, Clinton type Democrats who have who have, you know, progressive social values. And I think you'll you'll find those kinds of people, too, will be really intrigued by the the the abundance framing because it's nice. Who's against abundance? Yeah, I mean, I feel like. Yeah. So Bill Clinton is, you know, his his framing

is the DLC and it's neoliberalism. It's really the Democratic Party sort of embracing the Ronald Reagan era framing. And Jimmy Carter, to be fair, initially is the one who starts to move Democrats away from the New Deal and into the neoliberal era. Bill Clinton really cements that. I sort of feel like Barack Obama is almost like another rebranding of like a different rebranding of neoliberalism. And now and that was coming out of the wilderness of George W. Bush. And, you know, how could we have lost to this guy? Oh, my God. Okay, here we go. Another rebranding of neoliberalism. And then it seems like abundance is the attempt again to rebrand neoliberalism as something new and fresh and different out of the wake of the devastating loss for Democrats to Donald Trump. Right. And the Affordable Care Act, Obama's signature achievement, was all about using the market and doing health care reform without, not even without adding to the deficit, but reducing the deficit. Yeah, it's a very, very Clintonian approach. Well, he brought a bunch of Clinton people into his administration.

So, I mean, the carryover from the Clinton administration was quite real and not just theoretical. Camp Shane, one of America's longest-running weight-loss camps for kids, promised extraordinary results. Campers who began the summer in heavy bodies were often unrecognizable when they left. In a society obsessed with being thin, it seemed like a miracle solution. But behind Camp Shane's facade of happy, transformed children was a dark underworld of sinister secrets. Kids were being pushed to their physical and emotional limits as the family that owned Shane turned a blind eye. Nothing about that camp was right.

It was really actually like a horror movie. In this eight-episode series, we're unpacking and investigating stories of mistreatment and reexamining the culture of fatphobia that enabled a flawed system to continue for so long. You can listen to all episodes of Camp Shame one week early and totally ad-free on iHeart True Crime Plus. So don't wait. Head to Apple Podcasts and subscribe today. DNA test proves he is not the father. Now I'm taking the inheritance. Wait a minute,

John. Who's not the father? Well, Sam, luckily it's your not the father. Now I'm taking the inheritance. Wait a minute, John. Who's not the father? Well, Sam, luckily it's your not the father week on the OK Storytime podcast, so we'll find out soon. This author writes, my father-in-law is trying to steal the family fortune worth millions from my son, even though it was promised to us. Now I find out he's trying to give it to his irresponsible son instead. But I have DNA proof that could get the money back. Hold up. So what are they going to do to get those millions back? That's so unfair. Well, the author writes that her husband found out the truth from a DNA test they were gifted two years ago. Scandalous. But the kids kept their mom's secret that whole

time. Oh my God. And the real kicker, the author wants to reveal this terrible secret, even if that means destroying her husband's family in the process. So do they get the millions of dollars back or does she keep the family's terrible secret? Well, to hear the explosive finale, listen to the OK Storytime podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. Over the past six years

of making my true crime podcast, Hell and Gone, I've learned one thing. No town is too small for murder. I'm Catherine Townsend. I've received hundreds of messages from people across the country begging for help with unsolved murders. I was calling about the murder of my husband at the cold case.

They've never found her. And it haunts me to this day. The murderer is still out there. Every week on Hell and Gone Murder Line, I dig into a new case, bringing the skills I've learned as a journalist and private investigator to ask the questions no one else is asking. Police really didn't care to even try.

She was still somebody's mother. She was still somebody's daughter. She was still somebody's sister. There's so many questions that we've never gotten any kind of answers for. If you have a case you'd like me to look into, call the Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145. Listen to Hell and Gone Murder Line on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Let me get your take also, Ryan, since we didn't have you yesterday before you have to jump on

Casey Means. So there's all sorts of things going on here i don't even know where to start but let me pull up a friend of show laura loomer who uh has been was first very upset about the first trump surgeon general pick and was probably influential and getting her spiked then trump picks casey means the sister of callie means. And Emily and I talked about her a good bit yesterday. She's really a like Maha influencer star. She's been on with Tucker. She's been on with Joe Rogan. She runs some health company herself, like glucose monitoring company. She wrote a book along with her brother, Callie Means. And so when she got picked, I thought that Loomer and certainly the Maha people like Nicole Shanahan would be delighted. But I was wrong.

