Chapo Trap House - 634 - Feelin’ Feinstein! (6/6/22)

Episode Date: June 7, 2022

Between a piece on “the left’s” positions on Ukraine, the NYT’s coverage of the death of Al Jazeera journalist Shireen Abu Akleh, and Rebecca Traister’s new profile of Dianne Feinstein, the theme of today’s episode is “looking the truth in the face and ignoring the most obvious conclusion.”

Hello friends, it's choppo Monday June 6 back again back at it boys. How's it going? Not bad It's been a great birthday month Someone even say birthday half year We had a pool day yesterday. Yes, that was fun. We had a wonderful time. Yeah, there's a there's an app in I don't know if it's local to Los Angeles or not It sort of feels like it would be but you like you've rent someone's pool For like 10 hours and it's the type of thing that I would think is really stupid and then you do it and it's wonderful You're like, oh my god. Can you use their bathroom though? No, that's a bathroom Lee

So the only separate exact. Yeah, okay. Well gang act I know Congratulations to Felix on his birthday month. He's back now. And you know what? Let's let's kick things off today with a little update on a sort of a forgotten choppo figure He's back in the news now. It's it's Milo Yiannopoulos is basically Starring in the remake of that movie with Robert De Niro and Anne Hathaway where he becomes an intern at the age of 50 Milo Yiannopoulos, he's now interning for Marjorie Taylor Green Yeah, that'll a squid. I'll that'll get rid of all those accusations hanging around a bunch of teenagers The far right there mark Foley

Remember Mark Foley folks is he is this is this like ultra immersion style of straight conversion? Oh I'm gonna work for the hottest woman in Congress My my attempted my attempt at straight conversion will surely stick. It's like dropping yourself in a country. You don't speak the language Sinkers swim sink or swim. Yeah, this lady on earth This is a coming courtesy of the dilly bees just a little quick start to this show here It says the far right troll fell on hard times But he is trying to rebuild his career as an intern from Marjorie Taylor Green A far right provocateur and former Breitbart editor Milo Yiannopoulos has found a new gig

Capitol Hill intern for Maga Firebrand Marjorie Taylor Green Yiannopoulos 37 post it to tell oh, he's there. Okay, it's 37. So is it Just filling out that resume Beginning level level 37. Um, you know, I wish I was 37 again. I wish um, you know, I turned 63 this weekend I wish I had taken that internship at 37. I wish I had rolled the dice on myself and restarted my professional career It's sort of what you know, working for a woman who kind of looks like a bull terrier 37 years young posted to telegram on Monday morning a photo of what appeared to be a newly issued Congressional badge placed atop a Louis Vuitton briefcase

I've finally been persuaded out of my route out of retirement wrote the British right wing media troll But my skills are a bit rusty. So the best role I could land was as an unpaid internship for a friend pray for me He added mummy always said I'd end up in government. Um, retirement is certainly one way to put it That's what that's really one way to put like no one wants to be seen with me for the last five years Yeah, so he says Yiannopoulos didn't respond to a request for comment But in a statement provided via her spokesperson Representative green confirmed to the Daily Beast that Yiannopoulos is interning in her office The quote is so I have an intern that was raped by a priest as a young teen was gay

Has offended everyone at some point turned his life back to Jesus and church and changed his life green told the Daily Beast Great story. Love it Did she mean like was gay like he converted out or like oh he was like being gay last week? I Just uh, I just uh for you know a press release I just love I love any press release that begins with was raped by a priest as a teenager and then ends with great story And always start with your best foot forward I think and also he says I like what else it says a mummy always said I'd end up in government At the end of April the hate spewing ideologue once a ubiquitous maga figure until he appeared to defend pedophilia in a YouTube video

Attended a green press conference and after it wrapped was escorted with the congresswoman into the Capitol building through a members only entrance Provocateur no longer attracts much attention But last year he declared himself to be an ex-gay and an advocate for the discredited practice known as conversion therapy I treated it like an addiction. He said last March referring to his homosexuality I hope people will support and pray for me if for no other reason then they share my delight at the prospect of Milo Yiannopoulos Furiously and indignantly railing against homosexuals for sins of the flesh. Yeah, I mean like the Ex-gay thing he does. It's like I don't know. I obviously don't take it at face value, right? It's just like you you constantly have to up the ante both as a conservative a social issues conservative and

As a media personality like if your thing is always outrageous You always have to you have to set up new boundaries and cross them, but it is like it is depressing Because it's just like how much How much money do you think he is made off of the ex-gay thing like $900. Yeah, I mean not really like a fraction of the money he made off the gay thing The gay conservative thing. Yeah, what he was doing the gay conservative thing The Mercer family was just like giving him blink checks to you know

They may have a tour bus and go around the country like doing speeches about triglypuff and it's like it's a gamer gate And now it's like now. He's like doing some form of crowdfunding. I don't know. I'm kind of interested in the The parallel ultra conservative crowdfunding space But a very few people are making real money doing it Well, I mean, he's still not making any money working for Marjorie Taylor Greene if this article is to be believed He just wants to be around, you know, now that he's ex-gay He wants to spend all his time around just sort of a a fabulous woman and diva and Dedicate his life to supporting her. Do you think she'll like roll him into the polycool thing that she's doing?

