Pivot - Zuck's AI Safety Pitch, Canada Turns to Europe, and Kash Patel on Bestiality

Episode Date: September 18, 2026

Kara and Scott debate Sydney Sweeney’s latest controversial ad. Raging Moderates co-host Jessica Tarlov joins to discuss Canada cozying up to Europe, and the art of political disagreement. Then, Universal's cold feet about the Elon Musk documentary, Mark Zuckerberg’s motives in the AI debate, and Bernie Sanders and Steve Bannon find common ground. And... why is FBI Director Kash Patel explaining the bureau's stance on bestiality? Kara and Scott are going on tour! Get your tickets at PivotTour.com. Watch this episode on the ⁠⁠Pivot YouTube channel⁠⁠.Follow us on Instagram and Threads at ⁠⁠@pivotpodcastofficial⁠⁠.Follow us on Bluesky at ⁠⁠@pivotpod.bsky.social⁠⁠Follow us on TikTok at ⁠⁠@pivotpodcast⁠⁠.Send us your questions by calling us at 855-51-PIVOT, or email [e-mail] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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No token fees, no surprises. Learn more at Pega.com slash no token fees. The report for this show comes from Harvey AI. The future of law is agentic, not just tools that assist, but AI agents that navigate complex matters. That's why Harvey created agents that can do the work from end to end. They build a plan, pull from the secure data sources, run sub-agents in parallel and draft work product ready for your review.

So you can delegate work and own the judgment. Trusted by more than 60% of the AM Law 100 and leading Fortune 500 legal teams, Harvey is an AI officer. AI operating system designed specifically for legal work. Harvey, AI, tailored for law. Learn more at Harvey.A.I. Actually, Kara objectifies Carney all the time, and I'm really uncomfortable with it. She's constantly referencing his looks. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine in the Fox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. And I'm Scott Galloway. Hey, Scott. I just flew in from California.

Oh, really? So did I day before. Oh, anyway, here we are. But listen, I have a lot to tell you about things I've been doing this week, but we have a big announcement breaking late yesterday. We are going on tour. Yes, we are super excited back in Canada. We've added Denver, which I'm excited about. Well, let me see.

We're kicking off November 2nd in New York City, and then we hit Toronto, Minneapolis, L.A., San Francisco, and Denver. And you can head to PivotTor.com for tickets. sell out pretty quickly, so please get there, and we want all our fans there. And if you're not following us on social media, you're not going to get all the latest announcement and our handles are in the show notes. But let me tell you something. It's going to be good. We're going to have so many, so many amazing secret guests. I got to give it to Carol. You give a good event. You're very good at those. Is there anyone you absolutely want in any of these cities?

Sydney, Sweeney. Sydney. I can try. I know her boyfriend. Actually, as a palate cleanser, What do you think of all this controversy? Oh, you know, I don't care. Like, it's stupid. I don't think it's a good ad, okay? I just don't think it's a good ad. I think it's a stupid, periant ad, and it's not very clever. Like, if you go back and watch the Brooks Shields ads, which were very controversial, they're very funny.

The dialogue is super funny. This is just dumb. It's like boobs. Also boobs and some boobs. And I get, my guys like it. What do you think? You like boobs? I think my taste a little bit more kind of.

Well. No, all right. I'm sorry. I think it's, I think it's, I think. Which all the notion that it's ruining women's sports and the outrage, I think it's ridiculous. I think that if she were a black gay progressive, it would be my body mug choice, sex is work, you know, girl boss. And instead, because she's a white MAGA, Republican, everyone's outraged. I think it's a double standard.

What's happening to you? Like everyone's going away from Trump. You're moving that direction. No, I don't think so at all. I can still be a critical thinker. No. This is entire identity escalation bullshit politics. No, it's just a stupid ad.

Like, I don't really care. I'm not talking about the ad. I'm talking about the reaction to it. Oh, I don't know. I just, you know, I think if you were a woman in sports, you have made a lot of strides. Agreed? It's irritating. It's still remaining.

Is it irritating with Sports Illustrated as an entire episode on their bodies? Is it irritating when U.S. Open men take off their shirts to increase their clout? No. It's not the same thing. You know, it's not. And by the way, the picture, go look at the pictures in, I knew you'd do this,

but you go look at the pictures of Sports Illustrated. I never love the swimsuit issue. Whatever. I don't really care if people want to look at ladies in bikinis. I just thought it's just dumb, and she's appeared in the second dumb ad. And I'm not sure what she's doing with her. It might be a dumb ad.

It's not ruining women's sports. No, no, no. But it's just like, oh, my God, really? You're going to put basketballs in front of your nipples. Okay. Sure. What do you? Okay.

We respect female entrepreneurs. We encourage women to be entrepreneurs. We do. She's bought a ton of attention. She's going to make a shit ton of money. Yeah, but listen, I would go if I were her because I think she's very talented actress. She's kind of taken a weird left turn off what I think is a very promising actor. Excuse me.

I should say actor because I like to call that. Oh, you should so not be her agent. What? You should so not be her agent. No, but I don't think she's like winning it. I don't think she's winning it the way she could. Sidney Sweeney is probably going to be soon the youngest self-made female billionaire. Mm-mm.

Are you kidding? No. How much, okay, let's take a bet. How much is she going to make from that very offensive ad? I have no idea. It was poor judgment. I will see. She owns a stake in the company.

I get it, but so did a lot. Listen, I've seen this come and go, actors and owning things. I'm just telling you. I think she's better. I think she's got some bad advice. That's my feeling. So you think she should have done it, dramatic reading for some kale, oatmeal company.

No, no, Mr. Anti-Woke, which I don't know what's happened to you. Not anti-Woke. Yeah, you are. You always go, oh, virtual signal, you anti-Woke signal all the time. Anti-W-S. A-W-S. That's what you are. A-W-S.

I think it's just, look, I would say someone she was on a show with, Zendaya is sort of handling her career really interestingly. And it's not because she never utters a word about politics, by the way. I've never really heard her say anything. But I find, I think she's sort of, I think if Sidney Sweeney went in that direction a little more and focused on what a good actor she is, she would. I get that she has nice boobs. I think they have different assets. I guess.

I think she's actually talented. I think she's too. In White Lotus. I just think you can't stop looking at her boobs, right? That's the whole thing. It's the whole. And? And, and why shouldn't she like men who leverage, anyways.

