Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar - 6/30/26: MAGA Meltdown Over SCOTUS Rulings, Prof Pape On Iran Deal Collapsing, NBA Vets Caught Gambling

Episode Date: June 30, 2026

Krystal and Emily discuss MAGA melts down over SCOTUS rulings, Robert Pape on Iran deal collapsing, NBA vets caught gambling. Robert Pape: https://escalationtrap.substack.com/ Pisco: https://www.youtube.com/@PiscoLitty    To become a Breaking Points Premium Member and watch/listen to the show AD FREE, uncut and 1 hour early visit: www.breakingpoints.com    Merch Store: https://shop.breakingpoints.com/   See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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Indeed we do. Yeah, well, we got a bunch of SCOTUS decisions yesterday, some quite consequential ones. There are more expected today. We also have a little bit of reaction from the Steve Bannon and Benny Johnson's of the world we want to get to. But Pisco is going to join us to break down all of those decisions and what they mean. We also, it is officially in addition of paping points today.

We got Robert Pape stopping by virtually to talk to us about what he thinks unfolded over the weekend and what is likely to happen moving forward. We've got several NBA veterans who have been arrested now for alleged gambling and game fixing some very significant allegations there to dig into and some pretty devastating video proof, too. of what may have been going on behind the scenes. I guess sort of on the sports beat, we also have Dave Portnoy, who's thinking of running against Zoran Mamdani in New York City.

That would be fun. I would enjoy that. We'd have to go do some on-the-ground coverage. Absolutely. Absolutely. So I want to encourage Dave and his ambitions there. Also some significant AI stories, including new warnings about the size and state

of a potential AI bubble. And I'm taking a look at this very interesting story that unfolded in Utah. We covered this previously. So Kevin O'Leary is behind this massive hyperscale data center in Utah. Local people were not excited about this, but it got pushed through. Those politicians are now facing a massive reckoning. So two of the three commissioners that voted to greenlight this thing in this local rural county, they have been kicked down. And one of the most powerful politicians in the state has just lost his seat in a shocking upset because of his support of this data center. So I wanted to track all of that down and break it down for you as

well. You're going to be tracking the Chinese influence. That's right. Yeah. Yeah, I'll be on that heat. Now, as a reminder, we had tons of people sign up for the newsletter yesterday. Yes. Tons of people sign up for the newsletter. Of course, there's a free option for the newsletter. But just go to breakingpoints.com. We debuted this newsletter yesterday. And it's, I think, a really cool new product, Crystal. People seem excited about it. Continue to send us your feedback, guys. Love to hear from you all about what you think. But people seem pretty psyched. I think the product looks great. Let us know what you think. Sign up at breaking points.com. Also, if you've become a premium subscriber, you get the entire newsletter. You also get, you know, the whole show uncut in your inbox

every day. And if you had, if you are a premium subscriber and you had any trouble and you did not see that email, you didn't receive the email, make sure to message support at supercast. to get that work down. If you are a premium subscriber, this should have shown up in your email inbox yesterday. If it didn't, make sure support at supercast.com and we will get it all figured out. Yeah, I want to make sure everybody gets that because it's really cool. It's like links to things that we're covering on every show. It's been a real labor of love. Shout out to everybody who's been working on it and we're super excited that it's going to be landing in your inboxes every day. So Crystal, should we go to SCOTUS? Let's talk about some of these decisions that came down

yesterday, but we'll actually start a little bit in reverse order here. Pisa is going to join us to break down the actual decisions. Emily and I wanted to do a little bit of the political reaction, though, first, Steve Bannon, pretty unhappy with some of, it was a real mixed bag yesterday. I'll just say that in terms of, you know, your ideological perspective. And Steve Bannon quite upset that some of the decisions did not go the way that he wanted them to. Let's take a listen to what he had to say. You're going to get another wake-up call, and that's on birthright citizenship. And Connie Barrett and that crowd, man, she was a lovely pick.

did anybody do any due diligence here? I know it was quite behind the scenes. It was quite contentious before, but the right to life crowd, hey, did you do your due diligence? Are you happy with what you got? Emily, how common a sentiment is this on the sort of hardcore right that Amy Coney-Barrant has been this grave disappointment and a traitor to the cause, et cetera? It's a very common sentiment. And in fact, it started with Neil Gorsuch in the Bostock opinion, which people were really upset. about all the way back when, I mean, that was probably like 2018. It was a long time ago now. And

the building... Bostock had to do with gay rights, refreshment. It was, so yeah, it was, it was protect Title VII and transgender protections. And so people thought that Gorsuch got the decision totally wrong. And that was a really consequential move for him to decide where he did on that case. And so that goes back to the list that Leonard Leo's Federalist Society very famously handed to Trump. And Trump promised then to pick off of the list. And it was if there were any Supreme Court vacancies, which we knew that there would be. And instead, he got three. He didn't just get one.

He got three. And so Kavanaugh comes off that Amy Coney-Barritt is the last one to come off of that list. And so a lot of the Bannons of the world and the kind of MAGA wing see that as the establishment kind of con ink choosing establishment picks to then go to the Supreme Court and getting Trump basically at the time when nobody realized. that Trump would actually be the president. Many people didn't think he would when he agreed to pick off of this list, that he now has handed or seated these seats on the Supreme Court, basically to Leonard Leo and the Federalist Society. So that sentiment has been building since Gorsuch,

and Amy Coney-Brett is definitely getting the brunt of it. She's gone against the administration on a handful of pretty big cases now. So it's building, and yesterday was pretty consequential in how people have turned against ACB. This is why you can't trust women, Emily. Listen, you're telling me. That's what we always say on the show.

This is our one editorial position here at breaking points. You cannot trust one. That and women be shopping. Women be shopping. So true. Thank you for reminding me. Benny Johnson also very unhappy and specifically using the fact one of the decisions that came down said, actually it's fine for states to have laws that enable mail-in ballots

to come in after the election date as long as they are post-dated before or on election day. The case actually had to do with Mississippi that's relevant in California, a bunch of other states besides. So conservatives very upset about this. Trump, very upset about this. And Benny Johnson immediately turning to say, well, this is why we have to have the Save America Act in part because of this ruling. So using this moment to try to push forward this legislation that would limit the vote in a way that Republicans think will be favorable for them. Let's listen to Benny Johnson. And as soon as she gets to the Supreme Court, Amy Coney-Barrick changes. The stalwart Catholic conservative upholding of Christian and constitutional values morphed almost immediately into one of these little short goblins, which make up the only three left-wing Supreme Court justices.

And all of them are doing extremely poorly right now. I mean, goodness gracious. They're in like complete and total collapse. And they have no chance to win any decision if the conservatives could just state. together. Conservatives could actually lose a vote. You can lose John Roberts. He's squishy. Everybody knows that, George W. Bush. But you can't lose the Trump nominees. And I know it's anecdotal, but here's this footage of President Trump after the State of the Union. And he's talking to Amy Cooney-Barrant, and you can see he hates him. She despises him. It's just obvious when you study body language. It's just obvious. Although he's totally picking up on like, he's like mimicking Tucker there. Oh, funny.

