Pivot - Ye's Parlay, Rupert's Reunion, and Guest Anne Applebaum

Episode Date: October 18, 2022

It’s been a big week in right wing media: Kanye’s buying Parler, Murdoch may re-merge Fox and News Corp, and whistleblowers are getting fired at Truth Social. Plus, Musk is under federal investigation, stemming from his attempt to buy Twitter. Also, Apple’s mixed reality headset will scan irises, Netflix’s ad-supported tier will launch November 3rd, and in Big Grocery news, Kroger has agreed to buy Albertsons. Author and historian Anne Applebaum joins to discuss the latest in Ukraine and Russia. You can find Anne at @anneapplebaum on Twitter. You can listen to Kara’s new show, On with Kara Swisher, here. Send us your questions! Call 855-51-PIVOT or go to nymag.com/pivot. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Support for Pivot comes from Virgin Atlantic. Too many of us are so focused on getting to our destination that we forgot to embrace the journey. Well, when you fly Virgin Atlantic, that memorable trip begins right from the moment you check in. On board, you'll find everything you need to relax, recharge, or carry on working. Buy flat, private suites, fast Wi-Fi, hours of entertainment, delicious dining, and warm, welcoming service that's designed around you. delicious dining and warm, welcoming service that's designed around you. Check out virginatlantic.com for your next trip to London data, and a matching engine that helps you find quality candidates fast. Listeners of this show can get a $75 sponsored job credit to get your jobs more visibility at Indeed.com slash podcast.

Just go to Indeed.com slash podcast right now and say you heard about Indeed on this podcast. Indeed.com slash podcast. Terms and conditions apply. Need to hire? You need Indeed. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher.

And I'm Scott Galloway. Scott, the news keeps on coming. Guess what? Kanye West has a social network. We're going to get to that in a minute, but what do you think? Very quickly. I'm really happy for, I think his name's George Farmer. I met him at our conference. He seemed like a lovely young man to me, who has basically handled a flaming bag of shit and is trying to turn You seem like a lovely young man to me, like who has basically handled a flaming bag of shit and is trying to turn chicken shit into chicken salad. So I think he's hit the lottery here and he gets to sell this thing that is an unviable business that has been going sideways to down to somebody who's willing to show up with a check. So congratulations, George.

I guess. We'll get to it in one minute. His wife is Candace Owens, who was just appearing with Kanye. We'll get to all the particulars in a moment. Otherwise, how's it going there in Britain? Liz Truss looks like she's in big trouble. Yeah. I mean, she's...

I don't trust her. There you go. You know, she did bring in a responsible economic minister. I don't know what the right title is to say. We're going back. We're withdrawing our plan to cut taxes on the most wealthy. Well, she already has people in her own party calling for her head, which this earlier is really, really rare. This is just, you know, you run out on the field and you're not even at your position and you slip and,

you know, tear your ACL. This is, it's not weird that people shoot themselves in the foot. It's just, it's weird. They do it while the gun is still in the holster. I mean, she's, she's going to be a footnote in history. I don't see how she gets through this.

Jeremy Hunt has come in. He replaced the other finance minister. I mean, the whole thing is just, you know, the labor party must be like being thrilled about all this. Yeah. No, they're like in their jobs.

Jeremy Hunt is, he's the winner here. He comes across as the adult in the room. And he immediately gave what I thought was a series of very powerful statements saying, everybody's going to have to take their medicine here. We're in a tough spot. I think he comes out of this, he's the only one that comes out of this looking good. Yeah, the minute you get to London, Scott, I don't want to say anything about here.

Anyway, we'll talk today. We have a lot to talk about. The turmoil at True Social, Scott. I don't want to say anything about here. Anyway, we'll talk today. We have a lot to talk about the turmoil at True Social, obviously. Also, Elon Musk is under federal investigation. Not a surprise. We'll speak with Pulitzer Prize-winning author and historian Anne Applebaum about Putin's dwindling options in Ukraine and all the things that are going on there. But first, more bad news for the Mark Zuckerverse. According to the information, Apple's mixed reality headset will be able to scan irises for identification, similarly to Face ID on iPhones. The device will have 14 cameras, more than the Meta's headsets 10, two of which will be downward facing to capture legs. Wow,

you knew Apple was going to come out with something amazing. We'll see if everybody uses them because I think Apple's devices are going to cost $3,000 as opposed to $1,500. It's obviously going to be a device for wealthy people, but that's how a lot of their stuff starts. I thought, well, you know this better than me, but what I thought was most interesting was that they're pulling a Microsoft move and they're starting to release or leak features early in an attempt to put their elbows out. Or specifically, I think this is Tim Cook sticking his finger in the Zuck's eye because they usually are pretty close.

They usually keep their cards pretty close to their vest, don't they, around the box? Well, he has done that before, stuck a finger in his eye before with me and other people. Yes, they usually do. But I think they know this is a big deal. This is going to be a big move by them. And they're slowly making their way to it

through the Apple Max headphones. You can just see the progression from the AirPods, the Apple Max headphones to where they're going. And so they're going to position it as very small business at first, as opposed to Mark, who was acting like this is the beginning of the new world of Facebook. And I think that's smart. And it's going to be so nifty that lots of people are going to clamor for it to be cheaper and better. And that's how they're going to do it. They usually go from the top down versus the bottom up kind of thing. And Mark's stuck in the middle, which is a very expensive headset that is very hard to use, that is still terrific, but not good enough, if that makes sense.

Yeah, but where I think this ultimately heads from a technology perspective is it's all about the iris. I think the wearables are fun and an interesting soap opera specifically watching the self-immolation of meta. But I don't think the Apple wearable is going to work. I think what will make progress and how it will impact the world of technology is iris scanning similar to the incredible utility. What I see is a convergence between what happens at the airport with clear, which I think is remarkable, What I see is a convergence between what happens at the airport with Clear, which I think is remarkable, and what happens this morning when I was at the gym and I'm buying my protein shake and I just tap my phone and then I go and get my head shape and I just tap my phone. The collision between biometrics and payments is really powerful.

I don't think it'll manifest through a pair of sunglasses you got to put on your head. The wearable that works are your AirPods and your iPhone. But there's still tremendous utility to be reaped from time savings around payments. Payments are still... I tried to buy tickets for the Arsenal-Liverpool game last weekend, and I spent three hours on a site trying to figure out how to pay with U.S. credit cards. So it is still difficult to check out. There's still confusion around tipping. And there's still a ton of low-hanging fruit around payments and biometrics around security and identity. And also, I think this is where this is headed.

And just to inflame people on the far left who have decided that anonymity is some sort of built into the constitution around social media. I think there will be a point with your computer where if it scans your iris, you will go into an algorithm that says, this is a real person writing this, and this has more meaning. So, I think iris and identification and just, I think identification is going to be a really interesting topic. Identification, I think it's who you trust. I would not trust Facebook with my iris information. I'm already nervous about Clear, even though I've used it. I used it from the very beginning, and it's incredibly convenient.

