The Young Turks - Woke-a-Meter Weirdos

Episode Date: February 14, 2023

U.S. fighter jets have shot down a foreign object over Lake Huron. Thousands of protesters in Jerusalem appear as Netanyahu tries to weaken the courts. After the massive earthquake, Turkey’s death toll rises to 33,000. A new Fox segment debuts as the “Woke-A-Meter”. Lobbyists are buddying up with congress in the name of “diversity”. Host: Ana Kasparian, Cenk Uygur Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

You're listening to The Young Turks, the online news show. Make sure to follow and rate our show with not one, not two, not three, not four, but five stars. You're awesome. Thank you. On July 18th, get excited. This is big. For the summer's biggest adventure. I think I just smurf my pants. That's a little too excited.

Sorry. Smurfs. Only theaters July 18th. Woo! It's up. You know, I'm not going to be able to be. All right, welcome to the Young Turks. Jake Yuga, Anna Kusparian, with you guys.

Oh, my God. Are there aliens? Bloop, bloop, bloop. We're going to discuss that first in a second. Later, the program, did Trump know? And when did he know it? Interesting, Casper. All right, let's talk about these unidentified objects in the air that we've been

shooting down over the weekend. The United States has shot down yet another unidentified object on Sunday, making it the fourth taken down over North America in less than two weeks. The latest was shot down just over Lake Huron in Michigan. While U.S. officials have been weirdly tight-lipped in describing what the unidentified objects were, even going so far as referring to them as high altitude objects, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has confirmed in a cable news interview that it is in fact, or they were in fact balloons. Let's watch. The military and the intelligence are focused like a laser on first gathering and accumulating

the information, then coming up with a comprehensive analysis of what went on before, what's going on now and what could go on in the future. You can be sure that if any, any American interest, or people are at risk, they'll take appropriate action. Until they get that comprehensive analysis, however, we have to look at each balloon individually and see what they're done. They believe they were, yes, but much smaller than the one, the first one. Both of those, one over Canada, one over Alaska, were at 40,000 feet. Immediately it was determined that that's a danger to commercial aircraft, which also fly

at 40,000 feet. And so the second one in cooperation with the Canadians, the first one with the Americans took it down. So they took it down again, three over the weekend beginning on Friday. And then of course, prior to that, there was the much larger Chinese surveillance balloon, alleged Chinese surveillance balloon that was shot down right off the coast of South Carolina. A national security spokesperson said the objects over Canada and Alaska did not closely resemble and were much smaller than the. the suspected Chinese spy balloon that was shot down on February 4th, Cenk. Okay, first of all, let's be honest about this. Obviously, aliens. Because you know what aliens said? Balloons.

Okay, if that's the best technology aliens have, ladies and gentlemen, we got them. So, new right-wing conspiracy theory, obviously right away, they were in fact aliens. Illegal aliens set by the Communist Chinese Party. Okay, look, guys, they have not yet recovered the three that they shot down over the weekend, at least the two in Alaska and in Canada for sure. And so Adam and Kirby just in a press conference very recently right before we went live and representing the Pentagon, the U.S. government, et cetera. He said, look, they're not aliens, okay? They're not as far as we know. But what are they? We haven't gotten them yet, right? So that's fair. A lot of this got sparked by a Pentagon spokesperson over the weekend saying, I'm not ruling anything out.

Okay, they're not aliens. Okay, let's like, let's just move on. Okay, we don't know what they are. We don't know who sent them. We don't know if there's like nefarious motives behind it. We just shoot them down and that's it. That's what's happening. That's all we know.

Okay, the speculation is nonsense. It's a giant waste of time. I'm not even entertaining it. Okay, not being entertained. We're moving forward. Yeah. I got one other funny part of it. Representative Slotnick from Michigan, she was informed before these things were shot down.

And so was another Democratic congressman from Michigan. And they both were praising the courage of our fighter pilots for shooting it down. I was like, they're unmanned. I'm not sure it takes a ton of courage to shoot down a balloon. But anyways, are they spying? That's the actual question? Likely, but we don't know. Yeah, of course they are.

