Some More News - Brittney Griner, The Twitter Files, and EVEN MORE Beneful Stories

Episode Date: December 9, 2022

Hi. On today's episode, Katy and Cody discuss the peculiar conservative response to Brittney Griner's release, Herschel Walker's loss in Georgia, and the staggering nothingness in "The Twitter Files." Plus, you'll hear some real-time research into Benny Johnson's full name. Please fill out our SURVEY: https://kastmedia.com/survey/ Support us on our PATREON: http://patreon.com/somemorenews Check out our MERCH STORE: https://www.teepublic.com/stores/somemorenews?ref_id=9949 SUBSCRIBE to SOME MORE NEWS: https://tinyurl.com/ybfx89rh   Subscribe to the Even More News and SMN audio podcasts here: Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/some-more-news/id1364825229 Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/6ebqegozpFt9hY2WJ7TDiA?si=5keGjCe5SxejFN1XkQlZ3w&dl_branch=1 Stitcher: https://www.stitcher.com/show/even-more-news  Follow us on social media: Twitter: https://twitter.com/SomeMoreNews Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/SomeMoreNews/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SomeMoreNews/ TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@somemorenews  Get smarter See-Bee-Dee from NextEvo Naturals, and get up to 25% off subscription orders of $40 or more at https://NextEvo.com/podcast, promo code MORENEWS. Save 20% off and get free shipping by going to https://manscaped.com/somenews. Manscaped, for a perfect gift that will be the holiday's biggest hit.Support the show!: http://patreon.com.com/somemorenewsSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

why hello and welcome back to even more news the first and only news podcast my name is katie stole why hello because we're greeting each other and that's one of the words that you use to greet. Yeah. Hi, I'm Cody Johnston. Hi, I'm Cody Johnston. And we don't have a guest. We just have Jonathan. Just?

I shouldn't have said just. I shouldn't have said just. But we do have Jonathan. I'm here. I can just be here. That's fine. Please don't just be here. We're going to need you to chime in a lot. No, I'm just going to be here be here. That's fine. Please don't just be here. We're going to need you to chime in a lot.

No, I'm just going to be here completely silent. Oh, boy. This is going to be awkward. But still with my mic on as usual. I told you, cat's awake. Cat's awake. As soon as we start speaking, the animals come running. That's just how it works.

Or a bunch of Disney princesses up in here. This is going to be the second time in a row because the patrons in the last video got your, you talked about how your cat was right there and they're very upset that you didn't get to see the cat and now none of the people listening will get to see my cat. But we got to see your cat. Deepest apologies to

viewers who wanted to see the cat. Listeners. Understand the format, Cody. I was talking about the show. That video show. Hey, now. Keep up, Katie. Keep up.

December 8th, the day that we are recording. Pretend to be a time traveler day. No, absolutely not. What? I mean, okay, fine. Where would you? I would definitely. I mean, I don't know if I need to pretend.

I'll pretend. I'll pretend. What is this device in front of me? What is a device? Beep, beep, boop, boop, boop, boop. Is it pretty good? That's me pushing buttons. Wow.

Great Scott. This is heavy. Yeah. Perfect. Okay. So we're just pretending to be a time traveler. But where would you go? I would go probably to the 70s because I'm kind of feeling that vibe right now with my haircut.

go i would go probably to the 70s because i'm kind of feeling that vibe right now with my haircut but and you know john lennon would still be alive and maybe i could stalk him or something i don't know this is one of those movies where you end up being the one who kills him because yeah i just feel like that was a real missed opportunity for me i what was a missed opportunity the murder of john lennon yeah i don't like it i don't like i said it that's okay if you're not gonna play this game i'll move on to what december game uh am i allowed to go to the future or is it only the past yeah you go to the future oh then i would go in the future where uh where that's i was told it was about time, not location. Where in time? Oh, when in time? Either like a hundred years or a thousand years out of curiosity. To see if it's still there?

See what it's like. I mean, things are going to still be here. Unless the sun explodes, which is not likely at all. Or like an asteroid situation um so yeah i would i would go a hundred or a thousand probably uh just out of yeah curiosity i think uh the past would be fun but i think the future would be just mind well boggling and fascinating i would say that's probably healthy they always say you know don't get hung up on the past let the past go but don always say, you know, don't get hung up on the past. Let the past go.

But don't dwell on the future either. Don't get, you know. But don't dwell on the future either. But just to see. Yeah, no, I would love to see. You? I don't know, because I'm worried that as soon as I get to the past,

I'll be like, I need the device that keeps my mug of coffee warm. Is that what you're worried about? Yeah, I'll be like, I need the device that keeps my mug of coffee warm. Is that what you're worried about? Yeah. I'll be like, go back to 1969 and check out the Beatles or whatever. But then I'll be like, my coffee's just getting cold right away. I can't handle it. Yeah, and nobody has cell phones.