I think it's a question of who you trust, and I would trust Apple a little more with it, although I'd still be nervous. I don't love, you know, the biometric stuff stays within the devices, allegedly. So, it's going to be a really interesting thing. But identification of real people is great and convenient. It's also disturbing if the government gets a hold of these things. They already have. When you go into the airport now, they know your face. You don't even have to get a fingerprint to get a passport. You don't even use your passport anymore.

They didn't take it this time. They just had my face. They had my face. They scan you. Come to the UK, they scan you. I was just thinking, all my practices, I don't take my wallet anymore. I don't. I'm like, oh, most of these stores I go, I know they have Apple Pay. That's called being a woman. Every woman I've ever gone out with doesn't bring her purse. Oh, God. That is not what happens in the world of lesbians. And then it's stereotypes. Lesbians, that doesn't work that way. I pay for a lot of things.

That's right. Who does pay? That's a weird one. Kara Swisher pays. Kara Swisher pays. That's right. I'm the dude, I guess. According to straight people, I'm the dude.

Speaking of which, we went to see the monuments this weekend, me and the kids. I loved the photos. Yeah, aren't they lovely? We had such a good time. We were deciding democracy rules. Speaking of, not democracy, actually, Netflix ad-supported tier will cost $6.99 and will launch November 3rd pretty quick. It will include four to five minutes of ads for each hour

and is priced below what Disney Plus and Hulu charge for similar products. They're at $7.99. The move comes after Netflix had a drop in subscribers in the first two quarters of the year. They say it's going to be revenue neutral. It's going to be fine for them. Did they land on the right price?

I think so. A little less. Not much. Not too much less. I've been called a couple times for quotes on this, you know, because I'm kind of a big deal. Yeah, I understand. I understand. But I'm really struggling with this because I think Ted Sarandos and Reed Hastings are so smart.

And the company is very data-driven. So, I can't imagine they haven't done a ton of ethnographies and A-B testing to try and figure out consumer reaction. But here's the bottom line, if you do the math. The average Netflix subscriber watches 70 hours a month of Netflix. The paid version, where you get somewhere between $3 and $5 off the normal Netflix subscription in exchange for watching five minutes per hour or 350 minutes or six hours to save $3. So Netflix is effectively valuing your consumption or your time of commercials at 50 to 80 cents an hour, which in my view, it's just an incredibly shitty deal for the consumer. And the reason why broadcast media is in structural decline is that when Disney or ABC or whoever it is pelts seven to nine minutes of restless leg ads at me for watching Modern Family for that gorgeous 21 to 23 minutes of content, they're only getting 29 cents.

So they're basically valuing my time at a buck 20 an hour. This values my time at 50 cents an hour. So they're basically valuing my time at $1.20 an hour. This values my time at $0.50 an hour. So unless they've done a great job of screening better, more entertaining commercials, and they found that people don't really mind when it's below five minutes, this is just a very bad deal for the consumer. And I don't see how this works long term. Well, it's an option. It's supposed to be an option, right? If you want to pay a little less and watch a few more ads.

And then you don't really watch them, do you? You just let them. But you know what the friction is? You know what the consumer friction is between not having a Netflix membership and a Netflix membership is taking out your credit card. And I don't know. And maybe it's easy for me to say living in an urban area, making a good living. an urban area making a good living. But the difference between saving $3 to $5 a month for having uninterrupted storytelling, I think at almost every economic level, that's a really good deal. So, every marketing bone in my body, Kara, says this is not a good idea.

Well, they're all doing it, right? They're all doing it. It's not like- Well, they've all got to find revenue growth. But where the real revenue growth, here's another staggering number. What percentage of Netflix consumption is by people who don't have an account, have taken their parents' password? Right. Well, they talk a lot, but a lot of it. It's probably like HBO, right? Yeah. A lot.

Well, thank you for that data-driven answer. It's 41%. A lot. 41% Netflix consumption is by someone who's borrowed someone's password. So it strikes me that, I mean, I don't know if you've tried to use Hulu, but Hulu is basically like having a nun walking around and wrapping your fingers every time you try and log on from a different place. Yes, it's true. Yes.

But Netflix has decided to go after recognized perceived breakage, thinking it's good marketing. Yeah. I would think if they could tighten that up. They did talk about it. Ted Sorrento said that was a big deal to them. I think they're probably doing it quietly, much more quietly. But they've talked about that. Anyways, I don't like this. I think it ends up being a tiny audience, but I'm betting against this. All right. Okay. Well, we'll see what happens. Speaking of big deals also, Kroger has agreed to buy Albertsons for more than $24 billion. Kroger is currently the second largest grocer, and Albertsons and The Forest combined, the

two realtors have about 5,000 stores and make about 16% of the industry, still behind Walmart at 21%. Obviously, Amazon has moved in there rather significantly. The deal will need regulatory approval. I can't imagine the FTC or the Justice Department doesn't weigh in here. So I agree with you that the Justice Department will't weigh in here. So I agree with you that the Justice Department will likely move in, but I don't think this foots or sets up for a valid antitrust case because there's still a lot of competition in the grocery market. It's a low

margin business and Walmart, which is arguably the one that would be most guilty of monopoly abuse, I think it's difficult to make the argument that consumers don't benefit from the scale of Walmart. And there's two players already. And what you have here, you're right, Cerberus just wants out. And so they're trying to figure out a way to compete and then get liquidity. And the numbers three and four players in this market, if they're not allowed to merge, I think they will make the argument that we could go away. I mean, we could, it is difficult to compete against Amazon with unlimited capital, but I think this will make the market more competitive, not less. I think it's a case and I think you're right. I think the FTC shows

up and I think they lose the case because I think it's hard to say that Albertsons and Kroger combining is a threat to grocery prices. They'll probably have to- Spin stuff off. Yeah, in certain areas and they'll do that. California. This is an incredibly low margin competitive business. Grocery stores on average have something like operating margins of 4%. It's really low.

This isn't, and there aren't the externalities of like, they're not depressing teen girls or, you know, radicalizing young men. So, I would argue that if they try and block this, they get a, I agree with you, they'll try and block it. I don't think it'll be blocked. I think it'll go through. And I don't see how this makes the market less competitive. It's already a very competitive market. And a strong number three would be a good thing for consumers. Well, here's the deal, though.

I mean, I think that they're very much going to have to get rid of things. And at the same time, they do have a lot of competitors. But look at what they're doing around in publishing with Simon & Schuster and Random House. They're blocking that. So that's what it reminds a lot of people of, is this idea that they go from, I think it's five to four. And in this case, from, what, six to five or something like that. I don't know. I think it's five to four. And in this case, from what, six to five or something like that. I don't know. I think they'll attract scrutiny. I'm all for breaking the book companies up because I love my publisher, but I just know

when they say pencils down, it takes them a year to get my book on the shelves at Amazon. And I cannot figure out what exactly they need a year for. I agree. I agree. So, and by the way, I love them. They're wonderful people. They're smart. Who is your publisher? I'm with Portfolio Penguin, Random House, Berkshire Hathaway, Amazon, Joey Bag of Donuts, Reed Hastings, LA Law. I mean,

these names, it's literally like where brand goes to dog. Here's some Random House. So I used to be at Random House. Now I think I'm Simon and Schuster. You think? I think. And then we'll be together if they merge. There are all these really lovely

over-educated women. Okay, that's fair. They are. They're literally like every cliche of the 180 IQ woman who went to Brown. Yeah.

