Raging Moderates with Scott Galloway and Jessica Tarlov - Trump’s New Press Secretary Flops During First Briefing

Episode Date: October 13, 2026

Scott Galloway and Jessica Tarlov start with a check in on the election map, just a few weeks out from the midterms. Can Democrats trust the polling leads they currently see in the Senate races in Maine, Michigan, and Texas? Trump is doubling down on his decision to temporarily lift sanctions on Russian diesel, despite pushback from Republicans and European allies. The plan has Russia supplying around 300,000 tons of diesel immediately, with increasingly larger amounts to follow — but the total proposed over six months would cover just about 9 days of U.S. diesel consumption. Is this really about lowering prices — or is something else going on? Ukrainian drone strikes hit multiple data centers belonging to Russian internet giant Yandex, knocking them offline. This led some to suggest Russian social media bot activity had been disrupted — but the traffic that dropped was largely automated search crawlers, not Kremlin-linked disinformation. Troll farms, social media accounts, and paid influencers are still fully operational. Scott and Jess ask: how dangerous is it when misinformation about misinformation makes Americans less prepared to combat foreign interference ahead of an election? New press secretary Katie Zacharia held her first White House press briefing today — and used part of it to break the news that Kimberly Guilfoyle — Don Jr.’s former fiancee and America’s ambassador to Greece — would be resigning amidst a slew of allegations, including that she brought lobbyists to government meetings, and had a political benefactor pay her credit card bill. Trump is now privately having second thoughts about Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s announced plan to livestream the execution of Fort Hood shooter Nidal Hasan. Hegseth proposed broadcasting the firing-squad execution publicly as a deterrent, but bipartisan backlash has mounted. Will Trump go through with it? Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) has filed paperwork with the FEC to run for re-election in 2028. He is currently 93 years old — which means he would be 97 on election day, and is currently third in line for the presidency. Scott weighs in. And finally: What is happening to falling in love in America? For ad-free episodes, exclusive livestreams, and to connect with Scott, Jessica, and the Raging Moderates community, join us at ProfG+ on Substack: https://ragingmoderates.profgmedia.com/ Get The Monday Rage newsletter: https://profgmedia.com/s/monday-rage/ Follow Raging Moderates on IG, Tiktok, and Facebook: https://www.instagram.com/ragingmoderatespod/ https://www.tiktok.com/@ragingmoderates https://www.facebook.com/ragingmoderates Follow Jessica Tarlov on Instagram, Substack, and Bluesky: https://instagram.com/jessicatarlov https://substack.com/@jessietarlov https://bsky.app/profile/jessicatarlov.bsky.social Follow Scott on Instagram, Substack, and Bluesky: https://instagram.com/profgalloway https://substack.com/@profgalloway https://bsky.app/profile/profgalloway.com Subscribe to our YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@RagingModerates Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Harvey, AI, tailored for law. Learn more at Harvey.aI. Good morning. Good morning. I want to thank you. I know. I feel as if we took the 11th grade debate team coach and said, oh, you're Republican and you have blonde hair and attractive.

Let's make you press secretary. I mean, she's really not the spokesperson. She's the opening act. So, you know, Leavitt left to spend more time with her kids. The joke is that Zachariah's taking the job to spend less time with the truth. Welcome to Raging Moderates. I'm Scott Galloway. And I'm Jessica Tarlow.

Make sure to subscribe to support our show and stay up to date on all the news. All right, Jess, let's check in on some of the key races we're watching, which is 19 days until Election Day. Here are where things stand. Calh Street puts the odds of Democrats retaking the Senate at 62%. I have trouble believing that number, but anyways... Well, that's because we're bedwetters. It's in our nature.

Is that what we are? Yeah. Yeah. Or that's what I'm telling myself because my bed is wet and I don't want to think of what else is happening there. Just kidding. Maybe cut that out. I don't...

You can't believe. I get up four times a night, unfortunately, now to not wet my bed. All right. So you go back to the polls. You go polling shows 53% of likely voters in Senate states favor Democrats. Okay. A new Washington Post poll shows Troy Jackson with a narrow lead over Susan Collins. New York Times polling suggests moderates are finding ways to distance themselves from the party's far-left brand. And in deep red Kansas, Cal she has the odds of Adam Hamilton pulling off an upset at 37%.

Take us, I would just love some color here. Talk a little bit. First, the one I'm most worried about, I don't know about you, is Maine. Talk about Maine. Yeah, so this was one of the polls that was favorable for Troy Jackson, but in majority of them, Susan Collins has a slight lead, which is where I think the race stands. If I had to bet today, I would guess that we don't flip Maine and that we're able to pull off some sort of miracle in like in Iowa or Texas. And that's just pretty insane of a place to be considering the composite. of these states. I mean, Maine is a blue state that likes Susan Collins. The other states are red states that haven't liked a Democrat since Barack Obama. So a little bit concerning. And I meant that about Iowa, not about Texas, who did not vote for Obama. I think Susan Collins continues to be sneaky good. And I just don't think Troy Jackson is connecting with people that well, quite honestly, you know, there were huge problems with Grand Platner. We talked about that and saw that in the primary. There wasn't a good alternative, like a Jared Golden for people. And people were obviously hungry for something to the left of the quote unquote establishment. But I just haven't seen that excitement for Troy Jackson in the same way that you're seeing for other Democrats across the map. I think that the New York Times chart about all of these candidates being able to run away from the far-left branding is absolutely fascinating, raging moderates.