And depending on when you go back, you might not even have the coffee. I don't. Who knows? I think it's been around a while. Yeah, but harder to get. You know? Like, you'll have to... What are you gonna do? Toil? December 9th is National Lost and Found Day. On this

day, you are supposed to make a mental record of everything you found and lost over the past year. This could also be a good opportunity to reach out to people to whom you borrowed something but never got it back. To whom you lent something is what I should reach out to people to whom you borrowed something but never got it back to whom you lent something is what i should have right not to whom you borrowed right to whom you lent something but from whom you borrowed i think this is an impossible ask all the things i've lost it's like a daily occurrence several credit cards i'll say that oh gosh kathleen yeah yeah um okay i'm not proud of it i'm just an

honest person but you're clearly aware of it so it might be easy for example last night i got my haircut and i left my credit card right there at his station i almost left but didn't get it i got it see there you go he saw it so i'm saying are, not only are you aware of the issue, you're also aware of the times that it happened. So this inventory. No, he told me it happened. He had to tell me. But you remember.

But you remember. Yeah, then I remembered and I made a joke about it. Anyway, we've been vamping. What did you guys lose and find? I lent someone an improv book years and years ago. And then I think I misremembered who I lent it to because then I asked that person for it back and they're like, I don't have your improv book years and years ago and then i think i misremembered who i lent it to because then i asked that person for it back and they're like i don't have your improv book and then i i it's been so far in the past i can't remember whether i mistook the you know what i'm saying

like i don't know if i lent it to someone else it is signed by the author to me. So whoever has it knows they've got it. Yeah, they do. I briefly lost a set of house keys, but they weren't actually lost. They were under a stereo. They were found. I don't feel like you're taking this exercise seriously. One more for me. If I have lent you Tupperware in the past year, please return it.

I need it. We're going to take a quick break. Get our shit together. Come back and talk about some news. My shit is together. Got it all here. Pew, pew, pew, pew. Here comes the ad cannon firing

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And we are back as promised for news. Some of it. This is a great story that we're leading off with. I woke up and saw this trending and I started to cry partly because I was really tired. It was early as I've established, but it's good news. And that is that Brittany Griner has been released in a prisoner exchange and is heading back to the United States. This is thrilling.

Jonathan, give us some details here. Yeah, she was freed as part of a prisoner exchange for the Russian arms dealer, Victor Boot. The government also tried to secure the release of paul whalen a former marine and corporate security executive who's been held in russia for four years and accused of espionage that didn't happen uh whalen is still in a russian prison but britney griner who has was detained back in february is on her way home probably will be home by the time uh you hear this you know this is there's a lot of different opinions about the merits of

international prisoner swaps but it's great that griner is free she's should not have ever been detained or convicted of a crime over there in the first place the right wing is kind of up in arms that they believe that there's was only one correct thing to do here and that was to free Paul Whelan and leave Brittany Griner to rot in a Russian prison because dot dot dot yeah the dot dot dot is speaking volumes here I can just read through some of these Yeah, I was gonna say do they ever like do they elucidate on the dot dot dot or do they sort of leave it up to? our imagination the

people who are politicians or who have Like right-wing podcasts do the dot dot dot and then all of their reply guys in the comments say the actual ads where the magic happens So here's what benny johnson tweeted uh benny johnson said meet britney griner and marine paul whalen both americans both were convicted in russian courts on dubious charges both serving multi-year sentences in russian prison britney hates america paul served america guess which one biden traded a terrorist to free and then he said it's the lowest point in u.s foreign policy in my lifetime collapse of an empire wow bold statement have you been watching

any of the news ever in your lifetime lowest point in u.s foreign policy in my lifetime isn't he like 40 years old and doesn't the don't these people also hate the Iraq war? That's what I thought. Isn't their posturing that they're like anti-war? Isn't that what they pretend to be? I mean, this is wild. I don't need to get into any sort of conversation about the merit of one prisoner over the other. And, you know, it's just on its face

a great thing that she gets to come home. Also, she's not in any way affiliated with the government or the military or the Marines. She's an American citizen. She's an American citizen, a basketball star. So, you know. Also, aren't these the kind of people who would be like, so you know well also aren't these the kind of people who would be like uh this you know this person joined the military uh so that you have the freedom to x and y like isn't that the whole

isn't the whole point to like give everyday americans more freedoms right whatever they define as freedom right i don't know it just seems like you do know i know i know it's because like i also saw someone like oh they should have they should uh get a military band to play the star spangled banner when she lands i wonder if she'd kneel for the flag then and it's like if she did, okay. Like, the whole point... Isn't the whole point that she can? And she should be able to? And... No, people like Colin Kaepernick or who march for racial justice

deserve to be locked up in a Russian penal colony. Like, right. Like, it just seems, like, very based in, like, like, the libs and, like, wokeness and just sort of like, well, their ideology or like their they as a person represent this ideology that I'm against. Therefore, they should have less value to me, I guess. I don't know. It's still weird. It's not weird weird it's completely expected look i don't mean to talk shit about somebody who is stuck in a russian prison but also paul

wheelan has done some things is that correct am i correct in saying that versus britney who anyway well yeah i mean i only even it's irrelevant but i only even put that there because of people who are like this man's a marine who served his country and he should get to come home first and it's like yeah he should get to come home but like if we're comparing the merits of these two people like you know paul whelan lied in a deposition about being a sheriff's deputy and received a bad conduct discharge from the Marines. But like, again, it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter.

