The Philip DeFranco Show - PDS 3.17 WOW! Putin Calls For a "Society Cleansed of Non-Patriot Scum", Ukraine, Dr. Disrespect & More

Starting point is 00:00:00 Sup you beautiful bastards. Welcome back to the Philip DeFranco show. Hit that like button and let's just jump into it. You know, first up in massive separation news, we need to talk about my chin separating from my neck slowly. I'm kidding. I'm also not kidding. I want to talk about, I've seen,

Starting point is 00:00:15 I looked through the comments. I don't know when I say like, Hey, leave a comment down below. I actually looked through the comments and I've seen in, you know, especially the last week, a lot of people talking about my weight, which is fine. I get it. I looked at an episode I did about a month ago.

Starting point is 00:00:26 I'm starting to look different. And so I just wanted to clear things up because I've seen some people like going, hey, great health journey. Other people have been like, is he okay? I know that he's sick. Yeah, right now, all of this is just a change in my diet that I have to do for the rest of my life.

Starting point is 00:00:39 Turns out pain is a fantastic motivator. It's like, if you keep eating how you're eating, I'm gonna punch you in the stomach every day and maybe you die. And at the same time that was happening in my kidneys, I have polycystic kidney disease, they were like, hey, by the way, we're not happy either. So I guess it took me 36 years to realize

Starting point is 00:00:54 I don't wanna die. And so I've made drastic changes in my life and I'm feeling great. All my labs and stuff from the doctor visits are so much better. That said, I do have a long road ahead of me Like I have only not felt in pain for the last two days knock on wood that holds and I mean regarding my general health Even at this weight

Starting point is 00:01:12 I'm still clinically obese which I think my doctor has face blindness because every time he tells me that it's like he's saying it for The first time and I'm like dude. I know I'm me. I'm not wearing hoodies in the summer cuz it's fun Yeah, that's it and ideally this is the last time I talk about my weight or my health for a long time until there's an update. Oh my God, I got to get a colonoscopy. Which like 16 year old me would be like, oh my God, they have to shove how much up your butt?

Starting point is 00:01:36 But 36 year old me is like, I get to go to sleep for 45 minutes in the middle of the day? Yeah, main thing. I just want to stay alive as long as I can possibly annoy you. And then let's talk about this controversy in the gaming space that centers around Dr. Disrespect. Now, for those who don't know,

Starting point is 00:01:51 Dr. Disrespect is a very big gamer. And for those who do know, you probably know he's been wanting to release his own video game for a while now. And on Tuesday, he made a big announcement. All right, so back in December, he announced the launch of a new AAA game development studio called Midnight Society, of which he's a co-founder.

Starting point is 00:02:04 And although some were skeptical at that time, he did bring on some very big names, like Robert Bolling, a Call of Duty legend who's now Midnight Society's studio head, and Quinn DeLoyo, a former Halo game designer who's now Midnight Society's creative director. However, another member of the team, Sumit Gupta, its CEO, who previously founded and headed Bash Gaming,

Starting point is 00:02:20 which focused on mobile casino games, prompted red flags for a number of fans, with some worrying that Dr. Disrespect's new studio might be a ploy to just extract money from fans. Which, all of that brings us to this week, as Dr. Disrespect announced his first game, which is codenamed Project Moon. Where it's a free to play competitive first person shooter

Starting point is 00:02:35 where players ascend a burning building, battling each other while trying to escape the fire. And as of right now, that and some concept art is pretty much all we know about the game itself. With Dr. Disrespect promising it will be the most community focused online PVP multiplayer experience the world has ever seen. And that community focused part is where kind of a lot

Starting point is 00:02:50 of the controversy lies, right? Midnight Society is dishing out a series of access passes that in Bowling's words, will grant holders exclusive access to the early builds of the game, private discord channels, and the ability to not only play, but vote on key design decisions that will shape the future development of the game in both micro,

Starting point is 00:03:05 reload speeds, recoil balancing, time to kill tweaks, and macro, maps, modes, meta ways. It's a kind of beta testing plus. But the catch and the reason there's been a controversy is that the passes will be sold as NFTs, which Midnight Society also claims are environmentally friendly. With the first round of passes called Founders Access Passes being given to a select group of 10,000 people who have to go through an application process. With them said to be judged on criteria, including, how long they've been a Midnight Society member,

Starting point is 00:03:29 how active they've been in the community, how active of a gamer, creator, developer they are, and their vision for what makes a good PVP shooter. And then, if you're selected, you get the opportunity to pay $50 for the pass and NFT, which you can then sell on the secondary market after 30 days. With Bolling saying,

Starting point is 00:03:43 the purpose of this application process is to eliminate profiteers and non-community members with no interest in the long-term development of the game and the midnight society. But in general, and especially in the gaming space, because that's where a lot of people are trying to implement it right now, NFTs are very controversial.

