Pivot - HBO Max Returns, Trump in the Middle East, and RFK Jr. Goes Swimming

Episode Date: May 16, 2025

Kara and Scott discuss Trump’s deal-a-palooza in the Middle East, the Meta antitrust trial, and the return of HBO Max. Plus, Apple could raise iPhone prices, but without blaming tariffs, and RFK Jr. went swimming…in sewage? Follow us on Instagram and Threads at @pivotpodcastofficial. Follow us on Bluesky at @pivotpod.bsky.social. Follow us on TikTok at @pivotpodcast. Send us your questions by calling us at 855-51-PIVOT, or at nymag.com/pivot. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's up y'all, it's Kenny Beach and we are currently watching the best playoff basketball since I can't even remember when. This is what we've been waiting for all season long. And on my show Small Ball, I'll be breaking down the series matchups, major performances, in-game coaching decisions, and game strategy and so much more for the most exciting time of the NBA calendar. New episodes through the playoffs available on YouTube and wherever you get your podcasts. Subscribe to Small Ball with Kenny Beach so you don't miss a thing.

Look, he can do whatever he wants. If he wants to swim and shit, good luck, Robert. I can't believe he continues to survive. Hi everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Scott Galloway. I'm a bit thrown off by that. What's the Pup Hunter? I'm in your studio.

Oh, you're in my studio. Oh. Do you see this? I'm here. Oh, let me see. Don't I look like you? Isn't this great? Oh my gosh. Look at that. Look at that. I'm Scott Galloway, except I have hair. It's like that show, Substance. I want to be the hot young one in the unitard though.

I love that the only way Demi Moore gets an Oscar or a Golden Globe is if there's a much hotter version of her prancing around on a leotard. That's the only way they were going to give her an award. Yeah. Yeah. Well, for those who are just listening through audio, the background is the same because I'm at

Scott's apartment in New York because my son- Are you going through my stuff again? Again. You like to do that, don't you? No, I have Alex doing it this time. Yeah. My son, Louis, graduated college. Well, it's a long graduation process here at NYU,

but there was a smaller graduation yesterday, and there's a big one today, at Yankee Stadium. And Scott has so kindly let me use his apartment for the invasion of the Swishers for Louis' graduation. And so I'm here in your studio, which is lovely. And I have been going through your things and deciding what to keep.

And unrelated news, do not open the guest room closet. If it smells funny, it's definitely not Patrick, my male escort that wanted 80 bucks instead of 70 and I had to take care of it and I was a little too much math. Just don't open the closet in the guest room. Anyway, it's very generous of you. I'm trying to pay you a compliment. Scott and I did see each other this week when I came into New York.

Even though he protested and said he didn't want to see me, he and I did hang out one lovely evening. You went to the Webbies and I'm like, I'm going to stay at home and watch friends and neighbors. Well, I had to give an award to Fei-Fei Li, Dr. Fei-Fei Li, who. Fei-Fei Li who was one of the very early AI pioneers at the Webbies. Then I ran over to

the San Vicente bungalows where Scott was at the bar. It was such a picture of you sitting at the bar there. It was nice to see you. Thank you. Thank you for saying that. It's good to see you. Literally, once a year, I really want to sit down with you. Yeah, once a year. Anyway, we had a great time. At least once a year. I had a great time. It was nice to sit down with you. Yeah, once a year. Okay, anyway, we had a great time. At least once a year.

I had a great time. It was nice to see you in person. It's good to see you. Congratulations to Louis. Yes. I left him a gift in the refrigerator. You did. He was very touched by it.

He was very, he's very, it was a great day, I have to say. Pictures are wonderful. And what you put on a lovely graduation situation. Yeah, they do a good job. It's New York. We know how to throw a party. You do. The pictures are great,

I love the pictures of you in Washington Square. The best part was they did it in the Skirball Center. What they do is they break up all the colleges and they go to Radio City Music Hall or various places and then they have a main one at Yankee Stadium. But the smaller ones are really the lovely ones. And Louis Kluck Group, the Global Studies Group, did it at Skirball Center and then they

got to walk out of, which is right across from Washington Square Park and walk under the arch with the class and it was very lovely. That's such a beautiful iconic arch. That's nice. And then Alex was here too and he's really enjoying it. And by the way, he's still growing. I saw a picture of you, literally, you of course decided to send me a video of him explaining my one piece of art to me.

And he looks like he's dropping his four year old off at preschool talking to his mother. And I'm not kidding, I think he's still growing. I don't know what's going on. He's a big guy. I think he's still growing. The kid is enormous. He's not Baron Trump level enormous, but he's big.

He's a big guy. No, but he's much buffer. Yeah, he's very big. He looks like that guy. He's, I've decided he's the ultimate. If I ever get really, really rich, he's gonna be my bodyguard cause he's the kind of guy that like could,

I don't know, figure out, do your taxes and. Drones, and figure out the drone. Yeah, and like fix your car in the middle of the desert and also kill anybody. He's just, he's a very, he's a very much a multi-tasker. I think Louie should study, um, uh, female biology and study abroad or two. Oh my God. Study abroad. We're moving on.

Study abroad. Yeah. Yeah. How are you glad to be back in London? Yeah, it's been beautiful here the last few days. And I just did a profile or they did a profile. The FT is doing a profile on me. Oh.

And of course they always ask like, how did you make Harris Fishman? I'm like, oh my God, here we go. Here we go. You say in like in a whorehouse in Ibiza or something. There we go. And I think a profile in the FT, I think that is somewhat equivalent to being knighted.

That's nice. I think it's pretty close. You're in the pink. You love that pink bitch. What do you call it, the pink? Oh, that salmon bitch. Salmon bitch. Yeah.

It's ultimate self-expressive benefit. I saw the paper delivered and I put it under my arm when I go to breakfast at the Crosby because I think it makes me look more like a hero and smart. I don't actually read it, but it's like a purse for me. I think it just makes me look cooler. It's a purse. But I want to buy a lordship.

Specifically, I want to be Prince, and then I'm going to change my name to Shamu, and I'll be Shamu Prince of Wales. Oh, God. Never gets old. I don't think it's that hard to buy yourself a sir or a lord or whatever. Oh, you can.

I think we should try to go for it, that you get one. I think that would be cool. Oh to buy yourself a sir or a lord or whatever. Oh, you can. I think we should try to go for it that you get one. I think that would be cool. Oh, 100%. Yeah, I think you should be lady. I am gonna be up to you now. Lady Scott Galloway. Well, I wanted Charles and Diana to adopt me

and I was gonna change my name to Up so we'd be up, chuck and die. Oh. Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha. Ah. Oh my God. I'm on a roll. What is with you?

I'm on a roll. I'll be here all week, try the veal. No, you're not on a roll. Anyway, the Swisher family extends its thanks to the Dallas. You're very welcome. I'm glad you guys had a nice time. It's nice. I'm still here. I'm not leaving for days. It's a nice, well, how long are you there for? Until Saturday. Until Saturday.