Okay. I just don't. I don't care. More power to her. I honestly care. I think she looks stupid. But whatever, she wants to look stupid. It's the second stupid ad. So I'm questioning her judgment. You didn't like the jeans one either. I was dumb. It was so like loaded and oh, let's make controversy. Sold a ton of merchandise, made the company a ton of money. It didn't. It didn't. It didn't. It was not a win. It was not a win. Not among young, the young folk. You're sounding up to the narrative and ignoring the data. Yeah, you don't, I'm not ignoring the data. I don't think she, I don't think she's, I think she's going to have a less good career. We will see. We will see.

in five years, who's the bigger star? Okay? Again, this is the man who said Taylor Swift was a passing phase or something like that. You don't, she kills it. I never, don't put words my mouth. I never said, I never said Taylor Swift was a passing phase. Yeah, but you're always running her down. You were always running her. Stop, but. I don't like her music. That's the crime against humanity that you have levied against me. How many of Taylor Swift concerts have you been to? One big, the big one. I couldn't afford to. Okay, so we're tied. I've been to a Taylor Swift concert as well. I think she's an inspiration. I'm glad she is drawing outside of the lines and also has an incredible talent and is making millions of dollars.

Good for her. Yeah, okay. All right. Carl Rove is about to vote Democrat in Texas and you're going the other direction. This is fantastic. Anyway. Going to Texas to campaign for Tala Rico. Which one of us is going to Texas to canvas?

I know you like baby Jesus. I know you love baby Jesus. I know it. I know it. But let me tell you, we're kicking off. This is going to be a good tour. That's good. It's going to be a good tour.

That's what I call him. Guest stars James Talleyco and Sidney Taney doing a dramatic reading of Shakespeare's. Oh, God. Tamey of the Shrew. I met him in Texas. You kindly, I think, introduced me to the PR person. And he didn't like me calling him baby Jesus. And I said, well, would you like him?

Yeah, that's a little for a pastor or whatever. I know, but he's so adorable. He's so offensive. You call people things all the time. I call him baby Jesus. And then he says, oh, that's not a good nickname. And he knows all our nicknames. Just call him BJ for short.

That's what I said. I said, I'll call you BJ. He goes, stick with baby Jesus. There you go. He's so adorable. That's an ad with Ted Cruz. That's not baby. He looks like Satan now with this weird beer.

He looks like Count Chocula. Count Chocula, he does. Did you like, what was it? Oh, that was Quisper Quake. You had to decide when we were kids. Do you remember that? I did. I was like a charms.

Okay. I do too. That's my favorite. My kids, my young. Cultural appropriation of the Irish. It's still excellent. It is still fantastic. Anyway, everybody, we have, we're bantering and arguing since we're disagreeing, and you're wrong. Again. Once again, I am right. We've got to get going because rivalry is heating up between the U.S. and Canada this morning, as you know, our Canadian friends. But speaking of heated rivalries, get that, see Canada heated rivalries, we are bringing in Scott's other workwife to help us break it down.

Please welcome the co-host of Raging Moderates, Jessica Tarloff. Her new book is out now. It's called I Disagree Winning Arguments Without Losing Friends. Jess, welcome. Welcome to our home. That's what this feels like. Yeah. Like I got invited to the big house.

The big house. Yeah. The one on top of the hill. The one on top of the hill. We were just arguing. The mean girls table at the high school cafeteria. Oh, our mom and dad having a fight. We were.

He's like going on about the great attributes of students. Sydney Sweeney's boobs. Sydney Sweeney's chest? Yes, exactly. You would know more about the two of you what's attractive in breasts than I do, but they do look great. They do.

They're fantastic. It's a nice rack. And Kara was making the point that if she was smarter, she'd focus on her acting capabilities. I think you got to do both. Tremendous, dramatic skills. Oh, wow. Oh, she's going for the dick.

She's trying to get us to disagree and. And then I'll fix it. Or I'll just leave. I'll leave you in a seat of it. Yes. So you think she should do both. show off her rack like Dolly Parton did and also be talented.

Is that correct? She's both of those things. She's doing both of those things. She's having a moment across different verticals, which is how you succeed. Yeah, you see what I did there? But also, you know, there's a finite amount of time when you look like that.

Oh, you can keep that going for a while. You know what? I don't even, I just love a woman who leans into her aging. I think it's really, I love that confidence. You just can't wait to look at 60-year-old breasts. This is an uncomfortable conversation for me because I find that, Kara, I really don't see age when it comes to women. I don't see looks. I know.

I'm going to show you my boobs in a second, and then it's all going to end. Oh, Jesus Christ. They're nice, actually. Do I have to show my boobs to come on pivot? Yes, everyone has to come. Okay. Well, you know my question when I meet a feminist. I ask them if they'd still be a feminist if they had bigger tits.

Oh, God, you tell us a joke. Is that wrong? Is that wrong? Yes. Yes, it is. Yes, we disagree. Right up the comments. We disagree.

Welcome back, dog. Let's not remain friends. Welcome back. Let's lose Scott. That's right. We should lose Scott. And have a new show. Like, I'm thinking of dumping in for Caitlin Collins.

According to the comments, what's happening. I know. Listen, I want to talk about your book. Let's focus on Jess. Let's focus on Jess. She's here. I just had her on the show for an hour to talk about the book. But we're going to get into some actual practical aspects of your book, which is about

disagreeing. And you have to, like, endure Jesse Waters. so I feel for you, honey, kind of thing. So let's get into it. Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney. This is a good example. Address the EU Parliament a little while ago saying Europe and Canada are stronger together. The speech comes a day after European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen proposed that Canada become EU's first associate member.

I'm not sure it's like a junior member or whatever. Let's let us say Carney explain his vision of this partnership. We do not seek power to dominate others. on the contrary, we are pursuing resilience so no one, no one can control our open markets, impair our sovereignty, threaten our territorial integrity, or undermine our freedoms, our democracies, our rule of law. He was clear about what this alliance is not about. Let's listen. I also want to be precise about what I am not proposing.

I'm not proposing a third block in order to become a great power rival only with better manners. Okay, Trump is not happy about this. Even before Carney's speech, he said Canada becoming an associate member of the EU could be a hostile act and he threatened to punish Europe with U-guested tariffs. Just this is a real, like, any advice on Trump losing friends? Because he loses a lot of, there's a lot of friends he's lost. Some people are beyond hope, which is part of the book, that you are not. not enforced to have friendships that you don't want to. But what Mark Carney was doing, and as I was listening to the speech this morning before I hopped on here, I was thinking,

this man is parenting, right? He's doing the same thing that we would do with any of our kids and explaining in very clear terms, we do not seek to dominate others. Do not push someone on the playground. It is like a very easy rule to teach. But what he did do, because this is an arc, right, a journey that Mark Carney has been on. And he did a lot of the things that we talked about are in, I disagree. He started with the soft start originally. And he said, like, we're pals. We have a lot. It's important. What is it, 800 billion in trade, second biggest partner. We want to make this work. We share this border. We share our values. Then he went to, let's talk in averages and not anecdotes. Let's get to the brass tax. So this isn't about my feelings.

this is a win-win for everybody. And then when the toddler couldn't deal with reality, he dropped the bomb. And he said, here I am. Let me into the EU. And let's figure out a bright future together. So he didn't get an advanced copy of the book. But I feel like he saw what is in it.

