The Young Turks - Michael Cohen, Hannity, Starbucks Arrests and Kendrick Lamar

Episode Date: April 17, 2018

A portion of our Young Turks Main Show from April 16, 2018. For more go to http://www.tytnetwork.com/join.  Hour 1:Cenk. Republican donor has finally had enough and contributing now to democrats, Seth Klarman, CEO of Baupost group. Trump has lately done some things against Russia, such as the bombing of Syria… Michael Cohen has been raided, Trump wanted to decide what evidence could and could not be used. Sean Hannity is Cohen’s third client. Alex Jones is apparently done with Donald Trump, so done he was brought to tears. Syria airstrikes add $5 Billion to missile-makers’ stock value. Hour 2:Cenk & Ana. Starbucks employee calls police on two patrons for loitering. Kendrick Lamar won a Pulitzer Prize for DAMN. He is the first rapper to win the award. Bevin blaming teacher strike on children being harmed by sexual assault or ingesting poison due to not having anyone to look after them. Leading gay rights lawyer died after setting himself on fire, suicide note stated it was to make a statement toward the use of fossil fuels. Scott Pruitt’s soundproof phone booth. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Thanks for watching. All right, back on a young turks. You caught me looking at tweets. Jay writes in, it's funny he figured out that Trump was a dumbass after the tax cuts. Well, I know, but he did criticize the tax cuts. That's referring to Claremont, who is a Republican donor who flipped and is now supporting Democrats, a suspended account. also a little jaded, saying, yeah, he's going to buy off the Democrats now.

Well, I hear you. I would obviously, as you know, get to vote. Vote to get all the money out of politics, including the money going to Democrats and Republicans. Okay, Chelsea Charles writes in on YouTube Superchat. Jenks is on fire today, but really, when isn't he? Well, I thank you, Chelsea. Appreciate it. When you make a comment on YouTube Superchat, it helps the show. And by the way, if you miss any part of this show or Dan Rather's show earlier today, make sure that you become a member, t-y-network.com slash join so you can get the whole show.

Now, let's get some serious fun. Let's go over here. Well, you know Michael Cohen's offices were raided, and so were his home and his hotel room. He's, of course, a personal attorney for Donald Trump. But he's more than that. He also handles business for Donald Trump, and he's considered a fixer overall. So there is an excellent question as to which of his documents are protected under attorney-client privilege and which are not. So some have to do with business so they're not at all protected. Some do have to do with him being a lawyer for Donald Trump. Now, those dealings that relate to a crime would not be protected.

The ones that do not relate to a crime would be protected. So you really do need some independent lawyers at the Justice Department. or in prosecutor's office to sift through that and make sure that they contain the evidence that actually is protected under attorney-client privilege, and they do have that. There's a team that unfortunately is named a tank team that makes sure that none of the documents or any evidence that is actually protected gets into any prosecution. So Michael Cohen's team and Donald Trump's team think that is. not nearly enough. Now, that is normally how you would do things, but they have a different

idea. Now, that might be driven partly by their panic. As Maggie Haberman, New York Times reporter reports earlier today, they say you could tell, she explained that. You could basically tell, and she used this analogy, how bad the situation is if you're on a plane, for example, based on whether the flight attendants are panicking. Okay, if they're calm, then everything's going to be fine and it's normal if they're panicking, oh boy. Well, in this case, the analogy is to Donald Trump's lawyers. And apparently, they're in a panic over the Michael Cohen raid. She said the lawyers are not calm.

That is your hint about what is going on here. It may not end up mattering, but there are a few people who know as much as Michael Cohen. My guess is it will matter and it'll probably matter a lot. So what are they asking for instead of having the taint? team looking at all the evidence seized from Cohen's offices and homes. Lawyers for President Donald Trump's personal attorney say investigators, quote, took everything during raids last week on his residence in office. I don't know what to call that.

I don't know if that's white privilege, rich privilege, Trump privilege, I don't know, right wing privilege, whatever it is. But the idea that the FBI would come in and seize all the evidence seems. incredibly normal to the rest of us. But for them, they're like, they took all of the evidence. They didn't even leave half of it behind. Why would they leave any of it behind? What a preposterous thing to presume.