Don't you hear that? It's just obvious when you look at that. That's funny. Sounds very Tucker. But in any case, obviously he's on the, you know, ACB betrayed us. He goes on to talk about the Save America Act as well in his deep disappointment there. So. Well, and he says, we're looking right down the barrel of a full-fledged third world communist invasion, Emily.

We can, we can ask, Pise go about this, but I was reading Barrett's opinion. Barrett wrote the opinion in that case. And it's not like she just sided with them. She wrote the opinion. And it was interesting that she was kind of making an originalist argument. It's a, the ballot case is interesting because you have federal election law and then you have state election law. And there's supposed to be a federalist process in election law, which is actually a lot of the controversy over the Same America Act and the like. But she kind of tried to make an originalist argument.

I'm curious what Piscoe is going to think about this. But for the way that Mississippi is able to control. elections locally based on what constitutes day of with mailing. So it's the way she wrote the opinion is actually pretty interesting given why she was picked for that seat. I mean, I think it's fair to make an originalist argument because the whole idea is the states get to, you know, run the elections, the way they want to run the elections. And there's been a lot of deference throughout history to that principle. You might dispute that that's the right way to do it. It has its pluses and its minuses, you know, in some ways I do think it would be good to have one coherent national

standard, okay, here's how we do it, here's how mail-in ballots work, here's what we expect in terms of the count. That might be a better system, but it's not the system that we have. No. So, you know, I don't think that that is dissonant with an originalist reading of, you know, the way things have operated in this country since this beginning. Yeah, and just to be clear, by the time some people might watch this segment, things will be popping off once again. We're expecting today, actually, within a matter of a couple of hours, opinions in the birthright citizenship case, a transathletes case. And if Barrett, you know, goes against the conservative, the sort of consensus, conservative consensus on those questions.

This could get even more, I mean, there's nothing anybody can do about it. And she's probably likely to unbirthrighted citizenship. I mean, most scholars who looked at that one were like, not a chance. This one is very unlikely to, you know, go the way the Trump administration wants. So it may not just be her of the Trump picks that is disappointing to the Steve Bannons of the world. Well, remember, Donald Trump sat through those oral arguments and, like, stared the justices down. Yes. And didn't he leave early because he was unhappy with how it was going? That's my recollection. I think that was the reading of why he, like, got up and made a show of leaving. So in the opinion here, Barrett writes, we must decide whether the federal election day statutes preempt Mississippi's law. They do not. And so Piscoe will help us explain exactly what the layers are of government control, local and federal government control.

But it's interesting because one of the reasons that she was selected is she's seen as somebody who's in the originalist tradition, a Scalia tradition, which is what the Federalist Society, specifically vets for. They don't vet necessarily. This is one of the big criticisms of Maga World of the Federal Society. They're not like vetting for in any way whatsoever, like Trump loyalty or at the time it would have been more like Tea Party loyalty. It's originalism. And she kind of is trying to make an originalist argument here in the opinion. Yeah. All right.

Well, let's go ahead and bring Piscoe in and he can break down each. one of these and help us understand their import. Listen. And you're there. For heart-wrenching knockout. The world's biggest stage. And breathtaking triumph. 2026 FIFA World Cup.

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That doesn't work. To make it look more defined. They say it works. I don't know. Listen to Skyline Drive, How to Live Forever on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Well, we're joined once again by Piscoe. You can check out Piscoe Liddy on YouTube, former litigator. Piscoe, thank you so much for joining us here.

Just on this day, we're expecting more opinions, but we're breaking down already a few major opinions that were handed down yesterday by the Supreme Court. It's great to have you back. Thank you. Thank you so much for having me. Yeah, and we just wanted to get your general reaction to a few big decisions that came out yesterday. We started this segment by looking at the political reaction to Amy Coney-Barratt's decision

to side against the Trump administration. in that case about mail-in ballots. Some of the kind of MAGOW-Wing is very, very upset, once again, with Amy Coney-Barritt. But a couple other big decisions came down yesterday as well. We put A4 up on the screen. This is basically the overturning of Humphrey's executor. The Supreme Court allowed Donald Trump to fire Rebecca Slaughter, the FTC Commissioner, which finally, formally, basically overturned Humphreys executor, which itself overturned Franklin Delano Roosevelt, what was like 1933, I think, Pisco. But also then we could put A5 up on the screen.

This is a companion decision in a way. The Supreme Court ruled that Trump's firing of Lisa Cook from the Fed was unconstitutional. The argument in that case, interestingly enough, was basically that he didn't give her enough time to respond. This was John Roberts. You know, you said maybe he has the authority, but you have to give her time to respond. Finally, the case that we were just referencing the mail-in ballots, this is A-6. they allowed state law that said federal law didn't preempt state law and you're going to break this down for us, Pisco, in just one second.

But let's start with this broad-based reaction, your broad-based reaction to what happened yesterday these decisions, the breakdown of the decisions. What did you make of it? Yeah, in general, I think the reaction has been justifiably so, a bad day for Trump. A lot of the decisions regarding the FTC and sort of the executive power stuff, that was already baked in. We already had the shadow docket opinions on the FTC that indicated where the court was going to go when it came to the removal authority of a president. But in general, we have a loss for Trump on the issue of the mail-in ballots. They denied certiorari, which means they denied

review on the E. Gene Carroll case. There was a win on individual rights when it came to certain searches and seizures. And then on the docket for hopefully today, we'll have a birthright citizenship opinion. So in general, the outlook has been this is a loss for the administration because the sort of opinions regarding executive power removal were already baked into the expectations. But we can get more into the weeds on the particular opinions. Yeah, let's dive into, let's consider both the FTC decision and also the Federal Reserve Board decision because I think for most people who are looking at this, they're like, wait, why can he fire whoever he wants at every other federal government agency or independent

commission, but he can't in this one instance. How did they try to, how did they try to navigate that? And also, I understand the cake was kind of already baked here. We all knew what direction the FTC was going in or the FDC decision was going in, but still very consequential in terms of a further consolidation of power in the executive branch. Hulgely consequential. I would say that this is the most clear and elaborate exposition on the unitary executive theory that we've had, even more so I would say. than Trump versus United States, the immunity decision. So very impactful because essentially what this decision says is for most quote-unquote independent

agencies that the president is going to retain removal authority and thereby a lot more control over these independent agencies that a lot of them were constructed in the shadow of the case that was referenced by Emily Humphrey's executor. So what's going on here. So in general, what the court is saying, the logic of the opinion is that the Constitution of the United States gives to the president full. executive power unified. He can't lend it out. He can't give it to other branches of government. And really, when executive officials are using the executive power, they're kind of just borrowing the

power of the president. Now, why is this justified in the court's mind? I, by the way, totally disagree with the opinion for certain reason that we can get into. But the justification is based on the vesting clause of Article 2, which best the executive power into one president, according to the justices. And also some of the writings. of the framers, which they sort of speak about a vigorous executive, and the first Congress of the United States, which decided as a matter of statute that the president should have a great deal of removal authority, even though the Constitution doesn't sort of mention it explicitly. Long story short, the court held that the removal power is like inherently executive.

