The Philip DeFranco Show - PDS 4.26 FREE BILLIE EILISH! Secret Dirt on Tucker Carlson, Ezra Miller Flash Backlash, & Today's News

Starting point is 00:00:00 Free Billie Eilish! Granted, I don't know what we're exactly trying to free her from, but that's exactly what a man wrote on a massive sign before climbing the KTLA news tower in Los Angeles and displaying that message for the city, with officials telling KTLA that this was a protester, but the outlet also noting that the goal or point of his protest was unclear, especially because in addition to the Billie Eilish stuff, he had a sign that on the back said, MK Ultra Sex Slaves Donald Marshall Clones.

Starting point is 00:00:22 So now having said those words out loud, they sound like the key trigger word to activate sleeper agents. But also, that's not where the bizarre stuff ends with one KTLA reporter tweeting that at one point the man brought out a guitar and started playing while on the tower. While part of Sunset Boulevard had to be closed to handle the situation,

Starting point is 00:00:36 luckily everyone's okay. With the man after three hours finally coming down on his own around 9.30 p.m., he's been arrested and is facing trespassing charges. Yeah, another normal day in Los Angeles. And then, this Tucker Carlson news is crazy. With reportedly eight sources either at or close to Fox News telling Rolling Stone that executives have a dossier of dirt on Carlson that they are willing and ready to use if they have to. And it now being reported that Carlson and the network split on what's been described as the worst and messiest possible terms. And apparently

Starting point is 00:01:01 the head of Fox News' corporate communications department has an oppo file on Carlson, which is said to include workplace conduct complaints, disparaging comments about management and toxic workplace allegations. And many of those appearing to be consistent with a lawsuit Carlson is separately facing from a former producer. And while a Fox News spokesperson

Starting point is 00:01:16 officially denied the existence of this file, many sources say, oh no, it's real and the comms executive will never be shy about using these things if they need to. And claiming that the exec actually has a dirt file on all talent to screw with them if needed, and one source describing the tactic as classic Fox. The Wall Street Journal also reporting that there were concerns that Carlson had come to believe himself bigger than the network, which is apparently a

Starting point is 00:01:33 cardinal sin at Fox. Also saying that a slew of private communications that Carlson sent bashing Fox News management led to his departure. Though I will say this is where I disagree with a number of people who have commented on this situation. I personally believe that Carlson is in fact bigger than Fox News. I understand that his time slot is a massive part of his come up in recent years, but there are a few things at play. One, a big part of Tucker's narrative is always that it's him versus the mainstream. And with this split, there are going to be a lot of Carlson fans that go, oh wait, Fox News is the mainstream. Also, depending on the specifics of this alleged oppo research, I think there's a genuine question of how much of it matters to Carlson fans, right? People will believe what they want to believe. Prime example, Fox News and Fox News

Starting point is 00:02:08 hosts knowingly platformed false election theft claims. With the wildest private texts from hosts like Carlson seeing the light of day, Fox News in just this one defamation case having to settle for just under $800 million because of everything that happened. And a huge chunk of the Fox News fans were like, no, you didn't lie to us. What? Make it make sense. All that's to say, it's my belief that he could probably weather any storm here and make any competitor out there an immediate mainstream competitor or just do his own independent thing and it'd be massive. And then let's talk about this super weird and messy Stephen Crowder situation that took over a portion of the internet yesterday. He's a big right wing talking head. He's recently made news because there's been some like conservative infighting between he and

Starting point is 00:02:44 people over at the Daily Wire, as well as he recently went after Mr. Beast, pushing the trans agenda on young children because he just has a trans friend. While in the conservative sphere, there was a lot more of the focus being on Crowder versus Candace Owens. And that's because on his podcast, Crowder talks about how he's been dealing with a divorce since 2021, saying he kept it private, but people in positions of power knew that this was happening, with him alluding to extortion and threats about exposing that information, then playing a clip of Candace Owens speaking about him. There, she seems to question his Christianity,

Starting point is 00:03:11 says that he's going through a lot, says we should pray for him. And then you had Owens uploading a video titled Stephen Crowder Accused Me of Extortion, saying he always paints himself as the victim, saying no one's threatened him or made demands behind closed doors, saying Crowder sent her a flirty Instagram DM on midterm election night that she didn't respond to, saying after that he began his attacks on the Daily Wire, and concluding that the divorce is why he's spiraling and acting erratic. She then sends Crowder a cease and desist, demanding a full retraction, and then invites

