Joe Rogan Experience Review podcast - 528 JRE Review of Scott Horton

Episode Date: May 27, 2026

Scott Horton joins Joe Rogan for a heavy foreign policy conversation covering Iran, Israel, Ukraine, NATO, propaganda, and America's long history of intervention overseas. We break down Horton's biggest claims, Joe's reactions, the online response, and why this episode hit so hard with listeners trying to make sense of war, media, and U.S. power. Check out our website at www.jrereview.com For all marketing questions and inquiries: [e-mail] Please email us here with any suggestions, comments and questions for future shows.. [e-mail]

Hey guys, welcome to the Joe Rogan Experience Review. This week, we are talking about Scott Horton. And, well, at first, we were actually talking about the new government release of the UFO files. What are they calling that, Sean? I am not sure. I honestly have not looked into it. I just saw that they released something. Yeah, another scrambly bunch of radar photos.

that just it could just be it's so bad like I've said it before if that shit came out in like 1995 it would be compelling enough yeah apparently apparently the US Defense Department including reports of unexplained green orbs discs and fireballs 22 uh 222 files were made public on May 22nd of 2026 so yeah This was like literally the other day. But they all suck. Like recently on Instagram, somebody's door cam captured ball lightning going like across their driveway.

And as far as I could tell when I was looking into it and looking at other videos, it's like a legit ball lightning video. And it's crazy, dude. It's like a massive beach ball size, perfect circle just floating around. with lightning bolts coming out of it and then it just kind of explodes after it goes past a tree and the best UFO images

I mean I know that's not exactly the same thing but we're talking about weird stuff or unexplained things the best that the government could release after hiding it for God knows how long is just scrambly radar image like slowly zooming around a black and white map looking at a dot

Yeah. I mean, that's not really helpful for anybody, you know? Like, what's the point of releasing it? Yeah, just to say that they're releasing something, I think. But it's, it's so bad. I mean, it's like giving, you know, when you were a kid, did you ever ask your parents for clues of, like, where the Christmas presents were if you knew they hit them?

And they'd give you a clue that just completely was useless and threw you off and did nothing. You're like, that's not really a clue. Yeah, it looks like when you first see it, you're like, oh, something new, something flashy, let me look at this, and then you finally get into it and you're like, oh, this was nothing. This was a dead end the whole time. Yeah, yeah. This was a distraction. It's basically a redacted file. Yeah.

That's how it goes. But anyways, yeah, Scott Hansen had a lot of really interesting things to say. I think the, I haven't really looked into a lot of the Ukraine stuff. I feel like I know. a lot more about the whole Israel-Iran conflict, but learning a lot more about the Ukraine stuff is interesting to kind of get some of the backstory of like, you know, we've kind of been pushing pushing and prodding at Russia for, you know, kind of decades and then all of a sudden, you know, they break and now we're all of a sudden at war, you know, but there's a lot more, there's a lot more to that than just, oh, Putin decided to invade. Like, there's a bit of a backstory to that.

Yeah, and when you get somebody like Scott on, who just really has an image, right, of how it all plays in together, how it's tied in. I mean, he came in with timelines, names, treaties, like real receipts for this information. So unless you just sit there and go through each point and say, oh, well, that didn't quite go this way or that way. I mean, just for the benefit of the doubt, I'm like, okay. I'll just step aside anything that I do know and assume that he knows what he's talking about for the length, the duration of the podcast, just to build the image that he has and see if it lines up. And, I mean, you know, he's been talking about this stuff for God knows how long, 20 plus years in detail. And what a different view of how things are going than I'd ever even contemplated. I was like, oh shit

Yeah I mean essentially You know We're talking about You know During the Soviet Union All of the states that they controlled And then there was some agreement

With Which president was it It was before the Clintons The Clintons were the ones That went back on the agreement But it was Well Bush was before Reagan was before that

I think it was the first Bush president You know, they had set up this agreement that, you know, they're not going to continue to push into Western Europe, you know, and not develop it and not really help out and just kind of let it do its thing. And then we ended up doing that with the Clintons. And then all of a sudden, like the analogy that he gave was really beautiful of like, you know, if you imagine the roles were reversed, all of a sudden Russia is like all of a sudden in the Caribbean now. And, you know, they're making all these deals with neighboring countries and all. all of a sudden they're right next to you. You know, it's like, yeah, you'd be terrified as a nation. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I mean, it really does make perfect sense. And, you know, whoever blew up that pipeline, I mean, imagine how pissed off Russia it must have been when that happened.

And he did say that that was like the biggest natural disaster in history. And to think that that fell under Biden and then the orders from that administration, or if not just advisement through the industrial military complex and their overall plan, which, you know, probably trumps the administration, let's be honest. We like to think the president's in charge, but who really knows what they're doing. It's like, well, you know, you say you stand for these things, and we've got to be out there recycling our cans and doing the rest of it, And they don't even blink an eye

at just, like, blowing that thing up. Yeah, I mean, the amount of methane that was released into the atmosphere is, like, one of the largest, like, up there with, like, those big oil spills. Like, that scale of, like, natural disaster. But, yeah, it's just, it's just geopolitics. It's, I mean, and, yeah, you know, who knows who really did it. I mean, it seems to have benefited the U.S., you know, the most. Right. So, yeah, kind of put two and two together, but...