And so for basically most independent agencies, except for, ashtrax, the Federal Reserve, the president is going to retain that authority. Well, yeah, let's talk about it because John Roberts, correct me if I'm wrong, wrote both of the opinions, the slaughtered opinion and Lisa Cook opinion. So Piska tried to explain to us the logic of John Roberts distinguishing between the Fed and, in this case, the FTC, but really all of these executive agencies that fall under the purview of the president. Listen, I'm going to take a moment of personal privilege and say that at least some of these conservative justices like Clarence Thomas in my mind have a more coherent throughline in terms of judicial philosophy, and I'm sure you can. some conservatives agree that John Roberts always seems to be trying to split the baby in some way. Now, as it happens in this particular case, we'll give them a little bit of a break on the two different decisions, at least at step one, because they really weren't, the government wasn't as much contesting

the substantive authority of removal from the president to the Federal Reserve specifically or to the governors in this case. They had already lost that battle in the shadow docket, and they were basically just arguing that Trump has a great deal of discretion in whether or not for cause has been achieved. And so in line with a lot of the other arguments that the administration has been leveling, that like stuff is unreviewable and the president has to be given this massive deference on ascertaining facts and circumstances, the court was basically just assessing whether or not the courts have a basis to question what the president is doing when he's removing someone

who's protected for cause. And so it wasn't squarely that decision on point regarding the overall constitutional authority. And what the court said is, we can work it out later in terms of what are the limits here on the substantive power. But at a bare minimum, you got to give Lisa Cook some procedural protections, some guardrails before you make the decision. We can get into, though, and I think we should, the sort of fundamental distinction for powers purposes, for constitutional purposes, between why the FDC is not protected, why the Federal Reserve is protected. Well, David Dan offered his analysis, which I agree with, of why Roberts, you know, went in this direction. He says, Humphrey's executor is dead and the president can fire anyone in the executive branch at will, but not Federal Reserve governors, is really a parity of the difference between the money power and everything else in America. And that's the way I read this as well.

And, I mean, I read all these decisions through a very political lens. I think the Supreme Court and Roberts in particular is keenly aware of what they can. can get away with and what the political mood in the country is. The fact that Trump's political power has diminished and he's deeply unpopular, I think makes it more likely that some of these decisions go against him. But in this particular case, you know, Wall Street jealously protects their effective control over the Fed. And Roberts and many of the, especially conservative justices on the court, really care a lot about the corporate institutions and the Wall Street institutions in this country. So that is my read of why they tried to split the difference in this way.

Yeah, I'm going to put my polemicist hat on just for a quick second and say, is it a number off? Yeah, I know. Yeah, good point. If you're a cynic, right, like, what does the FTC do? Oh, I guess they do like monopoly stuff and consumer protection and all this other stuff. So like, it doesn't really matter if we politicize that, but no, don't touch the Federal Reserve. I understand that inclination. And if you read the opinion, there really isn't a lot to go on in terms of a substantive legal rationale as to why the FTC is not protected and why the Federal Reserve is protected. One of the things that they say is quintessentially executive is some sort of like government body implementing rules that affect the conduct of private parties. Well, Crystal,

who affects the conduct and the obligations and sort of actions of private parties more than the Federal Reserve of the United States? This is like arguably one of the most influential and powerful agencies that's ever existed. And they spend maybe a paragraph, Robert, does talking about the difference or and why it could be the case that this could be reasonable. And it's totally like devoid of any law. All they say is, well, I guess there was a first and second national bank of the United States. But that's just explaining that there in fact was like there's some history there. It doesn't explain why it is the case that we fundamentally treat an agency like a monetary

authority differently than we would treat an agency like the FTC or any other number of independent agencies. It's devoid of any legal analysis there. And it's really frustrated. It kind of feels like he's playing games. Pisco, do you think that these decisions hit a little bit different, given where we are in the political arc of Trump's second presidency? You know, if this had come earlier when he was at the peak of his strength and they were rampaging

through the federal government with Doge and all of these things, and he fully had the Republican party behind him, fully had the MAGA base behind him, I feel like it would be, it would land a little differently with both the right and the left than now when they're looking and going, Yeah, but you know who's going to inherit all of this power in the executive? President Graham Platner or whoever's coming in, President AOC or whoever's coming in 2028. Yeah, in terms of how it's landing, because like we mentioned, the shadow docket activity existed and because like the major attacks on the executive branch and the Congress and judicial authorities have already been done.

People get used to it. And it's kind of baked in at this point. And yeah, you're right. His political power has lessened in recent months based on polling, this disaster. this disastrous Iran war, but you mentioned something interesting. You mentioned the tit for tat. Well, if this is going to give a great deal of power to a Republican president, surely it'll be giving a great amount of power to a future Democratic president.

Don't worry, Neil Gorsuch has that all figured out. If you read his concurrent opinion, it's clear what at least he wants to do and probably what the courts are going to be able to do in the future. He's talking about reviving doctrines like the non-delegation doctrine, the major questions doctrine, and to apply it and reconsider, hey, are these agencies even constitutions in the first place. And so I expect that in the future, if you were to get a Democratic president, you would see a lot more problems in like establishing a regulatory state in the first instance, given how much authority has now been given to the president.

Sounds like Democrats need to think about packing the court piece go. Yeah, well, I am encouraging guys. I have a number of debates that I've done with Josiah from pondering politics on court expansion. And yeah, you guys should really consider it. Yeah, there's an interesting point from Sonia Sotomayor who wrote a 49-page dissent. and sure today the court discards the democratic regime created by the constitution, quote, in favor of one that distorts the structure of government to fit the majority's theory of unitary, unitary total executive control of the result, she concluded according to Skotis blog, quote, is a president who emerges with far greater power than ever before.

I put that on X and I was like, well, actually, far greater power than ever before Franklin Delano Roosevelt, because a lot of this actually is downstream of the last, like, what, 80, well, no, like 100 years, you could probably say of American politics, the growth of the regulatory state after Teddy Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson as technology, radio, then eventually television and railroads and airplanes. Like, it just started making this fabric

kind of knit even closer together because borders, to some extent, geography, to some extent, shrinks down when you have all of this new stuff. And so you have a federal government that grows and grows and grows and grows. And conservatives always opposed a lot of it for some of these exact reasons.

But it's not, I mean, I guess in this case, piece go, just going back to FDR, pre-FDR, there was a different kind of regime for the federal government. Is that not correct at the very least? So I think that the growth of the regulatory state happened during the 20th century, and a lot of it, you're right, like, has some New Deal foundations there, for sure. But it isn't the case that these kinds of agencies with protection from at-will removal just started in the 1930s. There were, were examines. There were, were even used in the opinion of some 19th century organizations and agencies within the government that happened. But yeah, I mean, you're right. Fundamentally, the belief by people like Neil Gorsuch,

the conservatives on the Supreme Court is that a lot of this stuff was a mistake. That certainly that Humphrey's executor was a mistake when it was written. And Hufford's executor is a case that Project 2025 had its eyes set out on. And that the Farrow Society has been. Let us earn a punishment. Let FDR cook. Well, no, think about this. In this concted, the 1930s, FDRs was trying to fire Humphrey, right?

