Knowledge Fight - KFC #3: The Crossover of the Century (w/ Molly Conger)

Episode Date: October 28, 2026

Dan and Molly proceed to level three of Knowledge Fight Country, where they encounter an unexpected team-up mini-boss: an interview between former rivals turned comrades Owen Shroyer and Ana Kasperian. How could two media figures with so little in common end up having so much in common?See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

I'm Melissa Jeltson, host of the What Happened to Her podcast. We're kicking off the season with the Sandra Birchmore story, a case the police rode off as a suicide in a snowstorm. Her family never bought it, and the man they suspected wore a badge. You never know who that devil is because he's wearing in disguise. Sometimes it's a police uniform. And you can get access to all episodes 100% ad-free with an IHeart True Crime Plus subscription exclusively on Apple Podcasts,

available only to IHeart True Crime Plus subscribers. So don't wait. Head to Apple Podcasts. Search for IHeart True Crime Plus and subscribe today. Cool Zone Media. It's going down. He's back in the fight. Knowledge Fight Country.

You're now in Knowledge Fight Country. Hello, I'm Dan. This is an exploration of the open world terrain. As if bullshit was a video game. We get to go explore all. the little nooks and crannies around, see what we can find. At a certain point,

it became very clear to me that bullshit artists and people who lie habitually in media love to say that they're being taken out of context. And as somebody who has a high threshold for pain and nothing better to do, I have decided that when these people get flack, say they're being taken out of context,

I will just, jump in the pond and swim in the context. Find the context. Take too long discussing the context. A third thing. So today, we are back for another episode, and I am thrilled to have, along with me again, the host of Weird Little Guys, Molly Conger.

So glad to be back, Dan. I mean, anybody who listens to my show knows I love context. I'm addicted to context. I'm ready to roll around in the context. We are context fiends. There's a kindred spirit kind of thing for you and I, I believe. And it's been a thrill doing these episodes with you. We were going to pretend that this was the fourth one because on the last episode,

we talked about how we were going to cover Joel Webbin and some of those NXR guys on our next episode, but I'm not quite ready to record that. So we were going to pretend and record them out of order, but I'm not good at that. I'm not good at acting. I was actually worried about this this morning. I was like, but we're not going to be able to open with sequential relevant banter. What are we going to do? Are we going to cave this?

Okay, but we're not. That's good. And then we're going to have to pretend like this is our last time hanging out in this series and like we'd have to do wrap up stuff. And that just felt insincere. So I can't do it. I can't commit to it. Because you can air them in whatever order you want. But no, I'm glad we're going this route because I was not prepared to act.

Yeah. No, no. You're not getting paid to act. You get paid to be. Right. We will do the next one. We'll do the Joel Weapon stuff. But today I had another episode that I had gotten prepared and ready.

And this is also semi-inspired by your love of weird little guys. I was trying to check back in on where all my weird little fellas were after I had left them. I'd gone to the store to get cigarettes and I left all of my frets unguarded for a while. So I was checking back in with them. We had Harrison Smith, Tucker Carlson, and today we're going to check in on a little fellow named Owen Schroier. How is Owen doing? He's thriving. I'm shocked to hear that.

No, I don't think he's doing great. Oh, okay. I think he sucks, and he recently dyed his hair blonde in a very strange PR move. He made a whole video about how, like, everybody's talking about me. me die in my hair, but they don't want to talk about the issues. They're like, this is desperate, man. That's a man in crisis. Yeah.

It doesn't look good either. I was going to say, is it a pro job? Is it a box job? What are we talking? I hope it's a pro job. I mean, he was making way more than he had any business making over at InfoWars. And unless he's wasted all of that on like his gold mic and the weird studio he's in, I think he can afford a hairstylist.

I mean, a good blonde. is expensive. I just stopped getting my hair highlighted because it costs like 400 bucks. Sure. And it's a process too, like especially if you have darker hair. Like when I was in, oh, God, I just realized there's so much more context to this story. So I ended up having a mohawk when I was like 19 or 20. And I was going to dye it like blue or something, but I had to go blonde first. You got to bleach it first. Yeah. And that took like four or five times. to bleach out. But the context that I got overwhelmed thinking of was the only reason I got the Mohawk was because I was drunk at a party and my friend was going to give me the Dr. Money haircut

where you have Dan shaved on the side of your head and then on the other side a dollar sign. But he was too drunk and he fucked it up. I don't think a drunk guy could do it. No. And I don't think he could have if he were sober. No, you need sharp lines for that. I mean, you need a Dominican barber for that. Yeah, we were just at my friend's bathroom. And he's like, you're getting a Mohawk. Like he just, it took almost no time to mess it up. But yeah, Owens bleached his hair.

I do think that he has sided with the anti-Trump side of the America First kind of split. You know, I think that's pretty clear from taking in some of his content. So we've got him on that roster. Right. He's chosen his team. Yeah. What would you say that your familiarity with Owen Troyer the Cuck Destroyer is? Well, as a longtime listener to your previous show, that's everything I know about Owen Troyer. Everything I know about Owen Troyer, I learned from Dan Friesen.

Okay. Well, you've learned a bit, Dan, because I have a bit of a fascination with the Also-Rands at Info Wars. And, you know, like Harrison Smith, the Chase Geisers, the Owen Troyers. and Owen's really the alpha of them. He's the guy who was the heir apparent to Alex in terms of like he was trusted with the spot hosting a show with Roger Stone. He was a guy that it felt like Alex could trust a little bit more. And Paul Joseph Watson refused to move to the United States. Paul Joseph Watson was always just sort of there, but it was almost like he knew.

knew that what he was doing was disgusting and he didn't really want to get his hands in it. Yeah, like he refused to be on air for many years when he was starting at Info Wars. And Alex was like, you should get on air. And I think after he did, like, gradually he must have come around to be like, I knew it. I knew I shouldn't have gotten on air. This sucks. I hate looking like I'm going to cry, staring into a camera and talking about migrants. In another world, Owen could have been happy, you know?

like a local market sportscaster. Oh, I think that's the irony, is that because that's what he came from. Oh, maybe that's why I think that. Yeah, that's what he was before he came along to InfoWars. And I do sincerely think that if he had just stayed there and not gone down this path, he could probably be married and totally happy with the family in St. Louis and reporting on sports. I could just imagine him being, you know, 55 and knowing a little,

too much about the local high school team. Yeah. And that's creepy, but fine. As it is, he's a weird adult who has been sued. Like, he was one of the named defendants in the Sandy Hook case. And then also did jail time because he was at January 6th in a way that violated a non-prosecution agreement he had from another protest that he was at. It's not just that he was at January 6th is that he promised he wouldn't be. Yeah. No, he promised he wouldn't be until he finished his community service and then didn't finish his community service. It's not even that hard to do community service. I'm sure he knows somebody with a fake nonprofit who could have said he volunteered here.

Absolutely. It was disrespectful that he didn't just go ahead and fake that. But yeah, now he's on his own. He either got fired or quit from Info Wars about last year. And Alex freaked out, tried to have a little bit of a fight with him. people weren't really all that interested in the blood feud, and now Owen's just been doing his stream from his basement. And I don't know if it's a basement. That's not fair. That seems like a jab that's unearned. I mean, I would love to be doing this in a basement. I wish my apartment had a basement to do this in. You're out Virginia way. Are basements common there? In this part of the state, yeah. So I live in central Virginia in Charlottesville. So we have mountains here. We can have basements. Where I'm from, closer to the beach, no. The water table is not. in a good position for a basement.

All right, all right. Yeah, I grew up in central Missouri, and everyone had a basement there. And now in Chicago, it's pretty rare that I meet anybody who has a basement. I guess we just call them garden units, though. That's kind of like what a basement is. Right. Anyway, I miss basements.

So he didn't get a cool new gig like Harrison. No, and actually, I need to correct something, because I realized since the last time we recorded that Harrison is actually also still working at InfoWorse. He's doing both. He's got two jobs. Good for him. He's hustling.

Yeah, it's sad. No wonder he didn't have time to read the protocols of the elders of Zion. He's working two jobs, Dan. Right. And I do respect the workers and solidarity with him and all that. But also, like, it's unfortunate because he would have had time to read the protocols if he could use that content for both jobs. But since he can only use it at one,

It's Alex stopping him. Yeah. Alex is holding him back. He's a censor or something. So I wanted to look through Owen's stream and find something to go over that would be interesting. And a lot of his episodes are really long. And I don't know if we need to go over one of his whole streams. So instead, I found something that I thought would be interesting.

And it's Owen Troyer interviewing Anna Kasparian from The Young Turks. Oh, no. That reaction is correct. Oh, no. Oh, no. It's unfortunate, and I don't love that I have to do this or talk about this or play it for you, but here we are. She brought this on herself. She should not have been there.

So what's your feeling generally about the Young Turks and Anna Kasparian if there is a particular feeling you have? Not positive. Were you ever like a young Turks? Young Turks fan earlier in life, like before they kind of shifted their brand a little? You know, I, for as online as I have been, for as long as I've been this online, there's some stuff that I just don't consider my business where I'm like, I don't have a, a lot of people have a strong opinion about this and the arguments they're having about it are not interesting to me. So I'm just not going to find out more. And the Young Turks has always been one of those things. Yeah.

Where it's like, this seems pretty polarizing and uninteresting to me. Yeah, I kind of feel similarly in some ways, but I do know, I know enough people who like, it was an important part of their early leftism and stuff that I, I recognize that it's someone's business, but it never was all that important for me either. It was something that was kind of there, and I thought like, good for them. And then gradually over time, you just see like, you know, Dave Rubin comes out of there and Jimmy Dorr comes out of there. And it's like, exactly.

This is a coincidence of the highest order or a sign of a problem. Like, I spent a long time not finding out about it. And then all of a sudden, everything I see about it is like, oh, they're hanging out with a lot of right-wing influencers, huh? Oh, they're saying some stuff that's a little crazy. Yeah, it's like, okay, this is a hub of leftism and progressivism. And then it seems to just churn out shithead somehow. And that to me is like, well, you either need to rethink your process or you're lying to us. I'm not sure.

Or like they were, was it that camp? I think it's Jimmy Dorr and Associated Friends was promoting that anti-war rally a couple years ago in D.C. That was just a pro-Russia rally. And there were a bunch of Nazis there. Was that the one with Scott Ritter at it? That's the one. Am I thinking of the right crew? Yeah.

I believe so. Yeah. Jimmy Dore is a mess. I went to it. I was just roaming around and I ran to our old buddy Matthew Heimbach. And he was noted anti-war advocate. Yeah, it was an interesting encounter. He was hanging out with a friend of his, a guy I'd never seen in person before.

Shandon Simpson, who introduced himself to me by telling me I was wrong about always saying that he used to be an Adam Woffin because he wasn't in Adam Woffin. He got kicked out of the National Guard for being in a chat room called Rape Woffin, which was an Adam Woffin splinter cell. Well, see, it's nuance, Molly. Yeah. You got to get these names right. Sorry, Shandon. It was Rape Woffin. It's slander to say he was in Adam Woffin if he was in Rape Woffin.

Right. And so I guess long story short, that is the degree to which I have a personal opinion about this content creator milieu. Yeah. And I think just in the interest of fairness to all of them, because I'm going to be pretty hard and not very. kind. But like the Jimmy Doors and the Dave Rubens and those folks, they did all kind of break in the direction that they broke

after they were at the Young Turks. So like, there's that plausible deniability of like they weren't shitheads until later, but I don't buy that. Yeah. And it's like I said, maybe it sounds like I'm being unfair. It's just because I don't know a lot about it because I never bothered to find out.