There's no. Why would you compare? They're forcing the comparison. Right. We don't need to and wouldn't do that. Right. But they're forcing it. I also want to get your reactions to these two other responses.

Carrie Lake was being interviewed by Stephen Crowder at the time as this news broke, so Crowder gave it to her live on his whatever they were recording. And she said two things I found interesting. She said, why do I have a feeling if President Trump were in office, it would have been handled so much

better? I don't know why you would possibly get that feeling. Because she wants to be the vice president in 2024 i know that's why yeah but as if like trump would have been a better negotiator and gotten both of them out or like gone in himself yeah exactly he would uh just his presence would have intimidated uh them into making a better deal. And Matt Walsh, of course, tweeted, we got absolutely fleeced in this trade.

America humiliated once again by the Biden administration. He's talking about it like it's before the NFL trade deadline and they're the Tampa Bay Buccaneers or something. I feel absolutely no humiliation. I just feel joy for Brittany and her family. It's just like framing this is like the worst like foreign policy thing that happened like that the u.s has been involved in like in their lifetime too like it's just absurd yeah benny johnson's been alive for lots of shit yeah i feel like he was probably like fired from

buzzfeed for plagiarism on the day we did something horrible right like that's not without outside the realm of possibility i just wanted to bring up the buzzfeed thing again nicely done thank you well let's move on to another positive story his first name name is Beneful? Sorry. Hold on. Is that why he goes by Benny? I was going to say, also you're like 40, don't go by Benny at that age.

But like Beneful. B-E-N-E-F-U-L. Strange. Odd. Sounds like a dog food brand. It does. But I guess that's why, that is why I guess he goes by Benny.

He could still go by Ben. He doesn't need to go by Benny. Could someone have altered his Wikipedia and not... That'd be fun. That would be fun. Because isn't Beneful like a puppy, like a dog food brand? It is literally a dog food. It is actually. I feel like someone's messing with his Wikipedia page.

I can't imagine his real name's Beneful. Breaking news, Benny Johnson's Wikipedia page is hilarious, apparently. Johnson is currently the host of the Benny Report, formerly the Beneful Report. Is this true? Excellent. Alright, well.

Good job, everybody. Nicely done. I love that we discovered that on air, like that. that on air is that what we call it these days by the time you hear this go to benny johnson's wikipedia page still if it's still says uh we'll do an investigative report at some point because here i am on what is it marriedceleb.com and it's this god the internet is so creepy his it says it's a page for his child god the internet needs to be destroyed um but it says in this random web page like eloise ellen

johnson is one of them who was born with golden luck she's the daughter of ben Johnson aka Beneful Johnson oh Benny so like but like so no one's like adjusting this random married celeb.com page right like it's just this very funny because Beneful Johnson only shows up on like Wikipedia wiki wand like pages like

that no article written about him has ever called him Beneful Johnson and then you have to get through all the purina benifold healthy weight farm raised chicken yeah and then you're down into the uss benifold maybe it's a joke that he and his listeners are are doing right we might not we don't know know all the benny johnson lore and all right we can we can stop talking about this we really have to but so far all i can say is that it may or may not be beneficial okay now we are moving on to another story another positive story we are front loading the positive stories and this positive story is that rafael

warnock has defeated herschel walker again uh again let's do it again next month yeah gosh Defeated Herschel Walker. Again. Again. Let's do it again next month. Yeah, gosh. This has been fun. It's almost like we're getting tired of winning, huh? Sick of winning. I could really use a good loss soon. Winning.

We're so full of tiger blood. The results were 51 to 49 percent. So better than last month. Still disappointing, to be honest. Sure. I i mean you know people they don't care no i know i get that i mean you know there's some there's definite benefits to having 51 in the senate instead of 50 you know everyone's like excited that we don't have to listen to mansion or cinema as much but that's presuming that any legislation is coming through

the house that they can pass right so you know there's like tempered expectations certainly but it's just like great that Walker lost and won't be in the senate and he's conceded well also like confirmations will probably be faster things like that there's some business that will probably

hopefully be faster but it is it's good that he lost and it's also it's it's funny just seeing like the reaction like ah the gop really needs to get it together you know better candidates and better messaging it's like that's it's 2022 and you're just now being like maybe we should like reconsider our course of action this is uh it's not going well for us um it's like for years of being like get on the trump train on the trump train and i like wait change the track the tracks are we're going it's bad get off the train um very entertaining you can't get off the train

this charlie kirk thing is very amusing to me when he was reading emails on the air the day after the election from people who wrote to him from georg Georgia saying they didn't vote because of all the fraud and Charlie Kirk talks for a while trying to logic his way out of the fact that he told people for years that there was fraud and there was no point in voting and now he's like mad at them for not voting and he does this whole thing where he's like well believing in election fraud that's a good thought that's a thought that i have and that you should all have but you still have to take the act it's a bad action to not vote you still gotta vote the mental gymnastics the gymnastics it is i think his first uh name is uh it's actually short for charla fold charla fold charla full or charla fold charla full charla full um it's very funny uh because i remember this the original like clips going around of him being like fraud dies or we're doomed or whatever