Starting point is 00:03:31 Crowder's wife on her show. So with all of that, I gotta say, I don't care about that part. Let him fight it out. But for me, what was the most interesting was the insight that it gave on what he and people like him think should be legal or not, with Crowder very much seemingly not a fan of the law. My then wife decided that she didn't want to be married anymore. And in the state of Texas, that is completely permitted. And I still believe that children need a mom and a dad and that divorce is horrible. But in today's legal system, my beliefs don't matter. In Texas, divorce is permitted when one party wants it, period. And she wanted something else for her life.

Starting point is 00:04:05 That's not my choice. She simply wanted out. And the law says that that's how it works. It's no one's fault but my own in that I picked wrong. And the focus on that felt very weird, right? Because to be clear, you should only need one party to get out of a marriage, to get out of a marriage. Anything other than that sounds like

Starting point is 00:04:25 or rhymes with a hostage situation. The person that you marry, man or woman, is not an object that you own. A thing that is especially important because when you get into a relationship and when you get married, it's just a matter of time before people change. Sometimes people change in a way they can do it together in a complimentary way and sometimes not the case. A marriage should only work if both people want in, period. And then Ezra Miller has got people fucked up right now because that new Flash movie is getting tons of praise, and with that, a ton of backlash. So the movie doesn't actually come out until June, but it was screened at CinemaCon for a select audience that included theater owners, and the reactions have been widely positive. One saying it's got heart, it's got soul,

Starting point is 00:04:59 it's going to be big. A report saying that the audience overall seemed to love it, some even crying by the end, and that's not even because Ezra Miller assaulted them during the screening. With Warner Bros. and DC higher-ups, unsurprisingly, but certainly boldly, touting it as one of the greatest superhero films of all time. Notably, the film's director, Andy Muschietti, specifically praising Ezra Miller as one of the best actors I've ever worked with. But all this in the face of Ezra, let's call it, being tangled in a plethora of controversies over the past couple of years. When I say plethora, I mean, honestly, it would take like a day to fully explain every single arrest, every accusation, every outburst. But some of the most notable altercations include a 2020 video where Ezra appears to be choking a woman in Iceland,

Starting point is 00:05:33 getting arrested in Hawaii for harassment and disorderly conduct in March of 2022, then getting arrested in the state over assault just a few weeks later. Also later that summer, there were accusations that Ezra was housing a woman and her child on a farm in Vermont, which was also later the subject of an investigation with the state requesting emergency care orders. There's also been grooming accusations against Ezra as well. And again, I've barely touched on half of it here. Now with all this, People Magazine reported that the Flash movie was mostly completed before most of the stories broke. Ezra also released a statement last year claiming they're suffering complex mental health issues and have begun ongoing treatment,

Starting point is 00:06:01 and saying they're committed to doing the necessary work. But given everything, and again, we haven't even covered everything, you have many people taking a back at how openly DC execs and so many people are praising Ezra with reactions like, no amount of talent excuses terrible behaviors. No matter how much money this movie makes, Ezra Miller must be recasted. And Ezra Miller should not be rehabilitated by box office numbers. And so we're just going to ignore the fact that Ezra Miller is an abuser because some of you want to see a 70-year-old man in a Batman suit. Others also arguing there's been vastly different reactions and treatments depending on who the star in trouble is. With people pointing to Jonathan Majors, for example, a Marvel actor arrested on

Starting point is 00:06:31 assault charges. With Majors having been dropped by his manager and publicist, his future in the Marvel films looking unclear. So you have people comparing that to Ezra, who has a dozen allegations and is getting the superhero treatment at CinemaCon. Which is why with this story and the arguments that we've seen, I'd love to know your thoughts on this. And then, gaming's biggest merger's in massive trouble. With UK authorities now officially blocking the $69 billion merger of Microsoft and Activision Blizzard, citing concerns over monopolizing the cloud gaming space. And the competition and markets authorities

Starting point is 00:06:56 stating that Microsoft already controls 60 to 70% of the space, and the merger would just make it worse. Also adding that Microsoft would have the incentive to withhold Activision Blizzard games from competitors in substantially weakened competition in this important growing market. So it really seems like Microsoft's efforts to appease regulators, that's not working. Because they've been signing deals trying to ensure that Activision Blizzard games won't be Microsoft exclusives.