All right. I love the idea of some regular old bank robber or anyone else. They come in here and they took all the evidence. They took all the tapes of me coming into the bank. Why didn't you leave half the tapes behind? Only this level of criminals can make these kind of assumptions because they're used to power being on their side and protecting them. All right, the letter that they sent demanded Trump and Cohen's lawyers be allowed to decide which items seized are protected by attorney-client privilege before criminal prosecutors see them. You want to talk about privilege?

They say, no, no, no, no. Now, prosecutors, I know you've seen evidence of my lawbreaking, but I'd like that back. and then I'll decide which ones I want to give you. That happened in your trial, right? I mean, if you've ever been tried, you get to go to the judge and go, now, look, I'd love for the prosecutors to have all this evidence. I'm sorry, but I just can't. I'm going to need all the evidence back,

and then I'll give the prosecutor the evidence that suits my interest. And the judge goes, well, well, that seems like a perfectly fair request. Let's hash that out. No, that's not how it goes. So, of course, that is denied. Trump's lawyers go even further. Now, they're Joanna Hendon and Christopher Dysart and Reid Keefe. They wrote that potentially privileged information was seized during the raid.

They argue that Trump should be able to review those documents before a taint team made up of federal agents and prosecutors to ensure his right to attorney-client privilege. So prosecutors shouldn't decide what's privileged. the judge shouldn't decide what's privileged under the law, just Trump should decide. Trump, he's like, yeah, give me all that stuff back. Okay, yeah, you're not going to get to see any of this, okay? Is Trump a lawyer? No, is Trump's lawyers are going to decide it? But Trump wants to take a look himself and make sure that they have the right evidence.

That's not how it works. Okay. Now, the lawyers say, quote, there is, as well, cause for concern that a taint team could not evaluate Mr. Cohn's files, and in particular, those relating to the president, fairly. So let me get this right. Seasons federal prosecutors, their boss appointed by Donald Trump, and his boss appointed by Donald Trump, cannot be fair enough. But Donald Trump himself, about an investigation about him, would be fairer. I'm sure he'd be fair to himself.

Would he be fair to the facts? That's a preposterous claim. Just take out Trump, put in any other defendant. Your Honor, I think the prosecutors are not being fair to my client. I think my client should get to decide all the evidence in this case because he would be way fair to himself. That is not an argument likely to win. Okay, so in a Monday letter to judge,

Kimba Wood, Cohen's team wrote that either they or an independent third party, known as a special master, these are all fun terms, should conduct the initial review of the materials to filter out anything protected by attorney-client privilege and avoid, quote, even the appearance of impropriety. Federal agents have seized documents in your home, hotel room, in office. There is an appearance of impropriety on your part, not their part, okay? And they are not just willy-nilly taking all the documents and saying, we're going to use them. They have a different team that is not part of the prosecution, that is going to look to see which ones are attorney-client privilege, and if they are, they're not going to let the prosecutors

see it. And to say that that system is not as fair as the defendant looking at his own papers and deciding which ones the court gets to see, it's a preposterous argument. By the way, not exactly the best judge to make it to either. Judge Kimba Wood denied the attorney general position when Bill Clinton, put her up because of some controversies that the Republicans brought up. Oops. Anyway, look, she's been on the bench for a long, long time, and there's no hint of impartiality

there either, but it's a tough draw for them. It doesn't matter because their argument is absolutely ridiculous. Continuing, Judge Wood asked Cohen's team during a Friday hearing to turn over an approximate list of individuals with whom Cohen had engaged in an attorney-client relationship, as well as an estimate of how much of the seized material was covered by that privilege. You were saying, hey, look, there's stuff in there that you don't need. That's attorney-client privilege, especially with other clients. So she's like, okay, great, who's the other clients?

He's like, yeah, about that. We don't really want to tell you. Well, that's because it turns out we found out today. It was Sean Hannity. So, finally, on this issue, attorneys for both Trump and Cohen have requested permission to carry out the initial review of the seized materials. though Trump's lawyers don't agree that a special master would serve as a good backup option. So they're saying, no, no, no, no, no. I don't even want anyone seeing these documents outside of Donald Trump.