Sunday. Okay, great. Enjoy it. Yeah, I'm having a good time. Stay away from the edibles. In any case, I'll be here until Saturday. I've got Richard Plepler for lunch. I any case, I'll be here until Saturday. I've got Richard Plepler for lunch.

I have some important dinners and things like that. And today we're gonna do Louis' birthday also today. So we're gonna do a big thing for him. He's planning the day for the family. More Louis? More Louis. It's his birthday. It's his birthday and his graduation day.

Good for him. I know. We're having a great time. I have a nice family. Good, I'm glad. You deserve it. I do. Anyway, nice. We're having a great time. I'm glad. You deserve it. It's a nice family. Anyway, we've got a lot to get to today, including Trump taking his art of the deal routine to the Middle East.

I'm so tired of this guy. And the not so triumphant return of HBO Max. You talked about this. We'll talk about branding in a second. But first, Metta's antitrust trial continues. The FTC's key economic expert, Scott Hemple, came under attack from Metta's lead attorney for having pitched regulators on an antitrust probe of a company in 2019. The pitch deck for the probe that apparently Hemple worked on, which was shown in court,

included public comments about the company's aggressive acquisition strategy, and one was from Kara Swisher. The headline projected me calling Mark Zuckerberg a small little creature with a shriveled soul. Salted on Malik, all this thing. It was just ridiculous. It was so ridiculous and really petty on the behalf of the Metta. And I heard from them and they were, I don't think they loved it either, but they did it anyway. And their lawyer was inaccurate.

They said I was a Vanity Fair columnist. I wrote two stories for Vanity Fair a decade ago. Anyway, just shitty and obnoxious. But I think we have to have another insult for Mark. I called him a small little creature with a shriveled soul. Your thoughts on that and do you have a different one to call Mark? What I'm just curious, give me a sense of what you think is happening in the case. Well, I don't know why they need to like rely on this,

because I think they have a relatively strong case. Well, they're slamming the media. They're trying to say that they're victims of the media. Correct, or something. I don't even understand it in that, you know, they're trying to show anybody who has any criticism for Facebook, which is they should receive a lot of criticism, is just mean, I guess. It's typical plays into Mark's idea of himself as a victim. And I don't understand, I don't even understand why it's in here. And they called O'Malley, who, let me just say,

O'Malley was a pioneer in media entrepreneurship. They called him a failed blogger. Like, what? Like, why? And he's been, you know, both O'M and I, and all kinds of people, New York Times reporters, everyone who's covered Facebook for a very long time as beat reporters came to the same conclusion

about this company differently, from different places. Even, you know, Stephen Levy, everybody. And I think it's really, really astonishing that they feel like attacking the media is the way to go here. I don't even understand the strategy, I guess, but anyway. Well, you know the difference between Mark Zuckerberg and my neighbor Steve.

No. Steve's not a cunt. Ha ha ha. And by the way, folks, before you filled my comments, if you'll excuse me, I've been misogynist. I'm in London. I'm in Britain. We're allowed to use that word here.

Yeah. And it has no reference to gender. It just means this person is a very unlikable piece of shit. That is, I have a pair of socks with that on it, just to know I was going to leave some for you. I'm certain I will. I was literally saying in this profile, in the Financial Times, it's appearing next week,

that they were talking about our partnership, which they're all obsessed with us, or our partnership, I should say. Our marriage. And I said that one of the few nice things, and listen to me, there's a lot of downside about our partnership, which they're all obsessed with us, or our partnership, I should say. Our marriage. And I said that one of the few nice things, I mean, listen to me, there's a lot of downside to subpoena partner with you,

but one of the few nice things is that I said, I get to be irreverent, and there'll be an uncomfortable pause, and then, and I'm serious about this, when you laugh, it kind of gives everyone permission to laugh. You've said that. So I like that a lot. Yeah, yeah, that's it.

Why don't you give me cloud cover for a lot of stuff. What's the downside? Wait a minute, where's the stuff. What's the downside? Wait a minute. Where's the downside? Where's the downside? The downside? We're going to need a bigger boat.

No, you love it. We're going to need a bigger boat. You love it. You have a great effect. Anyways, I don't want to, I think people are sick of hearing us talk about us. But do you think, you know this case better than I do. What is your speculation here? What do you think is going to happen?

I felt they have a relatively strong case and I don't usually, I think they're, they definitely have done all kinds of monopolistic behaviors and I think they control things. But I think in this case, things have changed, and I think the government took them far too long to do any regulation, and so I'm not so sure that they don't have competitors, they do have competitors, although they dominate at the same time.

You can't, it's not similar to Microsoft to me, They don't have competitors. They do have competitors, although they dominate at the same time. It's not similar to Microsoft to me. Microsoft truly dominated and there were not other alternatives. In the case of Facebook, it is. I think at the time, Facebook always manages to do the sneakiest, shittiest thing, especially back in the day, that they could. That's not illegal necessarily. It just makes them the word you use. They always make the choice that they could. And that's not illegal necessarily. It just makes them the

word your use. But I think, and they always make the choice that hurts people. They make the choice of not caring about consequences of the actions they take. They try to victimize themselves and blame all the critics as when they have legitimate criticism. But it's a very strong case. And I think they're not conducting it very well here, and I think they're going to lose. I do for some reason. I think that the tide against billionaires and these powerful tech companies is still, despite Trump, is still on the side of what is wrong with these people. And so, I suspect it'll go to appeal.

This one's not as strong as some of the others. But some of the emails are pretty terrible. I think, see, I think this is pretty strong because if you look at the definition of antitrust as it relates to trying to reduce competition, you are not, I mean, it just couldn't be clear with respect to acquisitions. You're not allowed to acquire a company to, for the purposes of reducing competition. And they literally have emails with Mark Zuckerberg and everyone else saying,

it's better to acquire than compete. I mean, it's almost as if they wanted to write a case study on what illegal antitrust acquisition is. I mean, if they don't, if the FTC doesn't win on this one, that's it. Let's just stop all cases because they literally, they are, if they had their hands around the throat

of someone who had just died with their blood splattered all over them and they were screaming, I killed this person and then they didn't go to jail, that's, if they're not found guilty of antitrust, I mean, this defines antitrust. It does. It does. I'm saying that the FTC's argument at the beginning was that Snapchat and MeWe was their competitor. I just feel like it's a stronger case. Look, the Trump

administration waged it and then it was thrown back at the FTC and Lina Khan improved it. That's absolutely true. I just feel like it's not this, of all the different cases, whether it's Google, Google, it's like to me, it's a slam dunk. The Apple one is very clear what's going on there. These emails, I think they call them hot emails or whatever, are really bad, are really bad. And so I think that's probably what's gonna do them in

because a lot of these companies, before they get to be big, I think it's called email hygiene, like they didn't have any. You can see what they think of what they're doing. And, you know, I think the testimony of Kevin's sister wasn't great for them. I suspect they've got people lined up around the block for that kind of stuff if they're doing it.