That's my wife. You're talking about my wife. I've literally met some of the most over-educated, impressive, radically woke people go into publishing. Oh, dear.

They are so smart. Yeah. But it definitely attracts a type. Yeah. Well, my wife was in publishing. It definitely attracts a type. Went to Brown. Very smart.

Oh, there you go. She's not radically woke. She's radically woke. Correct. More stereotypes. More reductive stereotypes from the dog. Yes. It's true, though.

Well, we'll see what happens here. But I think the Justice Department and FTC have been sort of not very aggressive in the way. Of course, certainly not at Tech. But I think the Random House deal is the biggest thing they've done, maybe looking at the MGM thing. But we'll see where it goes. We'll see where our regulatory agencies weigh in. They'll probably lose, as Scott and I always say. All right, let's get to our first big story because there's so many. Some big moves in right-wing media. Parler's parent company says that Kanye, or Ye, as he's

now known, has agreed to buy the company. Last week, he was locked out of his Instagram and Twitter accounts for making anti-Semitic posts. An outspoken opinionated rich guy decides he wants to own a social media platform. This could be the biggest story of 2022. We'll get to True Social in a minute, but tell us what you think of this yay situation. It has slightly worse prospects than True Social. Yeah, we'll get to that. I mean, Kanye and Trump, there's a lot of parallels there. But Kanye is infinitely more talented than Trump, there's a lot of parallels there, but Kanye is infinitely

more talented than Trump, but shares his business instincts. To be a successful business person, you have to recognize, you have to be able to do deals and get along with people. And Kanye, what do you know, signs a very exciting deal with The Gap, brings his genius, it's a successful deal, and it ends up in a fight and him walking away. He does a deal with Adidas, an amazing company with fantastic leadership, a great partnership, brings some of his genius, hugely successful, and what do you know, it blows up,

he's unreasonable and he walks away. The idea of Kanye running a tech slash media company is it's gonna literally be a race to the bottom with true social. And like I said, I'm really happy for George and Candace because they're going to get to cash a check and they're both, you know,

and they're having kids. Does it feel a little griftery for Candace? He seems to be in her thrall in many ways. He was with her doing those White Lives Matters t-shirts. He just gave a really bizarre speech. I watched it, about George Floyd based on some of her work. He's going DEFCON 3 on Jews. The guys are racist. Kanye is, it reminds me of, I don't like these films on TikTok, these videos of people saying really vile things. Because I think most of these

people, and I'm not excusing it, but are struggling. And when I say struggling, I mean struggling with mental illness. And I think Kanye, who has, and this is public knowledge, been hospitalized, I think he is struggling. And because he's a billionaire and because he's a genius, it makes for great media. I think it is disturbing. And I think the notion that he's going to... The good news is this platform reaches nobody. And so, this will be over before it starts. I wouldn't be surprised if the deal doesn't close because he's going to actually have to get along with people and get in a room and strike a deal. But if I was George, I would do anything to get to cash a check and get the hell out of Dodge. Yeah, I would agree. It feels very grifty to me because of his mental illness. I mean,

you know, everyone sort of walks quietly around that, but this guy is, I've spent a tiny bit of time with him and he was, it was clear he was struggling. And everyone is quiet about it, right? Like, hey, he should do what he wants. You know, this guy, you know, should determine, be whatever, conservative, whatever he wants to do. I 100% agree with that. But it feels like taking advantage of someone who's really has some real problems, has some real mental problems. And at the same time, buying sort of a pig in a boat, right? You know what I mean? Buying this, this is owned by the Mercers, I think,

as I recall, and some other people who really don't need the money. And still, they're going to unload it on him if they manage to unload it. You're right, I would agree. It may not happen. The leader in the space, Twitter, which is 10 times better run, doesn't work. Doesn't work, yeah, yeah.

So they're buying the shittiest companies of a shitty sector. Yeah, but who is this constituency that would sign up for this in seconds? He seems to have lost a lot of his constituency, it seems, I've noticed, among some of his supporters. The only play here would be as if he pivoted it and did a reverse TikTok and moved it to music. Yeah, but that's tried, that's been tried before. Remember Tidal? What was it with Tidal? Dorsey spent $300 million to hang, but that's tried. That's been tried before. Remember Tidal? What was it with Tidal? Dorsey spent $300 million to hang out with Jay-Z.

That's a great expenditure of investors' capital. Just like Trump, he's just too problematic. And he doesn't have the kind of base that Trump actually does. And speaking of which, some inconvenient truths for True Social, the board member at Trump's social network and one of the founders actually was fired after filing a whistleblower report with the SEC. In his report, Truth Social co-founder Will Wilkerson details infighting and turmoil at the Troublesite, which came as zero surprise. The story in the Washington Post is quite something. He's just sort of dropped a dime on all these people. Of course, they're saying he's a liar, but when it started, this

gang of idiots just felt like all the way to Trump, but including Devin Nunes and others seemed problematic. So I don't feel bad about them, but of course it's as disastrous as every other one of Trump's businesses. Well, what people forget is that Trump is a terrible businessman. And if he had taken his inheritance and just invested in index funds and the S&P, he'd be wealthier than he is now. It's true. Okay. The worst thing that happened to the Trump estate of his father, who was very successful, was that Trump got a hold of the money and started investing in casinos and in golf courses and antagonizing everybody and burning bridges everywhere.

He was very successful in reality TV. He has been very not successful in almost every other business venture. Trump University, Trump Vodka, Trump Taj Mahal, Trump Steaks. We could go on. And in America, there is a competence and there is economic reward around being shameless. If you're willing to burn every bridge, if you're willing to tell your bankers, essentially fuck you and start suing them

and threaten to embarrass them, if you're willing to not pay mid-level workers who retrofit and lay carpet at your casinos, just walk away from your obligations to them. You just, in other words, you just have absolutely no shame. Unfortunately, America in a lot of instances will reward that C above Alex Jones. But if you look at his business acumen, it's terrible.