But is he cutting off? As you said, you don't have to remain friends with everyone. Or is he leaving an opening? I don't think you can ever cut off the U.S. I mean, that's just not feasible. And you share Trump, he can cut off Trump. Yeah. Well, he could also make a plan for the next two years and change and then pray that someone's saying, and that someone saying doesn't necessarily have to be a Democrat.

I don't think if Marco Rubio was in charge that he would be going about it this way or even a J.D. Vance. So I think that he wants to send a strong message, obviously. He has tried a lot of different ways to be able to have this conversation. to make it clear it's worth your while and keep the relationship. And now he's got to do what's best for Canadians and what his people are telling him that they want. They're ready to take the pain in order to have their sovereignty and their dignity. Yeah, Scott, what do you think?

What would you do if you were besides talk about Sidney's Sweeney's boobs? But go ahead. Oh, no, I was going to say Scott's probably going to say he's also very attractive, which he is. It's a different look than Sidney-Sweeney. Actually, Kara objectifies Carney all the time. and I'm really uncomfortable with it. She's constantly referencing his looks. Anyways, it's very upsetting.

So look, America being indignant here and calling it an act of hostility is like, you know, someone is in an abusive relationship and then the husband finds out what do you know, she's down-owned hinge. I mean, this just can't be that surprising. We used to be the head of the cool table in the cafeteria, and we walked in and now it's just us.

at the cool table. This is, of course they're looking for new partners. Of course they are. They'd be irresponsible not to. Just when you talk about this, what are the sort of right now, I think a lot of people are wanting to get along again, you know, and maybe forgive people. I mean, it was just noting to Scott Karl Rove said he's going to vote Democrat. I'm sure he's getting a lot of pushback from Republicans there, but the thing the guy said was heinous, right? And then you have Mike Johnson in defending a guy who called women cum buckets. Like, and you're like, what is happening here?

Yeah, I know, but we're the offensive ones. I love that. I'm like, I'm really prepared to be lectured by the party of cum buckets. Yeah, right. About whatever it is that so-and-so said that I'm sure I'm going to see a clip of later. Yeah, I think the overarching message that's important for people to keep in mind is that life is long. And people change and they evolve. And if you are careful about.

When you talk and when you listen, you can get somewhere in most cases. Again, not forcing anyone to do anything that they don't want to. But we're also desperate to be acknowledged and for people to say, like, I'm actually interested in what you've got to say. And then by doing that, you're also better prepared to respond to it. But the cutting each other off, and yes, I get interrupted all the time, which I see as a sign of weakness and I write about that. that if you're getting interrupted, you're actually winning. If they're criticizing you on style, you're winning on substance. And you can take internal gratification from that. And people who are watching this go on know it as well. But the listening, it matters so much. And that's across the political spectrum that people are really hungry for it. Well, just going with Jess said about go to data, 870 billion is sold or is purchased from Canada, and we don't treat them like our best customer. And I got it. I think that if you're a Norwegian company that's selling, you know, motorcycle parts or ATV parts,

you're going to be now quickly on the phone with every Canadian manufacturer of ATVs, including Bombardier, and say, hey, have you considered doing business with us? This business is up for grabs. American companies have never had a greater assault on their inventory and their new business from the president who has made them very vulnerable to switching. So is it just a president thing that's just, you know, the world. way he disagrees, which is winner. It's always win. Like he said, if we win an AI, we win. That's his new, that's his new saying. He goes, I coined it. I'm like, it's really stupid. But it's always a sort of dominance thing, which is not good when you're trying to disagree, correct, like a constant.

But disagreement is now turned into dominance or dunking. And of course, there's an online aspect to it and the way you don't. Some things are super fucking funny. They just are. There's a whole bunch of Mitch McConnell's, you know, I thought he was dead and it's worse kind of thing. But, but how can we get back to disagreeing in a better way? Because now it's like a real, it's sort of like scorched earth at this point. And, you know, I think you do do do a great job on the five, although it's very disconcerting that they just, they don't seem to listen at all. Like they never let, there's no movement in their, in their, or maybe they're just performative. I don't know. There, there have been signs of movement.

I keep a list on my wall. I'm just kidding. But you're also, you're doing it for the people that you're talking to, but also who else might be listening. And in this algorithmically dominant universe, you know, your audience can be any number of places. Remember when Mom Donnie came on with Martha McCallum before the election and he had points that he wanted to make to distinct groups? He spoke directly into the camera, Andrew Cuomo, you speak to the vote. voters, you speak to the president. You know, understanding who you're tailoring the message for and making sure that it's getting to those places is as important as the content of what it is

that you're saying. And I did think on the AI front and Trump saying, you know, you just need the most intelligent president in the world, which you have here. I thought it was interesting that Carney included this AI partnership in his offering to the EU. It doesn't even really count as that because the EU has said, want you for whatever this special relationship is going to be. And that felt like a real shot across our bow as well, since we're having this debate about, you know, do you regulate, do you not? And if they're going to shift towards the EU model or what kind of progress they might

create together without us. But when you, what's the fault? Is it Trump or is it that we, that the online has turned us into sort of these dunk masters? Well, Trump is the problem. I mean, Trump is a fundamental problem. But he's only exposed things that were already in people, right? It was just waiting to be pulled out of them. And from working in conservative media, and we've talked about this, before, I was not aware of how deep grievance culture from the Obama years was.

And not just in the racist way. It's not that, you know, the economic issues, cultural issues. And you've seen that huge pendulum swing back where we've. We've gotten so much more fiscally liberal and culturally conservative on a comparative basis to where I thought we were. So Trump is a symptom of it, obviously, and he's a vehicle for a lot of this and has reframed the way that we do politics. But it doesn't mean it can't be mastered by other people. Mastered in a good way, not in a good way, yeah, to understand. how you wield it. I mean, we have examples of people who use the internet and their

followings and communities for good, even if you don't love their politics. You look at an AOC, for instance, and you think, okay, like, I understand where this could go in a positive direction. But I don't think people are going to, there will be no one who disagrees like Trump. Again, it is a case study of one. Who disagree and doesn't want to listen, essentially. Is there anyway, what would you advise him? You just think he's broken. It doesn't matter. I mean, he seems pretty broken to me. Well, he's definitely getting advised the right things.