and i just remember people being like charlie you're gonna make people not vote like every step of the way even people who wanted republicans to lose were watching these clips and like telling him like this is a bad strategy for you i want you to lose but this is this is silly of you to say it is wild the conservatives feel a little bit like chickens with their heads cut off right now uh shocked at the result of their actions over and over and over again over and over and over again over and over and over why is this surprising in any capacity we know not maybe it is maybe people are maybe charlie kirk is really believes this i don't i don't know if he believes in much of anything that's like an episode of

going through like 15 of these people and being like like grifter or like true believer because some of them are real borderline yeah it's it can be hard to tell sometimes it's very easy to tell but sometimes like i don't know you dip you dip into that. I am still surprised. Actually, I kind of thought maybe Warnock would win by a bigger margin. I don't really know why I did, I guess. I'm not shocked by this. Foolish, foolish hope? Foolish hope, but also just in general as being a special election and people, a lot of people, Herschel Walker is not a good candidate. I think everyone is aware of that. And I think that a lot of his, I thought that a lot of his votes maybe came from just the fact that there is a general election and other things to vote for.

Yeah. Well, I mean, there's, I mean, you can find like various interviews, like voters who are pretty straightforward about it too, at least. They're just like, yeah, he's a bad candidate. And Warnock, I actually like Warnock. straightforward about it too at least they're just like yeah he's a bad candidate and uh Warnock I actually like Warnock I think he's a really good candidate and seems like a really good person uh but I'm a Republican so I'm voting for the Republican you know that's just that's that's how a lot of people vote um which makes sense um but they're very very clear about like yeah not a great situation but here's what we got i think senator joe

kennedy gave like spoke at a rally a day or two before and was like basically conceding that like walker's not the best but he's like these other people and it was the same like dot dot dot situation he wasn't like these other people what but just like i don't know we're gonna turn your kids trans i guess it's the implication yeah but like i saw it on a dating profile recently someone is like some prompt a response it was like a list of things that i was like yeah i agree with that it was like you know music at night and you know tacos by the coast and uh pronouns don't win elections it was so weird and shoehorned in and i responded sorry go ahead he was saying my beliefs or something i don't know i'm giving bad examples but it was like a couple things that were like generic fine and the third

one was pronouns don't win election and i responded sure seems like they do though doesn't it he didn't respond yeah well so inland tacos are fantastic i do not know i don't want to promote misinformation i can't remember what the other things are i just tacos are great i'm kind of craving a shrimp taco so i threw threw that out there. But I – this guy. Well, it's interesting. I don't know. Interesting is probably not the right word. But it's – we've talked about this before, I feel, where there's this perception of, like, oh, pronoun, pronoun, all the pronoun people. Like, that's not how you win elections or the you know the tried and true uh go woke go broke that never

seems to really come true where the opposite is the actual true thing like you can find so many like anti-woke apps or anti-woke dating or anti-woke banking apps and things like that that fall apart or this last election was like we hate the pronoun people uh walker went all in on this and like the anti-trans panic and trans people in sports and all this kind of stuff and that doesn't win and it's just uh interesting this perpetual perception of like if you lean into this you're not you're not gonna win but actually it's the opposite if you go hard against it then that's very off-putting to people. Because most people have someone in their life who cares about that stuff.

I don't know. Yeah, no, he's right. Pronouns don't win elections in that the people who talk about them constantly on the right tend to lose. Right. Maybe that's what he meant. There you go. Maybe that is what he meant. Some hoops I would have had to jump to get that without context but yeah let's give him the benefit of that doubt okay we're gonna take a real quick break and then we'll be back for even more blues

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Balls. And we are back as promised for even more snooze. Let's start with the Twitter files. even more snooze. Let's start with the Twitter files. Talk about snoozing. Talk about snoozing. So Elon Musk from the beginning has said once he takes over Twitter, he's going to be transparent. He's going to release all the files and he's going to say what really happened to expose like why they decided to shut down the Hunter biden new york post story in october 2020

um jonathan sorry real quick is this the uh hunter biden new york post story that uh they blocked for a day and a half and then stopped doing that and regretted it and publicly uh said that it was a mistake and transparently explained why they did it yes that this is oh okay okay so we're all clear as to what all of this top secret information is about okay yes so this is that story so they're better there must be something really like uh wild that we haven't heard about yet so uh elon musk recruits a couple of journalists to dig into these files was that was clearing your throat on purpose or were you just clearing your throat no i've never cleared my throat that prominently it was really good it was a really good it was convincing you matt matt taibi am i pronouncing it right i believe so

taibi taibi i think it's taibi matt let's do it different each time. Okay, so Matt Tooby, he tweets out, he's like, starts a thread, the Twitter files, you know, part one. They do it on Friday at like 4 p.m. as you release top stories. It's this very convoluted, like 36 tweet thread about what happened. But the basic gist of it is, is that the Biden campaign reached out to Twitter to remove several tweets and those requests were honored. And so everyone's like, oh, my God, this is the biggest scandal since Watergate. But the tweets were images of Hunter Biden's penis. And since they were hacked, since they were taken from a laptop.