It's terrible. And this group of people was just, I mean, one after the next. I sort of had a vague idea of how it came together. And it was pretty much what I thought. You know, met at a table. Hey, let's make a social network with a stupid deck and non-qualified people trying to put this thing together. It just was like, it kind of felt like, hey, kids, let's put on a show. And you could feel it. And then when they had Devin Nunes, I'm like, what in the world? The two people who started, including this guy, seemed like

completely, absolutely in over their head terribly. And then this story is like Trump calling up, giving, give some of your stock to Melania. He already had 90% for doing almost nothing. It's just such a get-rich-quick scheme. He has used it. Now, he's done a bunch of outlandish posts that then get posted on Twitter. This weekend, of course, he talked about American Jews needing to get their act together and act more like evangelical Christians, which I did not see coming. Before it's too late, another weird thing to say. So, he has been using it. It's just, he's got to hope that Elon Musk, if he's going to run, owns Twitter and he can get back on it pretty quickly. That was a really disturbing statement,

because there was some language in there that wasn't accidental. He said, before it's too late. And what that's saying is that's a direct threat to Jewish people in America. And when you're in a situation that is starting to feel eerily reminiscent of 30s Germany, you don't start making statements to Jewish people as a group that one, they need to be more like people in Israel and to immediately conflate all Jews with a certain geography and a certain ideology and also to make these thinly veiled references, the better shape up before it's too late, that is, you know, as not that long ago, that rhetoric led humanity to one of the greatest

crimes against humanity in history. And that language needs to be rebuked, rejected. They're not. And shamed immediately. They're not. They're not. Have you heard? I can't. The uproar among Republicans has been so vast, not at all. It's ridiculous. They called Mitch McConnell's wife Coco Chow. I don't even know what that means, but I know it's bad. They don't care. They don't care. They don't say anything. They don't. And this one, you know, of course, all the Jewish groups said something. Everybody has said something that's of decency, but they don't. Anyway, speaking of old guard right-wing media,

Rupert Murdoch re-merged the parent companies of Fox News and Wall Street Journal, which they split up. 21st Century Fox from News Corp in 2013. Then Fox sold off a bulk of its assets to Disney. And today, Fox Corp has Fox News, Fox TV, entertainment brands like TMZ. They also face a defamation suit related to Fox News' reporting of Dominion voting machines. So why is he doing this? Is it just estate planning?

He sold most of it off for $71 billion. Is he thinking he's going to lose? What is the reason for doing this? It's a smart move. And it's just pure business. Media has become a business of scale. And he initially thought that the newspaper company would be better run as a focus company than the television and the broadcast business. And the reality is media is morphing and becoming cross-channel. But this is just, he controls both companies. He has something like 35% and 41% voting shares at each, which means he controls them. And the reality is it's a consolidation move.

He's going to have, right now he has two CFOs and six months he'll have one. He'll have one ad sales team selling ads across the entire network. You have to – media is bulking up. And they have, I think, $19.7 billion market caps, which means that they're worth half as much as Twitter, according to Elon Musk. They need to bulk up. This is pure smart business strategy and consolidation. Nothing more, nothing less. It makes all the sense in the world. I wonder why they didn't buy Parler.

Oh, God. Because they're not stupid. These are, I don't know if you know, I mean, I actually know the people at News Corp. I've spent some time with them.

They're smart people. Smart. Robert Thompson's smart. All of them. Robert Thompson's very smart. Damien Eames is a clear blue flame thinker. Their chief transformation officer.

Can't stand him. No, I like Robert Thompson, but I mostly can't stand him, but they're smart. There's no denying it. There's no denying it. I was on Fox twice last week. Were you? You and Stacey Abrams. Stacey Adams, as they call her on Fox News. I got so many people email me. It's so weird. You find out who is closeted Fox watchers. I get so many texts. Great. Hey, saw you on Fox. It's like, you watch wow. I mean, so many people are closeted Fox watchers. Oh, and what were you talking about?

Adrift? What do you think I was talking about? Adrift, your book. That's right. Adrift in America in 100 Shards. Yes, that's right. And it was zeroing on the parts. You know what?

You and Pete Buttigieg, I love you two go on. That's good. It's good. Stacey Abrams did it. It's fun. Yeah, me and Mayor Pete. Yeah. Yeah.

You always hear those two names in the same sentence. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's important to have dialogue, have dialogue, whatever. I think they're good. Stacey Abrams did it. Yeah, me and Mayor P. Yeah. Yeah, it was there. Those two names in the same sentence. Yeah, yeah. I think it's important to have dialogue, have dialogue, whatever. I think they're good. I do. I went on with Charles Payne, who I like. I went on with Liz Klayman, former Berkeley Cal Bear. And I love, I love Neil Cavuto.

And Stuart Varney's a total gentleman. I actually like the people over there. All right. Okay. Well, there you have it. Except for the crazy ones. Yeah, there's a lot of them. But you know what I don't like? Going back to Fox, I apologize. What? The thing I don't like, and I'm. All right. Okay. Well, there you have it. Except for the crazy ones. Yeah. There's a lot of them. But you know what I don't like?

Going back to Fox, I apologize. The thing I don't like, and I'm sure you've noticed this. The croissants? Well, I don't like coordinated attacks against emerging female voices. Yeah. They love to attack me. You and I both know people, and you were subject to what I'll call the coordinated light attack. But they'll release something not journalistic first in the

post, and then they try and add some heft to it by talking about it in the journal, and then they bring it up on Fox News. And when you see a story that is not true and that is totally exaggerated, but you see it from three different sources, especially the Wall Street Journal, it creates a certain level of veracity. And that's the problem with people with a political agenda owning multiple media outlets on the far left and on the far right. Yeah, well, there's no one on the far left like this. Come on, there's not even a comparable. Who? The majority of media is left. It's not. Yes. No, it's not. It's not. It's not. It's a business. It's corporate media. And

there's no figure on the left that even equals Rupert Murdoch. Not even close. Not even close in terms of control, in terms of manipulation of the assets, et cetera, et cetera. Nobody. You can't name someone. You don't think, you don't think, okay, so how would you describe, I think the New York Times is more powerful than News Corp. I would not describe them as left. I would describe them as sort of centrist.

They're very much more, a lot of stuff. No, they're very left. And occasionally they say something really stupid to try and pretend they're not far left. I've been inside that place. They're not. They're just not. They're not. They're definitely not like, not the way Fox is.

Not even close. Fox has got a point of view. Okay. And you don't think that folks at Time Warner Cable, you don't think they were pretty left? Not the same. Not the same. Sorry. Maybe not as smart, but as left. Not even close. Actually, that's not true. Jeff Zucker is very smart. They're very centrist. They're very centrist. They're very-

Well, then your scale is totally fucked up, Carol. No, it's not. There's nobody like Rupert Murdoch, Scott. There's nobody like him. No one on the left has the same ability to control this much media. Well, no one's had the staying power, I'll give you that. But an attitude and point of view and strategy. Having been in all these institutions, there's nobody like Rupert Murdoch anywhere. Listen, he came after me and I was tiny. I was shocked by it, but whatever.

Yeah, I remember that. So, I mean, and that was internally. And then Tucker Carlson, it was kind of stupid. The Post did at one point. They're just, there's no media organization like Fox with under Rupert Murdoch and Newsweek. I agree. Well, that's what I brought up is coordinated attacks.