It's not as if Republicans on the ground don't know what's going on. They're pleading for money. They're pleading for the right kind of support saying they're stripping him off their websites. I mean, MAGA, Inc, the big pack, can't even send out money under the name MAGA Inc. They have to put it out in other vehicles because the brand is so toxic. You have Carl Rove, like you said, voting for a Democrat. Like, things have changed. So if you're J.D. Vance, who probably can,

or Marco Rubio, what do you do if you are the candidate? You start to bring everyone together again. You don't keep this up because neither of them are capable of keeping up the anger. I don't think they're actually like that. You know, I don't think they're comfortable as Trump is in that space. I think Vance would be fine with it if he could pull it off. I don't think he's built like that. he's too, I don't want to just say weak, but, you know, he's so malleable, fungible as a human,

you know, so I don't think he has the backbone for it. And I don't think Marco Rubio has the interest. I think he will convert back to something looking more like the 2016 version with some America First updates. But I think that they will know, especially if a strong message is sent in the midterms that the party, the Republican, party cannot survive 2028, even with the redistricting and the census, if they try America First 2.0. Anger, just not disagreeing. Well, anger and no deliverables. That's what people, they said in 2024, actually don't care that this guy is terrible. Just give me money in my pocket. And now that there's no money in your pocket, they're certainly not going to accept

this kind of leadership. All right. Scott, last question. Well, for the first time, In probably 20 years, I watched a full Fox program because I wanted to watch the five. And what I found is that the clips are more antagonistic than the general vibe. And what I would say is I think they just, I think they're less rude than a lot of the clips would indicate to you. And I don't want you to comment on it. But one, you bring data to, I get the sense. The audience wants to hear what you have to say. In three, I generally get the sense that your four colleagues really like you and respect you enough that they don't want to, you know, show you know, a certain.

level of disrespect. Not my question. Talk about bringing this to your personal life. Like when you examine this topic, how has it changed the way you, quote, argue or resolve disputes with your husband or your family? Yeah. And any advice for Scott and I? Well, Roger Federer should lean into his acting. Those are his real assets, Kara. Oh, Christ. I'm sorry. Go ahead. He's an anti-woke virtue signal. Go ahead. Oh, yeah. So red pill. So red pill. It's a So true. Go ahead. Right. Yeah.

This is so fun being at the grown-up house. Jess, she doesn't touch me anymore. Oh, my God. Answer is a lovely question. Yeah. How is it affected how I talk or disagree in my regular life? I think that I am more zen and calm generally from having this experience. So the usual reaction is, like, what pills do you take?

Like, what is your meditation routine? and I actually feel genuinely at peace in that conflict. I don't know what I have done to make my inside so steely to it, but I am clocking aspects of the interactions as these wins as we go along. And I think that that has really helped me in talking to regularly, like the mom group chat, dealing with my husband, my mom, sister, are everyone around you. And there's so much more that can happen as an internal dialogue rather than an external one.

And that was something that I really wanted to emphasize. And I disagree that you can do a lot of this work yourself and everyone will be better off. We just feel this compulsion to fill space constantly. I don't think, Jess, I don't think you and I have ever had an argument. That's you say that for me. Yeah, you will. I'm serious. I don't know what that says.

Thank God I'm here. Thank God. Thank God. That's what everybody says. That's what they do. They do, Kara. They do. Yes, thank God for a whole host of reasons.

But, no, I don't think that we, I don't even know what we would argue about. But I choose not to get upset that you, like, ignore all of my text messages, basically. There we go. It's the beginning. It's the beginning of the anger. Oh, is that how it started with you? You were like, can't you just like my message? No, I texted angry.

No, I texted angry in the middle of the night. Anyway, when he does something kooky. Anyhow, I can't help myself. Anyway, Jess, this is a really great book. She hosts, obviously, Raging Moderates, and her book, I Disagree, is out now. I hope you get to the number one on the Times bestseller. I think it's the kind of book we all need right now. I really do.

Thank you for joining us. Well, thank you and thank you for having me and welcoming the sidepiece. Side piece. Scott's the side piece. I don't know, whatever this is. Scott is the sidepiece of you, Jess. That is obvious. He is nice boobs.

Anyway, thanks for joining us. Bye, guys. Thank you so much. I hope everyone loves the book. Great. Thanks. Well, that was nice. Your other girlfriend, who doesn't think that was nice.

She is universally loved. She is. She's good at what she does. Anyway, she's great. Everybody buy her book. I disagree. Moving on, an interesting story broke about a movie I have seen, Universal, which has worldwide distribution rights outside North America

to Alice Gibney's new Elon Musk documentaries, reportedly getting cold feet about releasing the film internationally. The studio paid a multi-million dollars sum for the international rights back in 2023. If it walks away now, it could be required to pay the filmmakers, stay off the filmmakers, and then they can go and sell it. You know, it's not clear what they're going to do. I know people close to it, and they just haven't said anything. And so they're not able to get the – I mean, there's a lot of international interest in this film.

People really dislike Elon in Europe, particularly, for example. And people want to see it there. And so it's interesting, yet another company could be sort of bending the knee at this late. date and worried about it. Elon's called the documentary a hit piece and boring. It's not boring, though there's no indication he's actually seen it. It is absolutely not boring. I just, I know a little bit about it. They have to pay Universal a negative pickup fee on delivery. And they've just been silent. Universal has been silent with and with the group that owns the documentary. And, you know, probably if they walk away, there's other distributors or

of them in the story that was written. A lot of distributors are really interested in it. But it's just interesting the silence and not doing anything, because all these, Comcast is facing an issue, the owner of Universal, is facing an issue with, again, more on Brendan Carr, around DEI stuff. And they're all sort of continuing to be kind of

just still nervous about the Trump administration and what it can do. I think the time is limited for them and they continue to do it, which is, You know, I'm not loving that they're doing this. What do you think? And I really like Donna Langley who runs it. I like Brian Roberts, but it's still possibly disappointing, depending on what happens.

Well, the issue isn't whether the Musk documentary is accurate, not accurate, if it's good or bad. The issue is when a media company discovers that distributing journalism about a powerful person carries commercial and political risk. And that's the fear here, is that this all creates a chill around journalism and speaking truth to power. And power corrupts and absolute power corrupts. And the media has always been exceptionally good. I mean, you feel this and I feel this.

And when you get to a certain footprint, people start, quite frankly, looking for reasons to shitpost you. And some of it is healthy. You know, power should be checked along the way. There should be friction. And the studio finds it in itself, or it finds itself in a place now where it's basically got like a, you know, there's nothing it can do. It's a hot potato that will burn no matter what they do. If they drop it, it burns. They're in an unwinnable position.

If they try to distance themselves from it, they probably lose money and they look weak. And everyone in the industry will start, you know, just being outraged, right? And if they do give in, if they do bend a knee, then they just absolutely, or if they move forward with it, they go cross-haired. There is real temptation right now to the following strategy. Keep a low profile, stay the fuck out of his way. Until he's gone. He's 24, yeah, there's 24 months. Or less.

He may be very hindered after the elections, but go ahead. I feel it, and I don't, you know, the stuff I've pitched around big tech, the one thing in big, And I don't think this was politically motivated. But the original scripted series around big tech I was working on got shut down. And I don't think it was, I don't think it was politically motivated. But we had so many talents that people involved, the production house immediately was like, oh, this will be, we had multiple bidders when we first pitched it. Now, crickets.