And we have to see how it unfolds. I think they're going to lose this, even though it's, of all the cases, it's not the strongest despite the emails. So we'll see. In any case, stop attacking the media. We're not in a problem. And this is the thing about, there's this General Gestalt in America

where anything you do around any trust is bad for the economy. If they were forced to spend Instagram, shareholders win. Think about how many people would wanna own a pure play Instagram. 100%. It's such a, I mean, to their credit, Think about how many people would want to own a pure play Instagram. 100 percent.

It's such a, I mean, to their credit, it's such an incredible product. Instagram, just to give you a sense of power of Instagram right now, when we did my birthday in Scotland, I don't know if you talked to any of that folks there, but basically Scotland has been totally overrun. They can't, and I said, well, what's happened? And they said, two summers ago,

the Scottish Tourism Board invited 50, quote unquote, big Instagram influencers. And like 30 said yes, free trip to Scotland. And Scotland, when it's nice out, is literally an Instagram orgy. It is spectacular. And tourism was up something like 22% the next year and like 28% the following year.

The ends can't handle it, the roads can't handle it. At the same time, a group of Instagrammers started posting reels of how ridiculously overpriced Ibiza and Mykonos had become. And supposedly tourist traffic in Ibiza and Mykonos had become. And supposedly tourist traffic in Ibiza and Mykonos literally crashed last summer. So Instagram is shaping global tourism flows now. Yes.

Fascinating, I got a million of them, Kara. I got a million of them. Okay, good. In any case, we'll see. I just feel like, what annoyed me less than like using me or Ohm as a thing is it was inaccurate. It feel like, what annoyed me less than like using me or Ohm as a thing is it was inaccurate. It was like, I don't work for Vanity Fair.

I said one thing, if you're talking about a thing in 2019, I said this recently after years of covering it as a beat reporter, because I was so sick and tired of this company. And so it's just like sloppy, just like stop it. They're just gross and they're not good at it. Donald Trump is good at lying, Facebook is not. So anyway.

When's the last time you spoke to Mark Zuckerberg? Oh, forever ago. Forever ago? Yeah, no place. When's the last time you spoke to Shel Sandberg? She texted me not too long. You don't have to answer, you're friends. No, we're not friends.

No, I mean, when she was getting married, she was driving a bicycle past the place where we did code and she sent me a picture of her and her fiance at the time. That's the last time I talked. It was years ago. Years ago. I'm curious, what do you think she's going to do next? I think she's supposedly, again, I'm not talking to her, is happy with her life.

She got remarried. She did a couple of little things, but giving my money quietly, I think. I don't know how much, but she was always pretty at the philanthropy. I think she's more ambitious than that. I think she's going to run for governor. Really? I don't think so. You don't think so? No. No, I think she likes her life.

I think if you go look on her Facebook feed or something, it's a lot of like, here I am at Donald Swift, here I am with my husband, here's, you know, seems like she's enjoying her life and good for her. Really? It's not 14 year olds cutting themselves? No, no.

No, no, sorry. All right, moving on. Best to you Cheryl, best to you on your natural. I don't know what she's gonna do. I honestly, we're not really in touch. So I tried to reach her when Mark was sort of slagging her and apparently she didn't think Mark was slagging her. So I did and so did many people,

but others didn't, so whatever. And who's the new heat shield? Who's the new guy who's going to lie and get paid 100 million bucks, and then once his reputation is destroyed, leave? Joel? Is that Joel? Oh yeah, Joel Kaplan, the Republican.

Yeah, yeah, I don't know. He's supposed to be very smart. He is very smart. I talked to him the other day at a party. You told me he wouldn't have lunch with you. He won't. He's smart. He't have lunch with you. He's smart. He should have lunch with me. He's smart.

Anyway, let's move on. Apple is considering increasing iPhone prices this fall without blaming tariffs instead attributing price hike to new designs and features. But while the US and China agreed to suspend most tariffs against each other, the 20% Trump tariff imposed on Chinese goods at the start of the second term is still in place and covers smartphones. Apple built up inventory and shifted some manufacturing, as we've talked about, to India in preparation for terrorists, but the company's most profitable and high-end phones are still

mostly handled by Chinese factories. I keep saying that to people. They haven't successfully moved these operations, although they've been moving in that direction. New iPhones will include some design and format changes, including an ultra thin design. You know, they're trying to still try to play up to Trump. They're not going to blame on the terrorists, but consumers will feel that it's Trump's fault, presumably. But maybe not. Yeah, we, I mean, essentially you have the largest yard sale in history with so much import and export business and so much, I mean, the US is the

largest economy in the world and so much of it now is up for grabs because of what's happened over the last hundred days, whether it's this tariff nonsense or people not trusting, trying to figure out a way to not, to do less business with America versus more. And one of the big winners, there's a lot of winners here. One of the winners is India, and that is Trump is making India great again. And that is people are saying, okay, America seems to have, or the Trump administration seems to, the relationship with China is very adversarial and creates interruptions or lack of consistency

or dependability on the supply chain. So Trump was claiming it was gonna bring manufacturing back to America, now it's bringing manufacturing to India. And it's, it's, I guess, Indian, uh, Indian manufacturing for iPhones is five to 10% more expensive. So you will see a bump in prices. Um, the, I mean, the problem is if you want to talk about how this hurts people or companies in little ways,

Apple really does need to innovate right now. I would argue that Apple's product line is a little bit stale. I was excited about Apple Intelligence, but I don't really see how it's doing anything that interesting. The mixed reality headset was a total thud. They really haven't, I would argue they really haven't

innovated since the AirPods, which I think is the most underrated. I think the Apple watch is essentially them throwing so much capital at it that it's, I don't know, I'm not a huge fan of the Apple watch, but I think you could argue that it's hard not to, hard not to call it a success. Actually, there's more Apple watches sold

than the entire Swiss watch industry, but they need a refresh. But where I'm headed with this as a following is that instead of focusing on innovation, instead of having the most important people focused on design or new products, they're focused on trying to figure out a way to get the largest, most complex supply chain

out of China and into somewhere else or India, as opposed to being able to focus on the next generation of products which grow their shareholder base, grow the U S economy. The, the, the primary costs of all of this nonsense and all of this chaos and a lack of regard for a lack of understanding for how business is actually done is just, it's basically like giving, um, American business high blood pressure. And that is they're more prone to opportunistic infection or to disease.

It's just weakening the business corpus of the US because you have a guy like, I mean, can you imagine how much time Tim Cook has to spend on trying to figure out a way to move the supply chain out of China to India as opposed to trying to figure out what the next thing in technology is? And what to say about Trump, right?

This is not something they had to do. This is every minute that it takes from the executives not focusing on product is always a bad minute, right? This is not something they had to do. Every minute that it takes from the executives not focusing on product is always a bad minute, right? I mean, that's it. What would you make though? What would you- I still go back to, I think there was an enormous opportunity.

I think, I mean, it easy to play Monday morning quarterback, but I think Apple should have early on acquired BYD, assuming that China hadn't been- Oh, the cars, yeah. I think that essentially the waiting list for an Apple car would be the most valuable list ever aggregated in history. Because the logo and the self-expressive benefit of Apple is so incredibly strong that, and granted, no one knew BYD was going to be the monster it is, but given the fact

they have such an incredible supply chain in China, given the fact that they have such a good relationship with Xi, if things had been, if the temperature had been lower, imagine if Apple had gotten to kind of letter L with a company like BYD and produced a really elegant, cool little car for $11,000. How many of those would have sold? And they could have made in America. They could have done it.