Humphrey is an FTC commissioner who was like against, he hated Roosevelt. And so, yeah, this was a situation in which he was frustrated that they didn't let him or that they had to pay out Humphrey's estate because it was Humphrey's executor who was suing Roosevelt. But yeah, no, this does have its origins in New Deal and in the growth of the regulatory state, which has been a sensitive and sore subject for conservatives for a long time. saw the decision on the Chevron doctrine, the same exact thing. This is an anti-regulatory court. Let's talk a little bit about the election law decision as well. Conservatives very animated about this, Trump and many others using this as yet another reason to push for the quote-unquote Save America Act. What do you see? How significant is this decision, do you think? It's a significant decision. This was a theory that essentially you had to have ballot receipt

on the date of election. And it's a wonderful opinion from Amy Coney-Barritt. I mean, she goes through the dictionary definition of the term election. She runs through the history to say why it isn't the case that this is how you should best read the statutes as requiring instead of casting your ballot on election day, receiving them ballots on election day. She then also explains other parts of the federal code, which presuppose that states have laws about when they can set ballot receipt.

And so this is a significant opinion on the interpretation of those statutes. I will note, though, even though I think it's an immaculate opinion really well done, it was a five-four decision. It was a close shave. And I think the conservatives and Trump in particular doesn't really care so much about these clutches of ballots, you know, whether they were received afterwards. I think he more cares about having some justification to have a federal hook into the elections that are coming up and to either claim an emergency or claim that something isn't being

done according to law. And so the significance of it, I think, is important both for the legal rule on when ballots need to be received, but also politically, I think it limits Trump's ability to claim a pretext. So I'm sure he'll try anyway. Interesting. Curious about your take on the Barrett opinion. Just I kind of read it as making an almost originalist argument in terms of who's like, because it's about preempting federal law, state law versus federal law. And the way that she wrote it is like pretty fascinating from the perspective that people are mad at her for kind of doing what the Federalist Society and Leonard Leo vetted Annie Coney Barrett to do, which is to be like, listen, I have no idea how Scalia would have decided on this

case. But she was, I'm crazy reading into this trying to make an, like, basically an originalism better than the dissent. Yes, she does originals and better than the dissent. She will go to the dictionaries used at the time, right, the original public meaning of the term election. She's like, this obviously means choice. When does a choice happen? Well, that's when the ballots are cast. And, you know, Just because we don't know about it until after the decision is made, doesn't mean the decision isn't made. The choice isn't made on the day of election and when people actually cast their ballots. And so, yeah, originalism in terms of the dictionary definition. Originalism in terms of deciphering what was meant at the time that these statutes were passed in like the 1860s or 70s.

And then calling out bad originalism by the dissent when they try to invoke a bunch of precedent from the 1900s, she's like, well, this isn't supposed to be the day that you look to. So I think that people are upset with the result here. No one's actually among the pundant class or very few people are looking into the meat and potatoes of the opinion like you did, Emily. They're just pissed that Trump didn't get his way. And so that's the problem. When you have judicial philosophy, it's not always going to lead you to the place that you want to go. And that's why I think I respect people like Amy Coney-Barritt, even though she's a very conservative justice more than someone like Alito and Roberts, frankly.

Let's talk about what remains outstanding, what we're expecting to get today. Put a nine up on the screen. This has some of the details here. We mentioned the birthright citizenship decision. That's probably the biggest one set to come down. We've also got a decision on transgender athlete bans. Another look at campaign finance, how much money candidates can spend in coordination with their political parties. So always trying to get more money into our political system. That's always great. What do you expect on these three decisions and which ones are you watching as being most important? Yeah, obviously the most important one is the birthright citizenship decision. That one is rumored perhaps to come out today. This is an opinion day. Now, it's not necessary that it come out today. But, yeah, this one is really, I think, not a close call on the legal issues and a major sensitive subject, I think, for all politically involved. So that should be coming down today or at least sometimes.

your expectation on a piece go based on the moral. My expectation is that they're going to go the right way. I know that it's a conservative leaning court and I don't, you know, really like this court, but based on the oral arguments and some of the questions, probing questions, even someone like Neil Gorsuch asked, I think it indicates that the history really isn't on the administration's side here. So I expect something like a six three decision in favor of the right decision, I think, which is birthright citizenship stands and the precedent stands.

Finally, from my perspective, Piscoe, one of these other. decisions handed down yesterday that's really significant and actually sort of cause for some optimism is we can pop up on the screen a 7 the geofence warrant decision civil libertarians were very excited about this one here's the headline court rules that law enforcement's use of quote geoffence warrant was a search and now this was actually somebody who was caught up in a robbery case who then challenged us on fourth amendment grounds if people don't know about geoffence warrants you absolutely should know about geoffence warrants where you can literally, I mean, it's in the name, you can get a warrant for data, really broad swath of data of people who are in, within a geofense at a given point

in time. I saw some quibbling with the opinion in like ultra nerdy circles that you're probably familiar with Pisco, but give us your reaction to this because it seems like a significant and great piece of legal news. Yeah, so it's an extension of a previous case that was decided in like 2018 called carpenter. And that decision was basically saying, hey, you have a reasonable expectation of privacy in your like the omnipresent Panopticon information stream, which is your cell phone location data and essentially applying principles of search and seizure to location data in

your phone. So this expanded it from like the initial cell tower data to now like Google, Google location service, which actually like more information. It gives you elevation. It's more precise, it's more information. And so it's a big win, but in terms of legal development, it's basically just a follow-on to Carpenter. And to get into the lead, just a tiny bit, they have to, before they decide whether a search is reasonable, right, the Fourth Amendment protects you against unreasonable searches and seizures, they have to decide whether it's even a search first. And so this was a question of like, when you ask Google for information regarding your location data, is that even a search? So there are other legal issues potentially that could cause

the petitioner here to lose, but in general, the court ruled that it is a search, not with saying the fact that you give information to Google and that's a third party, because it's such an all-encompassing data stream and because you have a reasonable expectation to that data stream, you're going to need to have at least some element of particularity and some guardrails before the government just gets that information or just like draws a circle around a location and gets like everyone's information who ever went there in the last two hours. Wow. Piscoe, anything else we didn't ask you about that you thought was significant or noteworthy you want to weigh in on? I guess the E. Gene Carroll denial of cert case where this was the case out of New York, I believe, where there was an alleged sexual assault against Trump.

And that was maintained on appeal. And now the court has denied any possible recourse for Trump on that case. So that's a significant one in terms of the damages, which we're talking about, I think, tens of millions. of dollars all told after the actual verdict and then the defamation case following after that. And Trump was really mad about that. So that's one other, I guess, Supreme Court decision. That's money he's going to have to pay to E. Jean Carroll now. Yes, yes. I'm sure he'll, like, start a coin or something or fundraising some other way. And so who knows, whenever these things happen or whenever these, like, I don't know, indictments occur, it seems like he raises more money or gets more prominence out of it.

But at least, you know, that has some final settling. Peace go. Thank you so much. Great analysis. As always, to go and subscribe to his channel. Peace go, Liddy. Great to see you, my friend. Thank you so much. An IHard Radio experience. Weekend gold tickets to Ilsoniq.

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on the IHart Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you can. get your podcasts. I'm Mungesha Chitogh, and I'm back with a new season of the podcast, Skyline Drive. This time I'm diving into a rabbit hole of peptides, organoids, blood boys, blue zones, and brain replacement to try to understand what this longevity obsession is all about and what it really means to live forever, for all of us. I learned about some rad science.