That's part of the therapy. That's what I mean. That's what he says pray for me That's what he's referring to pray that I enter the polycool talk about straight convert straight conversion therapy I don't about I don't about do it for me. Imagine like, okay I don't have you guys ever been in a CrossFit gym. No, I've walked past them Well, I mean CrossFit gyms are often called like, you know CrossFit gulosity CrossFit ultimatum core and they could they call them boxes in the in their world because that's literally what they are they are just like boxes like they should be storage units pretty much and

There's no like it's not like a big nice gym where there's a ton of like nice central air blowing stuff all over the place and ventilation It literally is just a box where people do the worst pull-ups ever and it's like It is kind of like an all-you-can-eat buffet for staff infections And just imagine One day you're getting done doing the worst pull-ups ever listening to what would be the opposite of a golden era like a Well, wood era wood era a little Wayne doing those shitty pull-ups

all the cut little Wayne songs about being an alien and Marjorie Taylor Green is standing across from you wearing a new type of ponytail that is doing something Previously unforeseen with her eyes sort of giving herself Epicantic folds through the height of her own ponytail and then she's just spreading eagle and you're you're you're gonna drill her CrossFit style and she's like it's okay. My husband likes this Well, I mean sign me up sign me up for being gay after that We have so, you know best best of wishes to Milo and his his new career as a congressional intern

And also in his career on being not gay anymore Best of luck to him. We're praying. I mean, I hope he starts collecting a paycheck So I hope he can like in a level up from being an intern to like, you know actual congressional staffer Yeah, I don't really I don't see why she isn't paying him as one. Is there like a background check he needs to go through Well, he's probably not an American citizen. So, oh, yeah, probably a little bit of a loophole. I would imagine All right, moving on from a Marjorie Taylor Green and Milo. I guess we'll be left to I want to talk a little bit about Ukraine and why it matters for the left at least according to a former Bernie Foreign Policy Advisor Matthew does so like, I don't know. I mean, I we haven't talked about Ukraine in a while. It's just

It's just Seems like the war has grounded to a pretty brutal stalemate I don't know I mean like you guys have an idea of like where things are at with this right now I mean, it just seems like we gave them 40 billion dollars and we're just like and also it just seems like I know I know the Boris Johnson government like actively is like trying to stop the Zelensky government from like Negotiating anything based on concessions the Russian government or the Russian military But like yeah, it just the war seems continues to go on

but I don't know that I found this is an odd piece and the new republic by Matthew does because It goes back and forth a lot of like it is sort of a it's hard for me to like discern from this What he actually wants here like what he actually wants from the left other than kind of like this sort of vague Solidarity with Ukraine against the the Russian invasion, but I don't think it's all very like qualified as like yes I know America's screwed up in the past and you know like they shouldn't be used as an excuse for like why America's good again, but You know like I think we need to come together for Ukraine now I think you can never think of the audience when we talked about this before the audience for this kind of thing as

Like some imagined, you know left that's gonna do something based on it It's the audience's potential bosses people in the media people It's to make them know that he's on their team and that he he understands, you know The greater priority of of of maintaining, you know, the American project. He's not gonna sacrifice that For any leftist notions. Yeah, it reminds me of another Dust piece this one from oh god almost like ten years ago It was dust's review of you remember Max woman falls book Goliath. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I do It was about like the you know hard right ethno nationalist

turn of Israel, which you know, obviously always an ethno nationalist project, but more outward in its image and it's elected governments, but That it's sort of interesting contrasting that review with you know this another I'm normal piece as we call them Because in that in that piece dust writes the classic liberal Zionist line, which you could still do in 2012 Which is like oh, I mean like this completely accurate criticism of Israel gets it wrong Because what's that famous saying? It's not acting like Israel has a right to defend itself But of course I'm against the occupation, which could mean anything

Could mean nothing It is interesting who gets to have legitimate security concerns I would like to see if dust still stands by all those statements on Israel I would imagine that he would try to weasel him his way out of it because Liberal the past few years with Israel since Trump have been very tough on liberal Zionists Yeah, but they've just they've just gone elsewhere. They've just gone to other parts of the world Hectoring parts of the left for not being serious enough in agreeing with the State Department and I guess Preventing some type of national liberation through posts or not being enthusiastic enough in their support

Well, yeah, the headline is why Ukraine matters for the left Opposition to US adventurism is principled, but this is Putin's adventurism and the left must stand firmly against it I mean, I don't know like I mean like who on the left. Yeah, sure. Okay. I I said I stand against it. I'm meaningless. Yeah, I just can't get who are you talking to? Well, what button do you want them to press? This doesn't exist. Well, I mean, I think what it comes down to is like You know like solidarity with Ukraine We have to stand against Putin

But like you like I think what he's really getting at is that you got to be in favor of all the arm sales, too That's what it all boils down. Yes, is that you have to you have to you have to if you are a man It's like if you're imagining the left as anybody if you're in the Congress That means you got to support the arms to Ukraine You know, if you're just a person reading this and you don't have any power Well, then you know post about it in a positive way or whatever, you know Don't be out there trolling us with all of your Russian disinformation I that you got from a gray zone or whatever a regimee door

But one way or the other. Yeah, you're like American foreign policy is what you're supporting here Yeah, I mean if does and Peter Beinart all those like former former front and center liberal Zionists They were masters of not saying Exactly what they meant, but like, you know, it's very clear what liberal Zionism means It's saying there is a certain amount of people a certain amount of civilians that is acceptable for Israel to kill a A certain amount of like interference in the politics and the institutions of its neighbors Whether it's assassinating Iranian scientists or whatever that is acceptable and you want to keep it

Around that line around around what your par is so you can go on a guilt-free Mediterranean vacation you'd say that without saying that and his same thing here is like well, there's an acceptable level of U.S. weapons that It's acceptable for them to fall on the hands of God knows who doing God knows what for God knows how long and We're because we're supporting it verbally the right way We're going to make that we're gonna make sure that doesn't happen just by virtue of us not wanting it to happen But you need to join us. Well, yeah

I mean like I I'm just like going to go into like the end of this piece. I just want to like highlight a few paragraphs It just says here he writes this solidarity has been hard to find in some of the statements from the Democratic Socialists of America To be clear the cherry picking of their statements by the White House's rapid response director and left punching and the left punching of floundering Moderates is transparently cynical and opportunistic Centering opposition to U.S. imperialism and militarism is an entirely appropriate starting point for any U.S. Left Organization Even if it's not the whole race hard questions need to be asked especially now about the goals and interests NATO actually serves But we also need to ask hard questions about how our struggle against militarism works alongside our commitment to colleagues around the world Who require more than just a call to stop the war with that said?