They sort of make, I think they're weak sauce leftism, I guess, I suppose, sort of weak sauce. And then they get nervous and skitter back. Fox News never skitters back. They continue on straight on. But we can disagree about it. I don't think there's any compelling figure on the left. I think your point is a fair one.

I think they're more strategic and they have a lot of assets. They've played into this notion that if you repeat a lie long enough, it becomes less of a lie. Anyways, I'll finish where I started. I've been rattled and disturbed by they have a tendency to do these strategic coordinated attacks across newsrooms, which kind of goes against the ethics of journalism, right? You're supposed to come to your own facts and not say, all right, we're going to go after this person and we're going to do it across multiple media outlets.

I would leave the journal editorial out of it. I wouldn't leave the journal business people out of it. That's how I would put it. I've never seen them do that. Not editorial. The news people, I think, are some of the finest. Anyway, we'll move on. Rupert Murdoch's very powerful.

He's doing a smart thing. All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break. And when we come back, Elon Musk doesn't just want to own Twitter. He wants to become its techno king. Also, we'll speak with a friend of Pivot, Anne Applebaum, about what's next for Putin and Ukraine. This is advertiser content from Zelle. When you picture an online scammer, what do you see? For the longest time, we have these images of somebody sitting crouched over their computer with a hoodie on, just kind of typing away in the middle of the night. And honestly, that's not what it is anymore.

That's Ian Mitchell, a banker turned fraud fighter. These days, online scams look more like crime syndicates than individual con artists, and they're making bank. Last year, scammers made off with more than $10 billion. It's mind-blowing to see the kind of infrastructure that's been built to facilitate scamming at scale. There are hundreds, if not thousands, of scam centers all around the world. These are very savvy business people. These are organized criminal rings. And so once we understand the magnitude of this problem, we can protect people better.

One challenge that fraud fighters like Ian face is that scam victims sometimes feel too ashamed to discuss what happened to them. But Ian says one of our best defenses is simple. We need to talk to each other. We need to have those awkward conversations around what do you do if you have text messages you don't recognize? What do you do if you start getting asked to send information that's more sensitive? Even my own father fell victim to a, thank goodness,

a smaller dollar scam, but he fell victim. And we have these conversations all the time. So we are all at risk. And we all need to work together to protect each other. Learn more about how to protect yourself at vox.com slash Zelle. And when using digital payment platforms, remember to only send money to people you know and trust. Thumbtack presents the ins and outs of caring for your home. Out. Uncertainty. Self-doubt. Stressing about not knowing where to start. In. Plans and guides that make it easy to get home projects done.

Out. Word art. Sorry, we have laugh lovers. In. Knowing what to do, when to do it, and who to hire. Start caring for your home with confidence. Download Thumbtack today. Scott, we're back. This week was supposed to be the start of Elon Musk's Twitter trial. The event was postponed.

We were going to have all kinds of programming, but Musk's not out of the hot seat. A court filing from Twitter revealed that Musk is under federal investigation stemming from his attempt to buy the company. It's not clear which agencies are interested in Musk, but Twitter's filing mentions the SEC and the FTC in other contexts. Twitter brought this up.

Why? Obviously that stock stuff that we talked about many moons ago had to be looked into. We hadn't heard from it for a while. I'm not sure the investigations will go away if he buys the company. And we'll get to Starlink in a second. But go ahead. I think this is a nothing burger.

And we don't know. But I think this is Twitter having to disclose that the guy who's going to acquire the company is under investigation, I would imagine that the SEC is compelled to investigate his share purchases well beyond after the filing deadline when he was supposed to disclose it. So my guess is that it triggers an immediate investigation. But even if they find something that would potentially block his acquisition, I think he has pissed off so many people that they will say, you know, he'll pay a fine, but we're not going to get in the way of this disagreement. Have at it, boss. You win. It's yours. And they'll fine him. But I don't think this is-

Yeah, he'll have a fine. He'll have a fine. I don't think this is...'t think this is a nothing burger. drug dealer, giving Ukraine a little taste and then taking it away. He's not taking it away, for one. Two, there's lots of government vendors of weapon systems, et cetera, and they get paid, and SpaceX should not have to foot the bill for this unless he wants to do it himself personally, and that's up to him and his gods. But I'm not sure what to think about this. You might be more incensed that he wasn't continuing to pay for it. You got to give the guy his due. He came up with this sort of low power consumption way of communication. It immediately added value to Ukraine.

He then comes out with talking points that parrots the Russian viewpoint. The Ukrainian foreign minister says, fuck off. And then he says, oh, someone needs to pay for this. And I'm not going to allow you to do it in Crimea because I don't want to start World War III. And there's something about, I'm uncomfortable, and I think a lot of people are uncomfortable, where someone of that power and that genius and those resources puts themselves in the middle of geopolitical decisions and battlefield decisions. I'm just not down, I'm not comfortable with it. And I also think it reflects poorly on our government, our Department of Defense,

that they let this happen. But here we are, the richest man in the world. Thomas Friedman predicted this about 20 or 30 years ago. I remember him saying that there are certain individuals in a capitalist society with regressive tax rates and idolatry of money, where individuals are becoming more powerful than nations. And right now, to a certain extent, on this topic, he is more powerful than the United States Department of Defense. He's more powerful than Ukraine. He's making decisions based on his blood sugar and whether what he feels is the right thing to do that have huge ramifications in what is a conflict that could lead to nuclear war. And whether you think his specific decision has merit or not, it's like,

how did we get here? Here's the thing. He is like a defense contractor, and he's a defense contractor with extra power for some reason. And so, the government should step in here, either pay him or get another system, just like they do with everything else, instead of being held hostage by him, that's all, and pay him, pay him. He should be paid. He's a defense contractor. And so, letting him determine the course of the war. Now, in the past, lots of defense companies have been very critical to what's happening and wherever it is, and whoever's selling the javelins or whatever the different things that we're sending over there, the government should have control over on some level, or at least perceptible control

over. And I can't imagine Lockheed or any of them saying, we don't want to sell javelins in this part because it may lead to war or this and that. And so I think one of the problems we have is that the government is letting him have power that he shouldn't have that said he should be paid. So they should pay him and then treat him like any other vendor and not let him have this much power. But can you imagine the head of Lockheed or Northrop Grumman getting personally pissed off at something that the foreign minister in Ukraine says and then saying, I'm taking my submarines and going home? I mean, this just isn't, this again, we have gotten to a bad place.

As fucked up as our system is, it reflects the will of the people. These are elected representatives. They get to make these decisions. They appoint incredibly talented people. I think we end up in a dangerous spot where individuals, because they aggregate so much wealth, are now more powerful than nation states. It's not a good idea. The world is riddled with historical evidence that power corrupts and absolute power absolutely corrupts. And that when individuals get this kind of power, it doesn't usually end up in a good place.