Guilty. Whoops. But, you know, there's so many people out there that it just like fuck Russia all the time, you know. It's like we're built on just believing they're the enemy, China is. And, you know, I'm not saying that they're not. Just saying like, we're told that. and if anything happens to them negative, that's a good thing, regardless of what consequence it was. And yeah, I don't, I can see why people are pissed.

Yeah, I mean, I think obviously, you know, the war is bad. It's not a good thing to have any nation invading another nation, but you have to back up and be like, all right, well, why, what led to this, you know? And it's like when you take some of these, perspectives it's like it seems inevitable you know it's like you keep kicking somebody and you keep kicking somebody and you keep agreeing to things and then going back on them and then just like keep pushing into their ground and stuff it's like you know what are they left to do you know they have no other option but to kind of use military action and you know it's unfortunate because yeah

you know the other disgusting thing which he brought up is like you know it's not even it's it's American policymakers that are causing these things to happen, but it's not even American troops that are being harmed and killed. It's Ukrainians. So it's like, you know, we're using this as like a proxy war for Russia without taking any of the hits ourselves. You know, we're just letting hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians die. You know, so it's like you started this and then you don't even have the balls to, you know, go in there and support it yourself. You're going to use the Ukrainians as it. And, you know, that is their home territory. And those people have a right to defend themselves. But it's like if you're going to be pushing these aggressive policies, you know, you need to have some sort of a backing and not just, you know, use some other country as your way to means to fight.

Yeah. Well, path to least resistance though, right? I mean, there was a politician recently talking about how great an investment this has been. We haven't lost any troops or almost any. And, you know, we're kind of. bankrupting Russia through the war and keeping them busy. And I guess the idea is there that they slowly over time have to keep conceding to different things that we need through trade. And, you know, maybe that's how it works.

What I don't get, though, is like, look, we don't have too much of a beef with most of Europe. and is that just that the European Union and the United Nations? Well, I guess they're all the United Nations, but is like what led to that being like how far back do we need to go to when we weren't doing great with Europe? And I don't mean just like Germany and World War II. Obviously that was a conflict. But, you know, most of the other countries. are cool with us now.

And it's like, isn't it always beneficial to head in that direction? And you're telling me we just can't do it with these other countries. So we just have to keep pushing their buttons constantly and that's a benefit. Yeah, no, I hear what you're saying. And they kind of discussed this in the show is like, you know, the way we've done it is we keep poking people. And like, you know, they were saying, um, for, long time in the U.S. government, the kind of foreign policy understanding was like when, you know, Russia is able to take a hit, you hit them. You know, you take advantage of that and you push and prod them and,

you know, you kind of take advantage of them in that sense. And that kind of fulfills some of those short term problems. But in the long term, that hurts your like equal understanding. And in the long term, yeah, that leads to further conflict down the road and more aggressive policies and things like that. And so it's like, you know, instead of pushing and prodding and trying to police all these people and stuff, it's like, you know, why don't we try and, you know, form alliances, agree to stop fighting, you know, try and find some middle ground. It's like in the long term, that would have, you know, I mean, hindsight is 2020, but, you know, who knows that could have been much more helpful than the current situation that we're in. Yeah. And listen, look, it's Memorial Day today. God bless the

troops. I love America. I'm America first. Like, I'm a moment. I'm America first. Like, I'm not trying to bag on this country for what it does and and who it is. But at the end of the day, I think, well, you know, imagine like just running a simulation through an AI program. And what I would want for America is the best outcome, period, right? And does that algorithm say at the end of it, oh, the only way to have the best outcome is to, you know, you have your alliances in Europe and with a lot of the world, but you've got to keep poking these other countries. Well, okay, then I guess I would be, because unless you, like,

live in a fantasy, utopian mindset of, like, everyone needs to come by aisle along, uh, to the detriment of yourself, then you're going to go with the plan that makes the most sense. I just don't believe that's necessarily true. I think there's too many players, too many chefs in this kitchen that are ultimately, what's the best way to say? Like, just trying to make money out of this.