Glorious penis. hacked since they were taken from a laptop glorious penis yes since they were stolen from a a laptop that violated twitter's terms of service against publishing stolen or hacked material and so twitter took them down oh and by the way like the fact that people like campaigns and groups like reach out to twitter to take down stuff is not like a new story right i just have to add that in there well is this um this this email uh share showing like links to these tweets um of hunter biden's uh penis that were removed uh is this the tweet explaining this is this um after a tweet explaining that both the biden campaign and the quote trump White House have reached out to Twitter and had their requests honored.

This was in the same thread. Let me see. Tweet eight is Biden team review. And then Trump White House is tweet 10. So two tweets later. Oh, OK. OK. Tybee concedes both parties had access to these tools.

For instance instance in 2020 Requests from both the Trump White House And the Biden campaign Were received And honored He does not explain What requests from the Trump White House Were made

That's information that I specifically Would be curious to know If we're really just airing out all the laundry here. I personally would like to know what the White House requested. Just seems like the transparency is still a bit opaque. Well, and again, this might not be scandalous at all if the Trump White House was saying,

hey, there's photos of Donald Trump Jr.'s glorious penis out there that we would like removed and that were hacked from him that were shared as, you know, revenge porn. Let's take that down. That would be valid. We're making jokes because this is silly. Wait, I'm going to make this point, which is that it's disgusting.

Private information being shared and mocked, pictures, stuff like that. Like, we culturally have come down pretty hard on the concept of revenge porn. If this was a woman, you know, I don't know. The reaction to it being Hunter Biden and grosses, it grosses me out. The whole thing grosses me out that people are dragging him through. I mean, gross. I mean, the the the salacious like, oh, look at his like sad life is pretty gross. I would I do personally feel weird about using the term revenge porn for this. That to me is sort of like related to a very specific, like usually weaponized against women thing that is like really, really gross.

And this doesn't it's not really in the same category. I just I keep seeing I'm not articulating it. No, no, no. This isn't about you. I'm saying that like I keep seeing a lot of people refer to the Hunter Biden pictures as revenge porn. I just feel like that's not quite yeah what no thank you for saying that because even as i was saying that i wanted to kind of mention that but then i told myself don't over explain yourself but just in general something that's right like obviously this is a it's about much more than um a penis or at least it's being

turned into something much more and it's hunter biden but just in general the casualness with which we are people are comfortable embarrassing someone and gleeful gleefully so and the thing in twitter's terms of service which as far as we know by now they've gotten rid of and it's fine on twitter now But like the idea is that's the kind of thing that this was this rule was put in there to prevent. Whether it's revenge porn or something related that it's like, oh, this is something stolen or hacked or that you don't have permission to post of a sensitive nature. Twitter's totally fine to suspend your account and take that down. Totally. If you do that.

Yeah. Reasonable request uh make and reasonable request to honor and those specific requests by the way at least the ones that matt taibbi shared were not related to the new york post story they were just like tweets that had the pictures in right so this is not like people sharing accusations about Hunter Biden and Burisma or whatever. Right. So so then he like share some internal Twitter discussions about whether or not to censor the New York Post story. And it turns out there was quite a healthy debate. like were suspending anyone who was sharing the new york post story and then a lot of people inside of twitter was like i were like i don't think we should do that and that's why after a day and a half that decision was reversed the the emails at least that we saw in that thread seemed to indicate that this worked not like not that they didn't make a mistake but that this worked the way you would want an internal company debate to work.

And it's unclear how Musk plans to do things differently. Right. So one thing I'll be a bit facetious about, I have a question for you, Jonathan. This discussion, this internal Twitter discussion that they're having about this New York Post article, it seems like, at least in my reading of the twitter on the twitter thread for also just a side note uh taibi had to uh make uh concessions in order to get this information and do this thing for elon musk specifically um it doesn't say what those are it seems like one of the conditions was he has to tweet it instead of like write an article about it. And it just is not a very effective way to get information out. No, it sure isn't.

It's not a good or well orchestrated dissemination of information or thread. Sounds like a ridiculous ask and thing for a journalist to agree to. Yes. So related to that, he points out the White House, Trump White House and Biden campaign have made these requests. He only gives an example of the Biden campaign doing that. Not sure why that is. And then he starts to describe these internal Twitter discussions about the New York Post article. step of sharing any evidence or example of the biden campaign asking for the removal of this

story it dives right into the internal discussion but doesn't show the impetus for the discussion which makes me sort of think maybe it was just an internal discussion based off of this warning the fbi gave months earlier about hacked material, and they weren't sure what to do. And they were like, well, maybe we should pull even Fox passed on this story. So maybe they were like, a little worried. It doesn't seem like the Biden campaign reached out and said, please censor this New York Post story. Because if they did do that, it seems like maybe that email would be shared. Yes, it would seem like that would be a part of this. And furthermore, and again, not that that wouldn't be a part of this and furthermore and again not that that wouldn't be a little bit shady and you wouldn't be like oh come on man we should have