Some people were delighted. Nicole Shanahan, notably, was really, really upset. And Laura Loomer continued to raise hell about this pick as well and despair truly over the over the vetting team. Not Trump, of course. It's not Trump's fault, but over the vetting team that is disserving Trump. So in any case, Laura tweeted this, which I thought was interesting. She said, I'm glad I initiated the Maha breakup. Many of these grifters needed to be exposed for who they are. And also I was amused by Richard Henania chiming in being like, here's another one. Go after him as well. In any case, give me your thoughts on Casey Means, on the Maha and MAGA

tensions that are emerging and Laura Loomer's role in all of this stuff. Yeah, I mean, look, I love all the folks that are into the crystals and the Reiki and the moon. You have some background in this. And shrooms, that's right. Yes, in the 90s, I used to go to Reiki sessions. Then I became like a Reiki practitioner. I'm all about that stuff. Of course you did. The chakras, this is important stuff. I don't think you want the surgeon general though from that world. I think it's know, it's a compliment to our system of Western medicine.

Because there are a lot of things that Western medicine doesn't understand about the body, clearly. And there's a lot left to be learned about it. But I think it's fine that it lives off in YouTube land. And in basements and in churches and wherever, you know, you want to get, you want to do Reiki? Great. It's great. Go do it. It's wonderful.

But to make that person the surgeon general, it's like, well, no, Western medicine is also responsible for an enormous number of advances. Yeah. Like when your wife got cancer, you didn't go to the Reiki specialist. Western medicine is also responsible for an enormous number of advances. Yeah. Like when your wife got cancer, you didn't go to the Reiki specialist. Didn't go to the acupuncturist. You went to the doctor. And you might go to the acupuncturist as well to deal with some of the side effects. True. But no, it becomes dangerous when you're throwing the western medicine out with the bath water

like this because look steve jobs for instance like you know thought you know thought he could you know cure his own cancer with his with his spirit and smoothies and oh that's true and whatever and what you know the the way that he just tried to approach it with his spirit or his will or whatever and he he as far as I understand, like that was a cancer that he should have beaten, you know, with treatment, but he didn't. And then he died. And there's a similar story with Kyle's dad, actually, who was going to a chiropractor who was telling him, oh, I got you, you know, and he didn't, he didn't go to a regular doctor. So he didn't get a cancer diagnosis until it was far too late because the chiropractor promised him

that he would be able to heal whatever ailed him. and yes then that's that's the real danger of that like it as a as a compliment to your life and to your you know your your spiritual pursuits great to to supplant to literally supplant medicine western medicine and have the person as a surgeon general it's like uh well here's here's the other thing ryan is there's another piece of this i want to talk to medicine, Western medicine, and have the person as a Surgeon General. It's like, hmm. Well, here's the other thing, Ryan, is there's another piece of this I want to talk to you about, which is like the realignment from those types from the left. I mean, this used to be very much the, you know, the crystal people were very much within the firmament of the Democratic Party.

And that realignment is interesting to me, which is how, you know, Marianne and RFK Jr. knew each other, ran the same circles and whatever. RFK Jr., of course, is like the emblem of that realignment, you know, the woo-woo realignment into the Republican Party. But the thing that really drives me crazy about RFK Jr.'s ideology, Casey means, Callie means from what I can tell, is like, number one, you know, the position on the left is that everyone should have access to medicine. Not that there shouldn't be medicine or that we shouldn't trust medicine. It's that people should have access to the advances of Western medicine. So that's number one.

Number two, they'll oftentimes talk accurately about the corruption of the food industry, about the corruption of the medical industry, of big pharma, et cetera. But then there's no effort to actually root out the corruption. Instead, there's just a redirection into alternative health profiteering, of which Casey and Callie means both participate. You know, that's their livelihood. And that stuff is wildly untested. I mean, there are much say what you will about the FDA, the standards for actually getting a drug approved, much higher than there are no standards for these supplements and things that you sell on the internet and all these influencers who go on and say, I take this,

I take that, they're getting paid and then they're selling it to you. And there's very little standards or testing with regard to that. So that's the other piece of it. And the fact that there's no focus on, okay, you're right, that the profit motive at the center of healthcare is, is actually deadly. Because that creates mass incentives for guess what's most profitable for people to be chronically sick, so that you can continue to have to treat them and treat them and treatment them over many years. There's no effort to root that out through something like Medicare for all system. Instead, it's just redirecting people into things that are worse, less tested and at least as corrupt. And you're right.