The only thing I did find out was that they co-hosted rally that a bunch of Nazis went to. So now I don't want to find out. Yeah. Well, let's learn a little bit. I'm going to force you to find some stuff out. Hell yeah. But first, here is an out of context drop. Nobody was good at motorboat and titties their first time. But you stuck with it. Yeah, exactly. And you got better. Yeah. Yeah. Oops. I accidentally kept that in. And I thought, hey, it's definitely worth hearing again. So why not? Honestly, I think you keep that one for the duration of the show. No one was good at motorboat and tinnies. That might be our thesis.

I mean, that's, that's, sodomite sent me buckets of poop, you know? You got to use that one for a variety of things. When life gives you lemons, you motorboat. So here we're going to start off. Owen is interviewing Anna on his own stream and he introduces her to the proceedings. The collaboration that you never saw coming. In fact, 10 years ago, you probably would have bet your life savings. against it. Owen Schroyer and Anna Kusperian. And, you know, Anna, there's no denying that you've become, I think they call you a queen now, even on the dissident right. I've been seeing the queen emojis and the little crown. I don't know how you feel about that. But this is definitely a phenomenon. It's been a spectacle here watching you kind of rise in popularity on the right. I do

want to talk about that. But I want to go back. I want to go back 10 years ago. The famous moment at the RNC in Cleveland, the Young Turks Info Wars, you were there, Leanne McAdoe, obviously Alex and Shank were there as well. We all remember the moment, Roger Stone. I was outside doing street content, so I didn't actually get to be a part of that fun, but you were there. I make the joke about that's where we were at 10 years ago. Now, it feels like Info Wars people and young Turks people have more in common now than they do with the Democrat Party or the Republican Party. So what I want to do is I want to get your perspective. People know my perspective, former MAGA, three-time Trump voter.

Everybody can see where I'm at as far as the last 10 years and where MAGA has gone or Trump has gone. I want to know what is the left-wing interpretation of this? What is the Young Terps interpretation of this? What is Anna Kasparian's interpretation of the last 10 years from that moment to now Trump is attacking Alex Jones? Trump is attacking Owen Schroyer. MAGA is attacking us. I think he had a hard time not saying the young turds there, because that's what they would always call them on Info Wars. They go and almost slipped.

Okay, so I'm glad to hear, I'm glad to hear this. You know, if you can sit there and smile while Owen Schroier calls you a right-wing queen, then as uninformed as my opinion was. I was right. So that's comforting. I think that some of this is going to be quite validating for your gut instincts. Sometimes you're just riding on a vibe. It's good to know I was right. Yeah, yeah.

I also would like to point out that it's fun to hear Owen say Jenk because he would always call him chunk yogurt whenever he talked about him in the past. And I guess that has changed because now he knows what his name is. What an asshole. So right off the bat, it's important to understand the way Owen is trying to frame this interaction the way he is. Because if you understand that, it becomes very obvious why Anna should not be doing an interview like this. At the 2016 RNC, Alex Jones, Roger Stone, and a bunch of other InfoWars dipshits invaded the live shoot that the young Turks were doing, very obviously engaging in a publicity stunt. They were being trolls, hoping to provoke Jank and some of the other young Turks folks to fight with them so they could farm attention. The game was to be assholes to the young Turks during a live shoot, get some fun video, and then after the fact, pretend that they just wanted to talk about their different opinions.

Alex and his people were just wanting to extend an olive branch, and look how these crazy. lazy lefties responded. Oh my God, they can't deal with the marketplace of ideas. You know that game. They're free speech, of course. They're acting in good faith and they're being silenced. Yeah, and the left simply can't tolerate this. It's all just a game, and I don't believe for a second that any of these people doesn't fully understand that dynamic. Alex exploited the fact that the young Turks were broadcasting live in an unfriendly environment like the RNC, so they knew that they could get away with using them for a publicity.

done. Now here we are 10 years later, and the brand positioning of both what was then InfoWars and what is still the Young Turks has changed dramatically. Info Wars was a Trump idol cult, and none of Alex or any of his recent actions can undo any of that. All of these people are stuck with that for the rest of their lives. The Young Turks, on the other hand, was a media outlet that branded themselves as progressive and very anti-Trump. Gradually, the Young Turks lost interest in having a progressive audience and it became less and less confusing how they kept launching the careers of I Left the Left types like Dave Rubin and Jimmy Dorr. Over time, they inched closer to holding right-wing positions that were particularly popular

in the culture war media space. And eventually, it's kind of unclear what they're even about. I don't really know why they're doing what they're doing. I know Jank tried to run for Congress. I forgot about that. Yeah. That was a high point for chunk of. yogurt talk over at InfoWars for sure.

So conversely, opposed to them, InfoWars lost their branding pretty quickly. In a matter of months, Donald Trump took public actions that his media surrogates felt were completely unspinnable, primarily involving his attacks on Iran and his comments about the Epstein files. The people who had his back through all the bullshit that came before weren't able to come up with any good reason for the guy they'd pretended Trump was to do the things Trump was now doing, and the dissonance got to be too much for them. The rug was effectively pulled out from under them, and it was really embarrassing to still

support Trump. And that ceded ground to the other branch of the right-wing media, which is the much more overtly anti-Semitic side. Where folks like Alex had no good excuse for why Trump was doing the shit he was doing, the anti-Semitic team had an easy answer, which was that it was the Jews fault. The Jews made Trump attack Iran, and Epstein was a Jewish guy, so case closed. The real explanation for everything is that Trump has been a piece of shit scammer this whole time. But for someone like Owen or Alex, that's far too painful a conclusion to accept. If that's true, then everything they've done for the last decade has been serving the whims of a con man. Owen went to jail for violating his parole for being at the January 6th insurrection,

and he did all of that because he fell for an obvious fraud. Instead of accepting that very humiliating reality, it's much easier for folks like Owen to, drift to the anti-Semitic side of the right-wing media, which is currently deeply invested in presenting their bigotry and scapegoating as an opposition to Israel. Simultaneously, Anna and the young Turks have been trying to decouple their brand from the Democratic Party, and a major part of that is an opposition to the Democratic support for Israel. It's a little easier to believe that their position and they're breaking from the mainstream of the Democratic Party are based on a sincere and valid criticism of the party, but it's becoming

harder and harder to maintain that belief as time goes on, and they make choices like Anna doing an interview with Owen Schroier. Like, that doesn't seem like a sincere act. Yeah. So again, not being familiar with the kind of content produced by the Young Turks at all, it is disheartening to see this, you know, sort of nominally progressive organization becoming outspoken against Israel, but doing so by teaming up with people who are saying, things like Zionist organized government. Yeah. Or Zionist occupied government.

You know what I mean? Like you can criticize Israel without becoming a Zog guy. Yeah, absolutely. And if you can't do that, that's a U problem. That's an anti-Semitism problem. Yeah. And I think that if you're someone who publicly creates things, you have a little bit of a responsibility to know what you're tangling with.

And if you're getting interwoven with people who are Zog guys and you're whitewashing them as people who just maybe care about Palestinians or are opposed to Israel, you are carrying water for anti-Semitism in a way that is a disservice to the real issue, I think. Right. Like, if this is a sincere pivot to break with the Democratic Party over issues surrounding Israel, you're either very stupid or this isn't sincere. You have to draw a bright line around your position and keep it 100 percent separate. from the position of people like Owen Schroier. And you can't say, oh, we have common cause on this issue.

No, you don't. No, you don't. Get off that show. Get off that show. You're either very stupid or you are participating in anti-Semitism willingly. Yeah, and I find it difficult to, like, lay back and relax with these stupid or ignorant arguments. Because at a certain point, that feels infantilizing. Like, these people know who each other are. It's not like they all just started in media.

He's describing this encounter they had fully a decade ago. You know who this man is and what he's about and what he's bringing to the table. You know the level of tensional trolling this man has engaged in his entire career because he did it to you. You know that he's called the cuck destroyer. Well, that's very powerful. Well, yeah. There's a certain irony in some ways, but yeah, it is strong. It is strong.

I think that we're all just going to be more depressed as this goes along. But Owen has given Anna this prompt, you know, like, hey, what's the left-wing side of this? She wouldn't know. Well, she bite. She has some thoughts. Anna, what is your analysis? What is your diagnosis for the last 10 years from that moment to today? Wow, there's a lot to get to.

And it's kind of hard to answer it in a concise way. so just bear with me as I try to kind of walk you through what, like, where my mind was at, how things have changed. And I'm only speaking on my behalf because, you know, there are variations of political thought at TYT. I would say that out of everyone who works there, I'm the one who's probably the most willing to give former Trump voters like the benefit of the doubt and hear them out. I'm willing to hear anyone out, to be fair. But at the time that that RNC was taking place, in 2016, I didn't realize it at the time, but there were, we were already existing in some pretty serious media filter bubbles. And so what we were consuming in regard to Trump and what

he was proposing was probably very different from what, you know, the original MAGA crowd was learning about him, hearing about him. And so when you think about the fact that a huge portion of people who voted for Bernie Sanders in the Democratic primary flipped and ended up voting for Trump in the general. I didn't understand that. I couldn't really make any sense of it, but later on I was able to make sense of it

because Trump's messaging, as, in my opinion, as phony as it really was, really did harp on similar economic issues, like the tariffs, for instance, were about protectionism, bringing manufacturing jobs back to the United States, which has been a long, long time left wing policy and, you know, rallying cry.

I don't feel like you can say this stuff sincerely. Like, I don't, I, this, this sets off some pretty bad radar for me. And I feel like none of that was something Owen was hoping she would say that he would be able to respond to. No. There was nothing for him to grab hold of there. No, but it is kind of a bounty for him because she's like humiliated. herself in a way. Like she's calling herself stupid and sheltered in the past.

Kind of. Which is interesting because that's something that Owen and, you know, these guys who left Maga, something that they cannot do. They cannot admit that they were wrong, that they got tricked, that there were things they didn't understand before, which is kind of something you have to do if you're going to make a really public 180? True. It's true.

That's why it's become like kind of a meme or a thing. to say why I left the left because all of those people have to make that post that like explains I was tricked, I was wrong, or something. That's so interesting though because yeah, the why I left the left grift relies on this sort of

self-debasing, this degrading humiliation ritual where you have to say like I was brainwashed on the left. They did this to me. Communism brainwashed me. But for Owen and people like him, they can just say, yeah, he changed. The news got to him.

They're like, no, I was never wrong. The situation changed. But it is a very split dichotomy that if you leave the left, you have to do this degrading thing. When you pivot on the right, you just say, conspiracy changed. Yeah, I think that some of that has to do with object permanence. And I'm not sure that people like Owen believe in that. Like, I don't know if they believe in continuity from one day to the next in a way. in a way that I think a lot of left-wing audiences do demand that someone who's commenting on things recognize that yesterday exists, the day before exists.

No, but both of those performances, you know, someone like Owen having a pivot from right to a different right, or someone like Anna having a pivot from left to right, both of those performances are for a right-wing audience. And that's what a right-wing audience wants to see that left-wing politics are a mental illness. but they cannot see the same thing for views that maybe they used to have on the right. Right. Or that are still useful for them. Right. Yeah, they want to see the sinner redeemed except for when it's a sin that they like committing. Exactly.

Yeah. I never really thought about it like that, but it is. You have to do the humiliation ritual if you want in to the right from the left. It's kind of like eyes wide shut. I don't know. It's been a while since I saw that movie. Me too. I just think there's a ritual in it. A degrading one for sure.