Gee, I wonder why. Well, whether they like it or not, people are going to see those documents. The prosecutors are, of course, this is preposterous and won't stand. You don't get to pick the evidence against you. That's not how it works in this justice system. So, request denied. All right. Now we move on to client number three.

We need to talk about a relatively new show called Un-F-E-Bing the Republic, or UNFTR. As a young Turks fan, you already know that the government, the media, and corporations are constantly peddling lies that serve the interests of the rich and powerful. But now there's a podcast dedicated to unraveling those lies. rebunking the conventional wisdom. In each episode of On The Republic, or UNFTR, the host delves into a different historical episode or topic that's generally misunderstood or purposely obfuscated by the so-called powers that be.

Featuring in-depth research, razor sharp commentary, and just the right amount of vulgarity, the UNFTR podcast takes a sledgehammer to what you thought you knew about some of the nation's most sacred historical cows. But don't just take my word for it. The New York Times described UNFTR as consistently compelling and educational, aiming to challenge conventional wisdom and upend the historical narratives that were taught in school. For as the great philosopher Yoda once put it, You must unlearn what you have learned.

And that's true whether you're in Jedi training or you're uprooting and exposing all the propaganda and disinformation you've been fed over the course of your lifetime. So search for UNFDR. in your podcast app today and get ready to get informed, angered, and entertained, all at the same time. So Michael Cohen's officer rated, as you know, his home hotel room, et cetera. He apparently has three clients, Donald Trump we know about. Well, another guy we did know about, his name is Broidy, and we found out about him because of this, partly because of this raid. he outed himself when it looked like people were going to find out who he is.

He is a person high up in the Republican Party these days, mainly because he gives an incredible amount to Republicans. He also gave an incredible amount to his mistress, who was a playboy model. He gave her $1.6 million. And she had an abortion with a kid that she said she was going to have with him. Now, we don't know if she was telling the truth or not, whether she was. was actually pregnant, but she claimed she had an abortion. And the guy says, well, I paid her the $1.6 million, but not for the abortion, if you say so. Now, those are two of the three clients.

The third client, we didn't know. So here's what happened in the proceedings. As you can tell, I think you're about to find out who it is. Disclosing the identity of this third unnamed client or other previous clients, Cohen has engaged would, quote, according to his lawyers, most certainly be embarrassing and detrimental to those clients. Well, it, has been so far, looking forward to more, Cohen's team has not met the standard for any exception to the notion that client identity and even fee arrangements must be revealed, according to Judge Kimba Wood. So she's hearing them out on that, and she says, no, there is no law that says it's going to be embarrassing to your client, so we have to keep his name hidden.

That's not really how it works. And you're not even proposing a legal precedent that I could rule on here. So, continuing, I understand that he doesn't want his name out there, but that's not enough under the law, according to Judge Wood. So finally, they say, all right, give us the client. They're like, can we write it down? They're like, no, no, just say it. Who's the client? And they had to finally say in court, the client's name is Sean Hannity. Dun, dun, dun, as the world turns. And obviously that's why you're looking at Henney's picture on the graphic. So we turned at Hannity for his response. We've been friends a long time referring to Michael Cohen. I have sought legal advice from Michael. Well, do tell

on what? There was a report out today that it might have been on the issue of the ad boycotts on Fox News and perhaps Hannity hiring private investigators to go after her left-wing groups who might have thought of those boycotts. But Hannity came out with a statement later saying no, that was not it. That's interesting. So that's not it. What is it then? Remember, the other two clients are Donald Trump in a world of legal trouble and panicked over what

they might find. And Brody who paid a Playboy model mistress, $1.6 million. So Jesus am Lord mercy, Hannity. What have you done? So here's more tweets from Hannity responding. Michael Cohen has never represented me in any matter. I never retained him.