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joined once again by University of Chicago, Professor Robert Pape, author of The Escalation Trap Substack, which if you're not following by now, you are missing out. Professor, thank you so much for joining us once again. Thank you so much for having me. Of course, much to discuss. There are negotiations that were supposed to be happening in Qatar today. We'll actually still see what comes of that. It's unclear even right now at this moment. But let's start here with B1. I want to roll this clip of an Iranian military advisor talking about disagreement with the Trump administration over the Strait of Hormuz. Obviously, the crucial point of leverage that Iran has in these negotiations.

Let's take a listen. But regarding fees, there is a cost dimension to this matter. There is a tolls discussion, a fees discussion. Our current discussion is about service costs in the Strait of Hormuz. Yes, we want to maintain the security of the Strait of Hormuz. We want to protect the environment of the Strait of Hormuz. We must establish insurance mechanisms so that if incidents occur, ships that encounter counter problems are covered to reduce their risk. And when we provide all of this, these costs

cannot come out of the pockets of the Iranian people. These costs must be collected from those who are transporting oil through this strait. Okay. So that's, I mean, Professor Pape, tell us how significant that statement is in the context of these negotiations, obviously, as we already mentioned, with which the Strait of Hormuz is absolutely the kind of critical part right now. It's important in a couple of ways. So, number one, what you are watching in the last week is the escalation trap snapping back hard. This is what I was worried about the last time we were on. I realized we all want this war to be over.

We wanted to be in the end game. And as I was trying to explain, we're in the middle game of the escalation trap, pretty much as I have been telling you for some time. And also the modeling has shown. What you see here is Iran is playing hardball. It is Iran. The big thing that is catching people by surprise is most people have been saying, well, if we could just get President Trump to stop bombing, stop doing the initiation of the violence, then this whole thing will just be over. We'll walk away.

It's all going to be good. And we can go about our merry way. Well, the problem is Iran is an actor. And what you are seeing is, as I have been explaining on the posts on the escalation trap, in this period of time, it's actually Iran who's most likely to initiate the violence, the bombing, to close the Strait of Formuzer, diminish the traffic to keep its leverage. Iran is moving into its period of maximum leverage because the oil inventories are drawing down. In this period of time, it is going to use that leverage to force the Trump administration to stick to the four corners of the MOU. Now, so far, they haven't gone beyond the four corners of the MOU. I think we can see pretty clearly what Iran's red lines are, but they include Israel completely ceasefire,

not just lowering violence in Lebanon, probably Israel out of Lebanon. Number two, this means the fees will come back in 60 days. And but before we just got on, the New York Times is reporting that Oman is putting forward a piece of fee structure. I didn't have a chance to even read it, so I don't know if the full structure is there yet. But what we're talking about with fees is, I think what Iran said from the beginning, it's going to be two million bucks, a tanker. If there are 50 tankers or so going through, that means leaving the straight, that's $100 million a day. that is $36 billion a year. That's in addition to all the oil revenues that they're going to get,

all the waivers on all the sanctions. So Iran, what they are doing, this isn't just a little bit of money. This is what you would do to become ascendant as the dominant state in the Persian Gulf. So what this is all about is not a return to the JCPOA idea. it's not a business deal where we're paying Iran fee for service. What it's about is the balance of power, and that's what the three states here don't agree on. Iran thinks it should be the ascendant state, the regional hegemon. The United States used to be the preeminent state in the region.

Israel thought it was going to be the replacement rising power. Well, these three states just simply don't agree. That's the escalation trap in a nutshell. I wanted to get your response to some of the analysis I heard from Professor Mirschimer that I was just listening to this morning. He feels very confident there's not going to be a full return to war and that Trump will ultimately accept what he describes as a surrender document simply because he's out of military options.

You know, in his telling, okay, they tried the air campaign that obviously didn't work. They tried the naval campaign with the blockade also didn't work. They do not want and have no concept of how they could do the ground invasion or the Army approach in a way that would be more successful. So he doesn't really have another option other than accepting this, what amounts to a U.S. surrender. I wonder what you think of that analysis. Well, first, it's important, I think, for your audience to know that John's office is literally right next door to mine at the University of Chicago. I'm John's first PhD students. So I got my Ph.D. in December 1988. Two of us went through Mike, Desh, Bob Pape, so maybe I'm the second one

if it was done alphabetically. But the bottom line is, I've known John since September 1982. I've started as a PhD student, the University of Chicago. He was the first year assistant professor. So needless to say, John and I know each other really well, and I highly respect John's views. So I think there's a couple things to say. What does it mean to return to a full resumption of the war? Well, Iran is not looking for a full resumption of the war. It wants to keep the oil flow under its control, and it only needs to use small amounts of force in order to make that happen. For Trump, to go back to a full bombing campaign, there's a real operational problem I just posted before I came on on my escalation trap substack, which is Saudi airspace.

You see, right now there's something like 8,000 Pakistani troops and jet fighters, also a squadron in Pakistan, and they've been there for over a month, according to Reuters and others. And what that means, that response to when Trump wanted to do that, remember, he wanted to have a certain operation, Operation Freedom, it got shut down because Saudi Arabia, well, this is Saudi airspace. So there's going to be a real operational limit on just what President Trump can do to go back to this resumption of the bombing in March. So I think that in many ways, John is right, but what I would just point out here is that doesn't mean the oil, we're not going off a cliff. I mean, the big issue here is the oil inventories are running down.

I've been worrying about this for months. They're running down, and that clock is still ticking away. It has not changed. That means come August 1st, man, we're on fumes here on the international economy with energy. And so this is, hurricane seasons come. A lot of things are coming here. It could be quite rocky, and this is essentially Iran's leverage. Now, by January, they may let up on the throttle a little bit, kind of set this tone for the next administration to come.

But between now and January, this could be a very rocky time with the world's economy. Well, let's get to the Lebanon element of this. We can put our next element up on the screen. This is reporting from DropSight based on, or it's a post on X based from DropSight based on the reporting of Courtney. but no, this is going to be B2. Drop site says, Israel continued its military attacks across southern Lebanon on Monday, despite a renewed ceasefire announced on June 20th. And then a framework agreement reached on Friday looking at artillery shelling in the outskirts of a village

that's about 15 miles north of the Israeli border. So, Professor Pape, this is for the Trump administration emerging as a challenge, almost as monumental as the one with the straight of Hormu's, where do you make of the progress or lack thereof when it comes to the U.S. being able to secure this part of a quote-unquote ceasefire agreement that would actually be lasting? Yeah, so what I see is this is the Trump administration, or at least part of it, with Secretary Rubio trying to undermine the whole idea of the Article 1 of the MOU. It's the equivalent of a congressional killer amendment, they're called.

You have an amendment which would undo the entire bill because what this is doing, and Prime Minister Netanyahu gave a big public video presentation over the weekend on this, and he showed on the map what this framework means is Israel stays in southern Lebanon, and he pointed that out in absolutely blunt terms. And I'm sure Iran saw that. So this is not a situation where this is fulfilling Article 1 of the MOU. it's going the other way around. Now, from President Trump and Secretary Rubio, they have said, well, this is a minor thing. Iran will just dismiss it. It's the mine. No, I disagree.