Even if he had the best of intentions, it's not good. One of the sides of acting like he said he'd give it to them and then he's taken it away, that's not exactly true. And it sullies the argument, which was that one person should not have this much power over anything. Speaking of which, one group that is going to give him power is the investors, according to the shareholder agreement. Musk would have total control over Twitter.

The deal goes through. It's going to become private. He would have the sole authority to sell the company, an IPO, appoint or remove board members. Minority investors would have to vote for any board member Musk selects. But who cares? He's going to run everything. That's no surprise. I can't imagine, given this much money in equities he's putting in, that he wouldn't have this control.

It's a lot more than other people, for sure. Yeah, he's effectively setting up a dual-class shareholder company, which there's no shortage of in media. It was initially supposed to be such that media and editorial rooms weren't subject to the short-term whims of shareholders. It's been weaponized to such individuals who want control without economic risk at hand. The Ford family has a small ownership stake in Ford Motors and controls it. And then we have guys like Mark

Zuckerberg and to a lesser extent, and I've said this, Evan Spiegel. Again, this goes back to the notion that too much power in one person's hands, there's more downside than upside. And he's creating another dual-class shareholder company. It's private. If his investors sign up for it, he has the right to do it. And it's nothing that every other media, the reason that Twitter is in play right now is because it was one of the few media companies that didn't have a dual-class shareholder company. The reason there will be an activist involved at Warner Discovery is because it is the only

media company now left that doesn't have a dual class shareholders system where family controls the company. It's no surprise. What's more interesting to me is who on earth is still in this deal? Lots of people. But again, I just love the notion of Sequoia Capital burning $800 million on close of their limited partner's money so they can hang out with Elon and be close to his next deals. To me, that's just stupid. I don't think you know these people. They love this. They brag on. It's exhausting

when you're around them. They don't care. Yeah, but the chief investment officer at Yale doesn't give a shit if the people at Sequoia get to hang out with Elon. I'm just shocked the limited partners of Sequoia Capital aren't calling them saying, help me understand how you vaporizing $800 million of our money on close of our capital. And then they go, well, he's Elon, he's pulled through, he's done this, he's done that. Look at, I can just see these conversations happening. It's very hard to push back in these environments. And they, trust me, I don't think the chief investment officer of Yale has the heft to push back. I environments. And they, trust me, I don't think the chief investment

officer of Yale has the heft to push back. I think the environment is changing. That's fair. We'll see if that happens. But so far, he's going to control everything. That's not a surprise. That shouldn't come as any surprise. But get the power out of his hands and just buy his goods from him and tell him to go away. That's how I would do it. And if he doesn't want to sell them, get someone else to buy them. That's all. Anyway, let's bring in our friend of Pivot. Anne Applebaum is a staff writer at The Atlantic and a Pulitzer Prize winning author of Twilight of Democracy, The Seductive Lure of Authoritarianism. The perfect person to talk about Elon Musk.

She joins us now to discuss the latest in Ukraine. Welcome, Anne. First, help us catch up. Where is the war today? The Ukrainians are winning. We didn't expect that to happen. We're not really prepared for that to happen. And of course, it hasn't. We're not. The war is not over yet. But they have made enormous gains. They've taken back territory. They've shown they can do that. They've shown an enormous amount of resilience. They have refused to be cowed by missile strikes and attacks on their cities. But the Russians who weren't expecting this kind of defense and never expected this kind of Ukrainian army are now looking for new ways to defeat them. So

we've seen a mass mobilization inside Russia, very reluctant. Many Russians have actually escaped the country or have sought to escape police in order to avoid it, but it's happened. And we see a stepped up attack on Ukrainian civilian infrastructure, on power plants, on cities, on people's homes. So we're at a strange point. The Ukrainians are winning the war militarily, but the Russians are now trying to fight back in different ways. Right, including the bombing of Kyiv. Today, I was on the way in, I was listening to some news, there's more drone strikes today. To be clear, these are individual drones or bombs, they're hitting individual buildings,

and of course, it's scary. It's not a mass bombing. It's not Dresden or Tokyo. You know, we're not seeing the whole city destroyed. And Kiev is a very large city. The attacks seem designed both to intimidate and frighten people, maybe to create more refugees, also to destroy as much civilian infrastructure as possible. And morales, presumably. But mostly they're hitting power companies, things like that.

Yeah, they're trying to hit power plants. They're trying to hit electricity stations. And yeah, they're trying to persuade the Ukrainians to give up. I mean, you know, as has been the case in other wars, this kind of thing often has the opposite reaction. In other words, Ukrainians are angrier and now want to fight even more. So it's not a if the point is to intimidate to fight even more. So it's not a, if the point is to intimidate people and make them quit, it's not happening. Can you talk a little bit about

the public support or lack thereof in Russia? I spoke to Ian Bremmer and he said that it's actually, there's more people who support the war effort in Russia than media has led us to believe. Can you give us a sense of the view of the war in Russia right now? So I think actually the question itself needs a little bit of analysis because in a country like Russia, there really is no such thing as public opinion. People don't have political views. They don't say, I'm left-wing, I'm right-wing, I read this newspaper and that makes me this kind of person or that kind of person. They don't associate their identity with politics in the same way, and they don't have opinions on public events in the way that we do. To be against the war in Russia is to be outside the bounds of the law. If you told an opinion pollster or a journalist or even your next-door neighbor that you are against the war, you risk prison. And so asking

people what they think and asking for opinion is confusing. For a lot of people, just to get through the day, just to live their lives and do their jobs and so on requires them to state support for the government or reflect support for the government in various ways. What they believe deep down inside, who knows? So it's a very, it's kind of difficult question to answer. You know, I'm sure there are Russians who believe the government propaganda and who think this is a war in self-defense or that it's a war against Ukrainian Nazis. We've also seen the reaction to mobilization, which wasn't an enthusiastic march. It wasn't lots of people joining parades. We've seen exactly the opposite. So one of the things that Putinist propaganda does

is it creates apathy. So most people, as I said, are taught to be outside of politics. And that's had the effect of meaning that people don't protest against the war, but it also means that people aren't protesting for it. And instead, mobilization means that people run away. I'm told that in Moscow and St. Petersburg right now, you don't even see many men on the street because people are afraid of being accidentally caught up in a kind of press gang drive. It's not so popular that people want to participate in the war and are joining voluntarily or not very many. Right. I think it was a surprise, this attempt to recruit people. In the last few weeks, he's also annexed four provinces in Ukraine.