So I think it's totally fine to accept that there are limits to the information you might have had access to 10 years ago. But this equivocating that she's doing is embarrassing. Let's imagine that Anna actually did have an information bubble that she was in back in 2016, where some of the common sense left wing positions Trump was proposing were hidden from her view. That could be acceptable to hear if she were a media consumer, but she's a media pundit. In 2016, she was reporting the news and opining on the world, so if she was in a media bubble, she's kind of admitting that she sucked at her job. But a bigger problem is that if she has any awareness of what InfoWars was, then she has to know that Owen's job was explicitly to enforce a media bubble. He was hired.

by Alex Jones because Alex thought it was funny how he would bully leftists at protest, and then he co-hosted a show with Roger Stone. The media didn't keep Owen and Anna in bubbles. They made a living by creating those bubbles, and I find it hard to believe that she doesn't understand that. I would have to think that she was incredibly stupid to accept her version of things here, and the much easier explanation is that there's an unspoken agreement between dipship media con people. If you give me a pass, then I'll give you a pass. If Anna, excuse me, uses Owen's past career and pretend it's kind of normal, he has an obligation to do the same for her, and they can get to the work of creating a new bubble that they can both share and make

money out of. And it seems obvious what they're doing. This has to be intentional bad behavior, because like you said, I don't think she's this stupid. And that's the only other explanation is that she just has no media literacy of any kind and never has, or maybe recently suffered a terrible head injury. Yeah, yeah. And I don't think that's true. I am kind of on the same page. And I think that I would be much more excusing of this if Owen Troyer wasn't a known commodity.

Like if he was someone who was kind of new and rising up the ranks through the like anti-Semitic media worlds that masked it by just saying that they don't like Israel, if he was just a newer guy, maybe she would have a plausible way to say like, I don't know what you're all about. But he worked for Alex for 10 years. There's a thousand hours of footage of him speaking on the record about what he believes. He went to jail for participating in January 6th. Like, this is page one Google results. You have the media literacy to have Googled this man before appearing on his show. There's a deposition that he, there's multiple depositions that he did for the Sandy Hook case, where he admits he's a puppet.

And all he does is just read the stories that people put in front of him. You have no reason to respect this person. And you've met him before. You've met him before while he was doing this. performance to you. So you do, you know, you know. Yeah, it strains credulity. And now you're just participating in a different work, you know?

Because it's all always been a work. Yep. They're like pro wrestlers who change their gimmicks. And their old characters couldn't have been friends. But now they're new characters. Maybe they're a tag team. Who knows? It's weird.

Yeah, because I'm just, um, just refreshing my memory a bit. I forgot. It was, it was Anna that earlier this year made that tweet about like the goyum or waking up. Yeah. Which is startling language. Yeah. We're going to get to that.

Yeah. So she knows what she's doing. I think so. I think it's pretty hard to make an argument the other way. She's claiming she knows what she's doing, right? But like a post like that, she is letting you know that she has willfully entered this information space saying like, yeah, I woke up. I'm self-identifying this way.

Yeah, but I think that everybody who does stuff like that on social media, always falls behind the, like, yeah, I mean, we're, we're just posting stuff online. We're being funny, you know, like, oh, it's not serious. And that's the cousin of the, you're taking me out of context, which is why I would rather not, you know, like, obviously we'll talk about her tweet, but, like, that tweet isn't as important as, like, an actual conversation that she's having with Owen. Absolutely. That's our context mine. It's a flag on the play. Oh, yeah, a big one. It's, like, almost a fly. Leger and Fowl. You're almost going to possibly get kicked out for them.

Hello? What's your favorite scary podcast? Radio presents the soundtrack to your October. From spooky podcasts and chilling playlists to non-stop Halloween radio and more. We have all the thrills and chills you're craving this season. Press play. I'm Melissa Jeltson, and in my new podcast, What Happened to Her, I'm bringing you new stories and conversations

every week. Stories about women whose deaths were too quickly ruled a suicide. She was starting to get worried and get scared

for her safety. Stories of survival. The only difference between me and her frankly was a little bit of luck because by all rights I should be dead.

Cases that everyone else called closed. They can't convict her, right? Like, she has so much evidence. These stories all start in the same

place with a woman failed by a system that didn't believe her, that didn't protect her, that didn't see her. No child should ever experience that. And we were babies. She did all of these brave things and came out and spoke about it and he got a year. You never know who that devil is because he's wearing in disguise. Sometimes it's a police uniform. Listen to what happened to her on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. If there's a million times more, more digital intelligence than there is biological intelligence. It's hard to imagine humans being in control in that scenario. I'm Walter Isaacson, host of the new podcast, The Builders.

Right now, we're living through an AI arms race. So I went directly to the people shaping that future. Elon Musk, Dario Amade, Alex Carr, Faye Faye-Fei Lee, Palmer Lucky, because I wanted to understand what the most consequential builders believe, what they fear, and where they think this is all headed. Silicon Valley is always saying the cliche thing about the way to predict the future is to create it.

Well, yeah, it's up to us. But when you say us, who's us? Is it 400 people that you know in Silicon Valley? Is it me down here in New Orleans? They're brilliant, controversial, and they're already shaping the future. The question is, whose imagination do we want to live in? This is going to determine the fate of nations and economies and the future of humanity. Listen to the builders on the IHart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

My name is Josie Duffy Rice. I'm a journalist who covers the criminal legal system. And over my career, I've heard account after account of prosecutorial misconduct, story after story of injustice. But I've never heard a story quite like this. The more I kept reading that stuff, I thought, man, there's more red flags that just kept coming up over and over. We'll hypnotize him to strengthen that memory. So he went into a good france. I really didn't believe any of it was real.

And I was like, well, they're going to figure out this is not me. They're going to do their police job. Listen to Examine the Backfire Effect on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts for wherever you get your podcasts. Shortly before 6 o'clock a.m. on November 13th, 1991, Annette's mother and her two young sons found her unresponsive inside their apartment. Investigators ruled the case a homicide. Over the years, detectives continued searching for answers, but the case eventually went cold. This is Hunter Gilmore, host of Hunting for Answers a True Crime podcast, shedding

light on the silent epidemic of missing and murdered black women and girls, bringing attention to stories that equally deserve to be told and to the questions that still remain. As the years passed, detectives continued working the case, but more than three decades after Annette's death, no one has been held accountable. Annette's mother, Frida Scott, spent years hoping to see her daughter's case song. She never saw that day come. Annette Jones' case remains unsolved. Listen to Hunting for Answers, a true crime podcast from the Black Effect Podcast Network on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.

So I think that Anna, one of her points that she's making largely is that we're in a unipart. And the Democrats and Republicans, not really all that different. Fast forward to where we are today, what I am realizing what I think a lot of Americans who have been paying close attention are realizing is that we're not even lucky. enough to live in a two-party system. We are functioning under a very real uniparty, not on the culture war issues. That's what they delve into to divide us and also to market themselves as different from the other party. But when it comes to the economy, when it comes to our foreign policy, there is so much agreement among both establishment parties, Democrats, Republicans. Now, you're starting to see this insurgent, you know, group rise both on the right and the left.

I think the group on the left has been around for a little while, certainly after Bernie ran in 2016. And, you know, it's a mix of Democratic socialists. I think that there are some left-leaning independence like myself who are also part of that group. And the reason why I kind of separate myself from the DSA crowd is because I am different from the DSA crowd. I like some of their economic policies. On a very local level here in Los Angeles, the DSA is destructive and they've done pretty terrible things that have dramatically decreased the quality of life for Angelinos. And so I'm never going to defend that no matter how much I hate, you know, what the Trump administration is doing right now. I don't think that you have to go from, you know, supporting Trump to supporting DSA.

No, just think for yourself and try to figure out where. you land on individual issues. On individual issues, I agree with libertarians on certain things, certainly on foreign policy. Yeah, that's weird. But one of the joys of doing this show and having you on is that sometimes during clips,

I can see that you're looking something up and your eyes will just show horror. And I feel like during that clip, you had a look of like either disgust or horror. I'm just so puzzled by what she's getting at here. I'm so puzzled. What destructive things is she's talking about, first of all? From Angelinos? Right. DSALA. What have they done that's destroyed her life? I'm just, I'm just curious. I think it's the example she uses because she lives there. You know, like, I think there may be a feeling of, hey, look, DSA and socialism kind of stuff. That's great everywhere else, but not in my home or something. That's the feeling it has.

But no, when she first started talking about how we're in a uniparty system, I was just looking up. just to get quite right, one of my favorite quotes. The United States is also a one-party state, but with typical American extravagance, they have two of them. I do feel that way sometimes. I do feel that we have no proper... Is that Voltaire? No, it's Julius Nairi.

Okay. It was a Tanzanian politician. I see, I see. But no, I do feel sometimes that we have no proper opposition party, but I think she and I feel that way for different reasons. Yeah, yeah. And, like, that's critical. Like, I think the war.

why is such an, like, a part of this that they just won't examine. Yes, there is a feeling that there's a lot of people whose views are not being represented and expressed by our leadership. But like, why do you feel that way? Is it the same as, like, for Anna, is it the same as Owen? Hopefully not. They shouldn't agree. And she's never, she's very careful never to give anything that could be pinned down, right?

I like some stuff that shows socialism does, but not all of it. Some of it's very bad. I like some stuff about libertarianism. Well, I think she fucked up a little bit because she did specifically say foreign policy when she was talking about libertarians. What does that mean, Anna? She just wants it to mean that she's against wars. But like, that's silly. That's just the, like everyone liked Ron Paul because he was against the Iraq war.

But that's not like a libertarian position necessarily. They don't own that. No, and also the non-aggression principle that they back all like a lot of these beliefs on. like you can justify war pretty easily. She wants to say that like, oh, we have no interventionist policy, but that's not even accurate for like a lot of libertarians. That's stupid. And foreign policy has to do with like diplomacy, humanitarian kind of things.

Like they would cut off every single humanitarian thing if they could, libertarians. They don't believe we have any responsibility to help anybody anywhere. Like, this is stupid. There's no soft power in libertarian foreign policy, foolish. Right, because it requires forcing you and everyone else to pay for it. Like, you know, you have to tax people in order to get those, you know, gauze and bandages to send overseas. So we can't do it. You can't force people to pay for band-aids.

But she is very studied in the art of saying a lot without saying anything. Yeah, and I think some of the times the, like, specifics come up, it reveals like, I don't I don't think you would agree with libertarians. Like, that just sounds good right now because you're trying to, you're speaking in code and just saying I don't like war. I've only met a few people in my life who I believe know what it means to say they are a libertarian and mean it. I've met a lot of people who say they're libertarians, but I can count on one hand the number of real libertarians I've ever met. I've never been to New Hampshire, so that does skew my results, but. And I'll be clear.

I don't think there's anything like fully wrong with being libertarian, although I do think a lot of the most public examples of people who adhere to those beliefs are silly. And I think that a lot of the beliefs are unfortunately kind of silly and don't work in practice. But I know that there's a lot of like libertarian socialism and there's a lot of groups that incorporate some libertarian ideas into a different like prism. and I haven't explored that enough to shit on them, but I know that the right-wing version of libertarianism is a disaster. In my line of work, those guys are just Nazis. Yeah.

But I know that's not fair to all of them. A couple of years ago, I was in Boston. This fascist front group was putting on something called a straight pride event. I was there just check it out. And a man who, I'll give him the benefit of not naming him here. But a fairly well-known libertarian influencer online was kicked out of the event. And he was very surprised by that because he was there just being a libertarian. You know, he was not 100% on board with what they were doing.

But, you know, more or less, right? He got kicked out of the event. And I ended up standing relatively near him in the street while the Boston police were attacking the counter protest. And this man shocked, shocked and appalled like a child finding out there was no Santa Claus when the police pepper sprayed all of us. That's like Milo. It's the Milo learning that ice is mean. Yeah, dog. That's my sixth time today.