Of course they are. Every country that has a capability to spy on us, spies on us, and we spy on other countries. No. That's what happens. I'm told by the mainstream press. And we spend hundreds of billions of dollars every single year. We increase the military budget every single goddamn year. And wouldn't you know it?

This situation is being exploited for calls for what? More military funding. In fact, why don't we go to this next video featuring House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Turner. get a load of what he has to say about this. Are you glad that they were, that they shot down these two objects? Because obviously you and other Republicans were critical for the, that the Biden team took as long as they did to shoot down the object that was clearly a Chinese spy balloon. Sure, as I was saying, I would prefer them to be trigger happy than to be permissive. But we're going to have to see whether or not this is just the administration trying to change headlines.

But what I think this shows, which is probably more important to our policy discussion here, is that we really have to declare that we're going to defend our airspace. And then we need to invest. What's been come clear in the public discussion is that we don't really have adequate radar systems. We certainly don't have an integrated missile defense system. We're going to have to begin to look at the United States in airspace as one that we need to defend and that we need to have appropriate sensors to do so. This shows some of the problems and gaps that we have.

We need to fill those as soon as possible, because we certainly now ascertain there is a threat. We don't have an adequate missile defense system. That's what he just said. He said, we don't have an adequate missile defense system. That's weird. Is the military somehow underfunded? Do we not have the resources to have an adequate missile defense system? I don't know, why don't we look at the numbers?

Let's start with graphic five here. In fiscal year, 23, the U.S. government, total U.S. government spending for defense, including military defense, veterans affairs, and foreign policy, is budgeted to be about $1,168.4 billion. Now, military spending, just military spending alone, is budgeted at $808.6 billion. Okay? Let's go to the next graphic, give you a better idea of just how much military funding has increased each consecutive year. 2021, it was seven. $753.9 billion, the amount appropriated for 2024, $836.5 billion. In fact, the last time they voted for the military budget, they actually offered even more

than what the Biden administration was asking for. So where's the money going? How do we not have an adequate missile defense system? I mean, it is amazing how much money gets funneled from the bottom to the top in this country. In the case of military spending, from the hard-earned taxpayer money of fellow citizens being redistributed all the way to private defense contractor executives who do what with it? What do they do with it? If we don't have an adequate missile defense system, what the hell does the money go toward? That's what I want to know.

That's the only thing that matters in this story. Everything else is nonsense. Everything. Yeah. So let me just double down on what Anna is saying. So he says, we don't have an adequate missile defense system. Then I literally, what are we spending the other $1.1 trillion on? Because this is supposed to be a Department of Defense.

These are supposed to be defense systems. I've seen us start many wars, totally useless wars, that got our kids killed and our trillions of dollars misspent, right? But we don't have a missile defense system that can spot a balloon. And by the way, the first balloon was 2,000 feet long, apparently. the three buses. We don't have missile defense system for them. What the hell did we spend? Obviously, you took the $1.1 trillion and you stuffed it into your pockets. So why don't you just be honest about that? And it's interesting that Jake Tapper, whenever we talk about Medicare for

all, something that would give universal health care that every other development nation has, is how are you going to pay for that? All of a sudden this guy comes out here is like $1.1 trillion is not enough. We need new missile defense systems that my donors want. And Tapper didn't ask him how he's going to pay for that. What a shock. By the way, he threw in there, it's certainly a Chinese spy balloon. It's very likely a Chinese spy balloon, but you don't actually know that. But just to like demagogue and fearmonger and create a bigger defense budget, Tapper's sure, he's absolutely sure, we all got a pile in the money here.

And of course, this is this lunatic Republican congressman, they all are, it says things like, they're trying to distract with these things. What do you mean? Are you saying that the Biden administration sent the balloons? and they shot them down. What do you mean they're trying to distract? What do you? But Tapper does he call him out on that?