Out in the wild, doing well in these races, and also doing excellent work in making positions that even, you know, a few years ago might seem like an asthma to core voters, independence, even right-leaning independence, just feel sane for the moment, like, you know, raising taxes and making sure that people have affordable health care. I think that will be the most seismic shift in our politics that talking about the need for some sort of universal coverage is not as frightening as it used to be. The Tala Rico stuff seems like it's died down. Obviously, it's been proven over and over and over again that he was not in a mental health facility in Ohio. Now there's ring cam footage. The New York Times did a whole deep dive. He was home at Austin being sick because the guy. has diabetes and got the flu, lo and behold. So I don't know if lawsuits are going to start

flying about that one. But it is curious timing because the Wall Street Journal had a very interesting piece of Opo on Ken Paxton from a couple years ago that he was seen partying New Year's Eve in Dubai with his mistress. I don't know if it's the same mistress that he was in London for the 4th of July with or this is a different one. I don't know if he's like a one a one-woman mistress man, is that what you call it, when you're so committed to your mistress or if you just fly around with whoever? But he was there with her and with two fugitives from U.S. law. So that's a pretty interesting one. And it's funny timing this whole, like, look over here. James Talariko is getting on a private jet with a Republican donor to go to an Ohio mental health

facility and the Wall Street Journal comes out with this piece about what a slime ball Ken Paxton continues to be. And also those fugitives donated, I think, $190,000 to the Ken Paxton campaign. The guy is rotten. That doesn't mean that Talariko is a shoe in to be able to pull this off, of course. But if there is someone deserving of your ethics ridicule, it is certainly Ken Paxton. And another poll today, Gina and Yehosa, who we're going to have on Raging Moderates next week, up on Governor Abbott. And it would just be the coolest if she was able to pull that off. Are there any racist that didn't cover that you're wondering about? I just want to double click on Maine.

I would argue that Troy Jackson has been an enormous disappointment that a couple months ago he was up around 65% on Calci as of now. Collins is at 44% Jackson is at 56%. When I saw the debate, I mean, maybe he just needed to show up with chest hair and not be, you know, not be accused of rape. Maybe that's enough. I thought she cooked him in the debate. I thought he came across this really like brightening up a room by leaving it. Many thoughts? Yeah, I thought his line about road salt was good and, you know, spurred a lot of memes.

and we know that memes matter, but votes matter more. And we have, you know, I feel like we're just trying to prop this up as something that perhaps it isn't. And people should be focusing their attention, you know, in Maine, of course, but looking all over the map, making sure that Peggy Flanagan is good in Minnesota. Sarah Longwell and I were talking about that last night, Chris Pappas in New Hampshire, the way that the GOP is spending their money indicates that they see the writing on the wall in North Carolina. In Georgia, apparently Democrats are also pulling their money out, and is they're that confident in John Ossoff? And last night, Keisha Lance Bottoms, running for governor, the Republican, Rick Jackson, didn't even stand up.

We had an empty podium situation, which doesn't bode well for him if he doesn't even want to stand there for an hour and answer questions. But I would largely agree with you about me. And it's disappointing because that's a blue state. And you should have blue representatives if that's where the populace is. Well, hopefully he's just an OK candidate, gets elected and ends up being a great, a great lawmaker. Who knows? I was shocked. I thought she actually looked.

I mean, I think I've created my own image in my mind that, you know, she's essentially Diane Feinstein from Maine at this point. But I thought she came across. I actually thought the debate that she won the debate. Let's just do a quick swing through Michigan, where El-Sayed, Kalshi has him at 67%. So two-thirds likelihood that Syed is going to pull this off. Your thoughts? That, I mean, it's what the production markets are saying. The polling, you know, has him up in most cases within the margin of error.

It's a swing state. LSS Locke and only won by 22,000 votes. Granted, that was a big Trump year. This is a very different environment, and Mike Rogers is running away from a lot of poor positions, like saying the tariffs are okay, voting for the war in Iran. It's going to come down to consolidating the support that was backing Haley Stevens. And you have an event that was going on this morning. I was just looking at footage from it with black voters from Detroit who are backing also talking about how Mike Rogers has never cared about them and doesn't care if their right to vote is preserved. So, you know, Haley Stevens is working her butt off, Alyssa Slokin, Gretchen Whitmer, Jocelyn Benson, who's doing very well performing at the top of the ticket.