Yeah, and that's what you wanted them to do, just not to you. Come on, straight pride. I love a straight pride parade. I would love to go. I'm jealous that I did not get to go to that. That's one of the things that I hope to do more of on this show is go to things. Yeah, I loved getting beaten by a bicycle when a bike cop chase me into the Holocaust Memorial Sculpture Garden. Well, was the cops straight?

You know, I have to assume there are not a lot of gay cops doing riot control in Boston. Maybe that's unfair of me. Yeah. But I think they would beat, I think the other cops would beat him up. Yeah, yeah, you would think that. But hey, maybe that's our close-mindedness. Who knows? But like with Anna, I think that she's right that, like, you have to think for yourself and pump to decisions on individual issues.

Like, you shouldn't just accept because people tell you this. that's what you should do. But that practice doesn't mean that you have to find common cause with shitheads. Just because you and the cuck destroyer both to happen to not like Israel, that doesn't mean you should be friends with him. Like there needs to be more here. There needs to be more assessment. And she's just not doing it. And where's the line? Yeah. David Duke still has a podcast. Would she do that? I think that she'd- He talks about Israel a lot. I think based on what she's been saying, like it gives you the feeling she'd want to hear him out. I like hearing people out.

That's a great euphemism. You can hear him out from home through your headphones. You don't have to go on his show. Drew, you can turn it the fuck off. So she agrees with the libertarians on like foreign policy kind of stuff, but she also agrees with the left in places and maybe the right in other places. Which ones? Well, let's see if you think they're equivalent.

On individual issues, there are left-wing policies where I agree with them on economic. With the right wing, I mean, conservative specifically, I think that they're right in pointing out some of the excesses of the left when it comes to some of these social issues. And in fact, I got purged from the left simply for drawing attention to the fact that I don't think women should be called birthing people. Like, I think it's degrading. Okay. You don't want to be referred to as a birthing person? No, no, I don't. I got to take this out of my show notes here. So I think my personal understanding of the political landscape was too simplistic in 2016.

As opposed to now, this is mature. So I just want to put a flag on that. So these jokes about like, oh, they're calling people who can have children birthing people instead of calling them women. First of all, that's not a terribly common practice. That's not a universal thing that people are doing on the left. It's not something that comes up that often. what this is is a way of making a joke out of gender-inclusive language. This is a way of signaling, I think, that, you know, the existence of trans people is a valid culture war issue, and it's funny to me that they exist in society.

This is a way of shoehorning that in and making a quick joke about it without having to get into it. That's what that is. Right. And I think in the same way that like the goyam are waking up, kind of, it's, it has a similar pattern. of behavior to the way that she's engaging with it. Like, I don't know anybody necessarily who cares about birthing person as a language thing. I don't think it's real. That's not coming up that often for you.

I think that these are maybe some arguments that possibly real, possibly fake accounts are having on Twitter and she's getting mad about it. And like, if you think that the rights criticism of that is correct, I think you're dumb as shit. Like, I have to think that this is cynical. I have to think that this is a charade because it just doesn't work. It doesn't track for me. Like, that's not why you got purged from the left. Like, Joseph Stalin did not rise from the grave and purge you from the party because you won't say birthing people.

Shut up. Yeah, the woke mascot, the race. her from a picture. I don't even know what the woke mascot would be. Rachel Dolazol, I don't know.

I mean, eight years ago, it could have been gritty. Oh, we love gritty. I feel like that moment has passed, but no, she didn't get purged. She didn't get purged.

That's just casual transphobia. That's lazy. Yeah, she got the like standard online pushback to something dumb, she said. And she's interpreting that

as being purged. And I'm not saying it's not possible that someone very overzealously, probably young person, you know, big Tumblr user, like a young person may have said to her, you know, that's not the language I prefer. But that's just one person's criticism of one moment of language. That's not the party. That's not the world. That's not the entire ideology. And take that criticism and do with it what you will. But don't pretend that's representative of an entire worldview.

And I think if you get that kind of criticism, generally speaking, like, people are fine having conversation. If it is the language they prefer, you can go ahead and deal with that with them. And no one is saying that, like, no one is saying you cannot be a woman. We're just saying generally speaking, not all people giving birth are. And that's a conversation to be had. And it shouldn't be earth-shattering for you. And if it is, it's because you're a transphobe.

You need to fight about it. you're an idiot and a transfer. Yeah. It's generally like, that's, I can't find another explanation. That language exists in like mission statements for organizations so they make sure they're covering everybody. It's not something people are walking around saying every day and getting in your face if you won't. The language police kind of shit is all very tired. Like, in that clip, what you heard is that she's saying that she agrees with the left on economic issues,

but she agrees with the right that the left is too kooky with. woke language. She's fiscally liberal and socially conservative, which is fascinating. And I don't think that these are equally relevant things. You know, like agree with the economy is a huge factor. If you agree with a party about their economic principles, that's a big reason to side with them. Whereas that birthing person stuff is a boutique concern and it does not matter at all. Like, more importantly here is that like folks like Owen, they aren't. mad that a very small group of people prefer the term birthing person to pregnant woman. That's a mask that they're putting on on top of their real complaint, which is that trans

people exist and are allowed to live in public. When Anna tells Owen that the right-wing folks like himself are right about the left in this way, what she's actually communicating is that Owen's position on LGBTQ issues is correct. For Owen and people like him, they don't care about the linguistic issues around something like birthing person. It's a proxy for the real issue. Everyone listening to Owen's show and everyone who has any familiarity with InfoWords understands this. So when Anna affirms Owens position and jokes around with him about it, whether she means to or not, she's taking the side of violently anti-LGBQ people. And she is responsible for not putting herself in that position or being aware of what that

position is. No, I think she knows full well that that was a quick and easy way to signal that I'm with you on this one. We don't need to get into it. You know? Yeah. And you know what's fucked is like that is definitely what's communicated. But whether or not she's willing to take responsibility for that is a whole other thing. I think she would say she's taken out of context.

She's been a broadcaster for more than a decade. I think she knows what she's doing. Yeah. And she's worked at the young Turks. Like when they got clowned on by Alex at the RNC, she worked with legitimate grounded leftists like, the late Michael Brooks. So, like, I can't see her being unaware of, like, the bigger picture.

I can't, I just can't imagine that a person has this perspective. It's silly. No, because this culture war has been going on. Like, the fever pitch, the cultural saturation of transphobia has been going on for a couple years now. So when you signal it, you know, you do know what you're doing. You do. I think so.

I think we've built up enough of a thing. foundation that we can be less charitable with her and less generous. I'm ready to be mean as hell. Okay, cool. Well, let's jump into this next clip then. And hear Anna talk about how, like, back in 2016, she was just getting all this bad info about Trump. Oh, no. Yeah.

Think about this. During the entire election cycle, if you were even leaning on the left, all you're getting is like apocalyptic coverage about how Trump is going to be the end of the world. how Trump hates women, Trump hates everyone. I mean, so when the RNC takes place, I don't know if you remember, but those days were so long. And so we haven't slept.

Cleveland, yeah, it was, it was crazy. It was truly a wild, it was a wild weekend in Cleveland. Absolutely. So it's hot. I haven't gotten much sleep. We're doing a live show every single day that we're there. And so we're running on fumes. And if I remember correctly,

Alex Jones crashing our set happened on the last day of the convention. So we are running on fumes. And so... Everyone at Info Wars was the same way, by the way. I remember we all went to dinner after all of this and we were sitting at the restaurant just like, uh, like, uh, everybody thought we were like zombies.

Interesting. You guys seemed like you had a lot of energy, okay? Well, that's just how we operate, you know. But no, we were we were zomified just like you guys after it was all said and done. So for me, the reason why I reacted the way, I did is because I was so offended that someone would crash your set during a live show. Like, even if it's my worst enemy, I'm not doing that during a live show. Like, I just, I can't do that to them.

Because I'm not even thinking about the hosts, who I might loathe. I'm not just thinking about them. I'm thinking about all the people behind the camera who put in the work to make that show happen. I don't know anything about Alex Jones crashing a live show, Anna. I don't know anything about that. I've never experienced that. That's right. He did that to you, right?

Famously, like every day. My God, I totally forgot about that. Yeah. So anyway, now it's funny because I go and look at that video, I look back at that video. And I wish I would have handled it. I wish we would have handled it differently. Like, that was an opportunity for some great content. Oh, that's an interesting take.

That's a bummer. Great content. We should have collaborated earlier. It's so strange. like she seems to take no responsibility for the fact that she was a content creator in 2016. Like talking about all the bubble stuff and like on the left, all you're hearing is that Trump is evil and stuff. Like you were doing that. You weren't the passive receiver of that information.

You'd have a house because of that. This realization that I come to anew so often is startling every time is that so many people who make a living as pundits are not reading the news. They're reading tweets. They're reading tweets. And the shit they see on their personal social media feed, they think is representative of the world, the media landscape as a whole, that this is all that's out there or like 10 people being mean to me on Twitter is representative of a cultural trend. So it's when she's saying like on the left, all you're seeing is no girl, that's your feed. That's your feed. You saw that because that's what you curated. Did you not as a journalist read the news? You curated it and then brought it to the attention

of everybody as like the news. Yeah. I read a variety of news sources. I read a fair amount, but like I definitely don't get stuff from Twitter. I don't let that form my impressions. But like, even when people like this take a step beyond, like Owen, when he's doing his show, we'll have monitor that's up and has like the front page of the drudge report on it. And like that is just tweets in another form. That's not the news. That's not the news. No, that's just headlines that are written by some dickhead that are basically tweets that are linked stories that you don't click on. But I think that's why these people become so insane is that they think what they're seeing on Twitter is is real life and it's the news and it's all there is and it's all everyone's reading.

Yeah. And it's as a tendency of self-reinforcement. too. Like, it just all... I mean, it's designed that way. Yeah. Yeah. So that whole clip was super weird for me because it felt like Anna was apologizing

for how she handled Alex invading the Young Turk set back in 2016, which makes no sense. I don't think they handled it great, but they were put into a no-win situation there by Owen's employer. The tone of looking back at that is something that she could have handled better

while talking to Owen is insane. Until the end, until the end, until the end, Until the end, when she says we could have made some great content. That reveals everything. In 2016, Anna took their show at the RNC seriously, and it was a great offense for Alex to barge onto their set. But now, here in 2026, she gets it.

It's all a game. Alex didn't barge onto the set to disagree about foreign policy or the economy. He did it to cause a scene, get a bunch of attention, and sell some Hillary for prison shirts. When Anna says she looks back at that and realize that they could have made some great content, what she's expressing is a deeply cynical view of her own career. If she knew what she knows now back in 2016, she would have been able to see Alex violating her set and disrespecting her whole crew as him doing her a favor.

He was creating a volatile situation that they could both benefit from, and if Alex made way more money off the whole thing because he didn't take any of it seriously, then maybe that's a lesson she should learn. If only Anna had known not to take her political beliefs so seriously back then, she could have wallowed in the mud with Alex and Owen and made some really good content. And it feels like that's what she's trying to do now. But unfortunately, the boat has sailed and this all just comes off as embarrassing and desperate. Yeah, it seems like she did learn an important lesson that you can completely change your beliefs to monetize them.

But it's, like you said, it's a little late. Yeah, and... She could have cleaned up if she did this pivot nine years ago. Yeah, or if she had like understood the moment of Alex invading her set and like physically assaulted him or something like that. Oh, wow. Yeah, she could have sold some shirts off that. She could have like if she did not take. And I think that Jenk too, I think he took it a little bit more seriously than he would have now, let's say. But like if they had just been like, all this shit's a fucking game, you don't care about Trump. like the fact that they cared

made them restrict like what behaviors they were willing to engage in and they could have made so much more money and they realized that now that it doesn't matter they weren't willing to play

yeah it sucks and it's kind of gross how openly she's admitting that like yeah we should have we should have been playing ball we should have been playing ball

because it would have been fun and profitable not that as a journalist as a person who didn't she teach journalism at some point? Probably. I don't know.