And the money is coming from these conflicts. Yeah. That's a suspicion. Yeah. And like I said, I think it's along the lines of like, you know, when you ask what's the best interest for America, it's like you kind of have to also ask on what timeline, you know, like do we want to play the long game or do we want to, you know, get the short term gain and, you know, how do we want to burn this? You know, I feel like that's one of the

ways that a lot of other countries, um, have much better foreign policy than us. Like, I mean, if you look at China, for example, like obviously, you know, there's a lot of flaws with China. But the way that they've done their foreign policy is it seems to be much more of a like slow burn and it's like you know we're not going to we're going to think of the long game we're not thinking about two years or next quarter we're thinking about 10 years 20 years you know the next generation and it it feels like you know looking at it from a little bit more of a long term strategy can be beneficial and rather than just what's this presidency going to do you know what's this year going to look like. You know, it's like how do we shape the future of the country across

multiple presidents and multiple political leaders and just in general try to move the needle to more of a, you know, I guess more peaceful solution. But it depends. I mean, you know, you talk to some people's, a lot of people are in favor of war. I'm personally not. But, um, yeah, I feel like I wish the leadership in this country would plan for more. And of the long-term game as far as our foreign policy is concerned. Yeah, look, I think that there's kind of probably two things happening. I think for votes and the news and for what people think about every day, they focus a lot on the short term.

You know, they're talking about prices, interest rates, the stock market, you know, how much eggs are, because it's kind of how we all think as people. So they highlight those things. I'm sure there's plenty of people at different levels of government and the military that are definitely thinking of things in the long term as well. But generally with the attention span of, you know, us here and me included, I don't know if it's all that beneficial to win favor by saying, hey, in 40 years, things are going to look really good for everyone if we do it this way. Yeah. Well, it's, you know, I feel like it can be somewhat of a balancing act. But I mean, I feel like honestly, and you know, they talked about this in the show, I feel like honestly for the last couple of decades, a lot of our foreign policy has been directly influenced by Israel and Israel's wishes. And I think that the Iran conflict is just another example of that. Yeah, that's certainly become a hot talking point recently.

And with that Massey election, it seems almost difficult to ignore. You know, I guess you could be people out there just calling that propaganda, but you can directly look at the donors and where the money came from. And also, you know what Massey stood for. As well as... A-PAC and he wanted... Wasn't Marjorie Taylor Green in the same kind of boat? like she was also against the kind of Israeli alliance and then she ended up quitting as well.

Yeah, they took all four of those people out that were pushing against that. And it's kind of unreal too because Massey had been in there a long time. That is his name, right? Yeah, Thomas Massey. Massa, yeah. And he'd been in there a long time. He was popular. And out of nowhere without even a debate, the other guy wouldn't even debate him.

They just threw $30 million at it. And, and, you know, what does that say moving forward? It shows that you don't even need a good candidate. You just need money. Yeah. To win anything. Yeah. That's the problem.

And, you know, it's like, what is the across the board? Are people in favor of what is going on or are people not in favor of what's going on? I think that, especially in the young community, I mean, I can speak for myself. No one is on the side of the pro-Israel movement. No one's in favor of the war in Iran. Like a lot of the decisions that this administration is making, particularly the foreign policy, is like everyone disagrees is wrong.

You know, I feel, yeah, especially for young people. I don't talk to anybody my age who's like, oh, yeah, we need to be supporting Israel. It's like everyone across the board is like, no, we're done playing these games. Right. Well, you know, I'm 44. I'm a couple of decades older than you, and it's similar in my range. It must just be the boomers that are all behind this, you know?

I mean, they're back from the Fox News of the 90s. They've been fully indoctrinated into how to think, and it's much harder to change your mind when you get older. Yes, yeah. And I mean, I know those people. know a lot of older Fox News type boomers who yeah it's it's like man do we have any independent thoughts anymore or do we just listen to what people tell us to listen to man it's interesting to talking about they you know they're often you know got lots of information great to talk to

wise older and then you get them on some particular talking point that you know that the only way that they know anything about it is from the news because it's not like their historians or did their own research like in a you know in depth and then there's this sort of speaking pattern that they develop where you just cannot kick them off there's just no budging they're not looking for a debate they're not looking to um incorporate new ideas or even be slightly open-minded it's like immediately on the defensive and then they get to um they get to um they're not louder, slightly more aggressive with their speech. And they're like, no, well, that's not what it is. It's because of these things. And I'm like, whoa, dude. Yeah. I know. I know exactly what you're

talking. I'm not your enemy. We've just been talking around this campfire or wherever you are for like the last hour politely. And now all of a sudden, you know, it's like I just called your wife fat. Makes no sense. Yeah. No, I know what you mean. And it's, it's crazy because it's like, yeah, there's like an immediate switch between like five seconds ago we were listening to each other's perspectives and having a civil conversation and now all of a sudden this particular topic is like some pressure point in your in your system and it fires you up you know right and sometimes i don't even disagree with them but i just don't get talking like that they rarely will get that heated ranting in like a one direction about something ever.