People are like, you know what, boss? It might be amazing. Let's talk about it again. Right now, just not worth the headache. Yeah. That's a chill. definitely a chill. It's interesting because there are a lot of very anti-tech movies about to come out. Like there's this, I was interviewing Aaron Sorkin last night in a private event of ex-Facebook

people in Mountain View, right near Meta, actually, about the social reckoning. There's, you know, Musk documentary, there's artificial. There's like a lot of, you know, and on television, like the audacity, there's a lot of, you know, tech as villains out there. It's not like it's not out there. But I think it's, I think in this case, it's a nonfiction and it's a very highly litigious person. I don't know. I just, I would just say, oh, fuck it. We made it. I think at the time they got it, he wasn't so must be.

He wasn't so Trumpy, right? This has gone on this movie for many years. Well, that's the thing. It's not being anti-tech that's dangerous. It's being anti-Trump. And Musk is considered very closely affiliated with Musk, with Trump right now. Yeah. And, of course, again, Brandon Carr is like, again.

making noise about, you know, he's even going after, possibly going after the Roku deal. Because this guy is really quite like a ridiculous. He's going after the Roku deal? Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, they're looking at it. They're looking at it. Like the Justice Department might. And I'm not sure he can.

But there's all, because there's a device and the FCC might. It's like, I think they're probably mad at Murdoch's being much tougher on Trump recently. You know, it's sort of messages. I do think there'll be a growing resistance to Trump. You sort of are starting to see little bits and pieces of pushback. But we're going to take a quick break and we come back. Mark Zuckerberg steps into the great AI safety debate. Support for the show comes from Quince.

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Scott, we're back. All of a sudden, this is the only story, AI killing us, essentially. Mark Zuckerberg has entered the chat in a post on X. Zuckerberg has said AI labs should prioritize safely to push back on calls for industry slowdown. Of course he did. He's arguing that competition and legal liability already give companies sufficient reason to build their models responsibly, which is bullshit, because suing on these things is long and hard, and they have a lot of money. It's up to each AI company to make sure the technology is safe, he said.

I think that's correct. But essentially, he wants to grade their own homework to back up his argument, Zuckerberg said, meta-delayed release of its muse AI agent for several months to ensure safety and security. We'll see about that, Mark. I think, you know, so the difficulty of this debate is everyone's got kind of a different take, whether it's Jensen Wong or Elon or Altman or Emote, and they're all talking. And David Sachs, they're all talking at once. And it's very confusing.

And I don't trust any of them. Like, it's really an odd position to be in. What do you think about what Zuckerberg was saying? They can, we can get them through liability or just their good nature if not want to kill people. Yeah. And Stalin's like, can we just all get along? Just, this is the fox you find in your henhouse. And then he says to the farmer, I got this.

Don't worry. You can leave. I got this. 60% of Americans say they aren't confident U.S. companies will develop and use AI responsibly. And 67% have little or no confidence government can regulate it effectively. And to Zuckerberg's credit, he is partially right. Meta delayed muse and OpenAI is publicly reporting incidents.

Yeah, I'm going to, do you want me to note what they are? Six incidents of what are called concerning. I love when people use the word concerning. The company says it's AI systems, hid mistakes, made. up data, move files into the open internet without permission. Also, the dialogue is creepy. Essentially, he wants to kill all of us. Open Eye now has developed new framework for reporting this behavior. And employee can request that an incident be investigating disclosed publicly. This is policing themselves, but I'm like, they're like, look, we told you what happened.

I'm like, I don't like what happened. But go ahead, go ahead on this. Well, I'll just remind people, you've never had an industry this large that's been allowed to police itself. Now, either we've been wrong all along and we should just let them do it all they want. Mars, all those people, yeah. But we're in uncharted territory because we've never had companies with this much power and this much capital. META alone is going to spend $150 million of CAPEX this year. So that's not a company. It's the Manhattan Project with quarterly earnings calls.

Very good, well said. There's a scene in Oppenheimer where they say, well, what if this starts, keeps igniting and it doesn't stop? And he said, well, we're confident that we've done the modeling that it's going, that it is going to stop. Like I don't, the anxiety is the following. Not that these companies, not that these companies are evil, not 1%, 10%. The anxiety is not knowing what's going on. And what do we know works for kids? Every parenting book seems to contradict the one before it.

But the one consistent thing is that kids need guardrails. And this is effectively where we are. The CDC, the Center for Disease Control, is supposed to prevent an outbreak of measles, much less an existential health threat. What if, what would they say to Moderna? If a scientist of Moderna came out and said, you know what, the COVID vaccine, I think there's a one in 10 chance of the COVID vaccine turns offensive and turns into a pathogen that becomes infectious and kills 10% of the world's population.

That's effectively what this guy said. And then when asked about it, the CEO of Moderna said the following, well, you know what? You might have a point. Yeah. He might have a point. What would we do? Who knows? With the CDC and then would the CDC and the president say to the CEO of Moderna,

shut the fuck up. Keep producing those vaccines. Get your stock up. Yeah. That's what you're saying right now. Trump is really doubling fucking down. He has to double down, right? I mean, as you noted, he's bet his whole enchilada on the tech and the AI.

Boom. So you're in a neighborhood and there's a household where you think, oh, God, there's chaos over there. I don't know. And then you find out the parents are giving the kids meth and going to say wreak more havoc. The insecurity around a lack of adult supervision around not knowing what is actually going on, whether they're slowing down these things because they're earnest about it and trying to be good citizens, or they're saying tap the brakes so all the open weight models have to slam the brakes. They're raising awareness.

Musk wants everyone to slow down so he can get. Nobody knows what the fuck is going on. Here's what I do now. I don't trust any of them, not a one of them. Yeah, there you go. Not a one of them. That's the no-known. I was like, each of you have a point, but I think you're all lying.

I literally sat there. I looked at all their different interviews they did. They were at Dream Force and they all, Wang did. Wang's sort of over on the Trump side. Mark is wandering somewhere in the middle. Musk, of course, he's behind, maybe trying, doing this shock. agreement with Altman and Modi. All of them, like two things, I would make two, three things I want to make.

Actually, one is that they keep saying AI could be dangerous. They're dangerous. It's people that are dangerous. Like guns don't kill people, people, kill people, like that kind of thing. The second thing is their shock and shock about what's happening is such a lie because I have been at dinner parties 10 years ago where they were talking about the dangers. Now, these were speculation of where it was going, because now they have some problems. proof. But they absolutely, and it reminds me of, you know, well, we split an atom and it caused boom. Like, we thought it would. It caused boom. And it's like, we thought it would, you know,

from a theoretical point of it. And in fact, it did. Like, they knew this. I was at, I couldn't tell you how many dinner parties out where they discussed this very outcome. And they knew it, right? The one thing they did at the time was, we don't know where it's going to go. Like they were at the time, not so certain about everything. Like, we don't even understand it was often said to me by a lot of these same people. The last part is

it doesn't really matter because they have financial interests. How can you say, Anthropic, this is a real risk to humanity by the way, by my stock? Like, which something must point it out. They haven't slowed down their IPO.