access to all the information that still would not be a first amendment violation as elon musk claims it is well right because the government's not involved um right it's just a separate well like and he's and you know he will frame i mean he obviously is a liar and says he's a free speech absolutist but then is clearly not for many many reasons uh we don't necessarily need to go into right now but this is it's one of those things where like because he's made these decisions he has made personal decisions to bring people back or to ban people um and these internal twitter discussions it seems like he's just uh saying that like look at all these people discussing this it should just be me it should just be me

doing it like that's his new system his he's not really saying that like there's an issue with the system it's just it it needs to be other people if it were other people like him or david sacks or whomever he would be fine with it it's not the actual system that has the flaw it's the people within the system it seems like that's what he's implying yeah seems like it um but again we don't have all the information because he's not being fully transparent it would be very surprising if and as far as we know there is more to come because they say there's more to come but we can also assume that if they had the goods they would have it would have already shared that uh yeah i mean and and jack uh dorsey even pointed out to elon like well if you're really talking about transparency like release all of them.

Don't have like hire these people into your fold to like do these weird Twitter threads. They don't really give a lot of information or clearly crafting a narrative for people to absorb. Just release all the files if that's your goal. If it's not, don't do that and just admit that that's not your goal um and your goal is to craft a narrative um he won't admit that but yeah he probably won't um and maybe you know maybe they will eventually release all the files but i imagine they won't all be there maybe because of this insidious lawyer they have that he just found out they had the hillary clinton pawn

that they just discovered was in their midst okay i'll try to go through jim baker like i swear this is just interminable with us are you listening still people have thrown their phones don't worry we're gonna bring this home in a fun way okay i hope so well i mean maybe not this conversation but the episode this. No, this is fun. This is fun, because we're really, like, going through the looking glass. I'm having a great time,

and my eyes haven't glazed over at any point. Okay, so on Tuesday, Matt Taibbi posts a supplemental to Twitter file thread one, and he says that one of the top remaining lawyers at Twitter was reviewing all of these documents

before sending them along to Matt Taibbi and Bari Weiss. He was Twitter's deputy general counsel. His name is Jim Baker. He used to work for the FBI, and he has prominence in right-wing circles for they think he shared the, quote, fake dirt from hillary campaign's operatives in 2016 basically he is the guy who brought michael sussman to the fbi and says hey this guy michael sussman says that trump has there's a russian bank called alpha bank that has an office in trump tower and there's something shady going on there and then the fbi was like hey are you bringing this to us as you or are you bringing this to us as a operative for the hillary clinton campaign and the allegation was that sussman lied and was bringing it to them as part of the hillary

clinton campaign he was on trial he was acquitted for this and and we can think whatever we want about michael sussman but the idea is that jim baker is the first person that michael sussman, but the idea is that Jim Baker is the first person that Michael Sussman contacted about that and who brought him into the FBI. So they think he's this shady deep state character who's secretly working for the Clintons. Okay, so, God, I'm sorry about this. So Elon Musk now claims to either not have known that Jim Baker worked at Twitter or not to know that he was the lawyer who was reviewing all these materials before passing them on to Taibbi and Weiss. Just like he didn't know the rules of how Twitter payments and app stores work. Yeah, the secret tax tax the really secret thing yeah um yeah it's um both

because both of these scenarios don't really paint musk as being a great right boss uh if you don't know if you don't know who your like deputy general counsel is that seems weird you've been you've owned the company for at least a month uh if you didn't know that he was vetting the files to release that also seems a little odd because that's like the process you go through right so you're not releasing information that you're not allowed to release um right it's ostensibly you would want a lawyer to look at it right and as uh elon said during his really long and uh kind of embarrassing twitter space he did after these the release he said he hasn't read the twitter files he so like what do you think is there what's going on it's very odd um he just seems like

he says whatever in the moment yeah it doesn't seem like that when does he have time to work i mean he's always working he has one of those calendars that's just like on board this person meet with so-and-so give feedback on deck you know he's got 18 21 hour dinner two and a half hours but so apparently once musk found out that jim baker was there he exited him from the company and then someone was like hey did you ask him for an explanation and then musk said i did and it was unconvincing unclear what of what i mean at this point i can't i mean it's just pure speculation what the explanation would be for other than I'm your lawyer. Which maybe he wouldn't think he needed to explain.

Maybe he is a liar. Maybe that. Just every step of the way. I just don't. It's just this. way i just don't it's just this he because he's so um the the one thing he's been like actually good at is the pr of it all we've talked about this he's a pr marketing kind of guy that's why success has uh succeeded up to this point um and he's trying to do it here and every single tweet he does is like it's that narrative crafting that he's trying to do he's trying to present it as this and he knows the audience he's playing to the ian miles chongs of the world um and so he knows how he's what he's doing there but also twitter is a can be a decent source of information and analysis and criticism and uh it just doesn't seem like it's really working for him anymore like the things

that he used to be successful at uh and effective at in terms of the the pr of it all it just seems like it's like it's a he's always been the sort of like the emperor has no clothes sort of guy but now because it's twitter it's this information hub and this communication hub for for all kinds of people uh it doesn't seem like the hologram that he's put up uh to make it look like he's wearing clothes is working as well anymore i guess is my roundabout point that i was trying to make i'm glad glad you made it. About every single one of his tweets. I think we should move on from this story and do something

a little fun for the last few minutes here. What do you guys think? I take that as a yes. Are you saying we didn't learn anything from these Twitter files yet? And maybe we never will. And it's weird that Barry Weiss is now living at Twitter.