Starting point is 00:07:13 Which I imagine is also why Microsoft has said that they will appeal this decision, saying that the authorities have a flawed understanding of the market and the way that relevant cloud technology actually works. So there, according to experts, an appeal is very unlikely to win as they almost literally never have in British antitrust cases. Also, as far as Activision's response, they weren't quite as calm, with the company saying that this decision contradicts the ambitions of the UK to become an attractive country

Starting point is 00:07:33 to build technology businesses, and adding that this is a disservice to UK citizens who face increasingly dire economic prospects and that the UK is clearly closed for business. And this is ever since leaving the EU, British regulators have increasingly flexed their muscles. Just last year, for example, they blocked Meta's acquisition of Giphy and forced a sell-off. But the next question we have to ask is if Microsoft somehow wins the appeal or they make a deal or they decide to just leave the UK, what happens then? Well,

Starting point is 00:07:55 they still have some big hurdles to cross, right? Because while the EU last month suggested that they are actually open to the merger, America isn't quite as convinced. Regulators here have already sued to block it, citing similar concerns as the UK. Though possibly in the most important gaming news, I am very likely going to be very pasty in the near future. Because Tears of the Kingdom and Star Wars Jedi Survivor are about to be released, getting rave reviews. I'm so excited. And then I want to share some cool things coming from the fantastic sponsor of today's show, Grammarly, or more specifically, Grammarly Go. Because Grammarly Go provides personalized generative AI communication assistance that accelerates your productivity and unlocks creativity. And my favorite part is that you can customize

Starting point is 00:08:27 your preferred style of communication by clicking set voice to determine how you want to sound. Are you creatively blocked? You need some inspiration? Just input a prompt and Grammarly Go provides innovative ideas to get your creative juices flowing. You know, with how many different things we now cover on this show,

Starting point is 00:08:39 as well as all the different things we cover on the newsletter and all the shorts and everything, sometimes you need a little inspiration to find a new jumping off point that's already outside of your head. It can help with writing, angling thing of thumbnails. With Grammarly Go, it's been A, cool, but also B, incredibly helpful. With our YouTube shorts content, so helpful because we're going to write out a whole script, but I can then feed in the script and say, hey, give me 10 headlines or possible hooks for a video. And then boom, I get an idea that I can choose from or

Starting point is 00:09:03 expand on. Or sometimes, you know, we'll be working on a piece and I'm like, I get it, but I need to make it consumable. Help me explain what I wrote, but like I'm five years old. Especially because with Grammarly Go, you can highlight the blob of text and choose from your options. Maybe you want to make it sound more exciting. If you're me, you want to make it sound less angry

Starting point is 00:09:17 or more professional. I'm telling you, you will be amazed at what you can do with Grammarly Go. You gotta check it out. So just go to grammarly.com slash Phil DeFranco and get 20% off Grammarly Premium. And then, some people say there's this new space race between the US and China,

Starting point is 00:09:29 but what if that turned into a space war? Because according to recently leaked Discord documents, that's the fear American intelligence analysts are discussing behind closed doors right now. With a warning that Beijing has developed significant capabilities to quote, hold key US and allied space assets at risk and would deploy them in any conflict with Taiwan.

Starting point is 00:09:44 And adding that in such a conflict, China would probably jam communications and intelligence satellites that can see through clouds, degrade or destroy space ground networks, and destroy ballistic missile early warning satellites. This is also coming just a week after Space Force General Chance Saltzman said that the Pentagon is seeing an incredibly sophisticated array of threats. These including spacecraft that can grapple other satellites, lasers that can dazzle them, cyber attacks, and even nesting dolls or satellites that release others that spread out and track adversary spacecraft. Whereas Russia, by contrast, is just watching its famed space program fade away, with a report noting that it will very likely diminish over the next decade as it suffers U.S. sanctions and loses business to