This is part of Iran's sphere of influence as a rising regional hegemon. They're going to want a secure base, a strategic base. That's where it moves. That's that great wealth, global economic wealth. And then they want a sphere of influence. This is what powers regional hegemon's want. Russia wants. wants it, China wants it, we want, America wants it, Iran's going to want.

That is where Lebanon comes in, and Lebanon's important, not just for ideological reasons, but recall many of people who are talking about pipelines going through Syria to bypass Hormuz. Lebanon is the perfect aircraft carrier. You've got Hesbwa is the perfect troops. They're already drones there to basically enforce fees going out through the med if they need to if those Syrian pipelines occur. So balance of power framework here helps to explain not just generalities, but a lot of the details of what is going on, what Iran wants, why they want it, why we want to undermine it, and that's what I mean by the disagreement.

This war can't end until all three sides, the United States, Iran and Israel, all three sides agree on the new balance of power. That's how war is at. You've been telling us since the beginning that we should pay more attention to things that are actually happening versus words that are being said by the various actors involved. And in that spirit, let's put before up on the screen, there's an increasing amount of publicly available data. Here we're talking about satellite imagery confirming the U.S. is continuing a military buildup in the Persian Gulf.

20 new refueling aircrafts been spotted at an airbase in Qatar. Sentcom says it has at least 50,000 soldiers in the region. and that are ready for action. What do you read into these dynamics? What I think is this confirms what I've been telling you and forecasting. And also, I really appreciate using the right metrics here because people just want to keep focusing on every post on truth social as if this is somehow the reality.

Some are, some aren't. But this is the reality. And by the way, notice that other folks were hoping, as recently as a week ago, that we're pulling troops out of the region when that's not the reality. This is the reality that you see. And I think also Speaker Johnson this morning, he's floating the idea that Congress will give Trump another 60-day window for more operations. We can conduct operations from the sea with our carriers for a long period of time. We have Jordan. We have some other bases here.

The idea that this is not going to, there certainly will never be a return to some serious operations is just too much. I would still say President Trump doesn't want to. But remember, President Trump thought this was going to be over in three days. He didn't want to get to, we're starting month five of the escalation trap. This is month five of the escalation trap. Not day five, not a window. This is where we are. And J.D. Vance told us this was never going to happen.

President Trump told us this was never going to happen. The problem is they don't have the control. They just don't have the control. And Professor Pip, one thing we've seen just in the last couple of weeks, I'm just thinking about this now as we're talking, is some of your critics, the most ardent pro-Israel folks out there. I'm curious if you think they kind of proved your point about the escalation trap over the last couple of weeks by saying this MOU is garbage.

Trump needs to escalate in order to get a better deal. Now, sometimes they were saying that explicitly. Other times they were saying it's a total straw man to suggest this would necessarily involve 3,000 ground troops and more deaths of American service members and more time spent actually prosecuting the war, but it's hard to get around. That would have been the inevitable consequence of this.

So just even as we were talking, this occurred to me that some of your critics were calling to escalate as soon as the MOU came out, which may have been perhaps amusing. It is irony of irony that there is the overlap, as you're pointing out. And I appreciate you telling me about them because there's so much I'm doing and writing, I don't read the comments.

Now, maybe I should be reading the comment. My wife tells me I should be reading the comments. So the way I get the comments is when I talk to you folks, who do always, you read the comments. You read the comments. That's very, very helpful. We'll let you know what you need to know, Professor Pave. Don't you worry about it.

Thank you for doing that. And I just want to point out, though, that this is a very tricky middle game. And this middle game, people wanted to be over by a date. You know, we got a midterm coming. We got the NFL season coming. Man, we're busy. The problem is that this could go on. And I just want to point out over the weekend, the first news service, the IRGC, most started talking about going nuclear,

actually having nuclear weapons. I've been warning about this. That's saying it's going to happen next month, but over the next year or so, Iran is very much going to want to have nuclear weapons. That's part of becoming that regional hegemon, that secure power. This is going to be very difficult for President Trump to just let stand.

Maybe he can let it stand, but if Iran were to literally test a nuclear weapon, whether it's in the fall or a year from the fall, that would pretty much end President Trump. Trump's legacy. He would then become the Lyndon Johnson. So it's either Hoover or Johnson. These are the problems for President Trump. And I'm just pointing out, these are the things that are not really being solved diplomatically. None of them are being solved diplomatically because diplomacy can't do fix what's wrong with the balance of power. The sides have to agree. They have to agree on the new

balance of power. And the Iranian, the more hardliners within the Iranians, the Iranians, government feel that the U.S. has not suffered enough pain yet to accept that new balance of power. Is that effectively your assessment as well, whether through a nuclear test or whether through creating more economic pain, that's what it will take. That's right. This is what I said back in March when we first started to say, which is they're playing a long game. And what a long game means is just like with the North Vietnamese, they want to go at the soft underbelly of the United States in long war, which is those costs amount up.

And for many Americans, they don't see a vital interest. It's not so much Americans are too soft. If there was an Iranian army in Mexico, I think this would be a different story. But the fundamental problem here is, if you just read any of the opinion polls or all the people I talk to, and I talk to quite a few, they don't see the vital interest here for the United States worth paying all these costs. Iran certainly sees the vital interest because we have toppled their governments before. We have just killed their supreme leader. So my goodness, do they see a vital interest in having a nuclear weapon or just simply being a stronger and imposing these costs?

That's why I'm saying I really think that between now and January, we're going to see there's a good chance those costs are going to go up. And the point of the cost is not just to make America hurts. The point of the cost will be to get America to truly leave the region. Apparently, we've already moved our chaos. I understand that's a command center from Qatar, our air base in Qatar, over to the states. Here, I think what Iran really wants here is America to truly leave the region, and not just President Trump to say he's doing that for a week or two or a month or two. They want this to happen in a substantial way, and that means basically the American public has to be on board with that. Fascinating, very dicey times we're living through and very grateful to have your analysis to help us understand what's going on.

Everybody goes, subscribe to the escalation trap on Substack and Professor Pape. Hopefully, we'll see you back here next week. Absolutely, absolutely. Right there with you. All right. Tell Professor Mearsheimer we said hi when you see him. Oh, yes, yes, yes. Pile with weekend gold tickets to Lassau Montreal.

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Oh la, my friend, oh, my friend, oh, my, my brother. What a... Look, I never have ever been talking with nobody. Except with my kids, my kids, my kids, so know. Se my amante. Oof. Ounch, that incredible. Yeah, the telenovela.

You're the only person I know that loves a yellow starburst. It's lemonade. No, there's someone. I'd like to collaborate with this person. This is Sweet 305. Listen to Sweet 305 with Lele Pons as part of my Culture Podcast Network on the IHard Radio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Mangashit together, and I'm back with the new season of the podcast

Skyline Drive. This time I'm diving into a rabbit hole of peptides, organoids, blood boys, blue zones, and brain replacement to try to understand what this longevity obsession is all about and what it really means to live forever for all of us. I learned about some rad science. I can make a brain for you and then we can test what draw is the best for your brain, as opposed to his brain. Here are some hard truths. I would expect Indians to age faster, but I did not expect it to be almost a four to five year acceleration. And get myself into a world of trouble. I'd say probably start bone smashing.