She's just not taking yourself very seriously as a journalist. You know, we could have made some good content. Content creator brain is a curse on society. And that seems to be like what she believes this role is now and why she is willing to sit down with Owen and be like, hey, we're buddies, we're contemporaries, we're peers. We're making great content. Everything's pro wrestling. Yeah.

It doesn't feel like the issues that you're talking about for a wrestling though. They seem pretty serious. So, like, maybe you shouldn't do this. Hello? What's your favorite scary podcast? IHard Radio presents the soundtrack to your October. From spooky podcasts and chilling playlists to non-stop Halloween radio and more. We have all the thrills and chills you're craving this season.

I'm Melissa Jeltson, and in my new podcast, what happened to her, I'm bringing you new stories and conversations every week. Stories about women whose deaths were too quickly ruled a suicide. She was starting to get worried and get scared for her safety. Stories of survival. The only difference between me and her, frankly, was a little bit of luck, because by all rights, I should be dead. Cases that everyone else called closed.

They can't convict her, right? Like, she has so much evidence. These stories all start in the same place, with a woman failed by a system that didn't believe her, that didn't protect her, that didn't see her. No child should ever experience that. And we were babies. She did all of these brave things and came out and spoke about it,

and he got a year. You never know who that devil is because he's wearing, disguise. Sometimes it's a police uniform. Listen to what happened to her on the Iheart radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. If there's a million times more digital intelligence than there is biological intelligence, it's hard to imagine humans being in control in that scenario. I'm Walter Isaacson, host of the new podcast, The Builders. Right now, we're living through an AI arms race. So I went directly to the people shaping that future. Elon Musk, Dario Amadeh, Alex Carr, Faye, Faye Leap, Homer Lucky,

because I wanted to understand what the most consequential builders believe, what they fear, and where they think this is all headed. Silicon Valley is always saying the cliche thing about the way to predict the future is to create it. Well, yeah, it's up to us. But when you say us, who's us? Is it 400 people that you know in Silicon Valley? Is it me down here in New Orleans? They're brilliant, controversial, and they're already shaping the future.

The question is, whose imagination do we want to live in? This is going to determine the fate of nations and economies and the future of humanity. Listen to the builders on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. My name is Josie Duffy Rice. I'm a journalist who covers the criminal legal system. And over my career, I've heard account after account of prosecutorial misconduct, story after story of injustice. But I've never heard a story quite like this.

The more I kept reading that stuff, I thought, man, there's more red flags that just kept coming up over and over. We'll hypnotize him to strengthen that memory. So he went into a good france. I really didn't believe any of it was real. And I was like, well, they're going to figure out this is not me. They're going to do their police job. Listen to Examine the Backfire Effect on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Shortly before 6 o'clock a.m. on November 13, 1991, Annette's mother and her two young sons found her unresponsive inside their apartment. Investigators ruled the case a homicide. Over the years, detectives continued searching for answers, but the case eventually went cold. This is Hunter Gilmore, host of Hunting for Answers, a Chief. True Crime Podcast, shedding light on the silent epidemic of missing and murdered black women and girls, bringing attention to stories that equally deserve to be told and to the questions that still remain. As the years passed, detectives continued working the case, but more than three decades after Annette's death, no one has been held accountable. Annette's mother, Freda Scott, spent years hoping to see her daughter's case solved. She never saw that day come. Annette Jones's

case remains unsolved. Listen to Hunting for Answers, a true crime podcast from the Black Effect Podcast Network on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. So scholars, the two of them, these both, they talk a little bit about communism, socialism, this kind of stuff. We've always had this pendulum swing in election cycles. There's no question, but it's become a lot more extreme. And I think a good sign of that is you're seeing pretty normy, long-time Democratic voters

suddenly open their minds to supporting people who do espouse, you know, communist ideology or whatever. And by the way, there aren't many candidates who actually genuinely believe in communism. But the Democratic Socialists certainly do believe in socializing certain sectors of our economy, things like health care, which I don't know how your audience would feel about it, but I don't think there should be a profit motive behind healthcare. I think the profit motive is actually very detrimental to our country overall. And I think you see it in our shorter lifespan compared to other industrialized developed countries. You know, that's such a great point.

And I'm sorry to cut you off, but I want to actually, I want to respond to that because I'm not a socialist. I'm very opposed to socialism. But I have to be, I'm a realist more than anything. We already live in a socialist country. This whole act like the Republicans are anti-socialists. Give me a break. You guys are global socialists. You're international socialists.

So this whole act like you're against socialism. It's offensive to my intelligence. But here's the way I kind of look at it. Because I agree with you. There's no denying we spend all this money on health care and yet somehow we have the lowest health standards. So there's something wrong with this. But I look at it from this perspective.

It's very pragmatic. And I'm curious. And this is where it's kind of like, where is the left and the right coming together? I'm not a socialist in any way, shape, form. But I look at our current foreign policy and I look at our current bill and I say, we're spending hundreds of billions of dollars overseas. A hundred out of a hundred times, I will vote to spend that money in America. If that's my choice of you're either going to spend $100 billion on another war and more foreign interest in a foreign country or you're

going to spend $100 billion on anything in the U.S., whatever it is, whatever socialist cause. I would rather spend it in the U.S. 100 out of 100 times. Now, I'd rather not spend it at all, but it's like it seems like these are the options. And when I present this to the right, it's like it completely befuddles them. Sounds like you're talking to dumb people if they're befuddled. So it's tough to know where to start with this. Everything that came out of his mouth is very stupid.

What? You don't say. Almost like it didn't make sense and is internally inconsistent. Yeah. The problem with the holdover hysteria, like this cold war that will not end, this American hysteria about communism is that the average American does want single-payer health care. We would love to every, I think everyone can agree that you should not go bankrupt and die because you can't afford to go to the doctor.

But people are so afraid of communism that they'll die for it. Like they will die for anti-communism rather than advocate for things that they themselves would benefit from. And it's very ridiculous. Yeah. It's baffling to me. It is an inexplicable behavior. Yeah, and what Owen has done here is essentially like rediscover just that Cold Warry kind of period that like John Birch society mentality that is like, hey, I'm going to be pragmatic. All of this is communism. All of this is social.

Like you look at the Democratic Party and anything to the left of that and you're like, well, that's automatically communist. And now you look at the right and you split it into, well, one side's. communist and the other side side that I'm on, incidentally, is the only vestige of patriots and capitalists left. Like, that's, this is just, we're hitting a reset

button or recycle button. Everything I don't like is communism. Yeah. But if we were going to spend that money on war, I would rather spend it on something at home, but I would rather spend none of it. So what do you think money is for? Why do you think the government has money if it's not to spend it? Like, you'd rather

spend it at home than at war, but you'd rather not spend it at war, but you'd rather not spend it at all. So you think the government is just smow? Yeah, yeah. We should, our scrooge, you know, like, pools need to be filled with something. You got to have money to dive into. Yeah, it's a little bit silly because I think that we'd end up in a very interesting hypothetical situation where the lives, like, let's imagine a situation where the lives of Americans can be materially improved by sending a million dollars overseas by six points. But if you spend like a million dollars internally, it'd be raised by three points. What would you rather do? Would you rather

send a million dollars overseas or a million dollars internally if there's more material benefit to Americans by sending it overseas? His argument essentially falls apart there. Well, now you're asking Owen to engage it in philosophical. evaluation, right? You're asking him to do utilitarianism. But I think that he's opening that door himself. And I think that I don't think he has much of an answer. I mean, I guess that's what you always come back to, you know, with Alex, with Owen. I mean, he's just just an Alex acolyte. He's not articulating a positive vision of anything. He can't tell you what he thinks should be, only what should not be. I think that's why they're in this position now of

being MAGA and now being anti-Maga is a lot of these guys on the right are the dog that caught the car. Like now your guy's in charge, what do you think he should do? What do you think should happen? Yeah. Unfortunately, I think if they were to speak frankly about what they think should happen, I think people might start labeling them accurately. And they don't want that. But even that, even this sort of most vile impulses of these right-wing guys, those are, again, things that shouldn't be. I don't think there should be immigrants. I don't think there should be trans people. So that's still a negative vision. What is the end result that you would like to see? They cannot articulate it. Well, it's bounty for white men that will be caused by hurting all of

these other people. Come on. It's obvious. It's just the last chapter of mind comf. Also, Owen, it's ridiculous to hear him say something like openness to everyone should have health care. Like that's so antithetical to everything that InfoWars has stood for for all this time. Yeah, he had to jump in there and say like, well, not quite, not quite because communism. I'm not a communist. I don't want that because communism, but let's face it, we're already in communism. So let's, it's befuddling. I'll agree with him then.

I'll come. I've come around. I'm befuddled. So healthcare is one place where maybe it should, be public. You know, it should be the government running this. Maybe we have an interest in that. And Anna brings up another instance of

where maybe we should have a public sector thing, and that is prisons. I think that what gets lost in these socialist, not socialist debates is that whether we like it or not, the fact of the matter is we live in a mixed economy

where we do have socialized programs, but we also have private companies, which I think is important, but it depends on which sector of the economy we're talking about. So let's focus on prisons for a second because I think prisons help you understand perfectly where I'm coming from. I don't think there should be a profit motive behind operating prisons. But after the formation, the creation of for-profit private prisons, they literally have boards of investors. What do you think those companies did? The first thing they did was push very hard

through a lobbying group to pass, I mean, tough on crime policies, but it's not just tough on crime. It like criminalizes behavior that shouldn't be criminalized so they can increase the number of people who would get arrested, who would get convicted, and who would get sent to the very prisons that they operate. But what's amazing is that these private prisons are given or granted contracts by the federal government. So at the end of the day, we the taxpayers are, funneling money to these private entities that have literally lobbied to pass laws that would criminalize, I think totally, you know, innocent, you know, non-harm harmful behavior. Well, I can tell you from my time in prison, I would say half of the men didn't belong in there.

And I was already kind of of the belief, I wasn't too heavy into it. I was already in the belief that nonviolent offenders should not spend time in jail. And there's some room for debate like. Do you consider theft of violent offense? I would. So there's some room for interpretation there. But you get in there. It's like most of these guys committed, you know, very petty crimes.

They weren't a threat to anybody. A lot of them are just in there for selling weed, quite frankly, which is like legal in half the states now. So, you know, this is something when I got out, I said very much that the right wing needs to embrace criminal justice reform or prison reform because most of these guys don't belong in there. They're not a threat to anybody. And it's costing us, it's costing us hundreds of billions of dollars.

What a big conversation. What a big-brained, deep conversation we're sitting in on here. I think she knows she's being very disingenuous here. You think so? You think so? Yeah. I think so. I think her inability to come up with a crime that is innocent and good that they have outlawed. I think that the inability there kind of shows a hand a little bit. So say like sectors of the economy, for example, prison, weird start. But fewer than 10% of prisons in the United States are privately owned. Like obviously, I think private prison is an abomination. Like she said, there should be no profit motive in prison. But if you're talking about criminal justice reform, if you're talking about the harms of the carceral state,

the privately owned prison is not the place to start that conversation because it is less than 10% of prisons are operated this way. This is not common. This is not a large market share. This is not what's driving the over-incarceration of black men in America because that's what our prisons are full of. But we can't have a conversation about race. We can't have a conversation about the economic incentive of the prison pipeline because that's too scary. Like the economic incentives of the prison pipeline exist before and beyond the existence of the private prison. Totally.