Of course not. Of course not. The beloved Republicans must be respected, even when they say crazy things that make no sense at all. And of course he added in, I'd rather have them be trigger happy. Let's shoot first, spend pork barrel money on crony capitalism first, okay, and then figure out things later. It's the American way.

It's what we do best. Both sides, both sides are going to use this. Democrats and Republicans, they'll fight over nonsense about who balloons, which balloons, aliens, blah, blah, blah. But at the end of the day, when the voting happens, both sides are going to agree 100% on spending more on corrupt defense contractors that apparently can't even protect us from goddamn balloons. That's right. All right, well, let's do some international news starting with this.

Now hundreds of thousands of Israelis went on strike and protested out of the Knesset this morning in response to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's efforts to weaken the country's judicial system. He's specifically proposing to weaken the country's highest court, Israel. Supreme Court. In fact, protesters or protests have been taking place in Israel for the last six weeks. Now Netanyahu's coalition advanced this legislation that would overhaul the country's top court and voted to send the first of two bills to Parliament for a vote, even with opposition from President Joe Biden and the demonstrators in his own country. Now, Netanyahu, to give you

some more details, has sought to fast track the legislation, which would weaken oversight. of legislation by Israel Supreme Court and give lawmakers the power to appoint judges among other changes. Now, the way the system of government is set up in Israel does share parallels or similarities to what we have here in the United States. The courts or the judicial branch is supposed to serve as a check to parliament. But Benjamin Nanyahu, who by the way is facing his own serious corruption investigation, is looking to weaken the oversight power that the country Supreme Court has. Netanyahu says the legislative changes are needed to curb Israel's overly activist judges. Rainin alleged judicial corruption and increased diversity on the bench.

His opponents say they amount to an end to judicial checks and balances and a governmental takeover of the Supreme Court, which many Israelis consider the last bastion of the country's democracy. Before we get to some more footage of the protests from this past weekend, And, Jank, why don't you jump in? Yeah. So I've often complimented the Israeli Supreme Court. Criticize them from time to time too. Of course, unfortunately, as with many parts of the Israeli government,

they have their absurd rulings, too, against Palestinians oftentimes. But they do also often have fair rulings. And they are largely independent from Parliament. And they do a way better job of checking corruption than our Supreme Court does. mean a billion times better. So it is one of the best parts of the Israeli government. And you do sometimes even get them checking the Israeli government on some of their worst abuses. Oftentimes they excuse the worst abuses as well. So it's a mixed bag in that department. But overall, one of the best institutions in Israel. So now what you're seeing is secular citizens. And look at

that. You see that? It's the same dynamic. There's all these people who think, oh, certain ethnic groups do this or certain religions do that. No, it's in every country, you have the right wing, which is usually filled with fundamentalist zealots, and you have secular people. Now, all the secular citizens that are showing up here in the protests, they're not all necessarily left-wingers, as we would describe them or progressives. A lot of them are, by the way. So look at all those progressive Israeli citizens, right? But yes, there are even some religious groups in there And other folks who are saying, yeah, look, I don't know how I feel about Palestinians or I don't know how I feel about this or that. But I do know I don't want us to be run by fundamentalist clerics and have my rights stripped away.

And a lot of people showed up in handmade's tail outfits too because the Supreme Court, if its power is taken away and its independence is taken away, could really harm secular rights inside Israel. Now, despite the large number of protesters that you can see in Tel Aviv, Fact of the matter is, polling indicates that a slight majority, in fact, favor weakening the Supreme Court. Now, this is one poll, so let me just give you that warning. But according to the Jewish People Policy Institute, which is a Jerusalem-based research group, roughly 44% of Israelis support the judicial overhaul and 41% oppose it. I should also note that Netanyahu pursued this, or the moves came after, the government announced its first efforts to strengthen Israel's settlements in the Israeli