It's important to differentiate between the genuine anti-war anti imperialism of DSA and others in the American left and the pernicious Authoritarian adjutant prop of the gray zone and the like the rights goal is to divide the left and we should not help them But the goal of building a stronger left is served by identifying Engaging and organizing with those genuinely acting on principles of solidarity democracy and human rights and not wasting time with atrocity denying grifters and clickbaiting provocateurs. So yeah, I guess he's going to max Blumenthal again With this piece. Here's it. Here's a little social experiment for you Go up to any American voter or really like anybody just go up to anyone and ask them like What do you think about the authoritarian provocateurs at the gray zone?

That will that is more dangerous than the infamous farting in the hood prank. I will say No, why you were your it's hard to get someone involuntary committed But that may do it for you, but like, you know, it just seems like there's a lot of like he's like I Just sort of like he's he's hopping from one sort of stool to the other Just like it's just I don't know. It's like these articles like this where like he's identified Like the gray zone and people like them is sort of like, you know, authoritarian agit prop But he wants to make sure it's just one of these articles were He wants to make a point

But he wants to make sure to offend like as few people as possible he wants to cover all his bases and you know, let let people know that like hey like It's wrong to cherry-pick DSA statements, but like also like they kind of screwed up not Demonstrating enough solidarity with Ukraine I guess. Well, that's how you know that this is written for Bosses because it doesn't say anything. It's like, why would you say any of this? And it's like cuz cuz it's not for you I'm demonstrating loyalty. Yeah, there's no instruction. I will show you the acrobatics I'll go through to support your bullshit. There's no instruction You can go off of if your DSA or even just a poster

It's like if I'm if I'm to break this down and give you the bullet points of your action items It's display proper solidarity. It's okay to don't worry. It's okay to center US imperialism but you have to display proper solidarity with our colleagues around the world and does he mean like The Ukrainian left policies were parties sorry that Zalinsky made illegal Does he mean Zalinsky himself? Is Zalinsky like DSA's colleague? I mean like going on here I mean like we can see more of this sort of like like hopscotch going on here because he says it is right to be cautious About getting drawn into something bigger than we want it is right to be concerned that the administration's rhetoric is to paraphrase one of the Reagan era

Militaries recruiting films increasingly writing checks that its policy can't cash. Okay, so he's a top-done fan, too Here as after 9-11 fear of overreaction is entirely appropriate our fallen policy our foreign policy apparatus is designed to stoke and then cash in on overreaction And our job is not to simply allow Ukrainians to write us policy Americans all of us are now implicated in this war if the American people are providing arms as we are to the tune of tens of billions of dollars Then we have a reasonable interest in and reasonable expectation of influence on its outcome The Biden administration has made clear the kind of outcome the US is trying to produce But also rightly made clear the limits of US engagement and the overriding concern about avoiding nuclear escalation One thing the left definitely should not do nor anyone is buy into the narrative that Russia's war on Ukraine has restored America's mission in purpose

That our country can seem to allocate money efficiently only towards weapons and little else should be a source of shame not pride Observing how easily tens of billions of dollars in aid to Ukraine. We're moving through our otherwise obstreperous and unproductive Congress Adam twos sundered up that they can agree on that and not on health care or climate change policy as a sign of America's own dysfunction Oh that twos I'm shaking my fist once again at Adam the twos No, no, but I mean I agree with twos. He's really one to he he's really one to talk about crossing a line What with how he's fucked to all of our significant others? Despite the enchantment of our political class Russia's war on Ukraine is not a manic pixie dream conflict that will lift our country out of its

Legitimation crisis if we allow this moment to be used simply to reassemble a broken war in Washington foreign policy consensus We will not reverse that crisis will deepen it an influential well well organized and growing political left is essential to repairing this country And that includes foreign policy the response to Russia's war in Ukraine is a key part of that It is possible indeed it is essential to apply the historical awareness that Sontag urged and not be stupid together While acknowledgizing well, sorry while acknowledging that supporting the defense of Ukraine is the right thing for the global left to do Even if our and even if our own government is doing it So like again like just try to like figure out like like again. What does he want from the US left here? I think what do you I mean? I think what he wants is just like okay say all the reasonable things about the US State Department

Pentagon and foreign policy and the fact that we can you know send 40 billion dollars in weapons to Ukraine to fight a war We have nothing to do with like or less or a war that is not really in our like, you know, direct national interest We can do that overnight, but we can't give healthcare anyone and by the way, Biden is also like cutting school lunches and raising Medicaid fees at the same time, but it's just like he just wants the right. I Don't know like he just wants to like just just don't go too far Don't go too far here and don't don't legitimate Russian aggression. I suppose which is like yeah like The DSA is a key factor in that certainly and

You know and Russian aggression or imperialism or whatever you want to call it the DSA needs to privilege Ukrainians in the progressive stack. Yeah, it's just I Don't like I don't know what can be done right beyond just like. Oh, I like I don't approve obviously of Russia's actions. I do not think it was the right thing to do to invade I don't think that our track record. However, give it does not give me any confidence about 40 fucking Billion dollars in weapons in in one allocation alone I don't know. What is what is wrong with that? And if there's nothing wrong with that, why write this article? What yeah, like is there a groundswell of like gray zone teens out there?

It is again like Matt Matt is right and that you have to read this as a hey everyone Bernie's gonna die soon and don't worry. I I Matt Matt suss from among us is normal. Um, but If you if you're taking his face value, which I guess he would want other people to do since this is public or not it's I Mean, I guess the only the only other way to read into this right is that What's happening in Ukraine now at this moment is kind of exactly what? You know, not just us but people like us generally generally in our ideological space said where

We did not approve of the invasion or operation but We said hey I don't think that Ukraine is going to win and that is certainly not happening now a lot of the worst case scenarios that People talked about are happening where people are signing up to defend their hometowns, which is a completely fucking understandable thing it is a Brave decision that I don't know if a lot of Americans would take and then immediately being sent to the front lines by

Ukrainian higher command and dying pointlessly It's a very sad fucked up conflict as we I mean even before the invasion I recall us saying, uh, this would be a uniquely like World War one ask pointless shitty stalemate And it kind of seems like it is and it kind of seems like any window for Ukrainian victory or Strategic victories closing rapidly and that lives are pointlessly being lost But I I guess if an article is written in the right way that changes that I just I don't know