This is a red herring. And she knows that. She has to. But I also think that the idea of private prisons being the problem is something that caught on with the Ron Paulish kind of libertarian-y crowd. Well, I guess libertarians actually probably would be thrilled with private prisons. I'm not sure. But it is that kind of like junior high, like rebellion kind of like I remember when that was my perception that private prisons were everywhere. And they are very bad.

They are, yes, absolutely. But you're totally right in terms of like it is not what the problem is at the root. It's, you know, it goes back to slavery. It goes back to the 13th Amendment making it so if you're duly convicted of a crime that you can be enslaved, convict leasing programs. I was going to say, there were leased convicts taking care of the grounds of the governor's mansion when Bill Clinton was the governor of Arkansas. and they weren't from a private prison. Yeah, all of that legacy exists with the government having the sole domain over incarceration and prisons. Like prior to any private system or these private prisons that she's saying like turned all of the, like created all of these laws that turned minor infractions into things.

Like that was all happening in reconstruction times. Yes, that is, that was all happening to criminalized. the black population at the time. Like, she has to understand any of that if she's, like, wanting to speak on these things. Like, I'm not exonerating core civic, but a lot of the problems she's talking

about predates that company and its board of directors and its shareholders. It was Jim Crow. Yeah. Do I think that they made things worse? Yeah. I think that they're bad. Yeah, but they're continuing a rich American tradition

that she seems to be unwilling to examine. And that's strange. She's willing to approach a critique of capitalism, but is unable to criticize what is underneath that. And a lot of times it's racism. Yeah. I think that's right on the head. I think that's exactly what the problem with her perspective is.

There's a lot of problems. But for Owen, like, he just, I think he's got a better leg to stand on here because no one believes he cares. Like, no one could possibly believe he cares. but you went to prison. I do love how many of the J6 guys came off a 30-day stint in jail prison abolitionists. You know what I mean? Like, damn it sucks in there. Alex got pulled over for a DUI and he's like,

I must crusade to save everyone who's been wrongly arrested for a DUI. Like, that's what they do. And like, I was against prison before I went to jail. I'm going to be straight up. I was always against it. You've been to jail, Dan? I got a DUI when I was like 19, 20, something like that. So I spent a night in a cell, but I didn't go to jail, jail.

Yeah. Yeah, I guess I was, I just was in a cell alone for a night. And you know what? I hate jail even more now. So I get it. I wish that I had that perspective. I had a great time. And I feel really bad about it because, I mean, obviously privilege intersects with it.

And like, I was in central Missouri. I was so nice to the cop. And he gave me, like, an extra pillow and he wrote a letter to the judge to try and get me a lighter sentence. Like, he was like, this is, this guy was so cooperative and great. Like, my experience was not the norm for people. That's for sure. I got a full cavity search. I got coffee.

I got an apology from the cop. I just think it's so interesting how many of these guys came out of jail saying, holy shit, did you? you guys know about this? And it's like, yeah, on the left, we did. We did. We've been talking about it. Yeah, and a lot of the people who are in your cohort, like with Owen, you also knew. You just liked that it was being done to other people and you felt immune from it. But I think that Owen's, like, his personal experience is a good way to hang a new kind of brand thing there. So if he's breaking away from some of the right wing in terms of like prison abolition or prison reform, then he could be like, I was there.

That's cool. That's evocative. And I hope he's sincere about it. He's not. But he also apparently still, like, he thinks that property crime is violence, which is strange. Violent. That's interesting. I mean, I guess that's sort of a libertarian idea, right? That taking my things is a form of violence against me.

Yeah. Yeah. And this is the part that I think is really fascinating that this clip kind of embodies is that, like, they're both right, but they're fucking idiots, and they're not right about the big picture. The basic point that they're making is the prison system is desperately broken and we need to fix it. Like, that is true. It's a crisis.

It requires immediate detention in whatever form we can. But they're both lying. Like Owen doesn't care and Anna's hiding the ball. Like, it's ridiculous. This is kind of where it ends with, no matter what point they think they're making. When they approach correctness, they are right for the wrong reasons and with evil in their hearts. Yeah, it does feel that way, doesn't it? And I don't think that counts as being right.

No, no, it doesn't have to, because other people are more right and not doing that. Let's give it up to them instead of problematic rights. In this next clip, Anna discusses. what I would describe as a junior high political science revelation, which is that we pay the politicians bills. Oh my God. And this has been a struggle for me personally because I'm trying to get my audience to think differently

if they fall under the category I'm about to describe. People at some point lost the plot and now believe that we, the people, are meant to serve the public servants. Whoa. And the answer is no. They signed up to serve us. We pay their salaries. And so this idea that I need to come on the show and cheerlead for a politician because

they're on my side is ridiculous. No. Like it just recently happened with AOC where she lied. Like she lied and said, I have never voted to provide weapons to Israel. But she did when she voted against Marjorie Taylor Green's amendment to a bill that would essentially cut half a million dollars in weapons. to Israel, what did AOC do? She voted against that amendment. What else was in it? Well, what does that do? Well, that's going to provide weapons to Israel if it doesn't pass, right? If that amendment doesn't pass.

Now, she says, well, it's not offensive weapons. It's defensive weapons. Okay, well, I personally look at the modern state of Israel and I see the new Nazis and a lot of people on the left, and I think some people on the right as well agree with that. So did anyone have a debate about whether or not we should provide defensive weaponry to the Nazis. Like that's crazy. And why are we tasked with paying for Israel's defensive weapons when we're $40 trillion in debt? Anyway, sorry. But my point is, I don't know if it's worth mentioning, but we did at one point help the Nazis. So I know, I know about that, yes, which is not great, which is not great. But later, we helped to fight, defeat them. And in modern times,

I just think this debate about whether or not we provide Israel defensive weaponry. We pay for their defensive weaponry after they've done what they've done in Gaza. And as they continue to do what they're doing in the Middle East overall, no, I don't think that they are, we're not obligated to give them our money. But my point in bringing that anecdote up is to just say, please hold your preferred politicians, those are the ones that you should hold accountable the most. Because if they feel that they're like the head of some sort of fan club and you can do know wrong, they're going to F you. And our politicians have been screwing us over for a long time

now. We have been allowing them to get away with it. But what's kind of giving me a little bit of hope is that, like, I would have never guessed that you out of all people would be as objective in analyzing Trump's performance in his second term. But you've been incredibly objective. And what I mean by that is you've been clear about what your values are, what your policy preferences are. and as soon as Trump reneged on those campaign promises, you started criticizing him, which is what you are supposed to do, especially as a member of the media.

But we got to keep moving toward that paradigm because the current paradigm that we've been living under where these politicians think we owe them something is unacceptable. So hold your own side accountable. Cool, cool. Objective Owen, the double O. Thank you so much, Owen, for your objectivity and your courage.

And your brilliance. Yeah, that's so embarrassing. It's funny that she's saying he's objective because I don't think he's capable of object permanence. Like, someone puts hands over his eyes. He thinks they disappear. Like, he's objective. What the fuck? Oh, man.

Oh, my God. There's not going on there. Thank you, Owen, for your courage. Absolutely. Absolutely. So on one level, this is the sort of revelation that most people interested in these topics has, in their late teens, early 20s, so it doesn't hit very hard from Anna,

but it is fair that we pay the salaries of our representatives and cops and all that. Yeah, cool. But much more important than that, what Anna is doing here is incredibly dangerous. She believes that she's just opposed to Israel and that she's done the work to disentangle that policy preference from any possible anti-Semitism.

I think she hasn't, but that's her perception. That's what she believes her, like, public persona is. Or which she wants you to believe she believes. Yes, that's the image that we're being sold, whether it's accurate or not. Because she feels like her stance is righteous and it's free from bigot attachments, when she sees other people like Owen calling her the queen of the dissident right and hyping her up, when previously they'd been bitter rivals, it plays into her ego to assume that Owen is doing that because she's just so right. It's really easy to understand how that would feel awesome and you'd want to feel that.

So, little story here. I wrote from my campus paper in college, and it was mostly just a bunch of bullshit, trying to be funny and doing a little bit of pre-social media trolling. The column that I wrote got a bit popular around campus, and one night I was at a house party where I ran into a kid who had bullied me in high school. I wasn't super athletic and definitely not conventionally attractive, and he would pick on me in gym class, so it was a thrill when he started telling me how cool I was at this house party.

he was acting like we'd always been friends and it was a bit intoxicating to be swept up into this place where I felt like I had the upper hand over this person who'd made me feel like shit previously but I knew even that night that he was full of shit I put up with him and I didn't call him out

because I wanted to enjoy the party and I don't like fighting but I never wanted to see him again he may have actually liked my writing or that could have all been bullshit but it didn't matter the face he was putting on was fake when it was advantageous for him to bully me, he bullied me.

Now it was advantageous for him to act like my friend, so he was acting like my friend. None of it was real. What I realized that night was that he was a desperate loser, and that that was true in high school, too. That was just a situation where desperate losers who fit certain social criteria had a massive upper hand over losers like me. What I'm saying is that this is the same thing that's going on with Anna and Owen. Owen and Infowars bullied them back in 2016 because they were living high on the hog, and the social conditions were right for their brand of desperate loser to bully people like Anna and Jenk. Barging into their set at the RNC, that's basically like them shoving the young Turks in a locker.

That's what they were doing. All good bullies derive their power from having a giant friend who will fight for them in case things pop off. The bully themselves might be a squirly weirdo, but the implication is that if you may be a squarely weirdo, but the implication is that if you mess with them, you're going to face the giant. Owen had that in 2016, where Trump was their giant, but now it's clear he's not fighting for any of them.

Alex lost his entire life's work and Owen went to jail and Trump doesn't give a fuck. They have no backup. But back to reality, the reason this is dangerous is because even if we believe that Anna's position on Israel is straight up and not a bigoted position, she has to know that Owens is not.

If she's in this line of work, she has a responsibility to know who she's endorsing, and if she won't put in that effort, she has a responsibility to recuse herself from interviews like this. She can't use whatever political credibility she has with her audience to say that Owen Schroyer stuck to his positions and treated Trump objectively. That's an absolute fiction, and it hurts. It harms people. Owen Schroier has no coherent position on Israel, and Anna has no excuse not to know that. All of his shit is recorded and it's available online. But zooming out to a bigger picture, these two can fuck off. Owen only has a career because he was exactly what Anna is accusing other media figures of being,

where they make themselves subservient to a politician and become their cheerleader. You could make an argument that between Alex and Joe Rogan and the subsidiaries that come off of the things that are downstream of that, like there are a lot of the reason why we're in the situation we're in now. If principles mattered or if he ever had any interest in policy vis-à-vis Israel, Owen could have broken with Trump when he recognized Jerusalem as the capital in 2017. But instead, he supported that. And then he tried to overturn the 2020 election to reinstall Trump. Like all of this stuff, when she says he's consistent,

all you're doing is making people who respect you more likely to believe bigots and shitheads are respectable. Yeah, I mean, yeah, it's important to remember that Owen didn't change his mind about Trump until not only fairly recently, but he was willing to go to jail for Trump after a full four-year term. He had a full four years of what that looked like. Yep. And there were countless times. Like, Anna was probably getting a lot of mileage out of this idea that like you were objective in the second term, you know, or whatever. But like, there's so many instances in the first term of Trump doing the exact. opposite of what people like Owen and Alex said he was going to do and demanded that he do and then them making excuses for it. There's no reason for her to do this. And again, she's doing that thing where she has one valid point and then she surrounds it with sort of this

vague nebulous bullshit, right? Like, I agree. You don't have to cheerlead for any politician. You don't have to remain loyal to a politician who you mostly agree with or that you voted for or that you used to support. You don't. You don't owe them. anything, you do, you know, as a 17-year-old would tell you, you do pay their salary. But the example she gives that apparently very much upset her was that AOC lied when she said she would never vote to send weapons to Israel because she voted against an amendment to a bill proposed by Marjorie Taylor Green. That's the example you have.