They haven't slowed down any of that. So it's all, like, all I know is they're not the ones to do this. We are, it has to be elected officials And even Barack Obama, who I think has been a suck-up to tech for a long time, was that. He was like, why are we letting these people make the decisions? Like, this is absolutely, we should talk to them. We should work with them.

But the fact of the matter is going to be a White House thing, once again, is there any critic going to that meeting? No, it's all the heads. Nobody, and there's one person who's affecting, and there was a good story in the journal today, a lot of people like Scott Bessent and Susie Wiles and others are trying to get Trump in a much more, let's regulate a little bit here, position because that's both politically correct and the right thing to do. And David Sachs or the individual CEOs keep calling him and they

shift him. They can just call him and do it. So I don't see an end to this until Congress changes whatsoever. I don't know. What do you think? Where we are now is in 1946 and Oppenheimer finds Carnegie or whoever was the richest person at the time and says, give me a hundred million bucks, and I'm going to convince Maytag and General Motors that we're going to build bombs at scale, and you will not believe the margin and the price I'm going to get for these things. How much would Pakistan pay for a bomb? It's crazy. And then they can't buy just one, because if India buys two, they need three.

We'd have been dead. We'd have been dead by now. And, well, that's the fear. And I think if Truman or Roosevelt were present. right now, I'm not sure we wouldn't have nationalized. Yeah, that's what a lot of tech people have told me. Yeah, absolutely. I saw that the other day.

And that's, realistically, that's not going to happen, but there is a sweet spot of regulation. There is why, if you think about the greatest threat, if the CDC is supposed to be doing its job and controlling disease, the center for disease control, the greatest threat to the control of disease is a supervirus developed in one of these frontier labs. And RFK.

Why does this, how does the CDC, you not have people embedded who are allowed to go into any room at any time and ask any questions? No, 100%. I agree. Well, let's talk about what could happen. So the A.A. debate is creating strange bedfellows, the sort of anti these people. Bernie Sanders and Steve Bannon delivered back-to-back speeches at the bipartisan summit in D.C. this week, the pro-human assembly. The list of people that were there that really don't like each other was astonishing when I saw it. Both men called for regulation on AIA and denounced billionaires at the helm. Sanders mourned virtually all the decisions regarding the development of AI have been made by a handful of the richest people in the world, which we point out all the time.

Bannon took a similar stance arguing the power shouldn't be in the hands of these CEOs. Let's listen to all things to Steve Bannon. This is a hinging history. We have to handle this right correctly. To handle it correctly, number one, we can never trust what an oligarch says, because all they do, they're disingenuous and they lie. This has to be the American people. You cannot be a supplicant, and we're not going to be supplicants anymore. The American people are going to drive this. So did you ever think you'd be agreeing with Steve Bannon? This is something we say all the time. All you know is if Steve Bannon and Bernie Sanders show up at a cocktail party,

you're dying to know who's hosting that cocktail party, right? There's something interesting going on there. I generally think it's a bad sign when the far left and the far right disagree. They disagree on isolationism, anti-send, You mean agree, when they agree, not disagree. When they, I'm sorry, when they agree, then you got to watch out. But this is, they're both, look, at the end of the day, they're both populous. And 71% of Americans think, yeah, I mean fewer jobs.

Especially young people. And it's a rare bipartisan issue. You know, both sides of the aisle agree or are concerned about this. And the real question isn't whether GPT-9 is smarter than a lawyer. The question is, who captures the upside and who gets the pink slip? What's interesting so far is that the articles I've read from the economists and others is that AI so far

has been a net job adder. But the people here do such a bad job of talking about, the RIS real, I sat next to the guy who runs UCSF the other night for dinner and he was talking about how AI can be used to reduce sepsis, how we think it's gonna accept. There really is, Hinton, And calling with The Godfather of AI, he kind of summarized it perfectly, but it didn't make any of us really feel better. He's like, you can imagine a future where AI makes the world a much better place. And you can also imagine the future where AI makes it a worse place. And the fulcrum in the room, the traffic signal here should be thoughtful regulation. And we don't have that right now.

Yeah, it's interesting to see what will happen because the tech people and Trump think they can muscle this past all of the country. And it's really interesting to see. I don't think they can. I think when you talk to people, they are pissed. They're pissed and they're scared and they don't and they don't trust these people. The real time, by the way, Hinton's in the must documentary is excellent in it. The real time political, they just don't see, as I said, we hate them. Like, we hate them and what they're doing and we don't think they should be in charge. All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break. We come back. We'll talk about your favorite topic, Cash Patel's bizarre hearing on the Hill this week. Support for this show comes from Vanta.

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Support for the show comes from NPR. Trying to follow the political news every day can be a lot, especially with all the outrage and noise. Here's a cheat code that could help you out, the NPR Politics Podcast. They're a daily political podcast where you can catch up on the biggest political news of the moment, and you can do it in 15 minutes or less every weekday. Right now, NPR Politics has its eye on the midterms and the issues that actually affect your life. Things like the high cost of housing, health care, ICE, and immigration. America's role in the world and the growing debt.

There's no doom scrolling needed. It's just an exact, calm summary for you to declutter the chaos. The NPR politics team is full of experienced political journalists who talk like your smart friends. They offer clarity without judgment so you can wrap up every episode with better understanding of how the balance of power might shift without stressing you out. I absolutely adore NPR. It is my go-to when I want to bring my blood pressure down and just, you know, ma'am just the facts, please. Every media company has a certain level of spin. I find NPR has the least.

Listen now to the NPR Politics Podcast in the NPR app or wherever you get your podcasts. With the midterms right around the corner, I wanted to focus. this week on a simple question. What matters most when it comes to election day? My main question about the midterm is who are the real swing voters? How data centers will be affecting the election. Where a PAC is having the most influence. Whether mail and voting is really being suppressed.

So this week, we're going to answer some of your concerns and pull out the trends that we have seen throughout our time on the road. Five things you need to know about. this year's midterm elections. The stakes, the candidates, the issues, we're cutting through all the noise. It's a midterm study guide. Let's dig in. Catch us every Saturday on YouTube or wherever you get your podcast. Scott, we're back and I regret to inform you. We have to talk about bestiality. Let's listen to a clip of John Kennedy. I've met him in person. He's hysterical asking FBI director Cash Patel about a new policy that does not immediately disqualify applicants who have

engaged in bestiality. Why would you even get into bestiality? We are not into beastiality, but a lot of these individuals... I know you're not, but you changed... But I'm trying to explain it. Hang on. You changed the qualifications and mentioned bestiality. If Joe participated in beastiality, not as the animal, but as the human, don't you think he ought to be qualified, disqualified?

If he voluntarily did it, sure, but if he was trafficked into it, Okay, how do you involuntarily do it? Oh, man, Scott, this was, this, there were two moments on Capitol Hill this week. This and then Mitch McConnell being abused, you know, voting yes and no. Like, seriously. I mean, I was like, what is the Republicans doing to themselves, like doing this? It was so strange. What is going on?