She's running for governor against John James, who I don't think is a particularly strong candidate, but I would imagine a close-ish race. And, yeah, I would give the edge to Abdul Siyadh right now, for sure. I don't think I've ever seen a candidate as strong as Tala Rico. I mean, he's great, isn't he? He really is. I think he just acquits himself with such dignity and generosity and great. and his ability to weave his spirituality into politics without, I mean, it's just so, he's just reminded us that the Bible didn't say anything about abortion

or, you know, basically cutting off welfare. And he's like, this just couldn't be more, A, the Bible doesn't talk about abortion and B, you know, it talks about loving that neighbor. And he just is able to just flip the Bible dramatically towards, I think, a really compelling vision of what, democratic politics are, you know, at its best, supposed to represent. What, if you were to try and give two races that you think will shock people, like your, you know, Jess Harlov shows up, shows to the five, just glowing and just like in your face and spikes the ball on the desk, what would

those two races be that we have an outside shot? And I think you mentioned a couple of things before that you didn't think it would just really send a chill down the spine of the GOP. Well, I think what's going on in Iowa with obviously Rob Sand, who's just like a miracle candidate. And then Josh Churich, I mentioned this yesterday when I was potting with Sarah Longwell, that Josh Chirich actually cut a border ad, like got border chiefs in Texas to support his candidacy. And it shows that he also understands the way that these issues work, that you have folks inland that have been fed. of lies about, you know, how Democrats think about immigration and that we would just leave the border wide open, but also the reality that there are people who have crossed this border that have gotten into the country illegally and then have committed crimes against American

citizens and that that's unacceptable. So I absolutely love that from Josh Turrick. I think that would be, you know, big chill down your spine situation. Also, I saw that Republicans are pulling money out of Iowa's first congressional race, which is a big deal. I don't think that. I don't think that we talk about Roy Cooper enough in North Carolina, the kind of normal campaign that he is running. But Mary Potola, I guess, would be my other chill down your spine, winning in Alaska. So I'd go Iowa and Alaska, you know, Texas, because we already talked about Texas anyway. It does feel like the Republicans are reaching when the kind of campaign strategies they're implementing right now or to accuse people of liking women's basketball or being in a mental

institution. It does feel like they're kind of, they're grasping right now. All right, let's get into the regular news. Trump is continuing to defend his decision to temporary lift sanctions on Russian diesel, despite the action-causing division with our allies in Europe and with many Republicans back here at home. The plan has Russia immediately supplying around 300,000 tons of diesel, followed by increasingly larger amounts, in part depending on the condition of Russia's refineries. The total amount proposed over the next six months would cover just about nine days worth of U.S. diesel use. Jess, this is interesting, right? Some Republicans have actually broken from this. What do you think ends up happening here? Well, I think that we should pause to first reflect upon the fact that in a

best case scenario, this is a few days of relief. And that no serious analysts thinks this is actually going to affect the price of diesel. So this is a big PR stunt, which is Trump's favorite thing. You know, I'll give you $5,000. I'm going to sign all the checks and huge font. and I'm allegedly, you know, going to make it easier to be a trucker or a farmer in America. But none of those things are going to happen. The Republicans that are pushing back, they're the ones that you would largely expect. You know, you have the strongly worded note from the seven senators. And it's like the Tom Tillis of the world.

I'm sure if Lindsey Graham were alive, he would be hopping mad and pushing back as well. The idea, though, which seems to be correct and that this bipartisan group of senators is pushing forward, to say Susan Collins is in there as well, obviously, in a tight race, is that it's illegal to do this. And that because of the sanctions ban against buying Russian energy

started in 2022, that you can't, you literally just can't do this. And I'll be interested to see if they get anywhere with this, because there have been a lot of things that a few members of the Senate and the House have said, oh, you're not allowed to do that. Like, you can't tariff people just because it's Tuesday. And, you know, you can't take us into war and then keep us there without any sort of re-uping of congressional authorization.

And Trump is basically just plowed through all of that and said, like, I don't give an F what you've got to say. This one might be so unpopular that they could get somewhere with it. And something that stuck out to me that I wanted to mention to you, and I didn't know this before I started researching for the show, that Putin actually just released Russia's 2027 budget. And there's a 27% increase for the military. And when Trump is out there saying, oh, this war's got to end, this is what everybody wants, it's, you know, it's Zelensky that's standing in the way of all of this. And you look at a 27% increase. increase in the military budget from the Russians. Like, you got to think, like, these guys are going for as long as physically possible. And even perhaps beyond the bounds of what's physically possible, considering the axis of evil that they're involved in. And they'll just keep importing people from other countries that don't care about their people,

you know, as little as the Russians do. So I thought that was interesting. And I hadn't seen that or known about the Russian budget. Yeah, the – I'll bring this back to me. Right out of business school, I started a strategy firm, and we used to do scenario planning where we would take a board or management team off-site, and my job being angry and depressed as a function of my resting bitch-faced life was to come up with risks. Like, what are the risks to the business?

There's risks – you know, the fun stuff is risk to the upside. How can we triple the market cap in five to seven years? And I would talk about risk to the downside and things you need to be mindful of. And typically the risks of the downside are things you never see coming, right? We didn't see two planes slamming into the World Trade Center. We didn't see a pandemic. The risks I see right now are a big risk we're not talking about is Russia's economy right now is unsustainable. It's rates are at 14 percent.