You're right. The i-Auto. Can you imagine the. You're right. The iAuto? Can you imagine the iCar, the iAuto? Yeah. Oh my God. You know, the thing is, as much as I think they're very great operators, and I think they are, I think there's no question. Oh, no doubt.

I think one of the things, when Steve died, everyone was like, it's over. And of course, Tim is 10x'd. Come on. Please. I'm just telling you, that was you remembering. I know. But logistics can only get you so far and the vision thing is not as, like jobs took these risks even if they didn't work, right?

And Tim is doing that through say the Vision Pro, et cetera. But it's not the same, it doesn't feel like, I sit around and I'm like, what could they do to the iPhone that makes it better, thinner? That's it, right? But that's not a thing, that's not a new product. Okay. But when we're talking about risk and product development, so first off, let's talk about the kids of the company.

To go from zero to 300 billion, which is what Steve Jobs did, is just remarkable and probably the hardest thing. It is really hard. It's like women will always have on men, they can create life, they can grow bones and muscle, that's singular. Starting a company from your garage and building

it to something worth a lot. I do think that's the hardest part of quote unquote, the life cycle of a company. Having said that until recently, Tim Cook has added more shareholder value than any person in history, because he took the company from 300 billion to 3 trillion. I think Jensen Huang is now number one, because I think he'd taken it from zero to over three trillion. But anyways, but when people complain about new products, if you will, there's always an emphasis on new more stuff. Tim Cook, to his credit, said, all right, I can either try and invent a bunch of little prop planes or I can take this 747 called the iPhone

and put hypersonic jets on it. And some really visionary moves that were kind of elegant and not that loud. He took the, remember the, what's it called? The iPod and he turned it into a button and turned Apple Music into a huge hit. He launched services and he's done it all around the iPhone because what he said is if we get distracted

with a whole bevy of other types of products, we won't be able to take advantage of what is the most profitable product in history with the greatest gross margin in history that has the production volumes of Toyota with the margins of Ferrari and that is the iPhone. So I think he's made a conscious decision to innovate around the thing that just produces more cash flow.

The question is, it's starting to feel a little tired. It is. Yeah. He's got to come. What would you put in? Ultra thin is what I would say, right? That's the only thing I want. Yeah, but that's a design feature. I think Apple, I now believe I'm writing an emergency no malice on health care costs and the budget deficit. I still believe the most disruptible business in the history of the West is US healthcare. And I think Apple should go deeper and deeper

into healthcare and fitness. Can I make a comment? As much as, by the way, Tim is very into fitness. He's like exercises, he's like you. He's in great shape. Yeah, as an older man. I don't think they have it in them. I think they've done enough and they don't have the, like the, Johnny, I did a really interesting interview.

I don't think they have the explosive creativity at all in you. There's a point where you can't make more stuff if you can't think of like you've done. And by the way, this is a record of a group of executives who, you know, as I always call them the Rolling Stones, but call them, the Rolling Stones, but it's still the Rolling Stones, right? Like they're not the Rolling Stones that were. And so they can't do much but play their oldies. That's how I look at them.

Yeah, but they have the capital to make some accolades. That goes to... Takes energy. In a board, agreed. But in a board meeting, you're supposed to every, at least once a year, a good board's there every six months. You go through succession planning and you're supposed to, that's when you can tell if you have the right.

Unfortunately, some of the best CEOs are very good at shooting any competition. And that's one of the things I noticed about when I was on board at NYT, it was clear the CEO was quite frankly, was insecure because nobody good would ever get past, they always seemed to either leave or she would shoot them.

Basically, no one, it was pretty clear there was no one who could handle the job, which means you're a bad CEO. And I don't know what the succession planning meeting is in there, but I would think Apple's board is so, it's so impressive that they gotta be thinking, all right, who are the VPs and SVPs that really bring some crazy fucking mojo to this whole thing right now? I think they got to be cognizant of this issue. I would think.

I suppose. I just think people run out of energy and then no one says anything. Anyway, we have to move on. Streaming service Max will now return to being called HBO Max. It's coming, of course. Yet again, we call it. God, literally, I've had it, yet again. Oh, God. Literally, I've had it.

I have had it, Kara. Well, so has the social media arm of the company because they were making fun of themselves. Let's listen to a clip of you talking about David Zasloff's decision to change a name right here on Pivot back in 2023. If you had $10 billion and you tried to recreate a brand like HBO, you probably couldn't do

it. It'd be one in 10 chance you could do it. So he's taken tens of billions of dollars or at least billions in equity and he's taken it into the street and created a fire to warm his ego. But this will go down as one of the great brand disasters. Okay. But this will go down as one of the great brand disasters. Okay, so now it's called HBO Max, the streaming service. The change marks the fourth name change for the service in a decade. It was called HBO Now, there was Max, there's HBO, there's HBO Max.

And again, the service, the company's social media things are making fun of it too, in a really kind of vicious way, how dumb this is and how difficult it is and they call it rebranding, de-branding. Scott, let me give you my, I don't have a perspective because I have a contract with CNN and I am making a documentary that probably will be on this whatever the fuck it's gonna be called, but that's my disclosure, but I find this like perplexing. I always liked HBO Max myself, thoughts, brand expert. This was probably the strongest, one of the strongest brands in the arts or in media, anything, what is a brand?

A brand gives you unearned margin. And in this case, HBO gave you, or the HBO brand gave unearned margin. And in this case, HBO gave you, or the HBO brand gave unearned trial. Almost anything that comes on HBO, you're more willing to trial. And the reason why is that to the credit of HBO, the culture they have been able to create there such that they attract the best and brightest in the industry

means that they basically can go toe to toe with Netflix on, no exaggeration, one seventh of the content budget. Netflix spends 18 billion, HBO spends two and a half, and yet, if you see two people at the quote unquote proverbial water cooler talking about a Zeitgeist cultural moment, and you had to bet what streaming platform that cultural

moment is taking place on, the best bet is HBO. It is, although it's increasingly Netflix, right? Did you see that show on Netflix? Okay, at seven times. HBO defines what it means to have an amazing brand that creates a culture that results in a company that can punch above its weight class. Yes, agree. It is so artisanal.

It's the LVMH. It's, it just doesn't have the capital of a Netflix, but I mean, talk about, you know, the last of us, Succession, Game of Thrones, the Sopranos. You know, you love hacks. That's not in the same league. Yeah, but go ahead. It's not in the same league as this shit that I'm talking about, Kara. Um, six feet under. Jesus Christ. It's not in the same league as this shit that I'm talking about, Kara.