Yeah. I will say also there is a huge, I mean, at least online, there's a huge, not civil war, but there's a lot of people my age kind of in their like early to mid-20s and kind of into their 30s, like the Gen Zers, who just takes. have everything against the boomers. I mean, just blame the boomers for everything. And I mean, some of it is kind of like based, you know, and some of it is, is true as far as like, you know, policies that have been enacted and kind of the trajectory that a lot of these people voted for, you know, you can kind of place some of the economical burden on them. But I think a lot of it is also

just like a lot of the sense of entitlement from older people, you know, it's like, oh, I worked my whole life. And it's like, yeah, but it was so much easier economically for you than it is now. But yeah, I mean, you talk to pretty much anyone my age and mentioned boomers. And, you know, they're like, oh, well, I love my grandma, but also, you know, at the same time, it's like they're blaming that generation for pretty much everything. And, you know, I think, yeah, there are some examples of things you can kind of trace back to that. But I think also that's just kind of the, every generation does that. Every generation blames the one behind them. And, you know, there's always something that somebody else screwed up.

and that's the reason I can't do what I want. And, you know, but that is a huge thing nowadays, especially in the Gen Zs, is, they do not like the boomers. Yeah, I do like those memes where the postal worker is like complaining about the young generation not working hard enough when they, when, you know, the doctor or the dentist today is working 60 hours a week and can barely afford a small, more condo for his family and the other guy sat on like three homes that he's bought that are now worth like a million apiece and he's you know not even willing to sell any of them or it's they're they're funny like they're yeah and there is some truth behind that and listen it wasn't easier for them back in the day they the people worked hard they always have but you know i know somebody that was a line repair man at AT&T for his whole life.

And he owns three modest homes now, all worth $600,000. Now, he bought them many years ago when it was a lot cheaper. And he spread it out. He added one at a time and, you know, has like a bit of a holiday home somewhere and has something else.

But it's just a huge amount of money that he sat on and I would say a line repairman if there even is like well there has to be the same thing now I'm like could you do that with the same types of jobs

you just can't do it no yeah not even close it's yeah yeah I know a couple that are both dentists back in the day

or still now that's a good job but like back in the day that was a great job and they have a two-bedroom condo and they're like struggling with their student loans. Yeah. They walk a ton. I'm like that doesn't, that doesn't seem right.

Yeah. No, it is. I mean, yeah, when you do the numbers as far as like buying power and earnings versus like, you know, the 1960s, the 1970s, it is a joke. Like, I think, I think I've heard certain stats of like minimum wage would need to be like $60 an hour for. for people nowadays to have the same buying power as, you know, several decades ago. And I think it is true. You know, if you look at the stats of like people's income versus housing prices and rent, it's like those two lines do not match up at all.

No, those are ugly for sure. And then, yeah, not to mention the student loan stuff that just went through the roof. But yeah, it's, it's. It's wild out there. And what about the, the, so you were talking a little bit about the invasion and, um, of Russia into Ukraine. And he kind of got into the, it all, a lot of this stem from Russia's warnings about them joining NATO, right? That was always like the line in the sand for Russia.

and kind of makes sense, right? NATO is like right at their door and what are they going to be up to? But really, if we were to play devil's advocate, what could Russia have done differently? It's like, I guess they could have just let NATO be right at their borders. But ultimately, what would that mean for Russia, realistically? Could we imagine something similar happening to America?

And would we be okay with that? Yeah, I think if the roles were reversed, you ask any American, hell no. Like, it's, yeah, I think there is kind of a double standard as far as what people are willing to tolerate. But, you know, if you had Russia setting up, you know, military bases and overthrowing elections in Canada, you'd be pretty concerned. At least I would as a citizen. So I mean, you know, some of the responses is kind of understood. But then, you know, it's like, do you just invade? Like, are there other solutions to this?

Are there other ways to negotiate to try to, you know, protect yourself and come to some conflict rather than just invading? I mean, I don't know. I don't know the answer to that. But you do have to wonder, like, was that at the end of the day, you know, regardless of how much Russia was being pushed away. Was it their last option or were they kind of forced to invade Ukraine or was there some other form of solution that we could have come to? Right. And it does seem like the U.S. had a lot of involvement in Ukrainian politics leading up to that, almost like we were setting the stage for this to take place. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, they were talking about like interference in elections. in 2000, I think it was

2003 or four, and then another one more recently in 2014. But yeah, I mean, the thing is too, like, and I'm pretty, like I said earlier, I'm pretty new to the whole Ukraine thing. I haven't really delves very deep

into it, but it has been going on for quite a while at this point. I mean, we're how many years into this conflict? Like, maybe four or five? Like, it's been going on for quite a long time. Yeah, it's brutal. And some of the videos, dude, oh my God, if people out there haven't spent, and I don't recommend spending a lot of time on it,

but if you haven't seen any, spend half an hour going down a bit of a rabbit hole. You can see some things on Instagram and different places. These poor guys in these dugouts and trenches, just running around with drones just blow them the pieces. I mean, God, a lot of these fucking guys are like 80s. years old. Yeah, it's, it's really sad to see. And I mean, yeah, I've seen some of the videos, you know,

you'll just see some video of a dude in a tank, and then there's a drone hovering above him, and then it just like drops a grenade in the tank. And you're like, all right, that's wild. But, you know, again, this is another way for us to make money. You know, all of those weapons, all of those drones, not to mention just producing them, but also all of the development that's going into them,