That doesn't work. To make it look more defined. They say it works. I don't know. Listen to Skyline Drive, How to Live Forever on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Indictments handed down in an NBA gambling case. We can put the first element up. on the screen. I'm reading here from ESPN. Headline ex-NBA player is Malik Beasley,

Ed Davis indicted in gambling case. Former NBA players, Malik Beasley and Ed Davis, and an NBA agent. The story writes are among six defendants indicted Monday on charges related to an alleged sports gambling scheme that targeted at least four games during the 2020-23, 2024 season. That is according to the federal indictment that was, again, released yesterday, just in the last 24 hours here, Davis and co-defendants, Rob Gordetskyy. Ernesto Placencia and William Brown were arrested Monday, according to a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern District of New York, ESPN writes, Beasley and defendant Palo Zamorano, who was Davis's agent, were not in custody as of Monday morning.

But Beasley's attorney is saying they've coordinated with the U.S. Attorney's Office for a voluntary surrender later this week. Now, according to the indictment, ESPN reports, Beasley lost millions of dollars gambling during his nine-year NBA career. He agreed to manipulate his stats ahead of at least four games during the 23-24 season while he was with my team at the Milwaukee Bucks so that the co-conspirators could wager on the stats according to the indictment. These wagers, according to this indictment, were like $75,000 net winnings of at least $121,000. He, according to the indictment, received bribes from co-conspirators. I mean, this is really brutal stuff, Crystal. Just going through the

It's very dark. I mean, it seems like he, you know, got himself into trouble. Gambling probably has a gambling addiction himself. Yep. He's deep in the hole. His teammate, Davis, was considered to be the quote-unquote gatekeeper in the scheme. And, I mean, look, they deserve their day in court, et cetera, et cetera. But it looks like they got him dead to rights because they have text messages between them, which are pretty damning.

Davis texted Beasley at one point. Only way you can beat Vegas is sports betting. we can make some good money. A month later, Beasley informed Davis he intended to underperform on rebounding in a January 26th game between the Bucks and the Cavaliers. According to the indictment, quote, the defendants and their co-conspirators placed numerous fraudulent wagers, totaling tens of thousands of dollars, conditioned on defendant Malik Beasley's under-rebounds prop bets. Beasley finished with three rebounds. Guess what the betting line was? 3.5 rebounds.

Yep. Other examples of this include a scheme that targeted February 27th game between the Bucks and the Charlotte Hornets, a March 10th game between the Bucers, March 21st game between the Bucer and Brooklyn Nets. As alleged Malik Beasley allowed himself to be bought and altered his game time performance two lined pockets of Ed Davis and his three other co-conspirators. So it looks pretty bad. We could put C2 here. There's a video that has been floating around on Twitter. that looks very much like suspicious gameplay, where the game is over.

There's literally five seconds left on the clock. And he, you know, the inbounds the ball, they're down nine points and races to the other end of the court to dunk the ball and score two more points in the final like 0.1 second of the game. Why would you do that when the game is already over? Well, he cut the lead from 9 to 7, and the spread was 8.5.

So this is the sort of thing that, you know, it appears he was engaged in. And you just look at these indictments and other ones that came before. And it is, you know, there's a big problem here. There's a big problem here. There's a big problem in terms of college sports betting as well. It really degrades the game. And a lot of it does have to do with these prop bets because it's one thing, it's much more difficult to throw an entire game, but like to grab an extra rebound or to not grab an extra rebound or to, you know, fake an injury and reduce

you're playing minutes in a way that, you know, people can bet on, like those sorts of things are very easily, easily manipulated and gamed, and that appears to have been what's going on here. Let's go back to some of the text messages in the indictment just to point out, Crystal's point, you know, obviously everybody deserves their day in court, but what they have on Davis and Beasley here, literally Davis saying, only way you can beat Vegas is sports betting everything else. They got the edge. At one point, Beasley says, trying to find like 2K, I'll do my best to pay in full on the first. Davis says, you got Snapchat. Beasley says, not really why.

Davis says, talk to you about some shit on there. Beasley, you can't do it here. Davis says better to talk on there. We can make some good money. So this is going to be- And you're talking about an NBA player who is struggling and come up with 2000 because of his $2,000 because of his gambling debts. And has continued to struggle financially got, you know,

evicted from his apartment that he was living in, et cetera. And now it's out of the NBA. And now being hit with these charges, I mean, it's just extremely dark, as I said before. It's extremely dark. And let's go to C3 because this just speaks to the magnitude of what's happened in recent years. This is from somebody on X who points out the total amount wagered on sports in the U.S. Back in 2018, it was at $6.6.6 billion, 2019, 13.1 billion.

That's a doubling for what it's worth. Then you get up to 21 the next year. Then 2021, it increases from 21.5 in 2020 to $57.5 billion. We get another massive increase by 2022, $93.7 billion. That goes up to $1211 billion in 20203, at $149 billion in 2024. And in 2025, the numbers at $165 billion. That is what has been unleashed, not just in these leagues, but in the entire country in less than 10 years.

That starting figure, once again, was from 2018, and it was at $6.6 billion. We are now at $165 billion. Billion dollars. Let's put CBS up on the screen. This is a report. They actually did on 60 minutes over the weekend. C4. Their headline was,

online prediction market traders make millions betting on U.S. military operations. They went through some of the evidence for how that's happening behind the scenes in really damning ways just the last year that we've seen significant, significant evidence. Once again, by the way,

when you have it at the upper most levels, which, like, do we have clear-cut damning evidence? Not exactly, but we have enough evidence to say there's something going on. It's starting to look pretty damning. It's starting to look very damning. And I will just say, though, like, you can't say definitively this person did this, but you can look at the whales and such in certain trades and say, somebody had this.

And then we have these soldiers who were talked about in the 60 Minutes report. It's like the example for them is being set by the absolute tippy top of this. And it's the same thing goes for NBA players. We're watching the gamification of our entire economy at the presidential level. And these guys are getting caught up and it. And it's dark, to your point. Yeah. Well, they indicted one dude who apparently had inside knowledge of the Venezuela operation and bet on it.

And I think it was like, you know, it was not a small amount of money. It was in the tens of thousands of dollars. But what CBS found and spoke with analysts who have been tracking this stuff, they say we spotted nine polymarket accounts all connected who made collectively $2.4 million betting almost exclusively on U.S. military operations. The gentleman I was just discussing who has been indicted. He made $400,000 more than I said, $400,000, a lot of money. But on the other side, we have $2.4 million. So he's really a small fish. When you look at the bigger picture, and their win rate for betting on these military, U.S. military operations, 98%. Do you think that's just, they're just really that lucky? No, of course not.