I don't know what to tell the people. I mean, I do know what to tell the people because they're not they're not posting about it Is enthusiastically as they were in yeah, oh, maybe yeah, yeah in their case Paying attention. I mean like it's it It's a weird thing because it's like he goes to such pains to kind of like establish his kind of You know left-wing foreign policy credentials But like I think the entire piece the Arctic the point of the article is that like yeah It is bad that the only thing our government can do is send 40 million sort 40 billion dollars in weapons to a fucking In like an arm sales to Ukraine more or less, you know instantly and do and do nothing else

But despite the fact that that is the case like they should still send the 40 billion dollars and and no one should be You know like no one should be too mad about it Yeah, or you can lament the fact that like oh, it's a shame that like all we can do is just sell Sell weapons to foreign countries, but in this case, it's like good that we're doing so or at least not bad I think that's basically the point of the point of the piece. Please don't say it's bad No, you can say it's you can say it's regrettable But don't say that we shouldn't do it or that it's just like it's a we're being forced for always forever for always a Democratic administration is always they always do things because they had to there's no other alternative

And that's how all of it has to be understood It's like this tragic necessity which really does like raise the question. What the hell do you need me for that? Well, I would like to ask does and All the people who slowly removed all the Ukraine stuff out of their profile in the last month I mean it really it really not to talk about myself here, but it really does seem as it inch closer to my birthday The flag started going away Fewer display names that were like Russian warship fuck off fewer fewer of those

Maybe it was just Felix jubilee mania Spelled those but I in the same way that those people would ask us like oh, do you think you create you think you're granting? She's just surrender. You think they should just like fucking give up and die I would like to ask them now, you know with Mainstream articles stating the obvious that it's really not fucking going well for them that there is No conceivable path that these the Incredibly large weapons packages that they probably showed up a little too late to turn the tide What do you want to happen now?

Given that there's no path Do you think do you think they should stick do you think they should still try their hardest? Do you think like that they should sue for peace or are you still holding on to that that it's it's your your You're you're being like Todd Akin if you think that maybe they do some some diplomatic solutions should be found I would like to know that and no one has really asked those people that in some instances the State Department has a way of shutting that all down I hear here's I would like them to you know We're selling we're giving them all the weapons, but here's one thing. I would like them to stop selling javelin missile systems on Etsy Yeah, it's kind of messed up not a fan of that

Dumping all those weapons in there and having no tracking system wink wink for where they go Well speak actually it was the Felix diamond Jubilee this month, but just just quickly Did you guys check any of the the Queen's jubblies over the weekend because they had her run They had a hologram rolling around in a carriage so beautiful isn't it? It's the third oldest surviving coach in the UK after the Speaker of the House of Commons and also the Lord Mayor of London's Coach it's just so beautiful. As you said, it's been re-guilted so many times It's probably just gold now our stuff and you love the Windsor graze the eight horses drawing the carriage and

It's many tons. It's medieval. It's fairy tale. This is the whole point of it, isn't it? It's something that is quite out of our ken. It's nothing to do with everyday life This is something completely different. It's such a privilege to see it to say that they're with tears in my eyes At that masterclass will be a great understatement. Yeah, they turned her into Cortana So they have a special carriage which I think is kind of cool Like I know I shouldn't say that and I know like the popular thing online is like oh British people are Disgusting British I hate I hate England blah blah blah even though it's like Sean Moorhead put it really well when it's it's like when you're a kid and your cousin who could be

Presumably identified as your identical twin who is about point six percent more fat and annoying than you when all you talk about is How much you hate him and find him annoying? That's how that's why people Americans talk about how much they hate you Yes, absolutely, but So they have a special gold carriage that they I guess they bring out for special events They bring it out when they've had a huge W and it hasn't been out since like 1975 and they put the quid They put a hologram of the Queen when she was like 28th inside of it Which I think I think that's kind of sick and I think I think we should have stuff like that I feel like the president should have a special vehicle

He gets to ride in when things go well Like not not just like a like a heavily armored limousine like something a little bit cooler than that like a sort of I don't know like a like a fan boat Yeah jetpack jetpack. Well for Biden. I think like maybe something from his childhood like a rickshaw Like a gold rickshaw Well, I just let I move on from the Queens jubilee Felix you were talking a little bit about Liberal Zionism and the liberal Zionists of your and where are they now? I just like to take a second to I talk a little bit about this

New York Times editorial board piece. That was one of the most nauseating things. I've ever read titled who killed Who killed journalist Shireen Abu Akle? Um, and the fact that they're even asking that question is Pretty fucking nauseating. They're just so we've got to get to the bottom of this We've got to figure it out. If you remember like the Kishogi shit I mean line those two line those up side by side. I mean like so, it's just a here In her 25 years as a journalist for Al Jazeera Shireen Abu Akle covered many clashes between Israelis and Palestinians

So so so when she went to the occupied West Bank City of Jenin in the early morning of May 11th to cover an Israeli army Operation in a refugee camp. She took all the requisite precautions She wore a helmet and blue body armor marked press in large letters She stood near the entrance of the refugee camp with a group of other journalists in her presence and her presence was immediately noticed She was so well known among Arabic speaking audiences that a crowd gathered to watch her work in the course of their reporting However, the journalist came under fire Miss miss Abu Akle an American citizen was was killed by a bullet to the head Another journalist Ali Samudi who was also wearing a flak jacket marked press was shot in the back and survived

More than three weeks have passed since miss miss Abu Akle was killed yet Despite a surge of international outrage and calls by among others the US State Department Israeli human rights organizations scholars and members of civil society for a thorough investigation of her death and Of the allegations that she was killed because she was a journalist no formal impartial outside inquiry has been started The world still knows very little about who is responsible for her death Miss Abu Akle's family her colleagues and all who care about freedom of the press as a pillar of democracy deserve far more So, I mean, I'm just like I was just trying to imagine like the the fucking like what what are the? What are the fucking like the straight jackets that they have to wear at the New York Times editorial board to write a paragraph?