you know, they must be thinking, of this is like, you know, this is development for future conflicts. You know, how are we, like, we have an active, an active war going on now. What, what a better place to test weapons than the real deal, you know? And before we got into the whole Iran thing, you know, I think that that was, yeah, it seems like a good way to test out weapons. Right. And there was a lot of talk about that where before the Iraq war, too. I mean, it's like real time invasion. simulations but not just like actual war happening let's see what our vehicles can do our planes um missiles you know and the whole thing with the war in iraq is like weirdly we went in there

after 9-11 after invading afghanistan we kind of somehow tied it into 9-11 and they weren't connected or mostly or some maybe they did something thing. But they weren't like the main aggressors. And then we said, oh, they have weapons of mass destruction, which many other countries were saying is probably not true. Though England and America were 100 percent, yeah, they have them. We find out they don't. So it was total intelligence manipulation and media compliance. And then we're hearing the same thing about Iran, but the weird thing there is Netanyar who's been saying this for

how long? 30 years? Yeah. I mean, all the time. They're months away. Okay, so maybe they finally are months away. But, you know,

at what point if at the end of this whole thing we find out they weren't and that was also a lie, can they just keep using this? Like, for me once. but fool me how many times and we're just like guys now yeah that's the i mean that was kind of

an interesting part of this podcast that he was talking about was like you know i ran has kind of gone back and forth as far as developing weapons programs and the latest thing is like they're saying hey we're not developing nuclear weapons even though we can look at us like we have the ability to but we're just not doing it. And the other contradiction, I think that's hilarious is, you know, back in, I think it was January, like really early on in Trump's presidency, we bombed the shit out of one of their nuclear refinery programs or whatever it was. You know, they had that operation, whatever it was with the stealth bombers. Oh, yeah. It's like, did that not take out all of their research thing?

And then now the latest strikes, you're targeting all these treatment plants and chemical things and all this stuff. Like, at what point have you got it all? Like, also, Iran is saying they're not developing nuclear weapons. You're saying that you're taking out their nuclear weapons refineries, but then you still say that they're developing nuclear weapons. It's like, how do you have all three of those at the same time? Yeah, it's almost like they just can feed us anything. But it's funny you say this, because I have some friends from high school that are like pro this.

They're military guys. In fact, they were like Air Force officers. And they're all about it. They say that this was actually something Trump wanted to do and America needs to do. And, you know, Iran are super bad guys. And, you know, there's a lot of messy stuff that goes on in those countries. I believe that for sure.

But the way that they spin that narrative when they're talking to me and, you know, I guess they're not. spinning it to themselves. It's like what they think. But they're just like, oh, no, they could get them or if they did get them, they're going to make them. This is so important to put them back in their place. And I'm just like, yeah, but that type of thinking is like setting yourself up for that

never ending. It's like, it means you never trust them and you just, we just have to like every, what, 20 years just smash them back into the Stone Age. and that's the best solution we have with the most powerful country in the world supposedly yeah well not only that but like you know hypothetically speaking i agran doesn't want to use a nuke on the u.s they would use it on israel like we're not protecting iran from ourselves we're protecting iran from israel at the end of the day like they're a number one ally bro yeah apparently you know

know, but it's like the audacity of some of these people to be like, oh, no, we're protecting America and protecting Americans. It's like, no, we're not. No, we're not. I mean, you know, all of those bases in the region, you know, obviously there are soldiers in. But at the end of the day to Well, we could protect them by just removing all those bases, right? Yeah, that'd be a great way to do. But, I mean, this idea that this is in America's best interest is just ridiculous. Yeah. And I guess there is some argument to say protecting our allies is part of our best interest, which there is an argument there. But they're definitely positioning it like we need to be doing this. Like this is very important for us. And ultimately, we're paying the price. Whether we send any troops or not. And some have gone and some have died. But, you know, everything gets more expensive for us. 330 million people. Yeah, it's like, what about our European allies?

All of a sudden, their price of oil has just skyrocketed because the Strait of Hormuz is closed, which, again, to get back like this guy, the Horton was talking about back in 2005 as they had an option. Like, if we attack Iran, they're going to close the Strait of Hormuz, and that's going to be a huge economic hit for Europe and the rest of the developing world. It's like that doesn't help our allies. No. Yeah. It's like we just have to pay the price, I guess, for this.

And probably keep doing it. Yeah. At what point do we just get to say, yes, this seems expensive. Yeah, I mean, that's the thing is, you know, we're spending, I don't know what the exact numbers are. but like, you know, we send a missile that's like a million dollars. Iran shoots it down with a missile that costs $40,000, you know, or something like that. It's like that's the kind of warfare that's going on here. We're just going to drag this out.