Received an invoice or paid legal fees. I've occasionally had brief discussions with him about legal questions about which I wanted his input and perspective. But that's not what the papers say. The papers say your client number three. So he acknowledges that he did talk to Michael Cohen and asked for legal advice. He says he wasn't billed and wasn't officially a client. And none of this is important.

Please look away. So wait, by the way, are you called Michael Cohen a liar? Because I'm sure investigators and prosecutors looking into the different criminal actions of Michael Cohen might want to talk to you if you think Michael Cohn is a liar and you weren't actually his client. That's also interesting. Hannity says another tweet, I assumed those conversations were confidential. But to be absolutely clear, but they never involved any matter between me and a third party.

What third party might they involve? We'll get to that in a second. But first, I'm amused by Fox News' reaction to this story. this is the entirety of it when it broke. Watch. Now, in today's proceedings that are underway right now, Stephen Ryan, one of Cohen's attorneys, was asked by the judge to specifically name the other name

because they said it would not fall under attorney-client privilege to withhold that name. And he stood up and named him as Sean Hannity. So moving on to the rest of what's happening today. Indeed. So moving on, Sean Hannity. Anyway, let's never speak of it again.

A little different reaction on MSNBC. ...informed inside that courtroom, that the third client, Michael Cohen's third client, is Sean Hannity. Wow. I'm going to, Paul, this is yours first. Slightly different reactions. Moving on to, wow! Okay.

Now, is Hannity concerned about himself? Now, look at this clip where he's talking to Steve Bannon. It's a little while back, and he says something curious. Here's Sean Hannity talking to ban. It's a Banana Republic. They're willing to destroy this country to keep control. A banana spot people out. By the way, people like us may end up in jail.

Let me tell you, they will stop at nothing. This is what I'm trying to get across. of people. This is serious. People like you might wind up in jail. Well, that would be one reason to have an attorney. Do tell Sean on what charges. Okay. So now some folks have brought up the old charges that Debbie Schlucel leveled at him.

She's another conservative commentator. Now we go to Rachel Stockman reporting for law and crime. It is unclear what Cohen's representation was regarding and it was not revealed court. However, there was a recent media scandal involving a woman who accused Hannity of making unwanted sexual advances, which matched the time frame exactly. In addition,

at the time, Hannity said that he had retained a team of lawyers to fight the false accusations. Okay, well, Michael Cohen's a lawyer, so I don't know why he doesn't admit it, but I don't know that that's the reason at all, for reasons I'll get to in one second. In April 2017, Debbie Schlucel, a former Fox

news guest, appeared on a local radio show last April and recounted an incident where she claims Sean Hannity asked her to a hotel and when she rebuffed his advances, she claims she was ostracized by the network star. Now, I'm going to be fair to Sean Hannity here, probably something he, a favor he would probably not return. But Debbie Schlussel, if you've ever seen her work, is not the most trusted source for news. and in that case later she went on to say well he didn't invite me to his hotel room he invited me to a hotel and they were on location in Detroit and she said well they didn't let me on

after I said no and then she clarified well they did let me on again but afterwards I was banned which one is it and if you were banned afterwards why she says oh it's because they were discriminating yes they claimed it was because I you know because of my performance performance. Well, we do have a performance on tape. Now, these were some YouTube videos that she used to put up until we commented on them. And she got so embarrassed, she left YouTube altogether. Anyways, here is for better or for worse. And trust me, it's for worse, Debbie Shlusel. So, the queen of daytime talk has endorsed B.O. No, not the smelly B.O., but the presidential B.O. That's right, Oprah Winfrey endorsed Barack Obama, as you've probably heard.

No, not that kind of BEO. There is some chance that Fox News didn't discriminate, but didn't find her to be a compelling guest. Or apparently a compelling editor, I'm needlessly amused by this part. But look at the edits here in this video about the $2,300, which she must have misstated in the beginning. Watch. While we're all regulated to a lousy $2,300 for presidential candidate. Sure, I can't really afford to pay $2,300 to any presidential candidate of my choice. Okay, now we're being good to this. Anyway, I'm not sure that I believe Debbie Schlossel's charges.