Starting point is 00:03:56 Some smell the stink of NFTs, they want nothing to do with it. Others think that it can make sense. And so you have people concerned saying, we don't really know much about the actual game and the studio is already trying to promote extra purchases, exclusive rights, virtual merch, and the in-game economy. Making those people wonder, you know,

Starting point is 00:04:09 is this really about community building or just raking in cash early on while people are hyped? With one Redditor saying, "'Consumers should be sold on the game for its gameplay, "'not profitability.'" And a Forbes columnist writing, "'I was willing to push past all this NFT stuff "'and at least try to figure out what this game is,

Starting point is 00:04:22 "'but right now the entire FAQ page "'is only about the Day Zero NFT. What is it? How do I claim it? Can I sell it? How do I create a wallet? Are NFTs bad for the environment? It's literally all the questions. And with this, Doc responded to the criticism on a stream saying,

Starting point is 00:04:33 "- Listen, in regards to NFTs, you don't have to have NFTs to play the game. It doesn't change your experience of the game once it releases and it'll continue to be free to play, right? You can't buy your way to win. However, for those of you who want to get more involved, there are ways to do so involving NFTs. That's all we're saying.

Starting point is 00:05:01 Adding later, this is no quick cash grab. That's not what we're interested in. It's a way that we saw many of Doc's fans coming out in support on social media, arguing that unlike a lot of other NFTs out there in the space right now, this one actually has utility. They're saying essentially you're buying a membership

Starting point is 00:05:13 into a club where you get to vote on things. And then if you don't want it anymore, you can sell it. But we have seen many people speaking out against this, including even streamers in the same space. Creators like Asmongold yesterday coming out against the NFT passes, calling them a huge mistake and arguing that they're bad for Doc's image. If you remove and you change that authenticity into doing something like NFTs or whatever,

Starting point is 00:05:32 that really hurts people's perception because it is fundamental to the image that he's created. It's kind of what I said before about how somebody can only get canceled if they get banned or if they contradict what their public image is. Although he clarified that he also doesn't think that it's Doc's fault saying. I think there's a good chance that Doc might not be the biggest fan of NFTs either. And just his marketing or production or development team thinks this is a really good idea. And so because he's the face of the product, he has to kind of defend it. Yeah. Ultimately, we're gonna have to wait to see what comes from this. The initial launch as well as, you know, how does this extend

Starting point is 00:06:05 into the actual game, or is this just something for the setup? But with all that, that's the story. Now I do wanna pass the question off to you. What are your thoughts on all this? I know in general, whenever we talk about NFTs, y'all hate it. For you, when you see this story, is it more of the same,

Starting point is 00:06:17 or do you think this is something different? And then, I don't wanna talk about this story. Experts are warning right now that in the US, we could be facing another serious coronavirus wave. And this, as we see the new, more infectious Omicron BA.2 sub-variant continuing to cause surges across Europe. But as we've talked about many times before,

Starting point is 00:06:32 new waves in Europe almost always have been a proven indicator of what's gonna happen in the US in the coming weeks. And right now, doesn't look great. According to reports, at least a dozen countries are currently seeing spikes driven by the new sub-variant, which has caused double-digit increases in many of those nations' tallies over the last week.

Starting point is 00:06:46 And in the last week, European nations made up six of the 10 countries with the highest cases per 100,000 residents. Some countries like Austria are nearing record level caseloads with Germany yesterday recording its highest new infection at any point in the pandemic. And as far as what's going to happen in the US, experts say that there are numerous variables

Starting point is 00:07:00 that could impact or change the course of any new wave. This including the fact that more restrictions have been relaxed since the Omicron BA.1 surge and the level of natural immunity due to how many people just had Omicron as well as vaccination rates and the accessibility of antiviral meds. But also one of the most important factors

Starting point is 00:07:14 is how many people will become severely ill, which could overwhelm hospitals like BA.1 did even though it wasn't as serious as other strains like Delta. Now that said, possibly positive or at the very least not negative news. If Europe is any indication, so far they haven't seen a widespread increase in hospitalizations. And

Starting point is 00:07:29 overall, BA.2 does not seem to be more extreme than BA.1 and the vaccines remain effective against preventing severe illness or death. But as far as when we might see this surge, it could actually be pretty soon. According to reports about US wastewater data, yes, poop water is actually a major indicator of COVID surges. They're already displaying signs of a new increase. CDC data also showing that BA.2 cases nearly doubled last week from the week before, jumping from around 13% to just over 23% of new cases. Though the sub variant did already account

Starting point is 00:07:54 for nearly 40% of the cases last week in parts of the Northeast and New England, which usually sees the beginning of these new waves experienced in Europe. But still, for now, overall, cases do appear to be continuing to fall. Yeah, that's a story. I don't know how to end this story.