It says like we still don't know we still know very little about who killed her because I mean like there are plenty of there's plenty of evidence and in fact the op-ed even Mentioned that the CNN report not exactly Al Jazeera That analyzed the video and said that she was not just killed by the Israelis, but killed on purpose by the Israeli snipers Yeah, it is it is pretty insane the New York Times Israel Palestine stuff because it's like New York Times is obviously like an ideological organ as is like any piece the American press, right? But they you can rely at least at least for cynical reasons some degree of fake impartiality and

Kind of making it making it look like everything's above board But when it comes to Israel Palestine, it is like it's like reading David Horowitz's blog. It's fucking insane Well, I mean like the interesting thing about this this editorial is that I think I mean it lays out like fairly clearly Who killed her and the conditions that gave rives to it, but like they do everything but say the obvious Like they I mean it's like it's like it's like the person who wrote this art Like wrote this editorial or whoever commissioned it or whoever like whoever was involved in it Like they all know the answer to this question and they give the reader Like every piece of evidence that would be like required to draw the conclusion that everyone else has but they just don't say it and

Like they they still parse it in this thing like I said like oh, I guess we did we need an independent commission But like you know an independent commission is like oh like that won't be seen as legitimate by the Israelis or the Palestinians So like for instance listen to this it says The early response to the killing has been alarming two days after her death The results of two preliminary investigations were announced the Palestinian Authority charged at miss Abu Aqla 51 had been targeted by Israeli soldiers the Israeli military for its part said there was always a risk of Non-combatants being hit during an armed clash and said that the fatal shot may have come from an indiscriminate Palestinian gunfire or an Israeli sniper on the day that she was shot a spokesman for the Israeli military

Implied that journalists were legitimate targets the Times of Israel reports that the spokesman told the army radio That miss Abu Aqla was filming and working for a media outlet amidst armed Palestinians They're armed with cameras if you'll permit me to say so so they're basically quoting the Israeli government as just saying like yeah Like journalists are legitimate targets and we shot her because she was with a you know a press organization That's hostile to the Israeli occupation But then like it just says it says but Israeli should care more about what happened to miss a miss Abu Aqla Democracy is required a free press as a prerequisite for informed self-governments Israel Israel needs to ensure the safety of journalists in the country and in areas that it occupies to ensure the safety of its own

Democracy didn't they give a shit about what like what? What what is this ass covering here? There there's they're telling you exactly what happened, but refusing to state the obvious Yeah, it is it is interesting right because When this happened it seemed pretty the playbook of people like the New York Times seemed pretty obvious right it's the obfuscate and Create a fog of like oh well this is consistent with the guns it is really uses but also the Palestinians could get those go and like You know, maybe it's blah blah blah We don't know we have to form a committee, but the committee the committee might be disapproved by Israel blah blah blah

That would it make sense to do in like 2006 But now when Israel is just pretty much openly like yeah, we killed her we killed her. What are you going to do about it? You kind of wonder what the point of them even doing this is like I said they reference the CNN report where it says it says your CNN and other news organizations have begun their own investigations after reviewing video footage witnesses accounts and audio forensic analysis of the gunshots CNN reported that evidence suggests is that evidence suggested that Abu Aqla was shot dead in a targeted attack by Israeli forces The witnesses and videos had said provided new evidence that there was no active combat nor any Palestinian militants Near Abu Aqla in the moments leading up to her death. I mean okay CNN did that I mean like to presume of the New York Times could do their own investigation into this and draw their own conclusions

But they're just like okay. Well, that's just what CNN says Israel reacted sharply in an address to the World Economic Forum in Davos on May 25th President Isaac Herzog of Israel rejected the report saying it was based on fake facts So it's just like it just goes on and then it just it's the last graph of it says the best tribute to her life and work Would be to make sure that her death does not vanish in the fog of hatred and recrimination But serves to guarantee the safety of all journalists who seek to pierce that fog So it's like they're saying they basically are saying that the Israeli military like Intentionally assassinated this journalist and the response to it is hope that doesn't happen again

Let's all dedicate ourselves to like, you know supporting her legacy by making sure this doesn't happen again But also, um, yeah, but but also don't make it disappear in a fog of hatred Which I guess I mean if they're saying what I think they're saying that is like one of the most repulsive things I've heard I've heard of mainstream media organ say with regards to Israel and Palestine just like Don't it's saying don't get too mad about this or you're just as bad as whoever killed her, you know We don't know. Yeah, it's just the the fog of war the fog of hatred, you know, like let's just uh, you know Like we keep yeah, we exactly we can't we can't we can't we can't allow this like assassination of a journalist Um, we can we you know, let's let's not let's not get too mad at whoever did it

But let's just make sure who did it doesn't happen again. Yeah, it's hard. Yeah. Yeah, we need to find out who did it But like, you know, uh, we may never we may we may never find out So like let's just not let's just not let it devolve into another bitter round of recriminations Well, I mean it's harder than ever to establish parity for you kind of bullshit Objectivity in American media. It's harder to establish parity between Israel and Palestine It always was kind of hard, you know the difference between rocks and small arms and fucking tanks and airstrikes, but it's especially hard now Given that the Israeli treatment of so many Palestinian populations is I

I mean, it is like if the Third Reich had modern technology it is they're doing everything you could to sort of beat down and cut down the birth rates of and mentally eviscerate hated population um I I guess the way that they find parity with that is It's twofold. It's like

The anti-Semitism stuff, which is like I think serves the purpose of like, okay well, if we're mentally obliterating Palestinians and trying to keep down their birth rates and litter literally like neutering people and And spraying them with chemicals and keeping them in an open air prison and doing everything We possibly can to make them feel like animals Well, you're also doing that to me by, you know, othering me in spaces Yeah, that's the parity they can create there, but here

I guess I guess it's it's a new one, which is like We're doing all that and we also just we just fucking gunned down this journalist in front of everyone but if you If you if you if you don't stoop to our level, I guess Yeah, don't see. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. No, it's it's just tough. It's tough I mean the New York Times's role here reminds me of like when a dog gets spayed or neutered and they still hump things You're shooting blanks. Your job isn't really needed here, but you're still doing the thing you remember you had to do