Um, six feet under, Jesus Christ. I mean, these guys consistently put out sex in the city. They consistently put out this content that identifies the moment and they turned it into fucking max so we can find big bang theory and shark week. I mean, and let's just go no one on the board. This is the worst board in media. Nobody on the board had the sense to go, you can't take billions of dollars into the street and light it on fire. That's bad for shareholders. Can we get someone here who actually understands brand who can talk about the power of HBO and not make... The job of a board is one, to pick the right guy or gal,

two, when to sell the company, but also to have some domain expertise on the board so occasionally you can save the CEO from him or herself because it is really difficult to read the label from inside of the bottle. This was the easiest one ever. No, do not do away with the HBO brand. And what do they do?

I'll give them credit, a step back from the wrong direction as a step in the right direction, but let's talk about this board. Since they merged, since Zaslav was able to talk shareholders into doing this crazy thing and overpaying for it such that he could go to LA and play Jack Warner, the stock is off 62.8%. And you know how much shareholders have lost two thirds of their value that were dumb enough to buy into this merger.

Do you know how much the board has paid Zaslav in his tenure for the last four and a half years? $342 million. So shareholders lose two thirds of their value and the CEO makes a third of a billion dollars. I'm going to ask you a specific question. What would you have them call it? Just continue with Max now that they made that way? That's one.

And then two, there's obviously rumors, and most people think it's going to happen, them spinning off doing what MSNBC just did, essentially putting CNN and other things in one bucket, and the studio, I guess, in another bucket. So what do you imagine? I suppose HBO would go with the studio part. Yeah, that would go over there and then the news

and other stuff will go up in places. They're doing what MSNBC did. So talk about those two things. What would you have them do? Call it that or not call it that? Well, there's brand strategy and business strategy. They probably have to do, and they lead into each other. But basically, we know what's going to, I think I know what's going to happen here.

The company is going to go good bank, bad bank. It's going to be HBO and Warner Brothers, the theater business, the characters, the IP, which will feed into HBO. HBO is the brand. It'll have another component, a subset, HBO Max or something that's all the other shit. And then they will spin all the TV and the cable assets into, they'll either consolidate or be part of a consolidation with Comcast. And that is, they're just, these are still highly profitable businesses, but they're shrinking. So that means consolidation and cost cutting. And they'll have good bank, bad bank.

And then the HBO Warner part of the business will trade it a greater multiple. They'll sell off the cable assets to a consolidator, although be the consolidating and they'll use that cashflow to pay down the debt and the stock will trade up. But the problem is, and it's always the boring shit that gets you. I'm not sure of this, but what I would suspect is the reason they haven't done this so far is Zaslav when he bought the company issued a ton of debt at exactly the right time.

And that is he has very friendly debt that is at a ridiculously low interest rate. And I would bet, I would bet that if he tries to spend those assets, it triggers an acceleration in the debt and then he'd have to go borrow money at a much higher interest rate. And I would bet that if he tries to spin those assets, it triggers an acceleration in the debt, and then he'd have to go borrow money at a much higher interest rate. So I think he has to wait until that debt matures, and he has to go into the market anyways.

I think it's because there was also a way they did the merger. They couldn't act until a certain amount of time. But I think the debt, they don't wanna do anything that in any way gives their bondholders a reason to say, Oh, we're out and you have to borrow money from us. It's that 8%, not a two and a half. So, but this company will be, uh, uh, an artisanal, vertically integrated, uh, Warner Brothers studio and HBO, the artisanal streaming network that will

survive, and then they'll take all of the highly profitable, but declining assets and roll them up with the bunch of the other cable guys. This company will be split up. Let's get back to the name. Would you have returned it to HBO Max or just left it at Max since they went that direction? Oh no, bring back HBO. Oh my God, HBO.

Should you call it just HBO or HBO Max? Not HBO Now, that was a short period of weirdness. No, Kara, do you remember HBO Go? Go, go, oh I forgot, go, yes, of course I do. HBO Joey Bag of Donuts? I remember for a moment being like, why are there more than one apps to access these? I would, I think HBO needs a distinct brand identity

that means artisanal high-end, like, this is LVMH. This is a different streaming network, and they probably have a sub-brand that's for all the other crap, right? That's for all the other stuff that they play online. So I think it would be HBO and then HBO Max, right? This is such a clean, beautiful artisanal brand and what they've created there is so special

and what to their credit, they've been able to maintain it. I mean, if you think about it, Netflix is the Russian army throwing 20 million people at a problem and they just have more gross tonnage. HBO is SEAL Team Six. I mean, these are the most elite content producers. Let me say, I'm speaking, since I'm having lunch with Richard, it's due to the Richard Plepler,

like set that in motion, the quality, and he's since gone on to other things. And the people that he trained, like Casey Bloys and others, are the reason for that, right? They continue. And I know he left the company under a bit of a, like, I think he was not liking what they were doing, like what they were doing. But I have to say, he set the tone for that and created one of the greatest brands, I think, with

Sopranos and, as you said, Sex and the City and Game of Thrones, et cetera. So much credit to him and they continue to create great stuff. The White Lotus, what's your favorite thing ever on HBO? Oh, God, there's so many. I probably Sex and the City is the thing I watched the most of. But I liked Sopranos. There's a lot I like.

There's always something good on HBO. There are always a lot. Chernobyl. Yeah, there's some movies. The Penguin. Yeah, just really good stuff. I just started watching, which is our friends iconic, The Leftovers.

Oh, that's what we have. Probably hugely underrated, really. Huge show. That actually did very well. Band of Brothers, I mean, these guys just keep- They do. Figuring out a way to put out amazing content. They do, and so don't fuck it up, David.

That's all I have to say. Anyway, speaking of streaming very briefly, Fox Corp will also launch its streaming service, not quite as fancy, called Fox One. I actually kind of like the name. Ahead of the NFL season later this year, they're going to jam a bunch of crap in there, and they have their own streaming service. So again, I think people will pay for Fox.

They had another thing, Fox Plus or whatever they had, where they had all that Tucker Carlson nonsense. There's lots of streaming services launching. What do you think about Fox's chances? where they had all that Tucker Carlson nonsense. There's lots of streaming services launching. What do you think about Fox's chances? Well, I mean, first off, they just announced their first show. It's called I'm Not Racist But. Yeah.

Oh, come on. Anyways. What? Okay. That's a good show. Like I believed you. I'm Not Racist But. Is that a real show? No. No. I believe you. I'm not racist, but. Is that a real show? No.

No. I believed you. I love how you believe that. See, I believed you. I was like, huh, I can see them doing that. Anyway, go ahead. I think there's a market for it. I'd go, I'd just go fucking crazy.

Like I'd have Laura Loomer, I would just go full conspiracy weirdo. I mean, I'd go, okay, those of you who are really crazy got to tune in here. I'd go nuts. I'd go. Well, legal liability though, you have to be very, you can't like, they've been down,

they're still in the middle of a loss. Claim it's an online platform. Yeah. That'd be interesting. Could you claim her an online platform? I don't know. Anyway, yeah, I agree. Well, anyway, we have to move on, but I think there's plenty of people who'd buy this.

It's a good idea. It's probably late. They probably should have done it earlier. Okay, would buy this. It's a good idea. It's probably late. They probably should have done it earlier. Okay, Scott, let's go on a quick break. We come back. Trump's deal-a-palooza in the Middle East. Oh, good God.

