The President's Daily Brief - Special Weekend Edition: Vulnerable Infrastructure, Zombie Apocalypse, & Open Borders

Episode Date: March 23, 2024

In this special weekend edition of The President's Daily Brief, Mike Slater and PDB host Mike Baker discuss a range of topics including Baker's relationship with podcast host Joe Rogan, the vulnerability of America's vital infrastructure, how to survive a zombie apocalypse, and a recent report of a Hezbollah terrorist caught at America's southern border. To listen to the show ad-free, become a premium member of The President’s Daily Brief by visiting PDBPremium.com. Please remember to subscribe if you enjoyed this episode of The President's Daily Brief. Email: [e-mail]. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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We wanted to take some time to go a little off format with Mike Baker, a little bonus episode for you. Talk about some of these big issues that Mike tells us about each day and break it down a little more sitting here together. Mike, how are you doing, sir? I'm doing well. Thanks very much, man. I appreciate it. No, good to talk to you. Thank you for always putting together this awesome podcast for us.

Real quick, before we get to some of these issues here, because I want to talk about our water infrastructure, I want to talk to you about the border. But I got to ask you, how did you get hooked up with Joe Rogan in the first place? He says you are his go-to guy for international politics. How did that happen? Yeah, I don't know.

I guess he ran out of all the other go-to guys. It was interesting. It was a long time ago, right? And I really, I just got a call from him. At one point, I think I'd been doing some, some work on TV, and I forget what the topic was that he might have seen. We never really actually talked about how that all came together, but he said, would you be willing to come down?

And at that time, he was in California, as before he moved out to Texas and, you know, come down and do the show. And it was great. Look, I can't say enough good things about the guy. He's incredibly curious about everything. He's funnier now. He's generous. He's just a solid dude that you,

enjoy hanging out with, which is a good thing because, as people know, his podcast is hours long, right? It runs for three hours or more. And, you know, but it's, it's one of those conversations you can have. It just keeps flowing. He asks, you know, very smart questions. He's read up on, on everything. You know, I've never watched any of his podcasts where he's been, you know, just lacking for something to talk about or ask about. And the great thing is he also asks us, these very short questions, which I think used to be the thing, right? In journalism and in interview, you'd say what, how, why, how come, right? And you've experienced the same thing.

We go in, and you and I go in for an interview, and whoever is interviewing you ask a question that runs for three and a half minutes, and you go, well, I'm sorry, the segment's only four minutes long, so I've got answer. You know, how do we solve the problems in the Middle East? So, yeah, anyway, not the bad. on about it, but just an incredibly solid guy. That's awesome. And it seems like his characteristic that works most here is his curiosity, right?

Super curious about the way things are going and why. And I think you can't fake that, right? I mean, look, I run a company as intelligence and security services, right, around the globe, and we've got offices in a lot of different places. And we're always talking about this. How do you hire for this sort of business, right? We're digging up information. We're gathering intelligence on.

on a variety of things. It could be a very pedestrian issue. It could be something that's critically important to whomever we're working on behalf of. And the answer is you can hire people who have got multiple degrees and speak several languages, and we look for those people.

But at the end of the day, what we really want are curious people, who don't settle for the first answer. They get that first answer. They're out there eliciting information. They've identified, okay, look, I found somebody who might know what we're talking about here. They may have a reason to talk to me

about it. I'm going to get in touch with them somehow, whatever that means is. And then I'm going to ask them questions. And I'm not going to settle for the first thing they tell me because I'm curious. And that's one of those qualities that we tend to look for all the time, but can be difficult to find. Just somebody who's inquisitive, curious, always ask the next question. Very interesting. I want to talk about something you talked about the other day on one of your episodes that I'm that I'm concerned about, and that's the hacking of our water system. So the president's team sent out a letter to all the governors across the country, warning them how vulnerable our water systems are.

How concerned are you about this? Extremely, right? And not just the water systems, but the power grid, the telecommunication system, our banking system, transportation. The interesting thing is here, if you asked this question, If you said to military intel officials in Washington, D.C., if you asked them 20 years ago, what are you most worried about? What are your top crises? What are your top concerns here for national security? The state of the infrastructure, the frailty of the infrastructure across the board would always be up there in about the top five positions.