I guess uh, it's a move on from this. I I want to talk about this, um, huge profile of uh, diane feinstein That's in a new york magazine by uh, rebecca tracer. It's it's on the cover. It's called the institutionalist and god like the The cover photo. I mean, it's just like it's exactly like this times op-ed and that like You know the the author and the magazine new york like they tell you everything that you need to know In terms of like, you know what we all know that she's a senile bat Who's like a huge impediment to like anything good happening ever? but like it's just the ways they go they try to like Avoid saying give you all of the evidence that would apply that but avoid saying directly that to like

You know like you know, rebecca tracer is like obviously very angry at diane feinstein particularly over the amy coney barrett Um confirmation But you know like as kind of like i guess like elizabeth warren supporting feminist and progressive Like she recognizes that feinstein like is just represents everything that's wrong with the senate And um is also like completely incapable of doing her job but like the the extent to which he tries to like massage that into a I don't know a more a more acceptable uh frame or i don't know just like Just do it just do it like the same with the matt dusting. It's just like what do you want here?

What do you actually want like you want us to ask make the obvious conclusion that if this Manifestly senile corrupt woman can just sit there in the senate for 50 years Then this thing doesn't work This party doesn't work. Let's think the structure that i'm supposed to trust you to work Like when the media are in the the democratic party Cannot be made to do anything but create this All right, here's a perfect example of what i'm talking about. So like in the piece is she traced her reds

uh feinstein who turns 89 in june Is older than any other sitting member of congress Her declining cognitive health has been the subject of recent reporting in both her hometown san francisco chronicle and the new york times It seems clear that feinstein is mentally compromised even if she's not all gone It's definitely happening said one person who works in california politics and it's definitely not happening all the time Reached by phone two days after 19 children were murdered in an elementary school in uvalde texas In late may feinstein spoke in halting tones Sometimes trailing off a mid-sentence or offering a non sequitur non sequitur before suddenly a lighting upon the right string of words

She would forget a recently posed question or the date of a certain piece of legislation But recall with perfect lucidity events from san francisco in the 1960s Nothing she said suggested a deterioration beyond what would be normal for a person her age But neither did it demonstrate any urgent engagement with the various crises facing the nation Oh, we'll get it done. Trust me. She assured me in reference to meaningful gun reform Every question I asked about the radicalization of the GOP the end of row the failures of congress Was met with a similar sunny sunny imperviousness Invincing an undiminished belief in institutional power that may in fact explain a lot about where feinstein and other democratic leaders have gone wrong

Some things take longer than others and you can only do what you can do at a given time She said that doesn't mean you can't do it at another time And so one of the things that you develop is a certain kind of memory for progress When you can do something in terms of legislation and have a chance of getting it through And when the odds are against it meaning the votes and that kind of thing. So I'm very optimistic about the future of our country Um, yeah Yeah, um hard not to be but just that thing where she says like okay So like she she's saying like according to like, you know people in the know in california politics and anyone even a casual observer

Her cognitive decline is real and shocking But then she also says nothing. She said suggested a deterioration beyond what would be normal for a person her age Like what like why that qualifier? Like It's just or like okay if that deterioration is normal for a person of her age Then no one her age should be serving in government. Yes, precisely. Yeah This is like a I've seen uh people like trace their fallback on this where it's like. Yes feinstein is a It's a demented old bat who um

Just one of these days she's gonna whip out like a hand crank camera and Send a lude to her boyfriend who's fighting in the marine expeditionary force in 1917 in outside paris uh because she has perfect memory of her childhood 180 years ago but uh You know, why aren't you why aren't you also getting on uh chuck grasley? and it's it's It's people are people are they're always trying it's the same thing with this bullshit parody Where they're trying they're trying to find some equivalents. They're they're giving you the liberal thing of like

well, you know, of course this thing is bad, but What about what about the other thing that's just as bad that i've decided you're not talking about right at this second? So you don't care about it And by the way, I mean people make fun of chuck grasley all the time for being a fucking old bat The man the man's twitter is hot fire. It's hot fudge. He can't stop going to dairy queen The man's loving it It yeah, I mean dian feinstein and chuck grasley. It's like when junior soprano wanders to that park bench Even that old woman talking to each other. They both think it's the 50s

It's like yeah, it's it's a it's a the dysfunctional gerontocracy and she's a fucking exemplar of it. That's it Here's another example, uh from the piece that uh tracester includes. Um, it says this It's talking about when she was working with, um To just um the the california sentencing the the california women's parole and sentencing board Uh for six years She had the power to determine sentence length for women who have had been convicted of everything from public drunkenness to violent crimes She took a reformist approach to criminal justice calling for rehabilitation rather than long sentences in narcotics cases Francois who would become the first african-american to serve on the san francisco board of supervisors

Supervisors assigned her to advisory committee on local jails. She reported on the terrible state of the facility is the inedible food The overcrowding the rampant vermin As part of her work with the board she found herself determining sentences for abortion providers Although she would later strongly support abortion access and often told the story about how back at Stanford classmates had passed a plate to pay for a student to travel to tijuana to end a pregnancy in the early 60s The procedure was still illegal in california And as she would explain to roberts the cases in front of her were all illegal back alley abortionists Many times the women they performed an abortion on suffered greatly

I really came to believe that the law is the law Feinstein's memories of this time period remained sharp Under the indeterminate sentence law most sentences carried a low of maybe six months in a high of 10 years. She told me by phone There was one case her name was Anita venza and over and over she committed abortions on women I said when we were sentencing her Anita Why do you continue doing this and she said I feel so sorry for the women in this situation? When I pushed further asking feinstein what it felt like now to be on the verge of a future in which providers like venza could Once again be the sentence to prison and which the law will once again be the law

She declined to fully acknowledge the chilling implications of the rollback on the near horizon Retreating instead behind an impenetrable platitudes. Well, one thing I've seen in my lifetime is that this country goes through different phases She said the institutions handling some of these issues have changed for the better They've become more progressive and I think that's important Well, she's saying like I do like that in her perfect recollection of the past She is not doing anything you could describe as brave selfless really anything she's