Their GDP is shrinking. War spending is about 20 percent of the budget. I mean, that's just striking. And the thing about these dictators or autocrats when they fall, almost no problem. No one's expecting it. No one thought Assad was going to fall. No one saw Gaddafi fall. It's like how Mark Twain described going bankrupt slowly than suddenly. And if Putin, if there were to be a power struggle and Putin were to find a window on the ninth floor, we don't know what would happen there. This is a, you know, this nation has the second most nukes. You don't know what hardliners would

potentially take over. The potential for tumult at the top or, attempt to consolidate power and maybe use a tactical nude if all of a sudden what happens when Ukraine lights all of Moscow on fire? And Putin feels like he's losing his grip because there's no democratic election or I don't think there's a nice retirement home for him in Odessa or in Paris. I think his losing power involves a window for him. So this, I think that is a fairly big risk. Also, as an October surprise, and it would be a good thing globally, but it would be weird for the election. I think there's a non-zero probability that before November 3rd, something happens in Iran. I mean, the purchasing power of Iranians has gone from $320 a month to $80 a month.

The sanctions are actually taking a really heavy toll on Iranian citizens. And while the IRGC is this kind of distributed octopus that grows new tentacles and one is cut off, I think we're underestimating the likelihood that that regime could fall. So there are just so many, so many risks. Back to your point about just how symbolic this is, is about the whole six-month deal amounts to about nine days of U.S. diesel. We are a diesel exporter. We're the largest producer in the world of diesel second to distant second as Russia.

This whole deal is about one day of global demand. What this is is symbolic. This is us saying, or this is the president saying, I'm supporting Russia over, I'm supporting the invader as opposed to the nation and that is bravely fighting off an invader. It's ineffective, it's symbolic, but it is powerful in the sense that America is seen as giving comfort to our enemies and betraying our allies. Vladimir Putin, with his sanctions relief, it's a huge puff-up-up-his-chest moment, right? Where everyone is out there talking about what a bad guy he is, you know, we're all.

all like all eyes on Mark Carney, you know, this beacon of democracy and freedom and leadership and defending his people. And then Vladimir Putin's like, oh, your old friend, actually, like he's in my back pocket, not in yours. First Citizens Innovation Banking, formerly Silicon Valley Bank, is the bank of the innovation economy. The name may have changed, but for over 40 years, their commitment to bold ideas, relentless ambition, and delivering what's next is as strong as ever. So if you're a wondering where the road to innovation starts, it's here. First Citizens Innovation Banking. Head to first citizens.com slash innovation to learn more.

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That's hims.com slash moderates. Prescription products require an online consultation with a licensed health care provider who will determine if a prescription is appropriate. Restrictions apply. Individual results may vary. See hymns.com for full details. So moving on, Ukrainian drone strikes over the past week have hit multiple data centers belonging to Russian Internet giant Yandex knocking them offline. After Cloudflare showed a drop in Yandex bot traffic, it is my favorite story of the week because I feel like it's validation for my paranoia over the last three years, which doesn't mean I'm wrong.

Some people suggested that the strikes caused a drop in Russian social media bot activity, including Ukrainian president Vladimir Zelensky and a European member of parliament. whose tweet went viral. But experts responded that the lost traffic largely came from automated search crawlers, not criminal-linked disinformation bots. I'm going with the bots, going up and smoke. Troll farm operations were unaffected, and experts wanted suggesting otherwise

could create a dangerous false sense of security ahead of the midterms. All of a sudden, the Alberta separatist site went dead. Yandex go boom, Alberta separatist, a very divisive issue. in a Western economy, they go dark. Anyways, any thoughts on this, Jess? Well, I think that's the point about how we need to make sure that we stay alert to what's going on is what's most important here

and that we don't want to be lulled into this false sense of security that maybe like things are better online. That it's over. That it's over. Yeah. And there are. many conflicting reports going back and forth. There are people with enormous accounts and huge amounts of influence, people with great experience, working in the region, who have gotten this wrong, and then issuing public apologies about it. So I think that we need to remain vigilant

and know that we are dealing with an enormous amount of bad actors who would love to see us in complete chaos come election day and certainly in the aftermath when Trump mounts all of these various lawsuits. And I think that there are three or four more Yandex data centers that Zelensky could target after this. And it was a real shot across Putin's bow. I didn't not realize how many essential services are linked to Yandex. So basically the banking system gone. So people can't access their money, having trouble with drawing funds, making payments, carrying out transactions. The taxi drivers encourage. are all on this system as well.

So stuff isn't moving around. Restoring these data centers, they're expecting it'll take six months or more. And there is an enormous amount of data that is just permanently lost. And I was reading about the implications for the crypto industry with that as well. Like when you have fake money

and then the information system gets blown up, you might not have access to that money anymore. So this is a really big deal. talking to a friend of mine who worked in Russia for a long time, I believe one day he'll admit it that he was also in our intelligence services while he was living over there. And he said, I cannot even begin to explain to you how much of Russian society runs on Yondacks. And what a big deal it is that Zelensky went after them in this way. So those are my two cents. Yeah, it would imagine if Uber went down, I'll ride ailing out.

went down. And when you logged into Wells Fargo or B of A or JPMorgan.com, and it showed your account balances NA. I mean, this is a big deal. To your point, and it was, you referenced this earlier, and I hate to admit it, but you're right, or I'll just say you're right, this is basically, you have a bad mailman, and you got them fired, but the arsonist is still working. And the most dangerous thing in security is not a threat. It's false confidence that you don't believe the threat exists any longer. And these troll farms would like nothing more than for us to believe that the war is over. I think this war comes to and if at key moments, there's a drone strike against grinder, servers, and Republicans are stressed and decide to actually fight this war.

and support Ukraine. I think taking out the grinder servers would be a real disruption to the GOP at this point. All right, let's move on. Wait, can I mention something that... About Grindr, go for it. No, not about it.