And yeah, yeah, it's ridiculous. And, you know, they were also mentioning, and I looked it up actually too because I was like, they mentioned it on the show and I was like, I don't want to make sure that that's legit. But they were saying that in Iran, they still have like 70% of their missiles. Most of their air defenses are crippled, but their missiles, the actual missiles they have, are like, they still have most of them. That's right. And the launches. Yeah.

Now, why is this? Is it because they're like underground? Yeah, they've been stockpiling them. Hopping out of the ground. That's the thing that's been so hard for the U.S. is unlike the rest of the reasons, like Saudi Arabia, even Israel, like all, Iran is mountains. It's just mountains everywhere. So they're able to hide all these missiles in the mountains and we can't get to them. So it's like it, they have a huge advantage in that sense because, you know, and not only that, but the way that they have

their military set up, you know, they kind of figured that, you know, as soon as they took out Ayatollah that it would all just kind of collapse. But it's like they have it separated so that their military is kind of coup proof. Like regardless of who takes it out, like, people are still going to do what they do and they have all this separation and stuff. It's like, this did not really work out the way that the U.S. kind of thought it would. And, you know, they used, they were talking about, you know, back in the 90s during Kuwait, you know, like that liberation was real quick, super easy. You know, we were able to push Iran out of Kuwait pretty quickly. And then, you know, later, when we went to invade Iraq, it was much harder.

And they were kind of making the comparison of like what we did to Venezuela. You know, overthrowing Venezuela seemed pretty easy for the U.S. And then we're like, oh, shit, that worked out. Well, we'll keep going into Iran. And then now we're doing that. And it's like proving to be much, much harder than we originally thought. Yeah, it's like an entire country just set up for war. Yeah.

And that changes the game, dude. Yeah. I mean, they literally have been kind of preparing for this. What did you think of? And I haven't looked into this at all, but they mentioned it in the podcast about a lot of the military leadership in the United States describing the war as like bringing about Armageddon. And, you know, this is going to trigger Jesus to come back and all that stuff. Like, that's terrifying. That's terrifying.

It's terrifying to hear from your military leaders. Yeah. Like it's a good thing. Yeah. I'm like smiling about it. Right. Once you start to have people in places of power, having those conversations thinking it's a good idea, I think it's, no, I don't think. I know it's more than reasonable to be very concerned about that setup. Yeah. Yeah, that is not what you want to be hearing. Hmm. And what does that even mean? It's like an actual global nuclear war is.

somehow beneficial. How in God's name could anyone think that? Yeah. Like, are they the only ones that are like, well, I build a bunker. You don't have one? And it's like, bro, what are you going to do after that? Yeah. You're going to do all the jobs you don't know how to do?

I find it hilarious the whole bunker thing because, you know, you have all these, like, you know, Zuckerberg and all these guys, you know, they're like, guys, humanity we're so optimistic AI it's going to be great all this stuff and then it's like why do you have a $20 million bunker in Hawaii like what is that for dude he has a $200 million oh yeah my bad add an extra zero

yeah exactly it's like okay so you have this and the world has gone to hell you didn't want that to happen maybe but it has now what kind of life do your kids have or their kids I'm like, you're just going to hide down there with a bunch of gold until the radiation blows over?

Or I guess they just hope it's just not quite like that. It's not the Terminator 2 complete desert of life. It's just, you know, pockets and then a bunch of raids for a while until we get a bit of law and order. And then they just pop their heads back out after watching, you know, a bunch of Netflix and eating. stored caviar and then they're like oh we're the billionaires again we're back hi

sorry everyone else has mutations there was a I think I can't remember who it was but I think there was a comedian who had a funny bit about that about it was something along the lines of like if that does happen you know as soon as those billionaires

go into their bunkers like the people who need to run the bunkers are really going to be the ones in charge like the billionaire is not going to be able to defend himself it's just going to be like the group of people who run the bunker Yeah, I think probably the best job to get is like the toilet cleaner guy there. Yeah, super unassuming.

Well, they're really counting on those robots, I think. Oh, yeah. So what you want to be is a robot repair man. They're going to take one of them into the bunker. And then all you do is just program the robots to work for you. Yeah. That's the plan, Sean. You and I.

What do we know about robots? We got to, yeah, we got to take out a small loan to get some robots. We got to make them really sexy so that the billionaires want them. Oh, that's easy. Yeah. Yeah. You just, with an app, you just inflate their tits. Yeah.

I thought it was interesting in the podcast. They were talking about Taiwan and manufacturing in Taiwan. and there seemed to be not a disagreement, but they seemed to, I think honestly they both were saying, like, they were both not wrong. You know, Joe was kind of like taking the position of like, no, Taiwan is like legit. The manufacturing that they're doing is insane. And just bringing that over from Taiwan into the U.S. is like kind of a fairy tale. And then you have Horton who's like, it's not a fairytale. It can be done.

And I honestly, I think they're both right. I mean, I can kind of use my own personal job as an example. I work in the bike industry. And pretty much almost every single bike on the market, regardless of what price point, is made in Taiwan. And the manufacturer? Yeah. Most of them are.