What's the state right now? And will Russia hang on to any of them the way they did previously? So I can't tell you what the borders of Ukraine will be exactly after the war. But it's clear that Ukraine does not recognize the annexation of these provinces. And actually, none of them are fully controlled by Russia, some only just barely. And so fighting continues all across that so-called annexed territory. The Russians themselves haven't said where they think the borders of their country were. So I don't think the annexation mattered as much as some thought. I don't think it's had any impact on the fighting on the ground,

nor does it have much impact on the way people on the ground feel about who they are. So right now, it's a theoretical propaganda move rather than something real. So the thing that made news was Putin basically saying that they were open to or normalizing the idea of a tactical nuke. Do you think that is a real possibility? So to be clear, Russia and Putin in particular has been talking about tactical nuclear weapons for years, years and years. So this is not new. A friend of mine who was in the Polish government used to say, you know, if the Russians would just only threaten us with nuclear annihilation once a month, that would maybe be enough. I mean, it happens much more than we in the U.S. were aware

of. You know, they've addressed this at Poland, they've addressed it at Germany. When they do military exercises, they exercise the use of nukes, and they've been doing it for many years. So none of this is new. It's part of their information war, if you will. It's part of what they do to intimidate us and make us not want to help Ukraine. If you game out how they could maybe use them in this war, even now, it's very hard to see what the rational use of them would be. It would be almost a kind of stepped up version of the current bombing campaign. You could, you know, take out a part of the Ukrainian army, then the fallout would blow into Russia. You could

hit a Ukrainian city that would make people even angrier. And the Russia would then have the, you know, incredible blowback from the rest of the world, from China, India, its other allies, and its other trading partners. So right now, it doesn't, it looks to me like with the mobilization drive and the use of drones in Kiev, that what Putin is trying to do is find a different way to fight a conventional war. So I don't see this happening right now. Also, you know, to us, what Putin's doing looks crazy or irrational, but actually, for him, based on the information that he has and the ideology that he lives by, he's not acting irrationally. He's not insane. He's not

suicidal. He's not trying to end the world. And so when you look at the nuclear weapon question, you know, you start where I started with, Is there a rational way for him to do it? Right now, it looks like no. So I don't think it's a thing to be afraid of at this second. So what does he want now? And is it the same thing he wanted in evidence at all that he wants to negotiate. And actually, he hasn't given any evidence that he's changed his goal. And his goal from the beginning was the destruction of Ukraine as an independent state, the elimination of Ukrainians and Ukrainian mess, the blocking or boycott of the Ukrainian language. I mean, all that has been, you know, in the occupied territories when Russia has taken over. That's been the policy that's carried out, and there's no evidence that they have withdrawn from that. On the contrary, they've actually just recently moved some more troops to Belarus, the country that's just to the north of Ukraine, which is an ally of Russia. And some believe that could be, you know, yet another harbinger of yet another attempt to attack Kiev. So there's no evidence

yet that he wants to negotiate. And this is, he won't negotiate until he himself understands that he has lost or is losing. And that when the Russian state understands that this war was a mistake. And that could go for a long time, presumably. I don't know. You know, things happen sometimes faster than we think. But yeah, I mean, they have to understand that it was a mistake. It was a disaster. It's been terrible for them, for their country, and they won't win. And when they realize that, then there could be a negotiation. Is there a comparison to Afghanistan? You mean to the Russian experience in Afghanistan?

Yes, Russian, not ours. We had our own. This is a bigger operation than the Russian-Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was really support for Afghan forces. And this is the Russians fighting themselves. And so it's a bigger, broader operation. It has bigger political consequences. You know, in a narrow sense, it could well be that the loss of this war would have the kind of political reverberation that the loss of Afghanistan had, maybe even more so. So, Anne, I'm curious. You talk about Putin not wanting to negotiate.

My sense is, and I want you to nullify or validate this thesis, is that we are not interested in negotiating. That this is going exceptionally well for us, that the West for the first time appears unified. The Ukrainian forces have recaptured in the last month more territory than the Russians took in the five months previous to that. This seems to be going very well. And I don't, my sense is we're not looking to negotiate right now. Your thoughts? We're not looking to negotiate because a negotiation right now to freeze the conflict as it is would not end the war. So the war will only end when Putin has decided that it was a mistake, as I'm repeating myself. But just to be clear, if we froze it right now and everybody stopped fighting

and we had a ceasefire along the current lines, that would be understood in Russia as an opportunity to rearm, to re-equip everybody, to wait through the winter, and then to start fighting again, either next year or the year after, in six years, whatever. So if we actually care about peace, if we want there to be peace in the region, we want Ukraine to be a viable country that people can invest in and that refugees can return to, then there has to be a sense of Ukrainian victory. Ukraine has to take back at least the territories that it has lost since February, and then we can talk about the end of the war. And I don't think that either Ukraine or its allies see that that's possible just yet. We were earlier talking about Elon Musk, who always sucks up all the attention in any arena he's in. There is a movement among people

like him where we need to end the war, we need to negotiate. Trying to paint a picture of Ukrainians as the bad guys, really, if you read some of their stuff. But this controversy in Starlink is just one of the many things to do with that. Do you think there's commitment in this country to that more? So everybody wants to end the war. You know, the Ukrainians want to end the war. You know, I want to end the war. We all want to end the war. But the war also has to end in a way that's permanent, so that it's not a war that's going to start again in six months. And, you know, whether Elon Musk really understands that, I don't know. Whether the business community understands that, I don't know. I, you know, I agree with you. I hear very, you know, off the record, I hear similar, I've had similar conversations. There's also a desire,

and this is stronger in Europe than in the US, to somehow go back to normal. You know, can't we just go back to the way things were before? Can't we have, you know, cheap Russian gas and open trade? You know, that was doing, that was really good for everybody. Can't we have that back again? And I'm worried that it's because people don't understand the nature of the Russian regime, and they don't understand the kind of threat that Putin poses. So Putin doesn't want to go back to normal. Normal was bad for him. Normal meant that Russia wasn't a superpower in the way that he thinks it should be. You know, this is a regime that doesn't think that the prosperity of ordinary Russians is necessary. You know, we

assume that the point of government, the point of trade, you know, the point of everything is to make people more prosperous and happy and so on. That's not what he thinks. He thinks that the point of politics is to make, you know, make his name in history and make Russia great again. And so hoping that he'll go back to some previous normal is, I worry, is the kind of fantasy. And it's better to drop it now rather than later. So if things continue, if the momentum stays on the West side, I won't even say Ukraine,

but the West, because I do think that there's a lot of, you know, my sense is this is a West effort, if you will. Could this be the end of Putin? This feels like an unmitigated disaster for Putin. It feels like there's a non-zero probability he comes out of this with no gains, except huge damage to the reputation of the Russian army, huge destruction in his armed forces, media around the world talking about Russian men trying to flee the country. Could this be the end of Putin?

So the difficulty with making predictions about Russian politics is that not only do we not know who would follow Putin, we don't know how that person would be chosen or who would choose him. There is no succession process in Russia. There is no means by which a bad or unpopular president can be got rid of. No normal means. There's no political process. There isn't even a Politburo or a Soviet Communist Party like there was in the olden days. There aren't any institutions at all. And so while it's clear that there is a part of the Russian elite, including the security elite and including even the world of sort of nationalist and military commentators who believe he's made

a mistake and would like him gone. We now have plenty of evidence of that. It's not clear to me what the mechanism is by which they get rid of him. So while I take your point, you know, this is a terrible embarrassment for Russia, for the Russian army, and a terrible, again, a disaster even for ordinary Russians, there isn't a clear process by which there's a power change. So, it could happen and you might be right, but I just can't make a prediction about when and how it would happen. All right. Anne, thank you so much. You can find Anne Applebaum's writing in The Atlantic. We really appreciate it. Thank you, Anne. Thank you. Scott, that was fascinating. We are so like not smart compared to her, I think.