They're not even charges. She said, I didn't file anything legally. And she says, I don't even know if I'd characterize it as sexual harassment, but he's a creep and all this stuff. So they've got a war going on there. I don't know why Hannity wouldn't admit it was Schlucel if it was Schlucel. That's probably a winning argument for him. So there's some chance it's not schlucel. And if it's not schlucel, and it's not the ad boycott,

and it's something that Cohn's own lawyers said would be very detrimental to a client number three. Sean, we're all dying to find out. What was it? Tick-tok, tick-tok until we find out. But meanwhile, let the speculation run amok throughout the Internet. All right, I've got to take a quick break here. I got a lot more for you guys, including Syria. Look, lighthearted and serious.

So on the one hand, I hate that we did the bombing. I did a video about it over the weekend. I'm going to tell you more about it and who benefited from it. On the other hand, Alex Jones crying over it. It's sorry, it's too funny. Okay, so it's not that he's crying over Syria. That would be, I know about justified, but understandable, I guess. He's crying over his hurt feelings about Trump.

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Thanks for listening to this podcast. You're only halfway through. So hold, hold, stay right here. Just want to remind you if you want to get all five segments of the Young Turks commercial free. These are just two of them. Every day we do it. So go to t-y-t network.com slash join. and you get the whole five segments, two hours.

Add free, do it now. All right, back on a young tourist, Jane and Anna with you guys. Sexy Speed Racer writes in, we simply must take profit out of making weapons of all kinds and out of polluting the planet as well. 100% agreed. Otherwise, capitalism must be killed off for the common good of our planet and species.

And you know that part I don't really agree with. I'd be curious to see what happens with so-called capitalism if we take money out of politics. And we don't have to be overly curious because look at Europe. They don't have money in politics like we do. You can't just go and buy politicians. Their elections are not open auctions. They might be in Russia where the oligarchs rule and they might be in other countries

where the rich and powerful obsie's power. They're not in a lot of Europe. They are here in America. It's an open auction. If you took that part of it out, as you see in a lot of parts of Europe, capitalism survives. And what does it do? It adapts to a mixed economy, which is partly socialism, partly capitalism. Germany has a wonderful model where labor is on their board. So anyway, I think it's complicated. So now on to Alex Jones, which is fun. Super Last Thing says,

I find myself rejuvenated with Alex Jones's tears. Yeah, same. Okay. SOS says, damn, Talk about insanity in the control room. But in that case, I think it was insanity in the studio. Yeah. And Addie on YouTube Super Chat chipped in a good amount of money. Thank you, Addie, and she said money well spent. She or he, sorry, I don't know. But thank you guys.

If you use YouTube Superchat, you help the show, and we really, really appreciate it. And, of course, membership gets you the whole show anytime you want to add free at t-y-tnetwork.com Join. Okay, Casper, you got a lot for us. Let's do it. All right. Over the weekend, a video went viral on social media featuring two black men, unidentified black men, who got arrested at a Starbucks. This story began when the two had gone to this particular Starbucks in Philly, and they were waiting for a real estate developer in order to have this meeting about possible investment opportunities. Now, the two had not purchased anything at the Starbucks. They were still waiting for the real estate developer to show up.

And at one point, one of these men went up to a worker at Starbucks and asked for the bathroom key to use the restroom. At that point, the employee denied access to the bathroom and told them that they needed to leave because they hadn't purchased anything. When the two refused to leave, this worker called 911. I'm not kidding, called 911, which is. supposed to be reserved for emergencies, but nonetheless, six police officers showed up because, of course, it takes six police officers to deal with the situation.

And the two got arrested. Now, we're going to show you the video, or at least a portion of the video that went viral. It's received up to 9 million views this morning alone. I'm sure at this point, it's gone way past 9 million. But with that said, take a quick look. Where did they get called for? Is there two black guys sitting here meeting me? What did they do? What did they do? Someone told me what they did?