Right. Marjorie Taylor Green. Even if we don't look into it any deeper, let's say we don't look into it any deeper, what we can say is that Anna is also being manipulative. here because she said that AOC lied that she'd never voted to send weapons to Israel. And the example that Anna is bringing up is her voting against something that would have sent less weapons to Israel. So technically speaking, AOC would be semantically not lying there.

And I'm not trying to nitpick and I'm not defending AOC because I would never defend a politician. I'm not interested in that. Right. Me neither. But it's like she has this one small. valid point that a child could make. And then she tries to give an example, and it's just not a very good one. Because AOC would have caught a lot more flack for voting for something Marjorie Taylor Green supported.

Probably, unless it was the Epstein vile's stuff. I think, you know, Marjorie Taylor Green associated herself quite heavily with that. That's a tricky spot. Yeah. I agree. And I think that it is just a problem when the specifics come up. Like, I agree with libertarians on foreign policy. What?

I agree with the left on economics. Yeah. This political analysis is something I would expect from a college freshman taking their first political science course and not getting a great grade. Or a content creator. Or a content creator, but not someone who has taken themselves seriously as a pundit in the area of domestic politics for a decade. Yeah. And foreign politics. and is speaking to, like, really, really serious issues.

Like, I think that I would take this kind of approach to someone who's, like, watching traitors or something, you know, but I don't know about the big picture. It's unserious. So this next clip, Owen says something that is deeply unsurious and it hurts. Owen? No, he wouldn't. It wounds me. And, you know, this is where I think a lot of people within MAGA are just,

I don't know the right word for it. I guess I would say politically immature. Wow. They weren't really involved in politics before Trump. They came into politics because they were Trump cheerleaders. And there's no doubt, you know, the momentum of Trump 2.0 and the second election, you know, that provided them a lot of gas in their tank. And they're selling shirts. And, you know, they having a whole online brand and personality that's based on Trump.

So really, they have this thing. I'm sure you've heard of audience capture. I kind of knew a lot of it as audience capture. It's like, well, they sell Trump gear. Like, their name is like Maga Dog. So it's just like they can't really break from that. That's their entire personality. That's their entire persona.

It's their entire brand. So they can't really break from that for pragmatic reasons. And what they don't understand about somebody like me is I was in the media before Trump. I'd like to stay in the media after Trump. I know what I stand for. And I am in no way, shape, or form in a mindset of praising a politician. I'm like you. I think that they should probably be working for us.

Probably. Probably working for us. What? Some people are really struggling with audience capture. Not me, though. No, I'm great. Owen, the Cuck Destroyer. Yeah.

I've always been a freethinker. And I was in media before Trump. I was doing local sports. And then I filmed myself a protest, making people cry. And Alex gave me a job on Info Wars where I cheer led for Trump for about 10 years and worked with Roger Stone on the war room. He was this co-host. What the fuck are you talking about? Dude, this is gaslighting.

The actual human man, Roger Stone. Yes, you were buddies. And the Nixon Tulpo that lives in his skin. Yeah. Oh, God. It's just not fair that people can say things like that and not, I don't know, explode or something. It's got to cause like a burning sensation at least to tell a lie like that. Like, it has to hurt a little.

That clip is about a minute long, and the first 30 seconds is him talking about himself. He's describing himself. I cheerleading for Trump, someone who's caught in an audience capture. That's his entire career. You made it your whole personality. You were selling merch. You're really stuck there. Like, yeah, dog, that's you.

Yeah. You've changed maybe some of the aesthetic qualities of it, but it is the same thing. But the end of it really does feel like he's talking about Alex. Like, you're stuck in this place where you work for Bigley. like how can you possibly get away from but the other thing that I can't really wrap my head around is like he has to know that the only reason he has a career

is because Alex allowed himself to be captured by that audience like they sold the Trump t-shirts so Owen could have a house like no one wants his shit otherwise no one's paying for this I mean cognitive dissonance can be so powerful And I do think that maybe some of this he is not able to understand because understanding it would destroy him.

It would cause such a blow to his sense of self that he wouldn't be able to get up in the morning for the rest of the year. You know? So I think some of it just can't reach, it can't penetrate his mind. But it is very bizarre to watch him do it. And here's some free advice for him. if what you're saying is true, take that half year off. Allow yourself to be paralyzed by whatever self-revelations there are. You'll come back better.

Go on a silent retreat, you know, get some intensive therapy. Get back into local sports. It's fine. Because this, I think, is so threatening to his sense of self, were he to realize that that whole statement was about himself. I agree. That mirror is rough. So the two of them get to talk in about third party possibilities.

No. And like maybe, you know, Joe Kent is hanging out, Tucker, Marjor, Taylor Green, all these people, maybe they're going to make a third party. Do you look at 2028 and a third party rise being a serious, formidable thing to look at? If I'm 100% honest, I have to say no, because making a third party formidable would recall. I think it would require years of strategy. And look, I've seen attempts at third parties and they always fizzle out. I don't have an answer for you. I don't have like a perfect.

Carlson, Marjorie Kater Green, Thomas. Yeah. I mean, they're clearly strategizing happening. They are. They are. They are. They are. They're definitely strategizing.

I mean, Joe Kent went on with the plan with the young Turks. I mean, he kind of introduced the whole thing right there. I would love to see a viable third party. I'm worried like our electoral structure is intentionally built to reject the formation of a third party. So, but I don't know. I mean, there might be some way to make it happen. I think that I'll just, I'll frame it this way. If that doesn't happen, if there isn't a political solution to what most Americans are undergoing and struggling with right now,

there's going to be violence, you know, and I've been saying that on the show, not because I'm promoting violence, but think about it. When you find yourself in a political system where you're not heard and you know that there's really no avenue in which you'll ever be heard, but the government's taking money out of your paycheck every single time and giving you nothing for it, at some point, I think Americans are going to be shaken out of their complacency and they're going to want to take matters into their own hands. So either, and here's the thing, when you go back, you look at FDR, you should listen to his speeches and you'll find that FDR realized, if I don't do the New Deal, capitalism is over, communism is ascendant, and he didn't want communism. So the New Deal was a way, and by the way, socialists complain about this all the time, because they saw the New Deal as a way of keeping socialism and communism at bay. But we don't have political leaders who are sophisticated enough to realize if they keep doing what they're doing, things are going to get scary. I'll just leave it there.

Well, there's so much more we can talk about, Anna, you know, you don't seem like a person lacking in self-confidence, but let me just tell you, if you're ever doubting yourself, go read the comments in the chat, and you'll know how the people really feel about you. They're digging the whole vibe today. Thank you. I really appreciate that. I love the conversation.

And I just want to say, I appreciate you, because it takes guts to turn. turn on someone that you know most people in your political spectrum support, but you decided to stick to your values. And I think in the long run, that's going to stand out when it comes to all these content creators. Yeah, yeah. He stuck to his principles and what a guy. That's one thing you can really say about the cuck destroyer is that he believes in

something and he really sticks to it. Yep, yep, yep. He is consistent at his destruction of cuckolds. So when was Joe Kent on The Young Turks? When did she interview Joe Kent on her show? I'm not sure if she did. Maybe Jenk did. I'm not sure. But it makes sense to me.

It seems like a good fit. Yeah? I guess. I don't know. Based on this interview. Yeah. Yeah. I saw Joe Kent speak once.

It was at a Justice for J6 rally in D.C. a couple years ago. Hell yeah. Yeah. I saw him in that America First. versus MAGA debate, I mentioned, sitting very comfortably and passively while Alex Jones screamed. Yeah, he had a member of the proud boys on his campaign payroll. So that seems like a good fit for your progressive content mill. Yeah.

And that third party that, you know, is supposedly involves Joe Kent is like Thomas Massey, Marjorie Taylor Green, Tucker Carlson. Yeah, it's like, okay, these are fucked up people. So it's the people who are willing to break with the GOP over their overt and violent anti-Semitism. Yeah, and they hope that some people on the left will side with them, and then they can purge them when the time is right. Like, yeah, girl, you go with them, you don't survive. It seems unlikely. But, hey, if you listen to that clip, it feels like Anna's position is that neither the Democrats nor the Republicans are going to do a new deal. and a third party isn't viable, so violence is inevitable.

That isn't really all that interesting, and I think a lot of people in this branch of media are becoming more and more comfortable with violence talk, but behind these comments, we see what side Anna is on. She's on the side of the bosses, and the side that's willing to throw crumbs to pacify the underclasses, and if violence does break out, she's on their side. Her complaint about the system is that it's stopped giving the public

enough bread and circuses to keep them subdued, and if that goes on much longer, the public will become too aware of their own condition and violently fight back. I'm not sure I agree with her on all of that, but let's stipulate that she's right. If that's the truth of where we are, why is she going on Owen's show

and building a bridge with a lunatic bully whose worldview is baked and half-understood John Birch Society talking points? If she's being honest about what her views are, why isn't she invested in helping make the public more aware of the conditions that they're in. Her demand seemed to boil down to insisting that politicians should pacify the public more so we don't wake up to how much we're being fucked over by the rich.

It feels very much like the bottom line is that she thinks the rich should continue being able to fuck everyone over just more subtly so as to not cause violence. I guess that's an improvement from where we are now, but if you're aware of these dynamics and believe that this is the state of the world, then I don't get how this doesn't come off like someone pretending to be against slavery, but advocating for convict leasing. Like, it's stupid. The position that she's seemingly putting forth is deceptively anti-populist.

No, and it's interesting when she chooses to say the quiet part so loud. Because I think this is a rather revealing thing to say because to some extent, I think she is right that there is no political will. or political savvy in this moment to do something like Roosevelt did, to appease the masses with a large scale package of popular appeasement. I think she is right about that. And I think that will cause problems. But it sounds like she might be in favor of those problems because then it justifies the violence to put it down. I think that would be something she's more comfortable with then, like, let's say, reformation of capitalism.

into something else. I think that she's definitely not interested in that. And I think that, like, obviously, you're talking to the Cuck Destroyer. And he worked for 10 years for a company that is partially responsible for why we have politicians who aren't savvy in any way. All of the people that they champion

are the biggest dumbdums in the world. The collective dumbing down has been a generational blow. Yeah. And we have a media that, has grown that will never allow people to be, like, compromised with. You know, like, everybody's mad about anything. And so, like, the idea that somebody who would have the savvy of a Roosevelt could come along, make a new deal in order to keep the ship moving, like, there's no way this media

space allows that to happen. Everyone, like, yeah, we, we, Owen is directly connected to the erosion of, politics and media in a way that that's why we're here. We're here and he loved it. Like you said, he owns a house because of the intentional political polarization that has made it impossible to even imagine the kind of bipartisan cooperation it would take to do something for the collective public good. Like, we don't, we don't have that anymore. There is no more collective public good. There's a measles outbreak because people aren't getting vaccines anymore.

Yep. the compromise and the like kind of coming across the aisle is this like it's a it's we could we could do a show where we you know like that's what this is that to me is is a dreadful state common good is we can make a stupid fucking show we could have made some good content out of it yeah so we end here with anna and owen just congratulating the shit out of each other for being so cool and good there's so much out there, but I think that there's a lot of dishonest content. So really happy to see honest, honest commentary that sticks to your real values. And you know what? We're seeing a lot of this, you know, and that's why I said what I said earlier. I said, I'm looking at what you're doing. I'm looking at what the young Turks are doing.