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Groceries that over-deliver. Scott, we're back. Instacart, groceries that over-deliver. Scott, we're back. President Trump is on a whirlwind tour of the Middle East. It's just, I don't even want to talk about it. I'm so tired of looking at him. Where he's been busy with all sorts of wheeling and dealing. He attended a lunch in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday with a gaggle of US business leaders, including the CEOs of Amazon, OpenAI, Nvidia, and Uber.

And of course, Elon was there all with their hands out to the Saudis. Some of the deals Trump has touted in the last few days, a $600 billion commitment from Saudi Arabia to invest in the US. The real numbers are reportedly much lower. Qatar Airways is buying as many as 210 Boeing jets. NVIDIA is selling chips to an AI startup backed by Saudi Arabia's sovereign wealth fund. News of the deal sent NVIDIA's market cap back. It had been declining to above $3 trillion.

And in a major foreign policy ship, Trump said he's lifting sanctions on Syria, and he met with the country's new president, the first US-Syria leader meeting in 25 years. Couple things. There was that lunch. In addition, Nvidia, AMD, and Amazon also struck deals with Saudi Arabian AI startup. Trump seems to be using US AI technology and chips as leverage for a lot of these deals. Not the stupidest thing in the world, but people are worried we risk losing the upper hand on AI for sharing them. OpenAI is reportedly considering building data centers in UAE. We're going to talk about the diplomacy part in a minute, but how do you think about the business part and what he's doing here?

A lot of like jazz hands all over the place. Look, I think it makes sense. There's been U.S. delegations led by the president that go overseas for decades. But what they usually have is they have a broader, campaign contributions aren't the litmus test. It's great American companies. And also they always make sure that the chamber of commerce and the small business association is represented such that at least there's the illusion they're trying to sell America as opposed to trying to sell the people who've

been really good to them and I are good to the president. I think it's, I think something like this makes sense. AI is big, he's leveraging it. I think they're being smart about this. That's the good side of this. The thing that's really scary and corrupt, is that all right, he's in Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia wants a technology

to build a civilian nuclear plant. They want AI, and what do you know? They announced a giant Trump Tower in Jeddah. You just shouldn't be mixing the two. And this is especially upsetting for me, for someone who thinks a lot about Israel and the fact that there are still 50 plus hostages that have been held for 500 plus days. I've always said, if you wanna get the hostages out,

follow the money, put pressure on Qatar. How much pressure can the president bring to bear on Qatar when they are talking about doing golf course developments and enriching the family by billions of dollars? How honest and how much can geopolitical interests of the US be pure and unfettered around us and our allies when they are saying to the sun, we'll give you a billion dollars for development here.

And by the way, in Qatar, it's not a private company doing it with Eric and Dawn. It's a division of the Qatari government that is in this real estate deal. And then let's keep traveling to the UAE where they want American AI chips. And the reason we don't want to give them to the AI and having to date is we are worried that because China, which represents three times the level of import business in terms of oil, in other words, the UAE economically is more dependent upon or Saudi

Arabia, excuse me, but the UAE is actually a bigger trading partner with China. We don't want to give them these chips because they're worried about leaking that sensitive information to China. But what do you know? The UAE has announced that they are going to invest in world financial liberty stable coin. This is just all folks.

Our interests are not being represented. No, the Trump family's interests are. So I like the fact he's sitting down. I think Syria is a big, I think for us to establish the rail politic of dealing with the new leader of Syria right now, I realize that has a lot of weirdness to it. I think it's a really smart idea to try and figure out a way to at least have an informal peace or ally or understanding. And this is the time to cut the deal and to put a cudgel or a wedge in between

Syria and Russia right now is a big opportunity. Yeah. So let's talk about the diplomacy angle of this trip. Trump is clearly enjoying all the pomp and pageantry. He loves walking by a bunch of soldiers and fancy gold stuff. But he's also got a lot of love for these leaders. He called the Syrian president a young attractive guy. He's so much on looks. It's so strange, especially with men. He said Qatar's Amir was a very

special guy. In talking about the Saudi crown prince, Trump said, I like him too much, which is interesting to say about someone who saw someone up in his He's literally going to say, and he's a great kisser. Great kisser. I know. It sounds like he might be leaving Melania for one of these guys. His way he talks about men, he talks about women in a grotesque way, sort of like nice

boobs, but men is very strange. Like it's not just funny. He does it all the frigging time. I like that about him. I think most people think that way. I think we're very luscious as a species. I don't know. You do. You do. You think most people think that way. I think we're very luscious as a species. I don't know. You do.

You're right. You're right. In addition to lifting these sanctions on Syria, he also said he's open to negotiating with Iran, saying there are no permanent enemies. That was kind of an interesting thing because most of the Republican establishment, if they did a really interesting go back five years with like Rubio, et cetera, there are permanent enemies, right? Like whether it's North Korea.

Trump has, this is consistent. Trump is consistently, I'll do a deal with anybody kind of guy. Um, so his, this one, I think he's correct. There are no permanent enemies, but it's a really interesting effort on his part to be like, whatever the deal is, I'll do the deal and you're an attractive man. That kind of thing. I don't know. Well, it goes back to values with respect to Iran.

I think it's different. I think you go. Well, it goes back to values. With respect to Iran, I think it's different. I think you go into Syria, there's a huge opportunity for us, and I would argue there's probably a decent amount of public support after what the populace endured from the kind of depraved, violent reign of Bashar al-Assad. When it comes to Iran, I think American values have to come out, and that is,

I think the smartest thing we can do is, frankly just to try and undermine the Islamic Republic. America does have, or at least pretends to have values about being concerned about the general population and being focused on rights, women's rights around the world. And the one place I think that we have an opportunity is that the Islamic Republic does not have a great deal of support from the Iranian people. And as someone who grew up with Iranians in LA, I've always thought Iranians are more American than Americans.

That we should be great allies with Iran. Because they're really into education, really into capitalism. I think Iran is just a huge missed opportunity for us. And when you meet, especially some of the, like, you want to talk about the benefits of immigration, we had, we got so many outstanding people after the revolution who immigrated to the U S so many great doctors, scientists, business people. the U S so many great doctors, scientists, business people.

One of my mentors, a guy named Hamid Moghadam, who runs the largest REIT in America, Prologis came here after the revolution. I mean, we got such incredible human talent and it's a shame that this, this, in my opinion, backward, primitive, oppressive government, uh, is unfortunately through kind of kind of a reign of terror is the leadership of Iran. So I think we should kind of take the Reaganesque approach and that is we have absolutely no quarrel with the Iranian people, but the leadership and the governing body there is not good for the, you know, the Iranian people or for the world.