Not being a leader as one might say and you know like so like so like you know like abortion is an issue that you know trace their obviously very um Uh passionate about her cares are in is very angry and frightened as you know, we all are about like You know what the supreme court is about to do but I just like this This weird back and forth that we've seen all of these articles that we're talking about today. It's just like It's back to an old cliche of ours It's like all of these people now on like the liberal media Have to reckon with the reality that like they've gotten what they wanted

And now they have to find a way to be angry at the fact that diane feinstein Is like fucking has her brains leaking out of her ears and talking about what a great friend She is at lindsay graham and how the amy coney barrett fucking confirmation was like the highlight of her career And that they're like that that the the leader is that they like they have fucking elevated And the party that they are fucking beholden to like this is this fucking This is the reality that this is produced and now you're not happy with it But you still have to massage the reality in such a way to be like well She's no more or less senile than any other 80 year old person serving in the senate

And that like oh, it's yeah, it's disturbing to me that like you know at one point in her career She actually like literally sent abortion providers to prison But hey like that was the law But like her response now that the law is that law is coming back Is that like well the institutions that administer the law have gotten a lot more progressive Like what is she talking about police departments? Yeah, that Congress that is like designed to make you insane. It's that you can't even like Have the thing that you could maybe have with rbg where it's like oh, well, you know, she's old and you know

She did something really selfish here, but look at this past and supporting progressive causes Dying fight scene has never been anything except for a cog And now she is a squeaky cog who no amount of oil will ever get her to stop talking about uh Giving the man with the organ grinder and a pet monkey and nickel to sing a song I Here's another example of the uh what i'm talking about Tracer writes if women changed the senate's image, they did not always change this character Political representation is a funny thing the absence of women and minorities from governing institutions is ghoulish

But the seemingly obvious remedy putting those people in power can often involve new participants Simply recapitulating the standards set by those who preceded them when fine signs started in the senate She enforced his dress code which reflected her own pearl wearing set respectability No pantsuits for female staffers. They had to wear skirts or dresses But even as senate rules relaxed feinstein kept her standards in tax intact as recently as 2017 It was reported that women in her office were required to wear stockings and skirts of a certain length So, I mean what a trail it's it's a it's a little rich of uh, i mean, you know I remember tracer back in 2008

Writing about obama boys being mean to hillary And then like of course in 2016 2020. She did the exact same thing to bernie sanders And now she's come to find out that like oh well, you know, I suppose just supporting any woman being in the senate is not really Uh in it in and of itself a respectable political goal because it produces literally the same outcomes But in the context of tracer the example she goes to is like the senate dress code and feinstein's office is that like her Staffers can't wear pantsuits Yeah, I remember do you remember the thing that tracer when she first came after us all those years ago six years ago? it was a the post hillary episode and we were talking about um

The obungler and hillary people that ran the hillary campaign calling them sick entitled freaks and tracer did um I mean out of all the people that went after her or went after us that year I would say she was the most skilled. She was like the john wick that they sent after us As she said the baba yaga. Yeah, she was like sick entitled freaks. Oh, you mean the black women that voted for hillary which Hell of a mover back up But I mean now now she's gotten the worst thing you can get in american politics If you remember the media, which is what you wanted. Yeah, which is winning

because that puts you in a real asshole position and she is bending the ankles skating around the frozen pond of diane feinstein's career who It turns out has not even ever even done a superficial thing for women She is she's uh making her poor staffers wear poodle skirts Here's another interesting bit about um her her staff though Uh, is it is a great detail

I like when a step it went when a staffer left if feinstein liked them and they had served for a long time She would give them prints of the still lifes she draws If they were less special to her or had served briefly she would give them a watch with her signature across its face I would rather have the watch honestly Yeah, it's always diane time That's gonna be the new thing for rappers to have the migas are gonna Iced out diane feinstein ap Leave my bitch to wear a dress

Uh, just a little bit more from the article says uh And like a lot of the art a lot of the a lot of the pieces is is tracer Like, you know trying to press feinstein and getting like woefully inadequate responses like based on what she wants to hear But again, it simply must be underscored here that like Feinstein is like like tracer has gone to bat for people like feinstein specifically or just like, you know A hillary clinton elizabeth warren this whole fucking rotten democratic party over and over again based on the grounds of like We need more women in leadership And then again, listen to how disappointed she is with feinstein's fucking responses to her questions

When I suggest to feinstein that the partisan hardening has been asymmetrical that her republican colleagues have grown more radical And rigid while she and many of her fellow democratic leaders have been all too willing to compromise. She responded. Well, yes I think that's not inaccurate. I think it's an accurate statement What did you first say about democrats moving? I repeated that it was the right that had gotten more inflexible while the democrats had been willing to cede ground I'm not sure she responded, but it's different There's no question about it And I think there is much more party control when I came to the senate

We spoke out and we learned the hard way We took action and it was clear at what was happening with weapons in this country and still is and in a way In a way the weapon issue was a good one because you were able to pass the first bill when was it tom Mensa reminded her that the assault weapons ban was passed in 1994 When I asked her about her statement stated commitment to centrism as a reaction to the tumult of her early political life She began speaking unprompted about dan white Clearly still appalled by his violent transgressions against the respectability politics that have helped her navigate the world

And that's a what that's a funny way of describing what dan white did a violent transgression against respectability of politics What? He assassinated the mayor of san francisco and harvey milk. What the fuck? He's a little rude. I I I do want to say I love uh Tracer, I mean we talked about her at the height of her powers, but now she is like uh It's like when they uh cut to goku and he's been on the couch for about three years No more zero g training for her. She could not she can't even pin down this old bat Like she's she's trying to get something. She's trying to nail her like isaac uh devour style