I haven't been on Grindr since I last saw you. So nothing to update there. You can use my account anytime. I mean, my kids use my Netflix. My co-host can use my Grindr account. But there was this other insane story about the hackers who hit France and force the temperatures of the fridges and freezers in French supermarkets up to 122 degrees, causing fires and spoiling food.

So this is one of the bigger cyber attacks that they've experienced. And I thought, like, looking at both of these stories and the shutdown of Russian society or huge segments of it as a result of the strikes on Yandex, what these hackers are doing in France, and you're always saying this, that warfare is changing faster than we can keep up with. And I don't know, I just found it really striking. A lot of disruption going on around us. All right, moving on to more fun stuff. Should we talk about Kimberly Goodfoyle? No, let's talk. No, it's the new press secretary.

We have to talk about her. Okay. Let's talk about her. You give us the rundown here, Jess. No, there's a clip. We've got to play the clip. She's so bad. Please play the clip.

Katie Zachariah. This is going to make our day. Yeah, it is. Good morning. Good morning. I want to thank President Trump for his trust that he has placed in me. I have wanted to work for him for a very long time, especially as we are in the middle of the midterm blitz, with energy and excitement, never seen before in the history of midterms, thanks to President Trump.

He is an energetic president. First of all, on Kimberly Gilfoyle, the Daily Mail has been reporting on her since last year. last year. The president said yesterday to reporters that he is considering firing her. Do you know a timeline for that? We have asked Ambassador Guilfoyle to resign. She has been a wonderful asset to the team, and we wish her well. Okay. What? I know. I was thinking about, you know, when you're at a wedding and like eight girlfriends get up to do a toast of like how amazing the bride is and how they had the best time at summer. camp with her and it's just terrible. That's what this felt like to me. And she did like eight minutes

and then she only took three questions, Fox, Bright Bart, and Daily Mail. So not spreading the ideological wealth around. She messed up so many times and I loved this. I was watching Stephanie Rule and she got a quote from an anonymous White House official so they could say something. And they said, getting behind the podium is tough, but she got off on the wrong foot. She needs to get much better fast. Otherwise, she'll break Garamucci's record. Yeah, I thought this is a real test of failed to be overconfidence because she doesn't seem very. I feel as if we took the 11th grade debate team coach and said, oh, you're Republican and you have, you know, blonde hair and attractive.

Let's make you press secretary. She makes, yeah, she makes Sean Spicer seem like. you know, I don't know, name a great press secretary. Who goes down in the annals is the best press secretary. Who does go down in the annals is the best press secretary? I think they just go down as if you're competent you can get out of that. You basically get up there. Your job is to put Vaseline over the lens of every mistake that your president makes, right?

In this instance, it's the only job where your boss is also your loudest competitor. She's not the spokesperson. I mean, she's really not the spokesperson. She's the opening act. and the average tenure here is about what it is for the free trial on Netflix. She needs to understand pretty quickly the difference between misleading and actionable. You know, Leavitt left to spend more time with her kids. You know, the joke is that Zacharias taking the job to spend less time with the truth, right? And this is becoming incrementally more and more comical.

you looked at the press corps like, okay, let's just go with it. I mean, at this point, why not? Like, pretty soon are they going to start serving highballs and doing, you know, socky bombs? It feels like the whole thing's gotten a little unsurious. Deeply. And I think she's an interim pick where they'll, like, figure out what to do based on the midterm results.

It is a big deal that she said that they've asked Kimberly Gilfoyle to resign. She was facing a whole host of allegations, you know, accepting lavish gifts, political connections for private business interests, which is just regular fare for the administration. She apparently asked this Trump donor to pay off her Amex bill in exchange for access. And there are Daily Mail's been publishing text messages of hers about Don Jr's now wife. This was when she was just her girlfriend, because Kimberly obviously got dumped for this. woman, and I think they thought the safest thing to do would be to plant her in Greece, but I guess she's gone too far. It does continue the trend, though, that only women have to leave, that you have all of these incompetent men that are self-dealing, and they just get to hang around.

So women's rates. Well, I don't see, I would push back. I think that all the male, I would say all the male ambassadors need to get 100K, K, equal pay, just, equal pay, that they need their own donor to pay their amics bills. All right. So on to something ghoulish. Yeah. Trump is having second thoughts about live streaming the execution of the Ford Hood shooter Nadal Hassan who killed 13 people in 2009. Defense Secretary Pete Hexat proposed broadcasting the farming squad execution publicly, arguing it

would serve as a warning to others. The idea has drawn bipartisan backlash, and Trump is now privately expressing doubts about whether it should happen. Jess, do you think he goes through with this? I don't. No. I think there are too many signals from important people like J.D. Vance, like Mike Johnson, that they are casting doubt on it and that they wouldn't be tuning in to think that this is going to happen. And I also don't think that it's actually in Trump's nature to want to watch this, frankly. And the reporting is that Pete Hague says, that surprised everyone, which doesn't surprise me that he picked one of the more ghoulish things that you could suggest and didn't run it by anyone. You know, even people within the Army and the Pentagon didn't know. And there are questions around also the unit that's been selected to carry it out and their identities.