And we have a tendency to group all of the Gulf as Americans into one group of people. They are much different. The Saudis do not have any love lost with Iran. So this is, but this is a place you want to talk about the need for someone really fucking smart and an incredible team that is solely based on competence, not whether Eric is selling golf courses. It's the Gulf between economic opportunities, between a flashpoint of

potential violence or wars that could erupt and destabilize the world. We've got to be really honest and really smart and not be seen as fucking whores over there collecting planes and golf courses. Yeah. One of the interesting things is this beef between Business Insider, which is owned by Axel Springer, and they wrote a piece about how Don Jr.'s like, it makes Hunter Biden blush essentially. And of course they're going after,

just a really minor story by a very good reporter, by the way, Bethany McLean. And they're putting pressure, they will not take any criticism over what is clearly grift. Like grift, grift, grift, grift, sorry, Don. I don't think it's the grift that bothers them. I think it's associating.

I think it's the association or the implication that Don has a drug problem. I think they're fine with it. I think they're like, yeah, we're capitalists or grifters. I think he's pissed off that you're saying, I'm like Hunter, that my drug habit is out of control. Oh, interesting. Oh, I didn't think Hunter that my drug habit is out of control. Interesting. I didn't think about that.

It wasn't in the story. I read the story. I was anyway. All right. All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break. We'll come back. We'll talk about RFK's bizarre swim. This episode is brought to you by Square. You're not just running a restaurant, you're building something big. And Square's there for all of it.

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Hi there, I'm Ryan Reynolds, and I have a list of things I like to have on set. It's just little things like two freshly cracked eggs scrambled with crispy hash brown, sausage, crumble, and creamy Chipotle sauce from Tim Hortons. From my writer to Tim's menu, try my new scrambled eggs loaded breakfast box. Scott, we're back with more news. Health and Human Services Secretary R.F.K. Jr. had quite a week.

First off, let's listen to a clip of him answering questions before a House committee. I don't think people should be taking advice, medical advice from me. I think that's about, that sort of says it. He also said his opinions on vaccines are irrelevant, and thank goodness he's not prompting people to take his advice because he recently posted a photo

of himself and his grandchildren swimming in Rock Creek, which is close to swimming because it's used for sewer runoff, E. coli. He did look good, like he's in good shape, but it was pretty astonishing that he's, I was sort of like, whoa, I won't even go in there with rubber boots, essentially. But he really seems out of it in some ways, but he seems to be just plotting on and cutting things that are critically important for kids especially and safety of all of us. But any thoughts on RFK and his swim? I think that's noise. Whatever, it's just noise. The key to your story and what we should, in my

opinion, be zeroing in on because it's more substantive that the head of one of the biggest agencies and who sets the tone for where we allocate resources to try and keep America healthy, him claiming that he doesn't give medical advice is such a just an outrageous lie. He has been one of the strongest anti-vaccine advocates. That is medical advice. He has written a book, The Real Anthony Fauci, a book, a bestselling book, Kennedy offered medical perspective contradicting mainstream public health guidance. He's promoted alternatives to COVID-19 treatments.

Medical advice. He's made, I think it's called themarisol claims. For years, Kennedy has advised people to avoid vaccines containing themarisol. That is medical advice. EMF health claims. Kennedy has suggested electromagnetic fields from wireless technology

pose serious health risks. That is medical advice. Discussions about his own medical conditions. Talking about measles and rubella, claims about medical conditions in children. He gives more fucking medical advice than a surgeon general. And he presides over a medical organization. That's the thing.

I think he's saying, I don't think people should be taking medical advice from me, which is such, it's so disingenuous is what you're saying essentially. He realizes what he has said. This guy is literally the best friends, the best friend Measles and Rubella ever had, right? They're like, oh my God, we're back. Right.

Right? We thought we were out of business, but this guy wants to put us back on a global tour. He wants to, you know, first stop Texas and really crazy conservative places, we're back. For a limited time only, oh, maybe it's gonna be an extended time, bringing you, you know, this band from the 50s and 60s,

Measles and Rubella. This guy is so, and the problem is he's very handsome. He's very compelling. He is very good on some issues on the environment, in my opinion, on Israel. He's powerful, you want to like him. And this guy is so fucked up in the head and dangerous when it comes to medical advice and vaccines.

And this is the guy figuring out where we're going to allocate resources. He's fired so many really good, thoughtful people who save lives. And again, it's this death by a thousand cuts. There's going to be kids. There's going to be more, more death, disease and disability because this guy is in office.

And for him to say, you shouldn't take medical, he's trying to backtrack cause some of the shit he has said lately, whether it's we represent X percent, nobody, there was no diabetes when I was a kid. He is constantly spewing misinformation. Can I just point out the stream thing? I know it's a distraction, but it's not actually because it shows the same kind of lack of care.

I mean, if even one person goes in that stream, like he's in there with children, it's poop, it's E. coli, it's shit. He's saying something rather disturbing. Look, he can do whatever he wants. If he wants to swim in shit, good luck, Robert. I can't believe he continues to survive, but with all the stuff he does. But I think it is important that he's doing that.

Like, here's the head of the health and human services just swimming in a sewer and saying, hey, I'm having fun. I just, I don't think it's a distraction. I think it says exactly what you're saying here. Anyways, I think that there's a lot of people, Secretary Hegseth puts us in the most immediate danger because incompetence overseeing the largest military in the world is just dangerous on a short-term basis. But over the medium and the long-term more death, disease, and disability,

unnecessary death, disease, and disability will be spread by RFK Jr. And I don't say that lightly. I, that is a terrible thing to say about someone. And I think there's a lot of evidence backing that statement up. I would agree. As you said before, planes were not having all these near misses when Pete Buddha Judge was in there. Things weren't falling off of aircraft carriers before pretext and stuff like that. And in this case, I agree, it's a long-term danger, especially with the decimation of science.

especially with the decimation of science. And everything he does is always either performative, grotesque, and always dangerous for people's health. And he's really one of the more dangerous. And this whole make America healthy again is such a fucking distraction. It is, I agree. I'll grant it, no doubt, no doubt, we need to look at our food supply and sugar, no doubt.

It's hard to find sugar in Scott's apartment, everybody, just so you know. Well, you know why? I agree. I'll grant it, no doubt. No doubt we need to look at our food supply and sugar, no doubt. It's hard to find sugar in Scott's apartment, everybody, just so you know. Well, you know why? Because I have money and I can buy healthy food. I can go to doctors. I'm really upset. No, I'm trying to make a serious point here.

If these guys were serious about health of America, they would have a more progressive tax structure. That would literally be, if you wanted to increase the health of America, give kids access, get rid of food deserts, give kids access to good healthy food, make it such that people have the time to exercise. They don't, you know,

the best thing you could do for the health of America, $25 an hour minimum wage. Yep, like we say, 100%. You're absolutely right. Scott, president running for president of America. All right, one more quick break and we'll be back for predictions. I'm excited to hear your prediction. Wendy's most important deal of the day has a fresh lineup.

Pick any two breakfast items for $4. New four-piece French toast sticks, bacon or sausage wrap, biscuit or English muffin sandwiches, small hot coffee, and more. Limited time only at Participating Wendy's Taxes Extra. Donald Trump's been back in office long enough to shock or surprise just about anyone who voted for him at this point, be it the signal scandal or the tariff turnarounds, the Jeanine Pirro of it all, the way he talks about Ozempic. And he takes the fat, the fat shot drug. So rude. I'm in London and I just paid for this damn fat drug I take.