And like, it seems like she's an employee now, actually. The reporting seems to imply that she has like a company laptop and full access to Slack. Wait, does she? Oh, boy. It's like staying there, basically, because he has also he's also put basically a hotel in the Twitter HQ because he is a lonely man and wants people to stay there with him. I wasn't actually saying any of that. Oh, okay. But we can talk about all of that. Oh, it's too late.

I already said it. It was mostly just that I thought we could freshen this show up with a little chit-chat about fun things. But we can dive into all those things you just said right now. Oh, no, I already said them. I know you did.

It was really good. Yeah, now we're up for air. We done really good yeah no one needs like five more minutes straight of me explaining who this FBI agent is and like what the right things you did a good job I was I definitely got distracted thinking gosh Jonathan so smart and it's like he's really good at retaining all this information just do your own research man it's all out there your own research man although so along those lines if you do want to know what's in the twitter files watch our episode about hunter biden from a few weeks ago it's all there like i and i'm not saying that there's nothing going on there. Twitter's not like a perfect company.

There's conversations I have about their processes and transparency. Absolutely. 100%. It seems like maybe Elon Musk is a big liar who is trying to craft this narrative. If maybe, you know, maybe this secret FBI lawyer kept the one email that had Biden saying, remove this New York Post story. Maybe that happened. And there's a secret email that we're going to see one day, but we haven't yet. But also, let's not pretend like this isn't stuff that other people have done, like we've established. Or, you know, again, like White House has made a request about this, whatever that was about.

And the whole thing that Elon Musk wants are people to be on Twitter tweeting or the interaction engagements. The only thing he's hanging his hat on right now, and he knows that he has to keep making a spectacle. He has to create, keep creating events that bring people to that site. And that's all. That's, that's, that's what it is from his end that's why he made him put it as a tweet thread yep that's why he keeps tweeting all day because

the only thing he can do for this company at this point is make it messy so that people react he doesn't fucking care what the implications of it are or what that mess looks like yeah it's spectacle stuff it's a, it's spectacle stuff. It's a spectacle. It's jean jacket stuff. Okay. Did you say that because of the jean jacket I'm wearing right now?

No, I said it because of... Is that jean? It looks plaid. Nope. If you go see Nope, it's good. Wait, Jonathan, that's not a jean jacket. No, it's plaid. No, I was making a joke.

I'm wearing a flannel. Okay. There's something wrong with my brain today i just was like jonathan are you okay it's not a jean jacket i deliver things i deliver things so deadpan like clearing my throat i like just effortlessly did it so that you didn't it's wonderful you're you're a talent i'm tired like i also established earlier but now we're gonna talk about something fun because i've already teased it and we want to introduce lighter stuff from time to time talk about things we're consuming we're all pop culture people and it is the holidays sort of it is it's december we're all winding down

you know it is the honda days for sure it's the Hyundai guys what are you guys Nissanica I got it okay sorry good Nissanica there it is you got something it's close there what are you guys consuming right now tell me what I should be watching TV or movies I'll start with TV I mean I've been watching the White Lotus I've got theories but I don't want to spoil anything or assume that everyone's seen what I've seen. I'm only about two to three in of this second season. Cody. I'm trying. This is difficult.

I'm sorry. How are we supposed to talk? I'm dying to know what Jonathan's theories are. Everybody skip ahead 10 seconds. We don't have to talk about his theories. Are you enjoying it? People have strong opinions about whether or um are you enjoying it people have strong opinions about whether or not this season is as good as last season i mean we'll see how it

wraps up the writing is the writing is so good that it's i feel like mike white's always a step or two ahead of me um when i think i've like got something figured out um but i mean season one is really fantastic but it's interesting because season one is all about like race and hierarchies and power and this season's all about like sexual dynamics and power among the wealthy

relationships yes yeah power in relation in interpert power in romantic relationships instead of power over those who work for you and stuff right but jennifer coolidge is fantastic in both seasons incredible incredible always and aubrey plaza is going to get an emmy nomination i think so i'm not i've always had mixed feelings about aubrey plaza great on parks and rec and i like her performances but it's a little bit of the same vibe in performances but she is perfectly cast

in this and she's wonderful it's a really good role for her she's crushing it all the casting is great the theme song absolutely makes me feral i always want to dance i've been listening to it every it's going it is absolutely on track to be in my top spot Spotify year-end wrap-up for 2023. The theme song. Do you listen? Do you frequently listen to, like, theme songs on Spotify? No. If a theme song gets stuck in my head, I'll get it.

So, actually, I guess I should say that HBO shows I seem to have a lot. Like, Succession you probably had for a while. I don't. I never had Succession, but I have True Romance. Oh, I had the song from Patriot. Fan favorite, Patriot at this point. I saved that theme song. Now this one.