And if they can say no, right, like if a soldier can just be like, I actually, I don't want to be involved in the live streaming of an execution of a paraplegic. Like, could we do it? I know we've had trouble with lethal injection just in the last week. I don't, I think there are many people, you know, I'm not a death penalty person. I think that if, you know, one person is put to death who didn't deserve it and we have records of that happening, then it invalidates the entire system, you know, just not an eye for an eye kind of girl either. But if there was someone who I would nominate for deserving to die for what they

did. I would put this guy on the list, so I understand that. But if you want to do a firing squad, I struggle with even talking about this, but like I can wrap my head around it. Like, do it in private. We're just, we don't do things like this in the United States or not since 1961. Yeah, it's, obviously it brings up a larger conversation around the death penalty in general. And I was actually, I don't say pro-capital punishment, but was fine with it. when you hear about the crimes of some of these people commit, they do, and I think you could argue they deserve to die. And then the one photo, the one image, imagery is just so powerful.

One photo can literally just change everything for you. There's this fairly famous photo of, it's not a man, he's a boy, a black boy, but they decided to electrocute the kid. And there's pictures of this boy being led to his execution. And the reality is our guy, has periods where it just gets it wrong. And so state-sponsored execution should just not be a thing. And we can have an argument or discussion over that.

But an easy one, a layup of any sort of morality or just from a defensive standpoint, trying to maintain some modicum of being the good guys around the world, we should just not join Iran, Afghanistan, and North Korea as a nation that livestreams public executions. The last public execution was in Pennsylvania in 1834, It drew about 20,000 people. And so we didn't stop because we went soft.

We stopped because they turned into carnivals with vendors, crowds, and drunkenness. And the spectacle itself began to swallow justice and just reflect so poorly on our populace. And also his basic notion that it's a deterrent, there's nothing to support that. The National Research Council in 2012 concluded that capital punishment is not a deterrent. and there's just no evidence that it's a deterrent. And this isn't about deterrence. It's about content. We'd be turning state power into a vile streaming event.

And so, you like you believe, Hassan deserves whatever the law hands them. America doesn't deserve to become the kind of country that monetizes or in some sort of weird really weird, like I've taken way too much peptides and testosterone and have turned to just ruin my judgment. I've completed leadership with violence. So fortunately, my prediction here is this is just not going to happen. Trump will not bring this up and he'll distract us with something else and it's just not going to, it's just not going to happen. But it's such a, it's such a gross thing that this is where we are, that we would, even that a cabinet member would suggest live streaming a public execution, it's just shocking to me how far we have fallen.

And what people distinctive, what you think about, the death penalty, live streaming it or not. I heard actually what I thought the best argument for live streaming it was, if you're going to be comfortable with a death penalty, then you should be comfortable live stream it. I think that is a real, but I think there's some legitimacy to that. I'm not comfortable with the death penalty. but it's just stupid.

The two most powerful aircraft carrier squadrons for the United States are one, the U.S. dollar. Everybody settles in dollars, which means we see the flow of power. Our sanctions have power. People have to flow through us. And two, our reputation abroad, 98% of the world will never come to America. So whether they help aid and abet terrorist cells decide to send their kids to Ph.D. programs in the United States, buy our products, watch our TV and our media with men in tights and capes. It's all dependent upon this intangible association that is brand America.

And something like this just says, oh, they're not the good guys. These are not good people. I'm going to buy a European or a Chinese product. And, oh, those mean people who are, from what I understand, taking pilots lessons such that they can infiltrate the West and create an act of terrorism, you know, I'm just going to keep that to myself. I'm not going to form the U.S. Embassy. this is a stupid, it is not only immoral, it's just bottom line strategically very stupid. I mean, I'm in complete agreement and the barbaric nature of it,

that it was even considered and floated by our Secretary of Defense does send ripples across the globe. And people spot us and say like, oh, no, they've got someone high up there that is into this sort of thing, which I think is meaningful. And then this is a larger electoral point, and I was talking about this yesterday on the five, you look at how Democrats are closing this election.

We have 19 days to go. And they're talking about your grocery bills. They're talking about getting you decent health care. They're talking about protecting small businesses, human dignity, raising the minimum wage, protecting, you know, women's rights. Like very normal run-of-the-mill stuff that actually. affects people's lives. When they sit down, you know, at the kitchen table and they're talking about their lives, those topics are going to come up. And then Republicans are closing on,

let's live stream executions. And I'm going to pay you $5,000 to vote for us because I have nothing else to say. There is no record or there's no decent record to be able to even run on. And I think that the priorities of the parties could not be made more clear and the contrast could not be darker than between talking about getting you universal health care and live streaming a public execution of a paraplegic. That's it. And that is a contrast. I hate to say it. And I'm bedwetting as well, but going into an election, I feel good about that. And I feel good about the political party that I am a member of, that we don't have people that are thinking like that, talking like that, or that we certainly would never elevate to a position of power where they could actually think on

December 3rd, we're going to be doing that. Support for the show comes from CoreWeave. Everywhere you look, AI is expanding what we thought was possible, and at the center of it all is CoreWeave. Medical research and diagnosis, education, complex visual effects for movies, science and technology breakthroughs. CoreWeave powers AI pioneers around the world with purpose-built tech, building what's never been built before.