I said it's not working. On Today Explained, we're asking if any of his voters are experiencing voters' remorse. Especially those ones who are newer to his winning coalition. Younger voters, black voters, latin voters. We're heading to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to ask them if... regrets? Do they have a few? And just by way of spoiler to get this out of the way, the answer is yes.

They do. And he takes the fat shot drug. In most ways, Google and Apple are ruthless competitors. But then a high powered Apple executive gets up on the stand at the trial that might break up Google and argues that actually Google's fine and the best thing you can do is leave it alone. Why? Because Google being left alone means $20 billion a year for Apple. On the Vergecast this week, we talk all about what's going

on at the Google trial, plus the latest from the efforts to break up Meta, what's going on with Netflix, and lots more. All that on the Vergecast, wherever you get podcasts. Okay, Scott, let's hear a prediction. Well, first off, while I would enjoy, I'm all down. I think the American public should be down with him getting that 747 on one condition. They paint along the side of it, it says Qatar's bitch. Yeah.

I think that that would be the trade. But anyways, being serious, my prediction is the following, the plane's not going to happen, Kara. These people, they're so amateur, and I've been saying for a while, they're so good at the grift, they got this grift wrong because here's the thing, the NSA, the CIA, uh, the secret service who's charged with the president's safety are going to say, you realize a very small amount of C2 explosive could be put anywhere on this plane that has the wiring of, you know, a hospital complex.

And if they at some point decided they didn't like who was on the plane, including you. So in order for this plane to live up to vet security standards and protocols, they would have to disassemble it and reassemble it. And that would cost approximately $1 billion. He can't take this plane, not because he's not a criminal, not because he doesn't want it, not because they're not willing to give it, but his security apparatus is gonna sit down with him

and say, we need to have an adult conversation with you. You can't have a foreign government giving you a piece of technology that you're flying in at 40,000 feet. We can't ensure your safety. And the only way we'd be able to do that is to take the thing down to a series of 48,000 parts and then put it back together again. Do you remember, it reminds me of, do you remember when we let the Russians build our embassy in Moscow?

Yes, that's right. It was full of like, listening devices. They would just literally, they would start hammering pieces of the wall and they'd find listening devices everywhere. Yeah, everywhere, like in the concrete. Yeah, that's right. Finally, they said, there's no way. Just tore it down. There's no way we can make this thing ever secure. So they said, just demolish the thing. So anyways, my prediction is the plane thing's

not gonna happen. Let me put it this way. It's not gonna be Air Force One. Yeah, well, Boeing's been building one, right? Correct? It's just taking too long for Trump. He wants a fancier, slicker plane. He's so, ugh, gross. He's so gross.

And also, by the way, I think you're right, because a plane is a real symbol. It's not a little grift. It's like a big, flying, huge fucking grift. A huge symbol of our power. Symbol. Symbol of real life. I love that. One of my favorite photographs, I was trying to get a print of it,

was when China was waving their finger at us and telling us not to go to Taiwan, and Nancy Pelosi showed up in a very American looking plane and they parked the plane behind her and there she was in high heels and a pink pantsuit. And it was just like, fucking A, I love America. Where a 77 year old woman gets on a plane for 14 hours, figures out a way to look fabulous,

and takes a picture and heels in front of our plane. I thought that was really, I thought that was a great image. You complimented Nancy Pelosi, that's a new one. Anyway. I like the speaker. Yeah. So anyway, I have just a very brief thing. The New York Times just came out with a piece again, speaking of this kind of thing,

this group called the Technology Transparency Projects is a nonprofit that focuses on accountability for tech. It said that more, let me read the lead, more than a year after researchers first warned that X was potentially violating U.S. sanctions by accepting payments or subscription accounts from terrorist organizations and other groups barred from doing business in the country. Elon Musk's social media platform continues to accept such payments, according to this report, this new report. We had said that he wasn't going to stop a year and a half ago, so we got that one right.

Just so you know. Anyway, once again, they just love them a terrorist. Anyway, we want to hear from you. Send us your questions about business tech or whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. Elsewhere in the Kara and Scott universe, this week on ProfG Conversations, Scott spoke with Timothy Snyder, a leading historian of authoritarianism, Ukraine and Eastern Europe. I've interviewed him too, but just the news recently, he's moving to Canada, he and his

wife I believe, but let's listen to a clip. When we make enemies unnecessarily, we are encouraging terrorism. So it's not just that we're putting our defenses down, which we're clearly doing. It's also that we're inviting the offense, which we're also clearly doing. What the Trump people are doing is draining American power out of the system because the international system, our power in the national system depended upon, among other things, relationships, trust, alliances, reliability, treaties, but everybody else's power remains. Everybody else is now more relatively powerful with respect to us. And so of course they can now afford to think about

interventions and adventures, which they wouldn't have been able to think about before. I agree completely. Did you like that conversation? He's really smart. I love that stuff. I'm fascinated by it. But just for the record, because I asked him, I said, why did you move to Canada? He said that it didn't have anything to do with the current political climate, that it was a lifestyle. Yeah, and also his wife. Also, they did a story,

I think in the Times today about that. There was some of like, you can't go away from history, I believe. They definitely did talk, he and his wife, they're sort of a power couple, history department power couple, his wife Marcy Shore. They're all going to Toronto. But there was some element of you can't escape history and this is not a good situation to

be in. We'll see how many scholars actually leave. There's a move and the new head of NIH was- Well, they're being recruited. I know firsthand they're being recruited. Yeah, they're being recruited by say France, for example. The new head of the NIH, who I think is a loud mouth. And China.

Yeah, exactly. And the UK. I mean, I'm telling you folks, the best and brightest at these universities are getting calls, offers for money, intellectual and academic freedom. But we were talking about this guy moving to Canada. It's interesting, you know why that you can't actually, a guy who's from Boston is not,

you can't bury him in Toronto, you know why? No. Oh, no. Because he's still alive. Ah. Anyway, it's just an interesting time. The head of the NIH said about France taking scientists, he goes, oh, it's a nice place to visit. What an idiot. What a stupid idiot in that way.

People are thinking about this at the very least, which is they never would have in a million years. I set a trend. It's a trend. It's a trend. We're not moving. We're staying here.

I'm going to stay in Scott's apartment and never leave. Okay. That's the show. Thank you for listening to Pivot. Be sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel, which is growing quite smartly. We'll be back next week. Scott, read us out. Today's show is produced by Larry Naiman,onzo and Marcus Taylor Griffin and Kevin Oliver.

Bernie and his team have engineered this episode. Thanks also to Dubrow, Ms. Severo and Dan Shalon. Shack Kurwa is Vox Media's executive producer of podcasts. Make sure to follow Pivot on your favorite podcast platform. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. You can subscribe to the magazine at nymag.com. We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Louis Swisher, congratulations. Well done. Graduation. I need Kara to keep doing this podcast thing, so I need you to go to grad school.

We need to lock her down. She needs the money. Grad school, my friend. Anyway, happy birthday, Louis too.