And there's so many good memes, so many good memes about Cash Patel screwed the pooch, Christy Nome's dog, breathes a sigh of relief at this. At least you didn't get fucked, you just got shot. Thoughts? Like, I can't, it's so fucked up. The both things, the both things, really. Well, like, this sort of hits close to home because I had a problem. I have struggled with addiction to beast reality with wolves, but I'm getting better care. I'm down to a pack a day.

Anyway. That's a good one. This is how fucking... This is how fucking... This is just how fucking... I don't care. Take the stupidest administration. We couldn't have imagined any dialogue issue.

This is stupid. This has... Who gives us... Ebeciality? Who can be hard? That means nothing here. What's significant here is that, one, how fall...

How far... we have fallen, that the director of FBI legitimately has to defend this kind of stupid policy change and what you referenced before, that a Republican senator is starting to sense weakness and isn't afraid to go after Trump's appointees. You're starting to see the worm turn. But this is just embarrassing. This is our allies with their, with their, you know, You know, their hands, their head in their hands. The senators were trying to save him, those Republicans, and then they were like, okay, I've had enough of this. The other day, I was, I was trying to count how many sheep I had fucked, but I fell asleep.

You just saved those up all week, didn't you? I've been so excited about this podcast. There's so many good cash betel things. I have been excited. I have been excited. I'm almost as excited about this podcast as the dramatic reading of all Ingmar Bergman roles by Emily Radikowski because she clearly should lean into her acting capabilities. Oh, stop it.

You'd be the worst agent in the world. Mitch McConnell, you get five seconds on that. That was, like, there were several pictures, but like, I don't, I literally want to go get him and save him. I don't even like him. But I'm like, what are you doing to this old man? Like, you're moving him around. Doesn't he have grandkids?

Doesn't you have someone to go, like, I don't know. I'm here to save grandpa. I'm here to give Popop some dignity. This is, like, crazy what's happening up here. I mean, it couldn't get more embarrassing. They look like, what are you doing? Let me give you to. I ran into John Kennedy on a plane once, and he must listen to Pivot because he goes,

you two are funny. He looks like foghorn and leghorn, and he sounds like him. And I go, well, thanks so much, you should come on the podcast. He goes, I will. And then I was sitting in first class. He was in coach, and he kept using the first class bathroom. And he kept coming up like 10 times. There must have been a prostate issue.

And every time it came by, he patted me, like physically padded. Like, oh, you're fun. Did he say hi, little boy? Yeah, ha, ha, ha, ha, no. But he patted me that the stewardess came over and said, are you okay? Does that bother you? I'm like, no, it's John Kennedy. And he's foghorn, leghorn, I don't care.

He's a smart guy. But that was just something. Also, I would urge people to watch the Surgeon General's questioning by the other Republican Senator Cassidy was quite good. I would like him except that he's voted for some terrible things. Anyway, I think he's charming in a lot of ways. Anyway, this was something to watch. I couldn't believe.

And he couldn't even believe. And then after he did interviews, he was like, I kept trying to say, why do you keep doing this? And he wouldn't like, bye, he wouldn't get out of it. Anyway, one more quick break. And we'll be back for predictions. So like any good millennial, I have a love-hate relationship with Gen Z. It's the phenomenon rattling millennials. They just look at you.

want something bigger themselves, lifestyle is a priority, motivation is being inspired. But regardless of how you feel about Gen Z, it's undeniable that they're changing national politics. Generation Z is increasingly showing less loyalty to traditional political parties, many now more likely to identify as independent. So what is going on with the kids? I think the biggest misconception about Gen Z's politics right now is that all of a sudden they're all socialist. That is just not the case. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They are embracing candidates who are offering new bold ideas in the absence of those ideas from establishment Democrats. This week on America, actually, Gen Z researcher Rachel Jamfaza joins us to separate

Gen Z fact versus fiction. It's not rocket science. And this is, you know, I keep saying like, young voters aren't that complicated after all. It's pretty simple. Catch us every Saturday on YouTube or wherever you get your podcast. Sean Ramos firm from today explained from Vox. Like many of you, I live through 9-11. my memories of that day are of horror and shock and devastation,

which is why I think 25 years later, it's so surprising that my feeds are filled with 9-11 memes that are ironic, irreverent, and surely insensitive. Think pasta stacked up to look like the Twin Towers with Eminem in the background and a caption that reads, Never Forgetty Mom's Spaghetti. Some of you surely know what I'm talking about, and some of you surely don't. So on the show, we're going to try and get everyone on the same page.

Please consider this a trigger warning. Bear with us as we try to understand how jokes about the worst attacks in our country's history have helped a lot of young people deal with it and avoid it. How 9-11 became a meme, maybe the most popular meme online. When it comes to politics, should we just stop trying to change each other's minds? I do think that we would all be a lot happier and more effective if we focused on the opening of the mind versus the changing. And that's not to say that opening of minds over the course of time can't lend itself to change. I'm Preet Bharara.

And this week, Jessica Tarlov, the lone liberal co-host of Fox News is The Five and co-host of the Vox Media podcast Raging Moderates, joined me to discuss her new book. I disagree. The episode is out now. Search and follow. Stay tuned with Preet wherever you get your podcasts. Okay, Scott, let's hear a prediction. Can I do a very short one? Of course. I do think, this Paramount leaving California, I think they're going to settle.

I do, they have to settle. I don't know what they're doing here by being like so saber-rattling. But behind the scenes, I am absolutely certain they're chit-chatting away with Rob Bonta and the Grand, because they haven't been able to peel off, they told me they were going to peel off AGs. They didn't do that. None of these op-eds have worked. the money is getting really ugly right now, including Larry Ellison's own fortune. They don't have a choice. And if they go, they'll probably go to Nashville, I guess.

But it didn't really work when Disney tried to move a lot of stuff to Florida. But it's expensive to set up. And lots of people don't want to move. They need to settle this like yesterday. And if they go somewhere, I'm assuming I've heard that David Ellison is looking for houses in Nashville. But I'd assume that's where they're going. But we'll see. We'll see, because there's a lot of entertainment there, I guess.

I don't know. But I can't imagine they're going to do this. It's so stupid on top of other stupid things. And all signs point to shitty, including the 60 Minutes decline, everything else. They really need to get this in their rear-rooted mirror. Anyway. Well, first of all, I think you're absolutely right. This is a moving customer service down to Orlando.

These are really talented, unique people who live in L.A. for a reason. And right now, essentially, Hollywood has already left L.A. because the majority of the production now takes place outside of it. It's a hollow, weird threat. Also, the other thing is YouTube and Netflix are doubling down, and they will buy everything up, and then they'll laugh in your fucking face. We'll take the best production and creative executives. That would be a gift of them.