Starting point is 00:08:06 I feel like we're all just kind of like waiting on the beach just wondering, is this gonna be like a nice breeze or am I about to get fucking knocked on my ass by a hurricane? I'm hoping breeze, but the last few years have just, they've pummeled me into going, it's at least gonna be a tropical storm, right? Cause we can't just have like nice things anymore.

Starting point is 00:08:24 But from that, I wanna take a second to thank the fantastic sponsor of today's show, CredAI. And I want you to treat this like a free life hack that I'm giving from me to you, right? We've all carried debit cards in our wallets that effectively do nothing, right? But why, when you can switch your sad debit card to CredAI and automatically optimize your financial life.

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Starting point is 00:09:31 And then we have the DOJ announcing criminal charges against five people acting as agents of the secret police of China for stalking, harassing, and spying on Chinese dissidents in the US. The charges were made in three criminal complaints where prosecutors described several schemes, some lasting years, to spy on or intimidate dozens of Chinese American dissidents

Starting point is 00:09:47 and other outspoken critics across America. In one of the cases, the DOJ said that co-conspirators sought to interfere with federal elections by allegedly orchestrating a campaign to undermine the US congressional candidacy of a US military veteran who was a leader of the Tiananmen Square protests. Alleging that a man who works with China's Ministry

Starting point is 00:10:02 of State Security, MSS, hired a private investigator in September to disrupt the campaign of the candidate, including by physically attacking the victim. With the complaint claiming that the man directed the PI to dig up dirt on the candidate, but suggest that if the investigator could not find anything, they could try to manufacture an incident with a prostitute. And going on to quote an alleged phone call from December

Starting point is 00:10:19 where the accused man reportedly told the PI, "'You can start thinking now, aside from violence, "'what other plans are there?' "'Huh, but in the end, violence would be be fine to the Chinese agent allegedly chuckling while continuing beat him beat him until he cannot run for Election that's the last resort you think about it car accident You'll be completely wrecked right and the second case in sealed yesterday centers around a quote former visiting scholar and author who helped start a pro-democracy organization in Queens who pretended to be a pro-reform activist But actually had been gathering information for the MSS since at least

Starting point is 00:10:45 2015, alleging that the man used his position and status within the Chinese community in New York City to collect information about prominent activists, dissidents, and human rights leaders to report that information to the PRC government. This including Hong Kong pro-democracy activists, advocates for Taiwanese, independents, and Uyghur and Tibetan activists. And finally, in the third case, prosecutors accused three different men of conspiring to commit interstate harassment of Chinese pro-democracy activists, including by electronically spying on them. With prosecutors outlining one incident where the man allegedly stalked an artist who produced a sculpture depicting Chinese President Xi as a coronavirus molecule and installed surveillance cameras and GPS device at the artist's workplace and in his car. Two of the men are also accused of trying to bribe an IRS employee to obtain the federal tax returns of one of the dissidents. And there are a number of other things these three men,

Starting point is 00:11:25 as well as the other two and the other cases have been accused of in the DOJ release. But main thing, these charges are especially significant because as the US attorney of the Eastern District of New York explained, "'The complaints unsealed today reveal the outrageous "'and dangerous lengths to which the PRC government's "'secret police and the defendants have gone to attack

Starting point is 00:11:40 "'the rule of law and freedom in New York City "'and elsewhere in the United States.'" But ultimately, as far as what happens next, we're gonna have to wait to see, right? What happens with these men who face years in prison if they're convicted? Though, notably two of the men are still at large in China. So they're, you know, China's not gonna extradite them.

Starting point is 00:11:54 What, are they gonna punish them for doing the job that they wanted them to do? Anyway, fuck Xi, you Winnie the Pooh motherfucker. And then of course, last today, let's talk about Putin's unjustified, horrifying war in Ukraine. First off, we've seen increased calls to bring Putin to some kind of justice,

Starting point is 00:12:07 with the US Senate and President Biden calling him a war criminal, and the International Court of Justice ordering that the war should be ended, although that is largely a symbolic move. But to be clear, it is very unlikely he'll ever actually end up in court for his crimes or really pay for them in any way,

Starting point is 00:12:21 unless someone just does the heroic thing and gives him some special Russian tea. But until someone puts that fuck face into the ground, the war continues. And by war, I really just mean more and more crimes against humanity like yesterday Russian forces targeting and bombing a theater in Maripol. Russian forces denying hitting any targets in the city at that time, but theaters don't end up like this randomly. But it's not just the fact that this theater was hit, right? And it's like some cultural piece. If Ukrainian officials are to be believed, there were in fact, 1,000 to 1,500 civilians sheltered in that theater.