Russia, China, of course, Iran, but you'd have the infrastructure issue and its vulnerability to either physical attacks or cyber attacks, sabotage. So this is not, it's not a new issue, but it seems as if some parts of the U.S. government are just waking up to this, right? Not all of them. Others have been focused on this for some time. But it is a significant problem because Russia, China, Iran, any nation that's got the ability has been out there probing and mapping our infrastructure for years. And they're doing it for a very specific reason. They're putting together essentially a playbook for if there is a global conflict, What do they do?

And what they're going to do is take the battle straight to the home front. And this is a real, it's a real problem. I go through, I don't know if I've seen too much zombie apocalypse stuff. But I'm thinking about what are, what things would be like if our water grid was poisoned. Even just in one part of the country, because then everyone else would still be freaked out as well. You can't go, you go three days out water and you're dead. So like how much would people just freak out if that got compromised? Yeah, no, well, first of all, I don't think you can ever watch too many zombie apocalypse movies, Mike.

So I have not hit that point. You're on everybody's zombie apocalypse team, by the way, just so you know, right? Like, everyone's got their team. And I don't know what I bring to the table, but you're the top guy. There's no question. And so I'll have people line up the door to go into the walk-in safes to get their gear and we'll all head out. You know, it's interesting because I think when you talk about, this issue, when you talk about

how, you know, how do we safeguard this? How do we protect against this problem? Again, and it's not, I don't want to just stop at the water systems because it goes across the board. And it won't be just a siloed event, right? It's not as if they're just going to say, okay, again, I'm talking a major conflict. I'm not talking about a one-off attack

by a state sponsor, a terror group or whatever, but I'm talking about if there is a global conflict of some sort that draws the U.S. into it and a major your hostile nation is on the other side, it'll be multifaceted, right? So they'll go after transportation, they'll go after electricity, they'll go after water, because they're looking to create maximum instability and chaos on the home front. And I think we've all seen, maybe we haven't, but I think a number of people watching

have been in those moments where the power's gone out for two or three days because of a storm, a snowstorm, hurricane, whatever. And, you know, we've seen what happens. People at first day or two are like, yeah, it's kind of fun. We're camping. you know, get the kids in the living room. We're all sleeping with candlelight. And, you know, maybe you're in a climate where it's cold.

You think, okay, I've got to get a generator or I got to get some flashlight batteries. Or I got to do it. You go to the store and people are looking a little crazy-eyed, right? Because now it's been two or three days. And most people aren't used to a lot of discomfort. And they're starting to get a little worried. The shelves are empty of water and bread and milk. And so it wouldn't take much.

And if you imagine the power grid going down for two months, shutting down the ability to move cash. You know, food can't get to the stores. Fuel's not being delivered to gas stations. You got a problem with water. It's not a particularly good scenario. Now, you'd like to think that people in those moments of difficulty rally together,

but I'm not sure if that's what happens. So I don't know. Human age takes over fast. Yeah. Yeah. Like, I'm just thinking like parents with babies who need water for baby formula. I just, like, the panic and freak out would be crazy.

So the question is, do we have the same capacity to shut down China or Iran or Russia, the players that are doing this against us? Like, is there that mutually assured destruction or are we so vulnerable? Because the Biden administration said that some of these water infrastructure systems have the passwords set to the default password.

The passwords are password. Like, that's how insane we are. Yeah, the password is water. So it is. It's a great question because, yes, the answer is we should all hope we do, right? Because the reason I say that is because every time I talk about the threats posed by another nation that doesn't have our same interests at heart, people, you know, some folks roll their eyes and go, well, we do the same thing. It's always a what aboutism, right? Well, the U.S. does the same thing.

Well, you better hope we do because it's not a community of nations out there as much as we like it to be. And so, are we doing the same thing? Do we have the same abilities? Well, look, I rank us up at the top of the heap in terms of our abilities to engage in offensive and defensive measures, whether it's in cyberspace or space or, you know, normal traditional battle environment. So yes, and we understand the severity of it. I do think we're a little bit late to the game, certainly on the defensive side when we're talking about, you know, the safeguarding. Look, we built a power grid system. They've got the east, the west, and Texas.