The profiteering is outrageous. The entire reason we have the FDA is in response to and I wrote about this in my first book. They used to be called patent medicines. Right. And like literally snake oil. That's where we get the phrase snake oil. People would come by and say, look, this oil from a snake, rub it here, and this is going to be effective. And oftentimes, it wouldn't even be snake oil. It would be like, not that the snake oil would work, but they weren't even selling you snake oil which good because like you'd probably you know exterminate all the snakes if you had to do that uh and so the fda was brought in and and it was the it was actually the first kind of

assertion of of federal government you know regulatory power um which is why there's this alliance with corporate power linking up with the Maha people because they understand both historically and intuitively that the FDA is sort of like the tip of the spear for this regulation of corporate profiting. And if they can gut that, they can roll back so much else. And so that's how you wind up with a chemical industry lobbyist being put into place by the Trump administration to oversee what the Maha people thought was going to be an effort to like root out toxic chemicals. Right. And then how do you think like what do you think of what are your reflections on the Maha movement into MAGA world, some of the tensions there and how that comes about? I mean, I think the most obvious thing is just to say that many of them were skeptics of the COVID vaccine or skeptics of the school closures, the lockdowns, those sorts of things. But I also think in general, the right has just become like the magnet for sort of all conspiracy theories.

And so, you know, there's just been and the Democratic Party has become like the party of the experts trust the science like that's that's, you know, especially with the Democratic Party becoming more heavily college educated um although there are also plenty of maha people for sure college educated very highly educated wealthy successful whatever i mean that was kind of the hollywood liberal type but anyway what do you what do you make of that transition where do you think it comes from my basic sense is that it when when a lot of these people gave up on the idea of collective change and instead began to pursue kind of individual self-improvement, self-help, as the atomization of society and of communities took hold, they moved right. And the male version is, you know, we see it all the time in the management.

The Bernie bros, yeah. And also, right, the Bernie bros who then, who now the thing that they, you know, or tell themselves that they're going to focus on is, you know, their own, like, you know, taking the right supplements, drinking the right powders, you know, work, you know, doing the right kind of workout, the right amount of testosterone or whatever.

Like that's. Instead of Medicare for all, the collective project. It's all right. Well, let me just, let me get fit. Let me do what I can do individually.

And that's the, that's the, that's the male version of the kind of woo woo, you know, Reiki Maha stuff that will, you know, where you're just like, let me find my own individual spiritual practice that's going to, you know, get me out of this toxic culture or detoxify it, detoxify myself as much as possible. Because you've given up the possibility of of kind of collective liberation do you think there's a parallel to the back to the land movement of the 70s yeah same same thing same thing yeah like we're gonna make we're gonna change the world in

the 60s and then you give and you're like wow this world is just didn't work not only unchangeable all our efforts backfired and so we're're just going to go live on a commune. We're just going to withdraw from society altogether, live on a commune. And then the commune is going to fall apart and then we're going to go sell out and go to Wall Street or go just do the thing that we were destined to do. Yeah, I told you I read this book about the back to land movement and focused on Vermont that Bernie Sanders randomly shows up in at some commune and they have to make him leave because he won't stop distracting everyone from their work and talking about politics. A millionaires and a billionaires. Just too much. I was like, oh, my God.

He was at that time writing for some socialist adjacent newspaper or something. And so he shows up at the commune to interview them. Talking about Eugene. He won't shut up about Eugene Debs. Something like that. Yeah. Something like that. Oh, here.