They didn't do anything. I saw the entire thing. They didn't see. The woman said it's for paying customers. They didn't do anything. So the two unidentified men were taking out in handcuffs. soon after, which you can see this video, they were held for nearly nine hours before being released. No charges were filed because they didn't break any law. They didn't do anything wrong. They did what the vast majority of people tend to do at Starbucks, which is loiter. And Starbucks,

by the way, really quickly, Jake, is known as a community hub. They're always advertising about their free Wi-Fi. They want people to come there and just hang out, which is why oftentimes you can't even find a place to sit at Starbucks. I've done it a billion times. I've literally walked into a Starbucks without buying anything just to use their bathroom. I always get the key with a smile. So it's just interesting to see how these two individuals were treated compared to the vast majority of patrons at Starbucks. I believe loitering is their business model. They want people to come and hang out. And it was a unique business model when they started. People were like, Oh, you're crazy.

If people aren't buying stuff, you should be kicking them out. And Starbucks said, no, we have a revolutionary new idea. We're not going to kick them out unless they happen to be black, and which is we're going to have them arrested. We're going to call 911. Yeah. Now, look, to be fair, Starbucks did not do this from corporate headquarters. The store manager in this case happened to do it.

And Starbucks is over the top apologetic. We'll get to that in a second, which is good. But Andrew Yaffey was the real estate development guy that was supposed to meet with them. And he said, why would they be asked to leave? He said, it's absolute discrimination. Does anybody else think this is ridiculous? You could actually see him in the video. He was the person who was kind of speaking up, and I'm glad that he did it.

But regardless of what he had to say, the officers were pretty dead set on arresting these two guys. Yeah, and I think that part of what happened was the call in the first place. The second thing that happened is no one has ever allowed to de-escalate a situation, right? So now luckily, nothing physical happened here other than putting them in handcuffs, leading them out in front of everybody, which is also physical, and we should never understate the very active arresting someone is state violence, right? Now, if it has to be done to protect the community, we all understand that, and that's what we signed up for, and that's why, you know, we agree to policing.

But if it doesn't have to be done, that is a pretty significant action to take against a human being. In this case, the cops say, well, we went in and they wouldn't leave. Okay, but were they doing anything wrong in the first place? You came and you assessed the situation. Were they breaking any laws? No, you decided that you can't have your authority questioned, hence they had to be arrested. You know how long they spent in prison or in jail? Nine hours.

nine hours for sitting in a Starbucks. Have I done their drug and your drug where I've gone into Starbucks and not bought something? Yes! But see, look, I don't love the term white privilege, but we're talking about this a lot on the show. This is exactly what it means. It doesn't mean that if you're in the middle of Kentucky

and you're a white person, you're rich. It means that you go into a Starbucks and don't get randomly arrested. You just don't realize it. I mean, it's not a thing that you celebrate. Like, hey, high five. Use the Starbucks bathroom, didn't get arrested. But for black Americans, unfortunately, it happens far too often.

I think the problem with white privilege, or at least the pushback that you get every time you mention it, is because it's hard for some people to comprehend something that they haven't experienced, right? Yes. And so white privilege is really something that people don't experience. It's not something that they do experience. And what I mean by that is that you still have to work really hard. You're still going to struggle. No one's going to hand you anything.

You're not going to necessarily get, you know, these incredible opportunities handed to you left and right. It just means that there are certain things you don't have to deal with that other people do have to deal with. So, for instance, look, I mean, when has anyone ever walked into a Starbucks without seeing a room full of douchebags on their MacBook pros all day long? By the way, I'm one of those douchebags. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. So it's just, I've never had to worry about an employee. at Starbucks telling me I needed to leave because I haven't purchased anything.

I've never had to worry about that kind of harassment. And for the vast majority of Starbucks patrons, they also haven't had to deal with that kind of harassment. But, you know, the fact that someone would call 911 on these guys is insane. It's not a normal police call. 911 is I got an emergency, okay? And so one of the excuse that was used later was, well, there was an armed robbery at a Starbucks whatever nearby at some point.