We've got three power grids basically in the nation. And they were kind of cobbled together over the years and the decades, right? Never with the idea that we've got to build these things to withstand terrorist attacks. That wasn't the mindset years ago. And so there's an awful lot of hardening of the perimeters and of the systems that needs to be done, but that is an enormously costly exercise. And it also requires local and state and federal government to unask the sofa and actually get it done. Starting a business can seem like a daunting task, unless you have a partner like Shopify. They have the tools you need to start and grow your business. From designing a website to marketing, to selling and beyond, Shopify can help with everything you need. There's a reason millions of

companies like Mattel, Heinz, and all birds continue to trust and use them. With Shopify on your turn your big business idea into sign up for your $1 per month trial at shopify.com slash special offer you don't have to give us your entire zombie apocalypse checklist but what what what do you have to physically prepare for that chaotic scene you've painted a moment ago yeah um okay well i think there's certain things you always have to worry about whether it's a natural crisis, whether it's a hurricane, whether it's a large-scale snowstorm, whether it's a zombie apocalypse, or whether it's an attack by a hostile nation. So what do you have to worry about? First of all, your primary concern, you know, tends to be okay family. And so you imagine what

that means. I've got to take care of a certain number of people. Before I even think about spreading out and helping my neighbor. And it's the basics. It's always the basics. It's water. It's some ability to maintain a food supply for a period of time. I'm not talking about digging a silo and a bunker and putting in, you know, four years of food supply. But there's an element of that. There's communications. How do I communicate when this smartphone, you know, goes down?

And it will. Then, you know, so what does that mean? Okay, that means kind of reverting back to the old days of walkie talkies, you know, and Niner. And that's, and so we do that. And then you worry about other things, cash. You know, I'm going to need something to, you know, maybe to keep in reserve for exchange for trade,

because I'm not going to be able to go to the cash point or the ATM and withdraw money if the power is down. And, you know, everybody's gotten a little sideways. So it's those things. And then, yes, you know, weapons, well, sure. But that's, you know, that's a given. And we had a, A wonderful neighbors one time.

We've since moved, but we had great neighbors. And one time the fella came over and he said, you know, Mike, what are you going to do? You know, can you get me a list of things that I should have? Not to go overboard as a, you know, massive prepper, but just what should I have? So I gave him this list. And it was a little bit like because he's a great guy. I wanted to be somewhat detailed. And he's looking at the list and he goes, oh, geez.

He says, do you have all this stuff? And I said, no, I got a walk-in closet full, you know, safe full of, you know, guns and gear. I'm going to come over and take your stuff. But I was kidding. I'm not going to do that. But, but, but so you have the basics. And then medicine, think about, you know, that, and this is really important. Think about the medications that maybe you're, you know, if you're, you know, if you're, you know, caring for your elderly parents, if you've got children, yourself. And to the degree that you can, you need to say, okay, that pharmacy is probably not going to be open. If there's a catastrophe or things shut down

because of a storm, whatever it is. So it's the basics across the board that you need to think about. Yeah, medicine is a great point. On the cash, right at the beginning of COVID, when everyone was starting to freak out, I went to the bank and I wanted $5,000 cash. And they said, no. How about that?

They said, no, we won't do it. They didn't want to run on the bank, which I think they saw it coming. Once people come out of thousands of dollars, Mike, everybody was going to go. Well, Mike's doing it. I can't get a kid. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah, don't, don't, they did, like, don't tell anyone we gave it to you. Like, yeah, right. I want to pivot to the border quickly because they just, and I want to ask you how, like, why this guy even admitted to this. But there was a Lebanese guy. Here it is, a Lebanese guy passed in El Paso, an admitted Hezbollah terrorist, said he wanted to go to New York and make a bomb,

a 22-year-old guy. So how did they get that out of them? Once they, because this is now the 60, person on the terror watch list in the last four months that we've captured at the border, 270 more the two years prior to that. So there's been hundreds of

known terrorists coming across the border. Why would this cat even admit to this such a thing? I know. I know. I love the idea of the conversation, right, where they say, so, Mr. Abadi, what brings you to America? He goes, I'm here to build a bomb. Oh, geez, I shouldn't have said that.

You know, maybe he's got Tourette's. Who knows? He just shouts things out. Yeah, it's a, it's, I mean, we laugh and I do laugh about it because it's, it's bizarre. Normally you don't identify somebody quite that easily because they don't admit to it. But you've pointed out the most disconcerting part, which is, look, these numbers about how many known gotaways, right, the millions that they're estimating that have come across the border without encountering law enforcement. They think that could be two, two plus million in the past, two and a half years or so, they're guessing. But what that means is you've got millions who we don't even know about.

And we're not even really vetting the encounters, right? The known encounters, the people that we actually encounter at the border. There's not a lot of vetting going on with them either. So this fellow, this Lebanese fellow you talked about, he was questioned a couple days after being picked up, I believe, by medical staff who were just doing some medical screening. And they literally, I suspect, said, so what brings you to the country? country, I don't think they were trained in interrogation. So this guy just, you know, came up with this. He said he'd been, you know, working with Hezbollah. He'd been, you know, trained by Hezbollah.