Maybe I don't agree with everything politically, but it's like you guys are principled. You know what you're talking about. And I just see everything MAGA has become is pure cultish. low information. They don't have any principle. And so it has really opened up this new realm of, okay, we're finding unity left, right. We're having real conversations. Maybe this leads to something good for the country politically. We're kind of in the beginning faces of this. But great conversation, Anna. I hope we can do it again sometime soon. For sure. Take care. Each other are great. The young Turks are principled.

Sticking to their values. What values? Whose? Well, I mean, You know the ones. They're so hard. I love people complimenting each other, and I think it's very sweet. So the two of them being so nice to each other makes me feel a certain way. But I've been doing this a while. And so because I have a history in this, I can't not remember stuff like this. It's like I have to actually ignore the young Turks because they are so stupid.

and because they are so pathetic, and mainly because they are so irrelevant. Like, if I spent all day trying to counter what comes out of the young Turks, it'd just be a waste of time. Nobody listens to them. Nobody cares. Nobody takes them seriously. They have zero impact, zero impact. That's why Bernie Sanders couldn't even get a nomination. So, that's why I just ignore the young Turks because they're basically just, it's like speaking to a turd.

Someone came here and took a deuce in the studio. Would I talk to the deuce? No, I'd be an idiot. So I'm not going to talk to the young Turks. Why won't chunk yogurt debate Alex Jones? Why won't there be a young Turks versus Info Wars debate? I'd be glad to have it. It'd be not only great entertainment, get millions of views.

It's conversation debate that needs to happen. But the young Turks would never show up because they're morons. And they can't debate the things they stand for. And they know if they had to debate and actually go toe-to-to-toe intellectually with somebody on the other side, they'd be embarrassed. So they never do it. So there we go. There's a clarion call to the young Turks.

You guys suck. You'll never debate us because you know you suck. You'll never debate us because you know you're wrong on all the issues. And you'll never debate us because you know you'll be completely embarrassed and we'd mop the floor with you. So keep hiding on your YouTube channel, young Turks. Keep hiding behind your fake reviews. Keep hiding behind your fake ratings. Nobody cares about you.

Nobody watches you. and you're so pathetic, you won't debate the real guys. You won't come and face the real heavyweight champions of the world Info Wars. Oh my gosh. Sorry, I just forgot how insane these people are. This is Anna Sarkesian from the Young Turks. She seems like a real nice lady as she shows her disdain towards Christians now in this unhinged abortion rant in clip 21, but,

but there's something about this clip that really stands out that really shows what it's all about. And I'll explain this, but first, here she is going on an unhinged rant because she can't kill her future babies. Cool. Yeah, I do think it was really fun that he got her name wrong because he was thinking of that Gamergate lady. And also, that clip came from way too late for that to be a reasonable slip. A fascinating slip. I was hoping you had some of those on deck. Yeah. And that's the kind of shit that Owen and Infor's used to say about the young Turks and Anna.

And his feelings haven't changed. Anna still supports access to reproductive health care, including abortion. So how is it possible that Owen has decided to stop caring so much about how she wants to kill babies? That really mattered to him, like almost like it was a lot of. a principle. Owen started warming up to Anna in 2024, not because of any policy decision that they agreed on, but because she got mad about someone using the term birthing person. Her outrage and social media fight around this played directly into the anti-trans hysteria that Owen and Infowars have been pushing as one of the main pillars of their culture war coverage. It was one of the big

ways that they tried to distract from how obviously corrupt and evil Trump was by yelling passionately about how if anyone but Trump won, they were going to forcibly cut your son's dick off. Oh, my God. Whatever Anna's intentions or full beliefs were about the term birthing person, her actions were perfect for Owen to exploit, so he did. He started talking about how she may be one of the only people on the left who really gets it, and as she spoke critically about Biden and then Harris,

it all worked really well for Owen. As Anna was catching heat from the left, particularly the online left, for her comments and tweets, she was hearing this sympathetic voice from people like Owen. The people who were supposed to be on her side were so mean, and her enemies were saying that she was the only one who saw reality clearly, so it's pretty easy to guess which story you'd rather hear. And it only makes sense that what brought them together was these culture war issues, because to quote Anna herself from this episode, Culture war issues. That's what they delve into to divide us and also to market themselves

as different from the other party. He didn't end up coming together over some agreement about important fiscal policy or foreign affairs. It was because Owen liked that she was fighting with LGBTQ folks online and he knew it was better for his bigot position to validate and encourage her. He stopped pretending she was a demon, and I think she may have misinterpreted some of that as actual agreement or as meaningful. But here's the thing.

She might take the genocide in Gaza seriously, and she may have serious geopolitical points that she would like to further in her opposition to Israel. But for Owen, this is no different than the birthing person stuff. By engaging with him on the subject and by elevating his show to something that's hard-hitting and objective media, Anna is effectively trivializing the importance of this issue. And I don't see how this can be anything other than a calculated move. To pretend that you found an intellectual ally about one of the biggest issues in this time in the Kuck Destroyer is just not serious behavior.

And I think the key to all of this can be found in that part that we listened to earlier, where Anna was talking about InfoWars crashing her set in 2016. She regrets how she responded and she's not going to miss the chance to make some really fun content again. That's bullshit. I think that was the most illuminating thing she said that we've heard so far is that we could have made some really good content out of that. Yeah. If getting yelled at a little bit online causes. you to completely change your deeply held views about the world, you didn't believe that shit in the

first place. Yeah. You didn't. You don't know who you are. You do not have a stable sense of self. You do not believe in these things fervently. If you can change on a dime because some people were rude to you. And if that rudeness or that pushback that you receive makes you think that the guy who

exploitatively crashed your set 10 years ago is maybe a cool guy and maybe you guys can work together. If that, like, you have no basis. There's a house built on sand. It turns out what you believed in was getting paid attention to and receiving positive attention. Because now you found positive attention somewhere else and suddenly you believe something else. And Owen Schroier is consistent and he's one of the objective guys. They've both always been consistent in their beliefs and that's one thing I would definitely say about them. Yes, yes. Consistency is king.

I think that I entered this interview with a feeling of like, I think this is a really bad idea for Anna to do. And I think that I generally give a little bit more grace because of the ostensible leftness. But as I got through it, I think I feel worse about her than I do about Owen. Like, Owen's a loser. And like, he has no purchase. Owen's way dumber. But he also has like a space that he's.

going to exist in that is the guy who used to work at Info Wars, and most people aren't going to take that seriously. I think Anna has a lot more, like, relevance and credibility to different people that, like, I don't know. I think that some of the things that she reveals in this conversation of, like, I miss, I miss the opportunity to make that content, you know, the ways that she kind of revealed that I don't want the people to get what they need. I want crumbs. to pacify people. These mentalities that are expressed, I think, are way, they have the potential to be spread much broader

and much more credibly from her than Owen. It was worse than I expected. This was a lot worse than I expected. And you're right. Like, at this point, Owen's not even on Info Wars anymore. Owen's out on his own broadcasting from his house. Like, what audience does he meaningfully have anymore to make this?

I mean, it's hard enough to do a content pivot. And it's hard enough to start over trying to find your own audience. To do both at once, like, he's almost destined to fail. So to go on his show as someone with an enormous platform, someone coming from the Young Turks, which has, you know, very well-established, very large audience, she is granting legitimacy to Owen and granting legitimacy to the idea that you can find common cause with people like Owen. And increasing the odds that low-information viewers of the Young Turks,

agree with that, that they now think they can find common cause of people like Owen over their perhaps sincere beliefs about Israel. Yeah, and it's a bummer. And it makes me actually think, like, I wonder if times are tough. Maybe we overestimate the audience that the young church has. Maybe this is a sign of a desperation in audience chasing that like maybe she thinks that they're, people that Owen has access to that this opens up. And that, that's kind of bleak. Because she's trying to do a content pivot, right? For the last couple of years, she's been doing this slow pivot. And I think that has had an impact on the audience of the young Turks. Yeah. So, I mean, it's bad for both of them. But it's bad for society, mostly. It's an alien predator situation. No matter who wins, we lose. Right. This is, I think, embarrassing for both of them, but it is a harbinger of something very negative about the media space.

Yeah. The ally ship that isn't ally ship that is being found is scary. But I'm fascinated also by the way that it's very obviously embarrassing for both of them. The display and what they, but it doesn't, they don't have to feel that, you know? That's what I find really interesting. Like, neither of them are embarrassed that they did this, but they should be. It's remarkable. I think sometimes if I were able to shut off the part of my brain that had any shame or memory of my own past actions, I might be very successful. If you can just free yourself from time and continuity, everything is on the table. But unfortunately, I do have strongly held beliefs that I can't abandon. Well, that sucks for your paychecks, but it's probably better for the world.

It is. It's remarkable, though. This doesn't appear painful. And I think that's why it's so painful for me to watch is because I'm imagining what it would feel like to behave that way and it would cause me agony. But I don't, I don't think they're experiencing that. Nope. I think that they're just fine. They seem happy. Yeah. That sucks. But hey, I don't want to begrudge someone their happiness. I don't want to yucky yum. Okay, yeah, me too. All right. I was lying. I do want to go out that yum. So Molly, thank you so much for joining. This has been an absolute delight. And I look forward to rounding this out with a talk about the Joel Webbin folk next time. I'm so excited. You have no idea how, like I said, I promised I'm not looking it up.

I'm not spoiling it for myself. You're going to get to tell me. But I told my husband what we were going to be talking about. And he was like, oh, my God. Oh, my God. You're going to hate it. I can't wait to talk to you about it. So he's sworn to not tell me.

I told him, you can't tell me anything. Don't tell me, because it's going to be a surprise, but he's horrified. I love the way that this is teasing for everybody. This is building up. Well, listeners, you'll get to hear that horror that is on our next episode. But people can find your podcast, weird little guys everywhere around, all over the place. Wherever you're listening to a podcast, just be careful, make sure you have headphones on. I was walking down the street towards Lake Michigan.

I just looked down. there was a weird little guys episode. Just right there. You could find it everywhere. It's everywhere. It's just out and about. But yeah, do wear headphones. Yeah.

I think anybody who likes this kind of media knows the headphone rule. You're going to hear some awful things that maybe you don't want people misjudging you for. You've got to look around, everyone around you and say, no, I'm against this. Yeah. I'm cool. I'm cool. I don't know if you can see in the background there, but I have, like, Wallace for president. and like gold water.

I don't think I did see the Wallace for president. Yeah, I found some old like George Wallace stickers and like buttons at a thrift shop. And whenever I have people over who maybe like don't know me that well, I always am like, shit, don't look at that. Please, I don't like George Wallace. That's actually so good. And the sickest thing is, I'm jealous. I would put that up in my house just as like in like the corner of evil because it's a

fascinating relic. But it is. You have to tell everyone who walks into your house. I'm against that. Yeah. I have a framed Info Wars magazine cover like on the wall. It's like if you just read this wrong, I'm a fucking creep. There's some weird shit on the walls in this guy's house. It's like going to Clarence Thomas's house in the 80s. So Molly, I still don't have an outro. I don't have anything to say. It has to come to you. No, and it's not. It is not organic. But you know it is organic, but not nice. Knowledge Fight Country is a production of Cool Zone Media. For more podcasts from Coolzone Media, visit our website, poolzonemedia.com, or check us out

on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Clips, links, and sources, reference and episodes are listed directly in episode descriptions. Thanks for listening. I'm Melissa Jeltson, host of the What Happened to Her podcast. We're kicking off the season with the Sandra Burr's. more story, a case the police rode off as a suicide in a snowstorm. Her family never bought it, and the man they suspected wore a badge. You never know who that devil is because he's wearing in disguise. Sometimes it's a police uniform.

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