occupied West Bank. So that's, in my opinion, another motivation here, because as Jenk had mentioned, the country's Supreme Court was far more fair in terms of weighing in on matters related to the West Bank and Palestinians. So this new authorization for nine new settlements is a bit of a problem, and I think that kind of informs us as to what the real motivations are for Netanyahu. Now, on the Israeli right, the Supreme Court, again, is typically seen as a left-leaning institution that prevents right-wing and religious governments from enacting policies that they were elected to implement, though it has broadly supported some settlement construction in the occupied territories. Jank went over this a little bit, but understand the criticism mostly

comes from Benjamin Nanyahu's right wing government because of the fact that they've been willing to step in and check some of the acts that they've engaged in. Now about the protesters, an estimated 200,000 Israelis demonstrated across the country on Saturday, according to organizers in one of the biggest turnouts in the weekly mass rallies happening for nearly two months. Israel's mainly ceremonial president also has called for compromise and warned that the crisis had left the country on the brink of constitutional and social collapse. The other thing I wanted to mention is having an impact on the economy, which I wouldn't have predicted, but just to give you a sense of what's happening, in recent weeks, U.S.

investors, J.P. Morgan and Goldman Sachs, as well as Britain's Barclays Bank, have issued reports. Warning of a rising risk of investing in Israel. Some economists have compared the situation to Poland, whose credit rating was lowered after passing legislation in 2016, restricting judicial independence. And as one professor of economics at Tel Aviv University says, what we see here with the reforms is bad for the economy. How fast the risk is going up is not yet certain, but it is rising and the people are worried. Okay, so I want to make, I think this is a really interesting point where we get to look at three different issues and see a little bit of insight into. One's about Jewish people overall. The other ones about

Palestinians and the third one is about Israel, all three different topics. One, there's tons of anti-Semitic theories that have come resurfaced recently because of Kanye West and others, right? And Donald Trump dining with a bunch of crazy anti-Semites. So, well, they're always portrayed as a monolith, right? Oh, Jewish business interests, Jews control this or that. Well, there's all those Jews in Israel who don't agree with one another. And the business interest, by the way, inside Israel are losing. And then international business interests like J.P. Morgan and others are coming out against the Israeli government.

Why are they doing that if the Jews control everything? So, I mean, look, these are super obvious points, but unfortunately they're not obvious to everyone. So the anti-Semitism is absurd and always ridiculous. And any look at Israel ironically shows that, okay? So number two is about Israel itself. Look, Netanyahu, in terms of their internal politics, is doing what all of these corrupt right-wing leaders do. I'm not worried about the Supreme Court because they're pursuing corruption charges against me.

I'm worried about their corruption. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, that's it. That's it. Even though my corruption is pervasive and proven and obvious, no, we need to get rid of those guys investigating me because they're the real corrupt ones, wink. And that's just exactly what Trump did with drain the swamp, exactly what Erdogan does during the earthquake and before, it's the same right wing formula that everybody across the world unfortunately applies.

And the last thing is, look, as far as the Palestinians are concerned, I actually view this as a really hopeful moment because unfortunately, the Palestinian cause has not animated enough of a percentage of the Israeli citizens for to push forward a peace plan, right? But now reformed secular Jews inside Israel are beginning to see, wait, my interests are not at all aligned with the right wing fundamentalist zealots. They're not just coming for Palestinians, they're also coming for us. And so now that's been a phenomenon for a long time. But now it's crystal clear.

And now they're on the brink of realizing they're also going to lose a lot of rights. here. And so it might make for some, I might create a tiny bit of sliver of hope that perhaps the secular side can win and they'll lead in a different direction for Israel. It's not a, it's not a huge hope, but it is a little bit. And so that's a positive development here too. All right, we're going to take a quick break. When we come back, we'll talk about some of the corruption relating to building codes in Turkey and how that played a role in the insane death toll that just continues to climb following a massive earthquake. That and more coming up. toll in Turkey and what has exacerbated that death toll.