Wait, so why didn't you call the cops on anyone else at the Starbucks? Like, were you really worried that he went to the bathroom and hence was about to do an armed robbery when he was already out? Wouldn't he have gotten the guns in the bathroom? So none of it makes any sense. I have to make one other point because I think that it's super relevant and no one's tackling this story from this perspective. These are two guys who are meeting with someone in regard to real estate investment opportunity. which means that they have money, right? So oftentimes when we talk about discrimination or the way people are treated differently

in this country, the issue of race makes people really nervous. It's not about race. It's more about socioeconomic status. No, it's not. No, it's not. These dudes have more money than I do. These dudes have more money than a vast majority of Americans do, right? They're trying to invest in property, in real estate.

But it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter how much money they have. Doesn't matter how successful or well-to-do they are. All that matters, according to some people, is what they look like and whether or not they pose a threat based on stereotypes. Okay, so now let's get to some of the fallout from this. And there's a decent amount of good news out of this. So, first of all, Philadelphia District Attorney is Larry Krasner. He's very, very progressive.

And he was like, yeah, no, we're not keeping them. He said there is not sufficient evidence to charge the men with a crime and they are free to go. So doing the right thing there as soon as it crossed his desk, as far as we can tell. Now, in terms of Starbucks, their CEO is flying into Philadelphia to meet with those two guys in specific and to meet with others as well to let them know, hey, this is not our policy at all. And not only is it not our policy, we're now going to do training about unconscious bias so that all of our managers realize, hey, this is something that is pervasive throughout the country. look, the police commissioner who's defending all, this is also African American. You know, I read somewhere that the manager in question might be Latino. I don't know or care that much about that.

The point is that that's why you do the unconscious bias training, because it's an unconscious bias. And it's not only in white people in the country, it's in all of us. That's exactly right. I think that one of the most common misconceptions is that if you are, anything other than white, then you are unable to have any type of bias or to ever discriminate or have prejudice. Prejudice, and it doesn't matter. Like, everyone has issues they need to work out.

I don't care if the worker who called the cops is Latino or black herself doesn't matter. Yeah, and so one other positive reaction from Starbucks comes from Rosalind Brewer. She is Brewer, by the way, is the last name for somebody who works at Starbucks. It's awesome. She's the chief operating officer. That means basically she's the number two person in charge in all of Starbucks. It was a gigantic company. She said this is a teachable moment for all of us.

So they're going to take it as an opportunity to not only fix the situation, but to go further. She also happens to be African American. And she said that she got a 23-year-old black son, obviously, and that the video was painful to watch. So obviously a very important executive there. Starbucks vowing for logical reasons, for many different reasons, to tackle this. So people's frustrations is very understandable. But like when they did the Craigslist killer thing, and they were like, oh, it's all Craigslist's fault.

It could have been the Yellow Pages killer. That's just where the guy happened to find people. So this problem, I'm sure, does happen in other Starbucks because you have individual human beings deciding who is allowed to stay and who is not allowed to stay, who a danger and who is not a danger, not based on whether they're actually are a danger, but based on their perception. And sometimes, yes, they're unconscious bias. But it's not particularly to Starbucks.

I'm sure it happens all across the different restaurants and different venues. And it looks like in this case, in my opinion, Starbucks has taken some excellent measures to combat it. All right. Let's move on to a little bit of good news. Compton rapper Kendrick Lamar has won a Pulitzer Prize for his album, Damn. That's the name of the album, and it's pretty awesome. You should listen to it if you have any interest in rap music, because it was a phenomenal album.

And he has made history by winning this Pulitzer. Let me give you the details. He's one of the first hip-hop artists, or is the first hip-hop artist, to win the Pulitzer's music category, which traditionally has honored classical works, even after the category. was opened up to jazz and pop in 2005. Jazz Master Ornette Coleman won in 2007, but the selection of Lamar is the Pulitzer's biggest swing toward popular music. Okay, I'm going to jump in here. So I don't know much about Kendrick Lamar because I stopped listening to the radio about 10 years ago. But you all love him and I'm sure that he's fantastic. And the ideas that he talks about is to me way more important and is really really.