Starting point is 00:10:15 SpaceX and other competitors. Because while NASA used to pay $75 to $85 million per seat aboard Russian rockets, it's been increasingly turning to SpaceX instead, with foreign customers having canceled planned launches on Russian rockets, eliminating a key revenue stream for Moscow's space agency. So as Russia becomes a smaller player in the space game, the stage is being set for confrontation between the US and China. Y'all, Beijing is moving fast, with Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall saying that China has doubled its number of satellites since the Space Force was established three years ago, and adding that it now has more than 700 in operation, with about 250 used for intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance. And while the field of space weapons

Starting point is 00:10:45 is still in its infancies, we have seen countries test some relatively crude technologies in recent years. Like in 2019 and 2021, we saw India and Russia fire missiles at two of their own satellites, blowing them up, creating huge debris fields that even forced the ISS crew to hunker down.

Starting point is 00:10:57 And if we look further back in 2007, China did the same to one of its own, followed the next year by the United States. But aside from land to space missiles, military strategists have also proposed attacking ground stations, which could knock out multiple satellites at once rather than trying to hit each one individually. Though that could also directly kill people and would probably be seen as more escalatory. Though not nearly as escalatory as detonating a nuclear bomb in space, which would create huge waves of radiation and an

Starting point is 00:11:18 electromagnetic pulse that wouldn't discriminate between what it would affect in a given area. And while thankfully, the use of nuclear weapons is banned in space under a 1963 partial test ban treaty, China notably is not a signatory. And notably, some policymakers believe that China perhaps rightly views space as the soft underbelly of the U.S. empire. Though, that's also been changing in recent years. China has expanded its presence in space with a new space station and a historic trip to the far side of the moon. You got both China and the U.S. competing to put equipment on the lunar south pole, where notably, water from ice might provide the ingredients of hydrogen and oxygen to make propellant for springboard missions to Mars and deep space. Though notably, not all space activity is militaristic or even governmental.

Starting point is 00:11:52 Satellites serve civilian purposes too, such as GPS, internet, and weather tracking. The global space economy was valued at almost $500 billion in 2021, with that projected to hit $1.25 trillion by 2030. And of the nearly 25,000 satellites expected to launch in the next decade, over 70% will be commercial. So policymakers have been debating whether these private assets are valid targets, especially since SpaceX deployed its Starlink satellites in Ukraine to help soldiers on the front line. So for Russia, the answer has been pretty clear

Starting point is 00:12:15 as it's been targeting Elon's toys with electronic and cyber warfare. But also the US is very likely gonna have to grapple with that question as well with Beijing, given how Chinese private companies are often closely entwined with the government and military. Though arguably the same could be said about the US, where the Pentagon plans to increasingly rely on private corporations for rockets that get its

Starting point is 00:12:30 military assets into space, as well as for on-orbit services such as refueling and repairing spacecraft. And then you need to just stay poor. That's essentially what the chief economist at the Bank of England's telling the Brits right now. With Hugh Pill going on a podcast for Columbia Law School and saying, somehow in the UK, someone needs to accept that they're worse off and stop trying to maintain their real spending power by bidding up prices, whether higher wages or passing the energy costs to other customers. Or the cost of goods goes up, so workers want to be paid more to keep their relative purchasing power the same. Then, as labor costs go up, businesses raise their prices to keep their margins, causing workers'

Starting point is 00:13:01 purchasing power to go down. So there's this spiral that Pill thinks is because there was a reluctance to accept that things are rough economically in the UK right now. And as you might expect, those comments received a lot of backlash. With workers pissed, saying, "'So you just want us to be okay "'with everything being expensive?'

Starting point is 00:13:13 Meanwhile, the Federation of Small Businesses was angry because he pinned the blame on them, reacting to the labor costs increases and calling Pill out of touch, and claiming that the real issue is that the cost of raw goods and energy has skyrocketed, arguing that if they didn't pass the prices onto consumers, they'd all go out of business.

Starting point is 00:13:25 So very important, not everyone disagreed with Pill's basic premise. But even there, you had people saying, you know, Pill could probably learn a lesson here that even if you are right, no one wants to listen to someone being an asshole about it. And then, now marijuana is just green gold at this point. With a new report just coming out

Starting point is 00:13:37 estimating that there were $30 billion in legal cannabis purchases just last year. And what really highlights how massive this industry is and how big it's going to get is legal marijuana is not even available in many states. Like to give you a comparison, do you like chocolate? I fucking love chocolate. I do some questionable things for a box of Entenmann's donuts. Americans bought $10 billion more in cannabis than chocolate, with it even approaching the tobacco industry, which has been shrinking and is now in the $50 billion range. And it's expected that the marijuana industry is gonna grow past that by 2028.