Like, Giant is the largest manufacturer in the world. They're made in Taiwan. There's a lot of companies that will have their own brand name on a specific product, but it's made in the same factory that makes, you know, 15 different ranges of products. So a lot of them are sharing factories and things like that. But the manufacturing, especially for the Bik cycle industry in Taiwan, is insane. It's legit. And it's the same kind of thing as the computer ships where they've been building that for decades.

So, you know, to have this idea that, oh, it'll be pretty easy. You just need to push and have some money to move that overseas is, you know, it's kind of true. But it's also like, you have to back up. These people have started decades ago. So you would need to invest for future decades. Like, you can't just move it over overseas. You have to start building some of those foundational things that Taiwan did, you know, decades ago. And you have to incentivize businesses to move overseas.

there. So it's, it's not quite a simple process. It would take a long, long time, but to, um, you have to acknowledge the incredible work that Taiwan has put into manufacturing over the last couple decades. Like, they are insanely good at it. Like, you know, people go on and on about the quality of overseas made stuff. And I can just speak to bikes here, but like, you know, If you're assuming that your Taiwanese bike that's made from a big brand is not as good of quality as it once was, you're mistaken. It's incredibly good quality. And they've got so good at it. They're making the best chips.

You know, why are you complaining out chips? Just because we've seen a bunch of like plastic crap come out of China. It's not all the same. Yeah. But I think they were both kind of right in that scenario. I think it just, it takes a long time to do that. Yes, theoretically you could move manufacturing to the U.S., but it would take way longer than a couple years.

And it would be a lot of money and you'd have to put up some huge investments and have overwhelming public support. And it's not quite as easy. I think the game changer could be when they start to build those robots that can automate everything. Because we got to think about why everything went, got outsourced abroad in the first place. and it was because labor was cheaper. So if we can work past that point and then also because we're building these warehouses, factories and facilities fresh,

we build them primarily integrated with this robot AI technology and then, you know, probably cuts down on the turnaround to how quickly we can catch up and then also be more effective and more efficient. Yeah. You know, at the end of the day, we have the money, right? It's like, and we're the ones buying most of the stuff. Yeah.

Yeah, it's just, it's hard. I mean, you know, it's like, well, what would stop Taiwan from, you know, adding robots to their facilities and, you know, lowering their labor costs themselves, you know? I think it's, it, yeah. That's a good point. It's a nice idea to move all that stuff to the U.S., but the actual reality of that is a huge bill to pay, both time and money.

So, I mean, yeah. Yeah, it's a tricky one, dude. I mean, you know, overall, I think, honestly, the way Scott was talking in this, he's not super hopeful for the future. He didn't seem like super pumped And he kind of didn't come in You know he kind of got to the point where we were just then

Like there wasn't a lot of solutions Coming out of his thought process either And maybe that's not his job You know he just reports Analyzes and then discusses And puts all the pieces together But I was really kind of hoping for like Yeah he had some ideas on what to do

And how but getting rid of super pack money and obviously he's very anti-war so it's like that's his focus but it seems like so few people have good ideas on what the fix is and maybe that's the big problem that we're all facing yeah i think it's it's tough because you know in a lot of instances we've been digging ourselves this whole for so long and it seems it seems tough to see what is the correct way. Like how do we put down the shovel? I think, you know, one thing I think a lot of Americans would be in support of

and I think would actually help is we have to get this Israeli influence out of our own government. I mean, at the end of the day, it's like they've just got rid of the last couple of representatives that were against the Israel lobby. and you know it's like this seems to be the problem in a lot of senses you know like Dave Smith talks about you know if you imagine you're out a best friend that you went out to the bars with all the time and they just keep starting fights with people it's like that doesn't help you you know you're defending them and you're taking cuts and bruises yourselves and it's like you need to stop fucking hanging out with that friend at the end of the day you know it's like I think that

that is kind of a good analogy for this and you know I think certainly when you talk to young people Gen Z is in favor of this. I think a lot of people are kind of waking up to the fact of like no we need to get rid of this this thing that keeps pushing us towards aggressive policy like it seems like

the reason we've gotten into this war was this is what the Israelis wanted us to do you know and I would like to see some steps being taken on that front to you know get rid of this foreign lobby that's infiltrated our government. Well look I'll give this

analogy. You know, I'm from England, so I'm English. And they've always said that there's a special alliance between England and the United States. It's been strong for a long time. I don't know how many conflicts or political infiltration England could have in the US that I would be cool with. Definitely almost no political influence. I'm just like, and that one's an obvious one, because, you know, that's how America became free anyway by kicking the Brits out. So the fact that they're kind of letting any foreign influence happen is strange to me. But then if Britain was pulling us into wars, I'd be like, yeah, look, I'm English. I like people there.