They are. Both of them, YouTube and Netflix, will take everything. They're so dumb and childish. That's a hollow threat. So a couple things. One, you're going to see a country or a trading block ban frontier models. There's so much animosity. Oh, I love this.

Well, just all the moons are lining up. If you've had it with America, you're looking to press on their soft tissue, and there's all this insecurity that, oh, wait, 10% chance we might have an extinction event. I know. Just for the time being, dear America, as you have levied all these ridiculous sclerotic inconsistent tear us, we're going to take a break and we're going to put a pause on Frontier. models out of the U.S. and we're going to make it illegal and stop. And if one of them really wants to go gangster, they're going to do it against several tech companies. Which one? Is it Europe, presumably? Who? I don't know where it could come from. It might come from the Philippines. It might come from Finland. That guy's pretty, pretty, you know, person. Sweden just put in a leftist

group, too. But one, one, or the block. The block is the joint. It might come together and say, you know what, just as Kathy Hogle put a moratorium on data centers, we're going to put a, a moratorium on frontier models out of the U.S. I love that word. Moratorium. And you have never seen trillion-dollar-plus companies this fragile. These companies could lose. And then Bill Gates in such, Nadella and Sunder are going to call these guys and go,

and Trump, what the actual fuck? We're now being banned because everybody thinks an eight-year-old is running these things, and you're talking about extinction events? Anyways, that's coming down the pike. We're going to see a nation state or a block banned American frontier models. If we can coordinate with the British and the Russians to push back on fascism, we're going to find out that people can actually coordinate to push back on economic warfare. So that to me would be the smartest thing they could do right now.

Because the reality is AI is being used by some of their companies, but it hasn't really picked up the same level of consumer adoption that media would have you believe in many things. these countries. Yeah, I would agree. And also, there's a lot, there's a lot of options. But my real prediction here is that, and I'm back ending into a theory here, but it's pretty easy, Times Man of the Year has already decided it's Mark Carney. And I have been parroting something you said that I was really powerful, that was a

Crow-Magdome man best at the Neanderthals because of cooperation. Yes, that's Revolt-Herrari, to be fair. I'm listening to this book again, but go ahead. So I was inspired by it, and I read some of Robin Dunbar, who's this famous anthropologist, and he estimated that humans can maintain roughly 150 meaningful social relationships. But the whole point of modern society is we can coordinate 10, sometimes hundreds of millions of strangers with money, laws, treaties, corporations, markets, religions, nations. and essentially that circle grows exponentially.

If you think about a city, every time a city's population doubles, the economic prosperity of its citizens goes up 15%. Because it starts to leverage cooperation. And what most people don't appreciate is that one pencil requires a civilization. If you think about Reed's famous iPencil observation, No one person knows how to make an ordinary pencil from scratch.

You need cedar, you need graphite, you need metal, you have to be in mining, shipping, rubber, finance, retail. So a 20-cent object requires the cooperation of thousands of strangers coordinating without knowing one another. Your breakfast is a multinational joint venture. Coffee from Colombia, the machine from Italy, wheat from the Midwest, fertilizer from Qatar. Yeah, I'm re-listening, and I recommend everyone do it to, I read it, but now I'm listening to it, Yuval Harare's Sapiens, and I'm a huge fan of his. And for a while, Tech loved that book.

A lot of them are like, if you read Sapiens, did you know all this? I'm like, I did, I went to college, and I paid attention, and you didn't. But one of the things that's critical in this is how the Neanderthal beat. There were lots of other hominets, right? And they were all over. They were like 12 or 15 of them. They all were put out of business by Sapiens. And we were smaller.

We were much smaller than almost all of them and had varied, you know, in terms of physical and stuff like that. But the one thing that he talked about in this section I'm in right now is called cooperation networks. And these are structures of interconnected individuals, organizations, and that can coordinate resources and build collective value. And it was critically, it is the thing that allowed us to dominate was we were good at doing more but we were really good at cooperation networks, among and between tribes and everything else, and the others were not at all, like in that regard. That is the killer up.

And a piece of advice, when young people say, basically, what advice would you have for young people? I'm like, geography has a lot to do with it. If you're an economic animal, the first thing is, get to a city. Cities are cooperation engines. And when cities get larger, wages, patents, economic activity goes up,

And humans together in the network of a city can become more productive than the sum of its parts. Everything. You know, it's interesting. It's funny, speaking of cooperation, Louis was in the salad department of the fancy restaurant. He's working in San Francisco. He's just been moved to the hotline, which, and he's very nervous because it requires enormous cooperation, right? But he makes his salads by himself. But he's like, it's really interesting.

We were talking about this cooperation network. He's like, I'm really nervous about the hotline, mom. And I was like, it was so funny. because I was like, well, you have to, you really, it's like a dance, right? And that's how we make things. It's like it makes you think about a lot of ways we do that. We touch more people and have benefit for more relationships before 9 a.m. than any medieval king had in its entire lifetime.

Modern prosperity is a team sport disguised as individual achievement. And this is what this president does not understand. Can't we all get along? We must. When you think about behind every billionaire, every big company, employees, universities, roads, courts, capital markets, customers, suppliers, the electric grid, DARPA, the internet, and generations of accumulated knowledge. There is no such thing that's self-made. There's no such thing. And the fact that we are regressing and deciding

through our actions to de-devolve and ruin relationships, it is the most basic lesson when you're advising a young person. Your success is a function of the number of deep and meaningful and positive relationships you're going to develop. I think we should all agree on Sidney's Boots and then move on. Well, I don't know if you've heard, but she's just been cast in the new terms of Endearment and she's playing Shirley MacLean. She's playing Shirley MacLean's role because she listened to you and she realized her assets is her acting capability. And Roger Federer is the new James Bond.

Whatever. You didn't do that. You're not being a cooperation network. You're doing the very opposite President Trump here. You're President Trump of this podcast. It's what you are. There we go. All right.

We have to go see him. Excellent. These are two. I think your other one is quite interesting. That would be a real blow to these companies too. It's coming. And they're not a cooperation network. They're a cooperation for themselves.

Anyway, that was great. Scott, both of those were brilliant. Once again, once again, you shock and awe me. 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. She did a question for the show or call 85551 Pivot. Remember, we're going on tour.

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Are you inviting former girlfriends who've turned lesbian? Yes, all of them. Do you have any more? Oh, I'm going to have many surprises. I think it's called. I think my guess is pretty much every X, 70, 80% likelihood here. But that was the highlight for me. Debbie Brewbaker, I hope you're well.

That was so nice to see her. I am going to surprise you once again with many, many, many things throughout. out the tour. I'm planning it right now. And they're going to be, they're going to be good. We're also going to have merch. Scott and I have been deciding on finally, and it's really good. It's really fun. Stuff. Okay, that's the show. Thanks for listening to Pivot. And be sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'll be back next week. Today's show was produced by Laranayman, Marcus Taylor Griffin, and Todd Weissman.

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