Structural engineers say steel reinforcement can deform to keep buildings from instantaneous collapse, but many of Turkey's structures appear to have been largely concrete, although Turkey has building codes very much in line with North American standards. But were those building codes enforced, and that's the real question being asked, As scores of structures have collapsed following the one of the strongest earthquakes in Turkey in recent years. Now here's an explanation of Turkey's building codes, how they came about, and then I'll explain how corruption pretty much mitigates the very codes that they discuss in this video. After the 1999 quake in northwest Turkey, which killed more than 17,000 people, investigations found many construction faults, including the use of corrosive beach sand in concrete. Turkey reacted by updating building regulations several times, most recently in 2018.

But look at this image of the Turkish town of Isla Hia, particularly this white building over here. Google Street View shows it was still being constructed in 2020. The weight of the floors suspended above a large empty shop space. Now that is a difficult design to survive an earthquake. And despite the regulations, recent satellite image appeared to show that it completely collapsed. The same is true for several recently constructed buildings on this street. Elsewhere, advertisements have circulated appearing to show buildings claiming to comply with regulations, buildings which collapsed.

It's these kind of examples that some suggest show codes weren't tightly enforced. And the reason why they're not tightly enforced is because there's something known as construction amnesties that provide loopholes for developers so they don't have to necessarily follow those codes. Older buildings that were built prior to the codes passing also do not have to abide by the the new codes and retrofit the buildings to withstand some of these stronger earthquakes. So some of these construction amnesties are effectively legal exceptions for the payment of a fee. So if the developers just, you know, pay a little fee, then they don't have to abide by the

building codes and the structures that fell as a result of the earthquake is what has contributed to this insanely high death toll. As of this morning, the number was around 33,000. it's going to continue to climb, of course, and the Turkish justice minister said Sunday that some 131 people were under investigation for their alleged responsibility in the construction of buildings that failed to withstand the quakes. But if the loophole is baked into the system, I mean, they're going to take advantage of the loophole. And it seems like that's what's happening here. Yeah, there's several different problems here. And guys, this isn't just about Turkey. This is about America and all across the world. There's a really,

reason why we have regulations, because they are rules meant to protect you. You could argue that all of our laws are regulations. Don't rob people, don't murder people, those are regulations. Hey, when you're building a building, make sure that it is earthquake proof, especially on a giant fault line, because that is the equivalent of getting those people killed if you don't. And that's exactly what happened here. So now there are the old buildings that need to be retrofitted. Oh boy, in Turkey, that is a hell of a process and a lot of them are not.

I'll give you the numbers in a second. And then there's the new buildings that were built since the 1999 devastating earthquake that killed 18,000 people in the western part of the country, right? And overall, in 2018, the calculation, 50% of the buildings in Turkey, that is 13 million buildings are not up to code. They will not survive earthquakes. That's half the buildings in the country. And there's two massive fault lines that Turkey's on top of and a third one arguably as well.

So when you do an exemption for a code, so that you don't have to have the building be able to survive an earthquake, it won't survive an earthquake. So I don't understand how anyone could justify an exemption for any building, period, especially in Turkey where there's fault lines everywhere, right? Absolutely unacceptable for one building, let alone the thousands of thousands of buildings they gave exemptions to. Why? Money, it's always about the money. And one more thing about that, the Turkish government has been collecting an earthquake tax since 1999,

I just for a situation just like this. And there's at a minimum $4.6 billion that has built up into that fund. A lot of Turks paid tons of taxes into that fund. Erdogan now says, I don't know where it is. Of course, of course. I don't know. Yeah, by the way, I'll tell you where it is. It's in his goddamn pocket.