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Let's have it. So if he wins, he'd be about 101 at the end of the term in January 2035. In the prime of his life. Yeah. He'd be as president pro tem, he's the third in line to the presidency. we've built, okay, so the U.S. is the most powerful country and staffed the cockpit like a retirement community. We've got a B-2 bomber that's being run by the Golden Girls plus 40 years. The median age of people riding the rules keeps rising while the median age of the people living under them stays the same. The average age of American is 38. And gerontocracy and my ageism isn't about their ability, although their ability is substantially impaired. It's about whose future gets priced into the laws that survive for decades.

Who are we planning for? Who are we shaping our society around? Your 401K has a target date fund. You've got to pull it out by 59.5. You've got to start spending your money. If you are in the military, you're not allowed to command soldiers. If you're in a pilot, you're not allowed to fly a plane. if you're a surgeon at some point, they take the scalpel away, as should the Senate.

This isn't a party problem. It's an incumbency problem. And the incumbency, income inequality, the construct of income inequality begins with a constant regulatory capture by the incumbents to capture and usurp power and money and leverage from the entrance. And that's what happens here. When, because of Citizens United, the incumbents have all the power. What do you end up with? You end up with skyrocketing education costs because the incumbents, the people who have degrees, like the idea of not making the investments or opening up your freshman class. That's that entrance could have a shot at the same economic elevator you had. It ends up taking housing costs way up because we took housing permits out of the hands of bureaucrats and put them into the hands of old homeowners who like the idea of having less traffic and fewer homes. such of the value of their home groups of. We end up letting $120 billion cost of living adjustment for Social Security fly through Congress, whereas the $40 billion child tax credit, which would cut child poverty by 50 percent gets taken out of the

infrastructure bill because who votes and who is willing to listen to these people, the land of the dead and the golden girls being elected by people over the age of 65. We have a group of old people voting themselves more money and constantly taking. power and opportunity from the entrance. And it starts with this. It starts with a basic sanity check around term limits about a recognition that cognitive decline, the first victim of cognitive decline is your own ability to recognize your own cognitive decline. These people claim they're serving America. They out themselves as having no fucking fidelity whatsoever to the nation, only to their own relevance and a belief that if I leave, I'm going to die. Yeah, that's the point,

boss, go home, go home. It's time. You no longer have the skills. You are bad for America. You no longer represent America. Your judgment is impaired. And in a minimum, just operationally, there is about a 80% chance between now and the end of your term. You are going to have to miss votes. You are going to put tremendous stress on your staff. You are going to delay Congress. You are going to mean that your state is not represented. It is going to mean that on key votes, we're trying to create this optical weakened at Bernies for some dignity, and it absolutely makes the whole fucking institution. Trust in institutions, the erosions results in measles. It results in depraved behavior when one president can overrun our institutions. And part of the reasons our institutions have lost so much

credibility is they're filled with people who have no sense of self. This is an enormous brand erosion and brand hit for the U.S. Senate and Chuck Grassley. Senator Grassley is about to go down. He's had a distinguished career. He is a fine public servant, and he's about to go down again, like Feinstein or Ruth Bader Ginsburg, and Biden and Trump is someone whose own ego, own lack of self-awareness, came well ahead of any concern for American citizens. I mean, you said a lot of my thoughts. I just, I don't know how it can be allowed. Like, I get that we don't have a term limits rule, but it does feel like this is a moment where your caucus says to you, we got to go in a different direction. He had this whole, and it was quite funny, this thing that he did with his vacuum cleaner. And the vacuum cleaner is gone now.

And I think Chuck Grassley should also be gone from the Senate. Maybe he's too afraid, though, that a Democrat would win his seat because I was turning. That's the only thing I can come up with and the insane selfishness. Don't you want to be with your wife and your like grandkids and like great grandkids? They mess up great grandkids now. It's very bad. Yeah, fucking 93-year-olds are out of touch. They're out of touch.

They're not creative. They don't understand technology. They don't have new ideas. I do want to talk about one last story because it's from one of my favorite writers, and that is Derek Thompson. He has this on Substack Now, Formal. of the Atlantic. He's total Benjamin Button. The guy is aging in reverse. He looks 14. Pretty soon he's going to have a big wheel. He has a new article out, basically saying that America

isn't doing so well. We know the marriage rates and birth rates have been falling, but what about falling in love rates? Some stats. The share of 40-year-olds who have never been married is quadrupled since 1980. Half of men aged 24 to 35 without college degrees are single compared with 31 percent of college-educated men. Among women, there is almost no comparable education gap. And also the popularity of dating apps is even falling. Yeah. Any thoughts here, Jess? It bums me out.