Kyle's here. Special guest. Special guest Kyle Kalinsky in the house. Hey, babe. Literally in the house. I'm in the bedroom. We were just wrapping up talking about Casey means and then sort of digressed into thinking about the way that there are parallels between this moment of men in particular withdrawing from like being the birdie bro looking at the collective solution into like, let me, you know, work out and take whatever supplements and trust whatever influencers and whatever to the moment after the 60s and 70s when there's Okay, well, we were going to change the world. Now we're going to go back to the land and we're going to like set up these communes and kind of like do our own thing. And Ryan, the other thing that was interesting out of that book is

that I never realized how many food companies, like organic food company type things that are big names now actually came out of that back to land movement as well. Oh, totally. That makes a lot of sense. And if we're right, then over the next, you know, five years, we may see communes starting to pop up where this is kind of like the Tim Pool's type of compound situation. Right. Or like the the the trad wife and what do they call the people who there there is a movement of this of people who are like, you know, moving out of cities. And this is all on the right becoming getting the like farms going and trying to be fully sustainable. Yeah, there's a term for them completely sovereign, sovereign citizens, maybe.

But yeah, they're like usually right wingers, the sovereign citizens. Right. It's going to be a right wing version. Yeah. Well, and it goes with like the trad wife stuff as well. You know, it's like we're withdrawing from society. We're going to go back to these other ways. We're going to end this. I mean, there were vibes of this community of preppers. Yeah. I mean, there was vibes of this with the 70s thing on the left, too, where it was like, OK, these new modern ways of doing agriculture, we don't want any of this mechanization. We're going to figure out how to use like a horse and a cart to do our,

truly like we're going to make our own tools. We're not going to have electricity. That was the pure way to do it. So anyway, interesting. Whenever I think of how to become happy, I go, let me copy the Amish. That'll work out well. I don't know. It might.

I have more sympathy to that. We rely on so you do babe we rely on so much stuff that we take for granted you know like whenever the power goes out and i lose the tv i'm always like holy shit the tv is amazing i wish i had that thing all the time so i have like the opposite philosophy of those people and the other thing is self-help stuff self-help help stuff in general. I feel like the only times I've been even somewhat interested in that in my life, they were the worst points of my life. That's the whole point. Yeah. Well, there's something to that. Yeah.

Going down this path in general is a symptom of an underlying misery or depression or being lost in the same way that like hyper religiosity or being an adult convert to a religion. That's a sign of like, hey, guys, let me tell you why I didn't kill myself last night. I came up with this reason to not kill myself. So it's a sign of a like decaying society. Yes, I think we all agree with that. All right, Ryan, we'll let you go. I know you got a meeting you got to jump to. Thank you, brother. All right. See you guys later. Bye, Ryan. Bye. All right, guys, that concludes the free show. If you want to see to thank you brother all right see you guys later bye ryan bye all right guys that concludes the free show if you want to see what kyle has to say about biden's re-emergence

on the view there's a lot to say about that one about judge janine being put in instead of ed martin as u.s attorney for dc and all kinds of other good things also we're going to answer a few of premium subscribers questions make sure to subscribe over at breakingpoints.com. Thank you guys so much for your support. Have a great weekend. DNA test proves he is not the father. Now I'm taking the inheritance. Wait a minute, John.

Who's not the father? Well, Sam, luckily it's your not the father week on the OK Storytime podcast. So we'll find out soon. This author writes, my father-in-law is trying to steal the family fortune worth millions from my son, even though it was promised to us. He's trying to give it to his irresponsible son. but I have DNA proof that could get the money back. Hold up. They could lose their family and millions of dollars? Yep.

Find out how it ends by listening to the OK Storytime podcast on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Camp Shane, one of America's longest-running weight loss camps for kids, promised extraordinary results. But there were some dark truths behind Camp Shane's facade of happy, transformed children. Nothing about that camp was right. It was really actually like a horror movie. Enter Camp Shame, an eight-part series examining the rise and fall of Camp Shane and the culture that fueled its decades-long success. You can listen to all episodes of Camp Shame one week early and totally ad-free on iHeart True Crime Plus. So don't wait.

Head to Apple Podcasts and subscribe today. Over the years of making my true crime podcast, Hell and Gone, I've learned no town is too small for murder. I'm Katherine Townsend. I've heard from hundreds of people across the country with an unsolved murder in their community. I was calling about the murder of my husband. The murderer is still out there. Each week, I investigate a new case. If there is a case we should hear about, call 678-744-6145. Listen to Hell and Gone Murder Line on the iHeartRadio app,

Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an iHeart Podcast.