My family lives there. I mean, I guess it's easy for me to say because they're not getting here. by missiles, you know? And maybe if that was happening and there were people rolling up on the shores trying to blow stuff up and blow people up and kill people,

I probably would think quite a lot different. But, yeah, it's, I don't know. It's a hard one. It's like, how many times do you go to bat for somebody before you're like, you guys got to change something? Yeah. Yeah, well, and also,

So it's like, it feels like a lot of we're doing their dirty work for them. It's like Israel by itself could not fight Iran. Like, no way. There's no way they would win that. You know, so it's like you're going to recruit our help and we're going to do it for you. And it's like that just feels like a blatant disrespect to all of us. I mean, how many billions of dollars have we spent on the Iran war? I mean, I don't know what the numbers are now.

I'm sure it's well past $50 billion now. I think it's like a billion dollars a day or something. but it's like, you know, it's incredible to think of what that money could have been spent on if it was directed towards American citizens and actually helping them on a local level, you know, rather than just some another regime change war in the Middle East. Right. Yeah. And that analogy is often given.

It's like, what about the poor neighborhoods? What about this? And Joe often reflects that. That's always a big thought for him. but here's the thing. Even when we're not at war, we don't spend that money on those neighborhoods anyway.

Yeah, that's the thing. Well, that's the frustrating part too is it's like every time you bring up those topics like healthcare or, you know, education or whatever it is, it's like, oh, well, who's going to pay for that? Where's the money going to come from? But then, you know, when the U.S. wants to, you know, spend billions of dollars fighting a war,

it's like, oh, all of a sudden we found that money. No problem. We didn't ask for anything. We went around Congress. Nobody voted for this war. but all of a sudden we've got billions of dollars that we can just spend on it and not ask for anyone's approval. And it's like that's the insulting part because, you know, when you need the money for that, all of a sudden you have it. But then U.S. citizens want money for ourselves and our own benefit and there's no money to be found.

Wouldn't it be wild if like one time in the future when we're not invading someone or at major conflict, we just go, all right guys we're just going to pretend that we are but we're actually nobody's going to die and gas prices are going to go up a little bit but i think the stock market's going to be more stable because this isn't actually a war and we're all on the same page but we're going to actually just spend a shitload of money on these areas like we are a war a billion a day clean up all this different stuff with like a doge style process you know we bring in some super geniuses to figure out all the best ways to spend that money. And hopefully it's not all embezzled by Gavin Newsom and people in California and whatever.

And it's used for all those places. We just do it for like two months. And then we just take a step back and go, how's that? How do we do? How's things going? All of a sudden, like, schools are clean. Everyone has books. Some people have health care, you know.

Some people without health care got some. operations they needed. And we actually take care of veterans. The VA is like just a well-oiled machine, becomes like the best medical services in the entire world. I don't know. I guess it's easy to say these things, right? Yeah, the problem is that... It feels like the problem is, is that the way the current system is set up is that there's a lot of people that are benefiting from this.

Very wealthy people are benefiting from this current system. So, you know, to change the way that we're doing things would put a threat to those people. And those people are going to fight tooth and nail to make sure that they don't lose any of their power. You know, all the lobbyists, all the, you know, tech executives and big oil executives and the people who benefit from our current system, the insurance people, all of them, you're taking money from them if you change the system. And that, they don't want that. And it's like those are the people who are unfortunately in power. So it sounds like a nice idea. But at the end of the day, without seriously changing the entire system, it seems like a pipe dream.

Yeah. It's like these people are not going to voluntarily give away their money. No. No, no, no. Well, we got to say hopeful, brother. Yeah. We got to believe that there's a path. And like, like, Rodney keeps saying, maybe like a super AI just comes out.

And for a couple of years, we let it make all of our decisions. And it's not super biased and all fucked up. And it cleans up some of the things going on. Yeah. I like that. I like that potential. But we'll see. Also, can we really hand it over to the robots?

Man, we'd be kicking ourselves at that backfired. They'd like, dude, they'd like 15 movies about this. That's the thing. Yeah, it's scary. Yeah. And also, like, all the testing that they're doing, they, like, still haven't quite figured out how to, like, not make the models racist or any of this stuff. It's like, yeah.

Um, uh, anyway. All right. Let's call it for today. I like this one. This guy was cool. I hope he comes back on. He was a super fantastic dude. And a lot of the comments were much more positive.

Like, I don't know who the, there was another guy who was, uh, it must have been 2498, like two ones behind. him people were just like berating him all the comments were like thank god this guy's so much better than the other guy he had on the other day or people seem to have much more support for for for this podcast then oh yeah some of the other ones so they were probably talking about gad sad i think so yeah they were yeah yeah i kind of i kind of skipped gad's i was going to review his episode but i ended up just doing the review from his previous time that he was on because he, I don't know, I found it far more interesting and it was just way more hopeful.

So, yeah. Yeah, I just jumped around with that one. But anyway, all right, thanks, Sean. And as always, guys, we appreciate you. We'll talk to you next time. Sounds good.