Starting point is 00:14:05 And remember, there's a lot of things happening with the money at play here. Just to give one example, in Q4 of 2022, California reported that cannabis excise tax and sales tax brought in $221 million in tax revenue. And that's not even including taxes made by local municipalities either. And then Ron DeSantis just keeps grabbing L

Starting point is 00:14:19 after avoidable L in this whole bullshit battle with Disney. With the latest news being that Disney has now escalated this ongoing feud and is suing DeSantis, the board he appointed, and other state officials for a relentless campaign to weaponize government power. And the suit specifically accusing DeSantis of personally orchestrating at every step a targeted campaign of government retaliation as punishment for Disney's protected speech. And adding that this now threatens Disney's business operations, jeopardizes its economic future in the region, and violates its constitutional rights. With Disney also painting this as a last

Starting point is 00:14:47 resort, saying, Disney regrets that it has come to this, but having exhausted efforts to seek a resolution, the company is left with no choice but to file this lawsuit. And specifically, the company is asking that the court rule that DeSantis' efforts to revoke Disney's special tax status and exercise control over the district violate a number of federal laws, including the First Amendment. Now, as far as how DeSantis has responded, a spokesperson said that his office is unaware of any legal right that a company has to operate its own government or maintain special privileges not held by other businesses in the state, and claiming that this lawsuit is yet another unfortunate example of their hope to undermine the will of the Florida voters and operate outside the bounds of the law.

Starting point is 00:15:17 And then, at a time where trust in the Supreme Court is so incredibly low, we're seeing a pair of senators now rolling out a bipartisan bill aimed at requiring the Supreme Court to adopt a code of conduct, where the proposal would direct the high court to develop its own code of conduct in order to preserve the separation of powers and publish the code publicly on its website. It would also mandate that the court name a person to handle complaints and violations, as well as give the court the power to initiate investigations into justices or staff that may have violated federal laws or codes of conduct or otherwise affected the administration of justice. And the bill's sponsor is arguing that this is necessary to bring the high court in line with the same accountability and transparency that literally everyone else is subject to. Right, noting that

Starting point is 00:15:49 these kinds of rules literally apply to all other federal judges and both the two other branches of government already have codes of conduct. And while we've seen calls for this in the past, those demands have been renewed in recent weeks, especially after that absolute bombshell pro publica report that we talked about on the show that revealed that Justice Clarence Thomas had been accepting incredibly expensive luxury gifts from a Republican mega-donor over the past two decades without disclosing them. But also, it's not just Thomas. Yesterday, Politico reported that just days after being appointed to the High Court, Justice Neil Gorsuch sold property to the chief executive of a huge law firm that regularly has business before the court,

Starting point is 00:16:17 but he didn't disclose the buyer's identity. And while notably, experts say that is not technically a violation of the law, it still emphasizes the need for reform. But in the least shocking news ever, the justices have been very resistant. With Chief Justice John Roberts yesterday declining a request by the Senate Judiciary Committee to testify in a hearing on imposing ethics rules for the Supreme Court. Roberts arguing that it would be exceedingly rare for a chief justice to testify before the Senate, implying that it may violate the separation of powers. Also attaching a statement signed by all nine justices asserting that their current ethics rules on gifts, travel, and other financial disclosures were just fine and dandy. But also with that, you're the Democratic chair of the Judiciary Committee hitting back saying, make no mistake, Supreme Court ethics reform must happen when the court participates in the process or not. It is time for Congress to accept its responsibility to establish an enforceable code of ethics for the Supreme Court.

Starting point is 00:16:58 And that is all the news you need to know today. My name's Philip DeFranco. You've just been filled in. I love your faces and I'll see you tomorrow.

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The Philip DeFranco Show - PDS 4.26 FREE BILLIE EILISH! Secret Dirt on Tucker Carlson, Ezra Miller Flash Backlash, & Today's News

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