I mean, it's statistically virtually impossible to have gotten it correct 98% of the time, especially when the bets that they're making, I mean, these are highly esoteric things, that you would have to be in the know. And so then you talk about, okay, well, what's damning about the tippy top of the U.S. federal government and, you know, connecting them to this. Well, if it wasn't them, wouldn't they be investigating this? Wouldn't they also be investigating? There was one whale who has made millions off of, you know, we're talking here about polymarket and these sorts of things, but off of traditional insider trading on oil futures and commodities. And that person, if the government

wanted to know who they are, the government could know who they are. And perhaps the government does know who they are. Are they being prosecuted? No, they are not. So, you know, this connects to the discussion we are having with Professor Pape about the Iran war. The rhythm and flow of this, this is just a joke at this point. You know, it's all market manipulation. It's all time for, okay, we're going to, we're going to bomb them over the weekend when the markets are closed. We're going to have some sort of a report leaked to Axiosis Baroque Ravid right before the market's open. All designed to manipulate the markets is it far-fetched, all to think that this government, the most corrupt government in American history, if not in world

history, by the numbers, that they would be, you know, cashing in in these different ways? No, of course, that's not hard to imagine. So, again, if they wanted to prosecute this type of disgusting insider trading, they could easily do it and have plenty of information to be able to make the case and send a warning sign to the rest of the public and the, you know, various military operators and other people and know that this is not going to be tolerated. They're not doing that. So this is an expert telling CNN. This is Victor Matheson. It's an economics professor at the College of Holy Cross and an expert in the business of sports and gambling as CNN put a recent

article. In this recent article, Matheson said that these sponsorship deals between some of these sports books and some of the leagues are probably more than a billion dollars annually, worth more than a billion dollars annually. I would say that might even be a conservative estimate, but they've become, again, just since that 2018 Supreme Court ruling, when we were reading earlier, it was like $6.6.6 billion a year on sports wagers. We're now at over $160 billion a year.

So just since 2018, this has become a really crucial part of the industry, and it is now completely woven into the fabric of their bottom line. So good luck extricating this now from these leagues, their incentive to keep these partnerships and to keep people addicted and hooked. I mean, here's from, I'm reading from the Harvard Gazette now. They say that 23 percent, there's a 23 percent national increase since the 2018 court ruling in internet searches for gambling addiction help. Here's an expert who says, when new forms of gambling appear, the rate of savings go down.

Then you see the rate of credit card defaults going up and you see the rate of mortgage defaults going up. So these are long-term financial and societal costs with broad implications. So think about that. Think about the incentive now with these sports leagues, who, by the way, have lobbyists here in D.C. as well, of course, or the sports books certainly have lobbyists here in D.C., of course, to keep this going at the cost of addiction and suffering. I mean, it says it ruins marriages.

It can lead to physical abuse. It's a horrible, horrible scourge on the moral fabric of the society. and now our economy is tethered to it in a significant way. And some of these past, like American pastimes are tethered to it in a significant way and have this ugly incentive baked into them. Here's the reality. Like, insider trading is basically the American dream now. You know, they've decimated the industrial workforce,

and now they're promising with AI to decimate the white color workforce. Costs are so expensive and ever skyrocketing that even if you have, a decent job. It becomes increasingly difficult to buy a home, get a good education, have health care. And so what do they offer? They offer you basically a lot or ticket. That's the dream that's being sold. And so when you look at that landscape, it's no surprise that you see those numbers going up and up and up to $165 billion, which is astonishing. It's also no surprise given the way that traditionally men are seen as like the providers and this is really a bedrock of what it means to be a man, to be able to earn, to be able to provide, that men would be the most susceptible

and young men in particular, most susceptible to these gambling addictions and to betting on these websites, not just on sports, but on everything else. I wanted to give a shout-on to Killing Mbapé, who's the French soccer star. I'm starting to, after watching so much World Cup coverage, I almost called him a footballer, but we'll keep an American here with the 250th anniversary. Anyway, he was very upset about his image being associated. with a betting website. And he really objected to that. And he said the reason why is because sports betting is destructive. It's ruined the lives of some people I know. That's why I refuse to appear in sports betting advertisements. Many of us come from the suburbs and it destroys the

lives of countless people there. I mean, the fact that that is such a remarkable and unique statement that, you know, people globally took note of like, oh my God, I can't believe he said that. That's incredible. Tells you something about the dire state of affairs here. Where are the other voices from, you know, superstar athletes or others in the industry saying this is unacceptable. I'm not going to take part in this whatsoever. Yeah. And so the Ethics and Public Policy Center, which is a very conservative think tank, put out a paper on this just last week. And they're reporting based on research, 10% of young men in the U.S. exhibit problem gambling

behavior more than three times the rate of the general population. 10% of a demographic that was already struggling before we introduced all of this, the percentage of high school students with a gambling problem is double that of adults. and 5% of all young people between the ages of 11 and 17 meet at least one of the criteria for a gambling problem. These numbers are huge, huge. They say a study in the UK found that 49% of students reported gambling in the past year, and 17% used their student loan money to gambler to gamble.

Male gamblers in particular spent an average amount on gambling per week that was nearly equal to their grocery budget. Another study in the U.S. found that household, that put money into online sports betting accounts reduce their financial investing by 14% on average. And it states that legalized online gambling, one study found increases in personal bankruptcy rates up to 25% in credit card and auto loan delinquencies

of 25% and 27%. Respectively, finally, the rise in bankruptcy rates translates to roughly 30,000 more personal bankruptcies in the United States every year. And this is, again, based on something that is really one of the few industries we have left of unification and monoculture to some extent. The NFL, for example, is like one of the few things

that actually does bring a lot of people together. It's one of the few things that we all kind of still watch as a country together. And this is utterly predatory behavior. They are now completely inextricably intertwined with this. And it's causing mass wreckage in the young male population in particular, which is not really something that young men can afford

to have on their shoulders additionally. That's right. With student loans already are a significant problem for many reasons that we've covered here for years and add to that gambling addictions. Yeah, I was looking at that $165 billion number and I'm like, where's that even coming from? Because at the same time you see credit card debt skyrocketing,

you know the costs are going up and up. You know that wages are not keeping up with inflation and yet more and more of the budget is going to, you know, these fundamentally predatory companies, very dire situation. It's so dark. dark and just a sad statement on where we are and ties back to our Supreme Court conversation earlier in the show, Crystal, about what the conservative Supreme Court hath wrought, despite this is an interesting tension, the conservative groups for years vetting all of these folks

to be friendly to industry. It's the perfect tension between the free market capitalism that the right claims to espouse and then the family values that the right claims to espouse. And this is the product of what's been unleashed over the last eight years. Very good point. All right, Crystal, let's move on to a new survey about the most popular politicians in America. Joy is essential and it's also elusive. But now, there's a new and exciting way to start your journey toward a more joyful existence. Joy 101. It's a new podcast hosted by me, Hoda Kotby. If you're craving inspiration to maximize your joy, tune into these candid, uplifting, and moving on-air chats. Open your free IHeart Radio app. Search Joy 101 and listen now. Joy 101 with Hoda Kotbe is presented by CVS.

I'm Munga Chitigler and I'm back with a new season of my podcast, Skyline Drive. This time I talk to scientists, biopunks, curmudgens, blues owners, super seniors, and Goa's top cryotherapy lab to try to understand this obsession with living forever and what it means for all of us. And I get into a bit of trouble along the way. I'd say probably start bone smashing. That doesn't work. To make it look more defined.

They say it works. I don't know. Listen to Skyline Drive, How to Live Forever on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Betrayal Weekly is back with brand new stories. From threatening text messages disturbing a small Midwestern town. It was from an unknown number.

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