Don't you think? I know. Anyway, one more quick break. We'll be back for wins and fails, including our intellect, apparently. As a Fizz member, you can look forward to free data, big savings on plans, and having your unused data roll over to the following month. Every month. At Fizz, you always get more for your money. Terms and conditions for our different programs and policies apply. Details at fizz.ca.

Okay, Scott, let's hear some wins and fails. Go for it. Go for it. So some wins. Richard Reeves has a wonderful, really a landmark book out called Of Boys and Men. He basically articulates what a lot of us have been feeling and seeing, but couldn't outline biologically, economically, and from a societal standpoint. And Richard does that from the Brookings Institute. He basically talks about young men failing. And I like, he's very even-handed. He acknowledges that women still face bias in the labor force, but he talks a lot about how slowly but surely for the last 40 years, bias has emerged against boys in the education sector. And I think that we needed that type of

hardcore research to have a more articulate conversation. So, I think it's an important book. And then another wonderful book by a guy I've always admired, the former editor of the New York Times, Bill Keller. His book, What's Prison For?, really offers a concise diagnosis of a huge American problem. We talk a lot about failing young men, and I wanted to start moving to potential solutions, traditional and non-traditional. And one of them is I believe that we should be thinking about a massive prison release program. And if you look at our incarceration, we incarcerate five times as many people as they do in England, six times Canada, nine times that of Germany. We incarcerate more people than El Salvador, the number one murder capital in the world. We incarcerate more people than Cuba, where you can be imprisoned for pre-crime thoughts, so to speak. We spend $80 billion on our prison. We were just talking about Russia's invasion of Ukraine. We spend more imprisoning our citizens than Russia spends on their military. and Russia spends on their military. And because we turned it into a for-profit entity, when people can make more money at something,

they become very good at figuring out ways for more demand. And this is both a Republican and Democratic failure, whether it was Nixon deciding to go after people of color because they weren't voting for him, or Clinton's crime bill, which criminalized addiction. 50 years ago, we basically gutted mental health treatment centers, and now prisons have become essentially our mental health institutions. And once a mentally ill person is imprisoned, they become seven times more likely to have additional sentences, because obviously that is the worst thing you can do to a mentally

ill person. One in three black boys ends up at some point incarcerated. And then on the flip side, it doesn't reduce crime. There are studies showing that increases in incarceration do not reduce crime, and also prison release programs through COVID and also allocating some of those funds to rehabilitation reduce crime. So when they let people out of prison during COVID, crime actually reduce crime. So when they let people out of prison during COVID, crime actually went down, in some because men get out of prison until younger men don't fuck up like I did. And there are entire communities in America that need more men. And I'm

not suggesting we let out violent criminals, but what I am suggesting is that there are more people in prison now than the populations of Atlanta, Miami, and Austin. Anyways, my win is these important books. And I think we need to really think about not only incarceration or a massive prison release program from a strictly human cost and economic level, but also what we can do to help young men become less likely to end up in prison themselves. Yeah, it's been one of our greatest failures. And it's also been very lucrative for a lot of people.

And it's easier to put them in there than do something substantive to help them. It's one of the worst parts of our country, I think, of all the many things we have problems with that particularly is. I would say my win and fail is both this parlor deal. I just, as I'm reading more about it. You like it? In a world where conservative opinions are considered controversial, which they aren't, we have to make sure to have the right

to freely express ourselves, said Yeh in a statement. He just never shuts up. Come on. This is a fail for him and a plus for the Parliament Technologies and George Farmer, but honestly, taking advantage of this guy seems really sad to me. That's what they're doing. They'll push back against that. They're absolutely taking advantage of this guy. And I don't think they had many plays, and they're doing this one. But I just feel like this is just a grift. This is just a terrible grift on a mentally ill person. So,

I don't know what to say. I love the way you phrase that, because it just didn't dawn on me that they were taking advantage of him. I don't like Kanye. I don't like what he says. I don't like what he stands for. But you pointing that out, that regardless of his wealth and the vile things he says, this is someone still taking advantage of him. I really, I hadn't looked at it like that. And we'll see what happens after Twitter relaxes its moderation policies under Elon Musk. And he had talked to Ye about his, the whole thing is just, this anti-Semitic stuff, including with Trump, is repulsive, just repulsive, just incredibly. And the fact that they're, you know, free-speeching it, fuck them. Fuck them.

And him too, even if he should get mental help and stop being an anti-Semite, that's what he should do. So I have a fail, and it's linked to my incarceration. And back to the notion that a boy becomes twice as likely to be incarcerated the moment he no longer has a male role model in his house. We have more single-family homes than any nation in the world. 85% to 90% are head by women

because when people decide to split apart, we always decide, or not we always decide, but women decide to stick around for the hard work. And when you talk about a single-parent home, you're talking about a single-parent home almost always headed by a woman. I think a lot about masculinity. I think the ultimate expression of masculinity is to protect and provide for a child that is not yours. But I think basic manhood is providing for and protecting and acknowledging your children. And Herschel Walker has children that he has ignored and that he has not been in their lives. And there are so many men in the US who, despite having no money, despite having a terrible relationship, make an attempt and figure

out a way to stay involved in their child's life, much less the women who decide to raise the kid, for a multimillionaire to deny his blood and not be involved in that child's life is unforgivable. And I'm going to give him the benefit of the doubt. I'm going to go out on a limb here. The majority of Republicans have decided that abortion is bad unless it happens to someone they know. That is their platform right now. Okay, fine. He's just adopted the Republican platform. Men do not abandon their children. This is literally, this is the most basic thing of what it is to be a man. And so my fail is Herschel Walker, who despite having more resources, money is time. When you have money, you have time. You have the ability, you have the option. And he has chosen to not be involved in a young boy's

life, which casts the die for a very negative way for that young man's, that boy's life. This is a fail on a cosmic level. That is what it means to be a man. You can fuck up in all areas of your life, but you can still claim that you're a man when you look out for your kids. This is a huge fail. I would agree with you. There's a lot of grifting going on, unfortunately. Anyway, what a glum thing to say, but it's true. We're in our mama mode.

Anyway, we want to hear from you. Send us your questions about business tech and whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. All right, today's show is produced by Lara Naiman, Evan Engel, and Taylor Griffin. Ernie Indertot engineered this episode. Thanks also to Drew Burrows and Emil Silverio. Make sure you subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks for listening to Pivot

from New York Magazine and Vox Media. We'll be back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Cara, have a great week. Thank you.