Oh, and when I'm writing, sometimes I use the music from 1883. So yeah, I guess I do frequently. Sounds like it, yeah. Is 1883 the first prequel or the second the first one that's coming out 1939 i want to say but i think it's 1883 unless it's 1886 can't remember whatever the yellow 1923 is the gonna be the new one with harrison ford the one in the 1800 it is nothing like yellowstonestone. I'd be curious what other people think of it.

I think the performance of the main girl is exquisite. She made me gasp. Really couldn't take your eyes off of her. She was really a magnetic performer. So that made it worth it. And the music is haunting. I liked it. Okay, but White Lotus,

you're watching that yellow jackets you put in these notes the second season of only murders in the building i am halfway through the second season of only murders in the building we could talk about that it's very good and it's a nice entertaining cozy little show i feel currently like i'm delighted every time they allow steve martin and martin short to clearly do a bit that they're like it's just for them and they're like all right do a little. And they're like, alright, do a little bit and then we'll let the scene, then we'll continue the scene later.

But just have your little moment. I don't know what scene I watched recently of them going off on giving the play-by-play of these political conversation from the 80s. What was it? Oh, they were talking about iran contra guys

made me laugh yeah great um my dad doesn't listen to this show so he won't see this hear this and it's fine because i i love my dad very much but boy steve martin would be a great dad i think at least the person that i who i think of him as being. I prefer the first season of Only Murders in the Building because I love the comedy bits that they do, but I feel like the actual mystery itself from the first season was more compelling and I was less invested in season two mystery. Actually, no spoilers on that one.

Yeah, I finished it. Okay. Yeah, I probably agree with that. But yeah, it's more just like a fun little romp. It's just fun to watch. I'm going to miss it when it's done. My pals. They're making a second season of The Sandman, which I'm very excited about.

Ooh. If any viewers or listeners are into that. Any Sandman in the house. Any Sandman in the house. I was actually surprised that they even made the show. So I'm very thrilled that they're continuing it. I wonder how the TV or I wonder how the streaming TV watching sensibilities of our viewers and listeners compare to the regular population. If everyone listening is like, not you know we only watch uh

survivor or whatever right well because yeah like we're like casually kind of talking about shows without like really describing what certain elements or what they're about because we don't know who watches what or want to spoil maybe every show we've mentioned so far people like i'm skipping this part of the episode maybe they've already turned it off maybe come back come back everybody we were talking we've been talking about how we can work more of this in like maybe an episode a month of pop something pop culturey we're gonna have those conversations but that's always is the problem is it do i assign the month before what show we're gonna watch and then we talk about it i don't know sound off in the comments some more news uh book club but uh tv yeah because i

did try to start a sub more news book club and let me tell you that failed fast not failed i didn't do it katie willard and i did it one episode of it i think oh maybe melissa i don't know it doesn't sound like it was very memorable experience it just the logistics i think tv is easier when everyone's reading the news all day i couldn't guarantee that i'd be done with this book in time or that anybody else would yeah we did the power i believe i enjoyed that book a lot anyway don't look for that episode i I'm not sure where it is, and I can't vouch for it. Probably not available. But we would like to introduce some of that into the world of the Some News world.

Yeah. Into the world of the Some News world. It's time to end this show. You're doing great. I don't know that I am today, Cody. You're nailing it. You're nailing it. It has been a week.

I do have other thoughts on TV that I have no idea if you guys are watching. So I'll just leave it at that. Got any Avatar 2 thoughts? No, I'm excited to see it. Same. Can't wait. It's a... I mean...

It's a... I've been making fun of it for years and years and years and years and years and years and years and years and years and years. Like maybe my entire adult life. Well, it's going to be... We don't need to talk about Avatar 2. I'm excited about it because, A, James Cameron rules. Isn't he an asshole? Probably.

I mean, I think, like, Ed Harris almost drowned when they were making The Abyss. Yeah, I don't know that we should be saying James Cameron rules, but he's a talented filmmaker. He rules the film set with an iron fist and makes amazing work but uh so is it seems like his like one of his true loves is like the avatar world because he's got like six movies planned uh and the technology is another one of his true loves right to make it happen but also his entire career his true love is the sea uh he loves under the sea uh whether it's uh the abyss literally just like going underwater to look at the titanic or making the titanic or whatever so it seems like this particular movie is sort of a confluence of all of his loves

it's all of that plus it takes place underwater so i'm just curious to see yeah nobody does a narrowly escaping from drowning sequence like james cameron can't wait he's got like the three best that i can think of of all time guys update my fish tacos have been delivered to the front porch so this episode is over i thought you wanted shrimp tacos. Did I not say shrimp? You said fish. I got one fish, one shrimp. Oh, perfect. I've just kind of used shrimp, fish. I just used ketchup.

Excellent. Was that rude of me to say I've had a lovely time? I am hungry. And we've talked about a lot of things. So we did it, right? I can get my food? Yes. You guys are both looking at me weird that's it for us this week guys

we're going to hop off for unspecified reasons we'll be back next week and in the meantime I want you to know that we love you very much much Cody