He'd been trained in, you know, to follow jihad and to kill non-Muslims. And that he'd been, you know, responsible for guarding some weapons, you know, cash in Lebanon for hesbalah for some period of time before making his way circuitously through several countries to eventually get to the U.S. using fake papers and false identity. And then he just comes up with this. I'm here to build a bomb and I'm with Hezbollah. Who knows? Maybe the guy's completely psychotic

and he just thought this might be the best way to get some hot meals in a place to put his head. The Krispy Chicken sandwich from 7-Eleven, people always call me loud. And I'm like, yeah, I know. I'm crispy. Did you expect me to whisper? If you want quiet, go eat some soup and reflect.

Like I know I'm a handful. I'm bold, I'm juicy. Throw some pickles and barbecue sauce on me. And baby, I'm a whole meal. And with seven rewards, I'm just $4. Quiet. No. Krispy, saucy, and $4?

Very. Only at 711. Valley 36, 2326, participating stores only while supplies last see out for full terms. Yeah, this guy may be a total clown, but the others who we know of, and then as you mentioned, the ones that we don't even know of, they may be a little more clever getting around at all. why else would someone who's already on the terror watch list want to come to America?

It's almost certain that there would be an attack, unless these people just fall in love with America in the meantime or whatever, but I doubt it, right? So that's a certainty, isn't it, eventually? Eventually it is, yeah, and that's the problem. Look, you can't, I've been saying this, and I'm sure people are tired of hearing me say it, but you can't, if you're the federal government,

your primary responsibility is the security of your safety, citizens, whether it's public security in the city streets or whether it's national security and keeping terrorists out of the country, that's your job. And you can't do that if you don't have a secure border and you know who's coming across. And so when we talk about the lack of vetting that goes on with those people who are actually encountered, but then released, you know, flown out to wherever. And let's not forget that the Biden administration itself admitted that they've flown hundreds of thousands of people into the United States at night in an effort to essentially to reduce

the numbers of border crossings. So they're just flying them in under the cover of night into various cities and they won't disclose what cities. So setting that aside, you've got this issue of if you can't identify who's coming across and you know that say last year you definitely had 169 individuals that you encountered came across who are on the watch list, the terror watch list, then you'd have to be a complete moron to imagine that all the millions that have come across who never encountered law enforcement, not a single one of them are on the terror watch list or have some bad intent by coming here. And that means that the federal government is failing in its primary job. Mike Baker, thanks for giving us a little extra time to dive deeper.

And thanks for all the work you put in your podcast. every day man it's not easy we're grateful no i appreciate you mike thank you very much for the time man it's mike baker uh i'm mike slater my podcast is politics by faith all of this how do you feel right now where's your where's your anxiety level like i like to be informed we need to be informed no question all that stuff you need to know you can't go on in your life not knowing this stuff because it's going to happen and most of the country is is going to be like, what? Who saw this coming?

You'd be like, I did. Anyone paying attention? You have to pay attention. But paying attention causes anxiety. So if you have anxiety, like I do covering this stuff for a living, that's why I created the Politics by Faith podcast. And the goal that is to alleviate anxiety.

So we talk about the chaotic things that are going on in the world, but then we pass them through the ancient wisdom of the Bible. And listen, there's nothing new under the sun. everything we're dealing right now is ancient stuff. It's all happened before. You go back in the Bible. You go back in ancient Rome.

You go back to the 1,200s, the 1700s. It's all been there before. So the goal of our podcast is to talk about the times this has happened before, how we overcame it, and to help alleviate the stress that you may be feeling today. So this is quite a one-two punch. President's daily brief every day to get that news. But then if it's causing you anxiety, flip over to politics by faith to help alleviate the stress that may come from that news.

Politics by Faith. I'm Mike Slater. Special bonus episode, thanks for listening to the President's Daily Brief. Ryan Reynolds here for MintMobil. I don't know if you knew this, but anyone can get the same premium wireless for $15 a month plan that I've been enjoying. It's not just for celebrities, so do like I did and have one of your assistants assistants to switch you to MintMobile today. I'm told it's super easy to do at mintmobile.com slash switch. Up front payment of $45 for three-month plan equivalent to $15. per month required. Intro rate first three months only, then full price plan options available.

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