Starting point is 00:12:48 And reportedly they are trapped inside. Now, the only possible good news right now is that there are no reported deaths so far, but that could easily change as rescuers continue to dig through the rubble. Also, while Maripol has been particularly hit hard with 80 to 90% of the buildings being damaged by the Russians,

Starting point is 00:13:01 it's hardly the only place dealing with Russian bombing. And the fact that with all of this happening, Russia's still straight-faced is claiming that it does not hit civilian targets. I mean, you take a look at like this interview with Kyiv's mayor to get an idea of just how believable that is. Putin says he's only targeting military targets.

Starting point is 00:13:18 Bull. Sorry. Where is military target? This building is military target. Also, while the war in Ukraine continues, there's also an economic war being raged against Putin and Russia. We've talked about a ton of companies pulling out of Russia

Starting point is 00:13:30 and that's had a major impact on the economy, but there's also now this list of shame. Right, companies that refuse to cut off business, right? You have examples like Papa John's Pizza. While its corporate offices try to cut off ties, its Russian franchises are run by an American who had refused to shutter their location. Then of course you have Nestle,

Starting point is 00:13:45 a company notorious for putting profits above everything else. So it's not surprising they're still involved in Russia. And this, despite the fact that Ukraine's prime minister gave its CEO a ring and asked him to stop, but this is how that went. Talk to Nestle CEO, Mr. Mark Schneider, about the side effect of staying in Russian market.

Starting point is 00:13:58 Unfortunately, he shows no understanding. Paying taxes to the budget of a terrorist country means killing defenseless children and mothers. Hope that Nestle will change its mind soon. But I do want to note that those two companies are hardly the only two companies. So if this is something that you care about you don't want to support companies that are still there. Companies more than happy to support Russia and its exploits right now? I'll link down below to a more exhaustive list of everyone who's pulled out, everyone who is staying,

Starting point is 00:14:19 and it's all the work being done by the Yale School of Management. Also beyond businesses leaving Russia, Ukraine actually managed to disconnect its power grid from Russia, which is a pretty big deal. With it now integrated with the EU and what is likely a sped up version of the process, but this removes a lot of power that Russia had over the country and region. And on top of all that,

Starting point is 00:14:35 Russia is also facing a potential crisis in the coming days over its international sovereign debt, right? Just like most people, countries also asked to borrow money and Russia has borrowed about $121 billion from foreign creditors. I'm not gonna get into all the specifics about how all these loans and bonds work. All you really need to know is that Russia had a 117 million dollar interest payment that they were supposed to make today. But those payments are supposed to be made in specific currencies, dollars in this case. Russia would easily have the money to pay for it if it was

Starting point is 00:14:59 allowed to access its foreign accounts. But with the sanctions there's a huge question mark over whether the U.S. would block banks from letting the funds through there's a huge question mark over whether the US would block banks from letting the funds through. Now the US said that it would not block payments on Russia's foreign debt, and Russia claims to have sent the payment, but Citibank, which facilitates the transfer of this money, hasn't confirmed or denied any of the details,

Starting point is 00:15:15 which is the standard practice for these kinds of transactions. But let's say this goes through. Well, that doesn't necessarily mean that the full crisis has been averted for them. Russia has a series of these payments coming up to a ton of creditors with some in the billions of dollars.

Starting point is 00:15:25 It's one of their big concerns there is that eventually Russia could default on its debt, which would be the first time this has happened in over a hundred years, leaving creditors completely screwed, which then could have a larger effect on the world economy. And then lastly, on this topic, things inside of Russia are looking pretty rough,

Starting point is 00:15:37 and I'm not just talking about economics. Putin recently went on a tirade talking about how the West was allegedly trying to exploit some kind of fifth column to divide Russia, Saying things like, "'Any people, and especially the Russian people, "'will always be able to distinguish the true patriots "'from the scum and the traitors,' and just spit them out like a midge

Starting point is 00:15:52 that accidentally flew into their mouths. "'I am convinced that this natural and necessary "'self-cleansing of society will only strengthen our country, "'our solidarity, cohesion, and readiness "'to meet any challenge.'" And so obviously, remarks like this have left many worried that there's going to be some kind of purge or heavy crackdown that's gonna be coming for Russians

Starting point is 00:16:08 who don't just go, Putin is God, which will make the already difficult life for average Russians even worse. I mean, the place already detains people who oppose Putin. Now he's setting up this rhetoric to justify doing horrible, heinous things to them. But ultimately that is where that story and today's show ends.

Starting point is 00:16:22 As always, thank you for watching, like and subscribing, being a part of these daily dives in the news. My name's Philip DeFranco, you've just been filled in. I love yo faces and I'll see you tomorrow. No, I won't. That was a lie. Actually, follow me on Twitter, we'll figure it out.

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The Philip DeFranco Show - PDS 3.17 WOW! Putin Calls For a "Society Cleansed of Non-Patriot Scum", Ukraine, Dr. Disrespect & More

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