interesting. But I'm going to go on a little bit of a different rant here about the Pulitzer. I love how they, they're like, oh, we're going to get a little radical here. Fine, we're going to open up to jazz. Like, wow, don't take too many chances, big guy. I thought the same thing. Okay. So edgy. Yeah. So I know that people, and Pulster folks are wonderful people, okay, but the idea that the only good art is dead art. You know, they wouldn't call it dead art. They call it culture, opera, ballet, whatever. I can't stand that. Those are ancient forms of art. They're fine. They're fine. They're fine. And if you're into it and Anna did ballet a long time. And I like classical music as well. It's fine, but it's dead. Living art is what

Kendrick Lamar does. Okay, let's all calm down for a second. Nobody goes. You're getting a little crazy right now. No, no. Opera and Shakespeare. You only see through your narrow lens. Like there's It's not narrow. Everybody else is narrow. I know that sounds funny. Okay. So Shakespeare and opera back in the day were pop culture. The ruffians went to see Shakespeare.

It was comedy. It was like a movie. And he was really good at it. And people loved it. It was pop culture. It's not pop culture anymore. And opera isn't because it's in a different language. And no one understands it.

So intellectuals like it. Anyway, I know I'm a bad guy. You are. So bottom line is, thank you, Pulitzer, for opening your vision a little further and seeing that pop culture does matter because it's living art, and it matters to real millions of millions of people that listen to Kendrick Labar and are influenced by him. So the reason why I'm very happy about this is because, you know, a lot of times rappers get portrayed in one very specific stereotypical way, right?

They're just rapping about their money. They're rapping about women in a very disrespectful way. And that's it. That's all they're all about. Or maybe rapping about drugs and gang life. But there are so many rappers out there who actually give you, give people like me an education about what their communities go through. And I think Kendrick does a really great job of that. Jay Cole does a really great job of that.

There's this one song, I know I'm going off on a little bit of a tangent, but it's called Neighbors by Jay Cole that. Like, the lyrics of that song really get to the heart of a political system that has done certain people wrong. And I think it's incredible. And he also talks about how his neighbors think he's selling dope. And I just love that because he's a rich black guy because he's successful in the music industry. He buys this beautiful big home in a neighborhood. And the neighbors probably think he's selling dope. And it's just, it just touches on something that I think a lot of people go through.

Yeah. Look, I grew up listening to Public Enemy. I also run the MC and Beastie Boys and those guys too. But Public Enemy, that's an education. They should have won a Pulitzer a long time ago. An Ice Cube, super crass in a lot of ways. There's a lot of questionable things. It's rap, right?

It's pop culture. On the other hand, if you've never lived that life, he gives you a window into that life. And that is really, really interesting. And if you're open-minded about it, you might learn a thing or two. And I could, you know, give you a thousand ice cube quotes that I love. But instead, I'm going to give you a Pulitzer Committee, a quote. Yes, I made a graphic.

You have to read it. Okay. It's so good. All right. This is about Kendrick Lamar. They say the Pulitzer Committee praised the album as a virtuosic song collection, unified by its vernacular authenticity and rhythmic dynamism that offers affecting vignettes, capturing the complexity of modern African-American life.

Well, indeed, it does. It does do just that. I'm not sure I would have phrased it that way, but I enjoyed the Pulitzer Prize, phrasing it that way. Nice turn of phrase. That's the reason why they love classical music in the ballet. Well, Kendrick does have vernacular authenticity. We could all agree to that. If ever there was a, I do declare, statement, that would be it.

Collection uniformed was vernacular authenticity and rhythmic dynamism. And it was affecting vignettes, capturing the complexity of my. I do look like Hendrick, you are now the winner of a Pulitzer Prize. All right. Let's take a break. We'll be right back. Thanks for watching what I hope was a lovely edition of the Young Turks. Now, you know that that is two of the five segments that we do, because that's free.

We want to have you support independent media and come watch the whole show that we do every day. That's five segments overall. No ads at all. That's at t-y-tnetwork.com slash join. Come become a member. watching either way. Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks. Support our work, listen to ad-free, access members, only bonus content, and more by subscribing to Apple podcast at apple.com slash t-y-t. I'm your host, Shank Yugar, and I'll see you soon.