That that guy the uh liberal guy who always nails people in Isaac's son. It's a son. It's here. Oh, I'm getting oh Edward Isaac devour is another guy with like a serial killer name. Yeah too many too many isaac's um But uh, yeah, she's trying to pin her down and like get something here. Yeah She wants people to like screenshot this and be like wow. I hope I never make rebecca traced her nab, you know Uh, it's the bullshit thing fucking losers do when one of them writes an article But she can't she's just being soundly outmaneuvered by by this woman who Clearly thinks that it is 1933 clearly thinks that she is like about to go see wendell wilkie speak

In a segregated ice cream parlor like it's fucking insane. She really sucks now rebecca Really sucks and this made me think of another thing. That's funny. Um, do you remember the um When the Weinstein article the first one broke in the new york times Mm-hmm. Uh-huh. I remember the day that happened and it was clear that like the hollywood was going to sell out Weinstein to To keep doing their shit um And rebecca traced her posted a story where she's like, oh, well one day, uh, Harvey Weinstein threatened me not to tell a story and I didn't but now look at him and all these fucking losers were like

Oh, don't get rebecca traced her mad She'll uh Get fooled by you and and and fold and wait for someone else to take you out Uh, I just gotta I gotta I gotta get to the the rest of what uh, dianne feinstein says because like okay Keep in mind. She's being asked about this sort of like, you know, I think we talked about last week. That's kind of um a strategic imbalance between um partisanship and uh political extremism as it regards the republican and democratic parties And she has this like baffling response where she brings up dan white She is this how she describes him a former young handsome police officer who goes in and kills the mayor

She said it was the kind of incident that should grab the government's notice and compel it to try to fix those things Which are wrong But the ultimate lesson she derived from the response to milk's murder Possesses an almost olympian complacency. I think one great thing about democracy is that there's always flexibility Newcomers can win and play a role and it's a much more open political society that I see than I hear of in many other countries That is like that she so like her brain starts to remembering Um when her good friend the mayor uh was assassinated by uh former san francisco city council member dan white And harvey milk as well and she like apparently the article also talks about her

She was the first person to discover harvey milk's body She tried to check his pulse and like her put her thumb immediately into a bullet hole in his wrist Like you know pretty pretty scary traumatic stuff, but she She calls the guy who killed her like these two people a handsome young police officer and the lesson is You know the lesson is that like, you know, uh Newcomers can always just come in and change politics It's like she's saying that about like serhan serhan or whatever Yeah, and she says it it possesses an almost olympian complacency

I mean, I wonder yeah, yeah, no, I mean I could I'd be like that's a very good at fucking That's a very accurate fucking description of uh tracer and everyone like her Who you know like I tried to move heaven and earth to make hillary clinton president twice And failed and in the process rat fucked like the the the one conceivable alternative that Again like would have had the politics that these people all claim to fucking loudly champion and they're like Oh, like, you know, why can't we get health care done? Well, you know, why is diane feinstein? Like an an obstacle to like any progressive change in the senate. Oh like how did that happen? All these old creatures that i'm interviewing it's like they're acting like an entire media

Enabled them and hid their declining brains and lack of will to do anything and antagonism Towards all voters. It's like someone did that. It's really crazy, isn't it? So it's just that going ahead here um from her youth. This is just the end of the article From her youth feinstein has been an institutionalist with an institutionalist respect for structure management and hierarchy as a means to manage the rabble of activism and protest She seems unable to appreciate the possibility that partisan insurgents have overrun those institutions themselves The crowds who came through the door with battering rams on january 2020 looking to kill a vice president Surely had chilling echoes for feinstein, but days later in the name of the senate

She was defending ted cruise and josh holly a man who had offered up a sign of solidarity to the insurrectionists In their attempts to delegitimize the election of joe biden I think the senate is a place of freedom She told reporters and people come here to speak their peace and they do and they provide a lot of kind of leadership In some cases, it's positive in some cases. Maybe not a lot of that depends on who's looking and what party they are She sounds like mikey miles when he talks about applying for a job Just a level 89 out there Just a kid from california

But the fact that many of her colleagues on their best days are less acute than feinstein on her worst is exactly the kind of Dismal institutionally warped logic that has left have left us governed by elder crats Who will not live long enough to have to deal with the consequences of their failures? Feinstein's defenders argue that there is something gendered about focusing on her overextended tenure Especially when the history of the senate includes strong thurman who retired at 100 and was basically not sentient by the end Chuck grassley and patrick lehi and mitch mcconnell are all are in their 80s Joe bodin first got to the senate in 1973 and he's the president of the united states But being no worse than strong thurman was not the standard to which we were supposed to aspire at this juncture

Well, guess what? It's what you got and it's what you're doing right now so make your piece of that and Just you know keep you know make your piece of that and defend dion feinstein being in the senate It's what you got this ikea bed. Uh, it just every time i lay down in it. It's stabbing me Really sucks. I don't know who did this And while it may indeed be feminist heresy to expect more more from women in fairness Some of those women told us to expect more from them. They were the ones who cast their own elections as the dawn of a new era They were the ones who argued that every generation does better than the one before

Indeed what we what may be producing the anger at this generation of democrats is not just ageism Sexism or the correct apprehension that america's governing structures incentivize officials to hold on to power sometimes until they literally die It is also the smug assuredness with which democratic leaders in whatever state of infirmity can still confidently in the summer of 2022 Tell us to trust them and see themselves as bulwarks against the ruin that is so evidently our present and near future I mean couldn't have said it better myself rebecca. So yeah, that's basically the other that's where rebecca leaves leaves the piece but again, it's just like it's just Could someone have also could someone else have written this piece? I don't know I'm going to be looking later today to see if people are like doing that thing where they they talk about what a great article this is

Just to kind of make myself nauseous. I mean, I guess the theme for today's show in every one of these articles we talked about is just like It's just like the the flat and appalling truth staring everyone in the face But then like the people's whose job it is to like feel bad about that and demand that we do better Just ignoring like the single most obvious conclusion with all of them Because it's just like okay, like just just say straight out that she's too fucking daddy to be in the senate She should get out immediately. She should be voted out or removed from office entirely Yeah, well, so uh, yeah, that's uh, what do you think is that it for today's show? Yeah, it sounds like it sounds right about right. Okay. Till next time everybody. Bye. Bye. Bye

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