I mean, being in love is one of the most incredible experiences that you can have in your life. And it doesn't mean you have to be in love for, you know, with the forever person. You know, some of people's best relationships are ones that have a deadline on them. Or, you know, there's a finite period of time that you spent with ex person. But you just, you lived so fully and you adventured together and you fought and made up and just loved. And I hate that people aren't taking that plunge. And there's a bit of conflation in the data between, you know, like there's love and then there's also marriage rates, which don't necessarily have to be the same.

A lot of people, you know, are in relationships where or have been in loving relationships, but don't end up getting to the altar. But I think that this is a bad trend line for all of us. And I don't bemoan the loss of the dating apps necessarily because I do think that people, it actually encouraged a lot of folks not to end up in relationships because you're just sitting around swiping all the time or you go on a couple of dates with this person,

but there was always this thought that there was someone around the corner better, perhaps. And it let you also say, it in your apartment or wherever you're living and just text for weeks, months, years, whatever it is versus getting out there and actually touching grass and touching each other appropriately. But I don't know. I don't like it.

And it's not a good trend when you think about population growth and also just happiness. You know, it has to be a good relationship or a good marriage, but it is directly correlated to prosperity and happiness, which are. two things that I think that we should all be hunting. Yeah, I find this an absolute punch in the gut. If you look at how we separated from Muhammadans and became the apex predator, it was through our ability to communicate and cooperate and the most accretive move you can make in your life.

And unfortunately, I don't think the bar should be being in love. I think it should be a decision to partner with somebody. And by the way, you might partner with your sister and decide to raise your kids together. you might partner with your brother on a business, but to be irrationally passionate about someone's well-being and that is not see the relationship as a transaction, but see it as an opportunity to be better to them, even when they're not as good to you.

I think that is the healthiest, most productive thing. Anyone can decide in society, and whether it's people who decide to overdose onto opiates, take their own life, the homeless, it's people who don't have anyone looking after them. It's people who don't, there's no one to call them. all. I've been looking into the homeless issue a little bit, and I used to think that it was veterans. Veterans are only 4% of the homeless. The HUD has done a really good job as Veterans Affairs,

ensuring that veterans have homes. The homeless, generally speaking, are people who have no one. They haven't attached to anybody. They don't have family who's irrationally passionate about them. They don't have a sibling. They don't have a boyfriend, a girlfriend. They're alone. This is, you know, it really is, I do believe, government programs that the answer is in each other. And while, you know, having kids is wonderful. I don't think you need to have kids to be happy. I think romantic love and sexual experiences are really important. But the basis of all of it is just a decision to invest in some sort of partnership in your life.

And what, I mean, to share half of non-college-aged men 24-to-year-old. 35 or single versus 31% of college, something we don't talk about openly because it's sexist, and I believe the sexes are different. This is an economic story disguised as a romance story. Women sort for men with trajectory, and we've stopped giving men non-college men a trajectory or a path, which makes them irrelevant and invisible in the mating market. Basically, the top 10% of men, it's the stock market, the top 10%. We had monetized, and financialized everything. The top 10% of men are bit up like NVIDIA,

and everyone else trades like a pennystock. And a man without a relationship is a man with no reason to show up. Unattached young men are the most dangerous cohort in any society. More prone to violence, extremism, and despair. The wrinkle there is that they're more prone to violence against themselves than anybody else. People want to portray them on TikTok as predators and the most dangerous person in the world. If you decide to go on a date with a man, just keep in mind, he's 16 times more likely to go home after the date and hurt himself than hurt you.

And also, I don't think this is a lifestyle trend. I think it's a national security issue. We don't have a loneliness problem. We have a relevance problem for young men. And loneliness is the symptom. We need apprenticeships, national service, vocational pathways, third spaces, tax policy that restores money from fucking Chuck Grassley to AOC and people of her generation. And young men need an economic trajectory.

in a path because at the end of the day, 75% of women say economic viability is key for a man, only 25% of women. And without a partner, and I think of it as dads. I've been thinking everything through the lens of stop talking about politics and the media and higher ed. It's like, okay, dad's like you got to get your kids out of the house. You've got to get them comfortable with meeting people. You've got to find leagues for them. You've got to. encourage them to meet people, you got to let them get into a little bit of trouble. You got, you know, I'm like, I basically say, get out of the house, join a gang. And if you get arrested, don't, you know, don't add to the population, don't subtract from it.

And if you get arrested and are in jail, established dominance early. And I'm only half joking, the answer's in each other. And we need more religious institution, more leagues, national service, more third spaces. After schooling, I would like to see child care where kids spend more time to together, but we're mammals. And if you want to see what happens to our society, just leave a Belgian Malinual or a dog alone for a day. That is literally what happens to our society. The mammal alone starts tearing a society, starts getting aggressive, and when it does run across other mammals, it becomes violent. I think this is the issue of our times. I want to end on a more

positive note and that is I do think there are things we can do. But at the end of the day, I do think the answer is in each other. Any thoughts before we close out? No, I love that. The answer is in each other. Let's leave it there, Jess. Have a good rest of the week. You too. Running a business shouldn't feel like surviving a software group project. One app for accounting, another for inventory, another for sales, and somehow none of them talk to each other. That's where Odo comes in, an all-in-one business management software that brings every part of your business together. From sales and accounting to inventory and marketing, all-in-one powerful platform. No messy integrations, no bouncing between tabs, and best of all, no spreadsheets.

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