Not all of it, but a lot of it, him and his stupid cronies and his family. And if you say that in Turkey, by the way, you'll be arrested. So that's the kind of tyrant that Erdogan is. In 94, when there was a pretty big earthquake in Northridge, California, they passed new building regulations related to what's referred to as Dingbat apartment buildings. And their apartment buildings where they have the carport, like right underneath the very first floor of the apartments, which isn't the most secure structure in an area where you're likely to get earthquakes. And so now all of those buildings have had to be retrofitted as a result of new regulations,

but there is no construction amnesty there. All landlords, mom and pop landlords, it doesn't matter. All of them had to shell out a ton of cash to retrofit their buildings, and that was the right thing to do. Those are the right regulations to ensure that people don't die when an earthquake happens and their housing collapse as a result of that quake. Now, as I mentioned, in regard to Turkey, the death toll from the 7.8 magnitude and 7.5 magnitude quakes that hit southeastern Turkey and northern Syria, nine hours apart on February

6th rose to 33,179 on Sunday and was certain to keep increasing as search teams locate more bodies in the rubble. I should note that some reports indicated that as many as 36,000 people have been reported dead. The other thing I want to mention is, it's fascinating because it appears the government here is trying to deflect and place all of their blame on the developers. For instance, 12 people have been arrested already. As I mentioned, 131 people total are already under investigation for alleged responsibility in the construction of the buildings. But again, I mean, if there's a loophole, the builders are going to take advantage of the

loophole and the fish rots from the head down. If the government has those loopholes in place, how are you going to pretend like you are not at fault in any way, shape, or form? That's insane. 100%. In fact, right before the earthquake, the Turkish parliament was considering more. building amnesties, code amnesties. Well, I mean, just like here in America, of course the politicians are super corrupt, right?

And so now they have arrested those people. Are some of them guilty? Yeah, it's entirely possible what they are, right? And did they cheat so they can make more money, not caring that 33,000 people will die because they wanted to have an extra boat and an extra car, right? Yeah, that might definitely be the case. Or, by the way, they could be scapegoats. And that's the problem with corruption.

Once you have a tyrant like Erdogan, you don't know what's true and what's not true. It could be that it's 12 guys he really doesn't like. It's 12 guys who are the most innocent. It's 12 guys who are part of other political factions he doesn't like. You know what this guy did? In the middle of the immediate aftermath of the earthquake, in the first 24 hours, when communication was the most important, he cut off Twitter. What people were organizing on Twitter and coordinating to rescue people.

Why didn't he cut off Twitter? Because one journalist criticized them. And he had that guy arrested. Okay. Turkey, if you're getting confused here, Turkey's supposed to be a democracy. But sometimes in a democracy, tyrants like Erdog come in, and they strangle and strangle the democracy until there's almost nothing left. It's exactly what Trump wanted to do when it had started to do. And it's what Netanyahu's doing in Israel.

We literally did a story about it today. The right wingers are same all across the world. I'm going to give you one piece of hope here in a second. But first, two more pieces of bad news. Of course, Erdogan comes in and says, oh, my opponents are politicizing the issue. Let's not politicize this. Whenever people commit political crimes,

they then immediately say, don't politicize, don't politicize. And by the way, they're the first guys to politicize things that aren't even political for their own benefit. So just a monster through and through. You know what else he said? He said, well, maybe it's fate. Oh, no, your job wasn't to protect them.

Your job was to take tons and tons, billions of dollars in bribes. While all those people died, that were your citizens that you were supposed to protect it afterwards? You go, maybe it was fate. Okay, these guys are monsters. Okay, and the second horrible news is if you think Turkey's in bad shape, nobody can even get to Syria. So for so long, the rose were closed. The Bashar al-Assad government is filled with monsters. And that fish rots from the head down too.

So nobody could even get to rescue the poor Syrians. At least there's aid in Turkey. All right, finally the good news. Yes, you're going to see some of those videos and they're wonderful. But remember, there are a tiny percentage of the folks being pulled out of the buildings. Six days later, an 88-year-old woman rescued a six-year-old rescue. children, a pregnant woman, families buried together. And this is one heartbreak, every story's heartbreaking.

But one guy survived all those days and they said, how about the others? Because he had been hearing them throughout. He said, I stopped hearing them three days ago. And so they were in there. They were in there for three days. They could have been rescued. But by the way, Adawan didn't want to use the military because he's not sure the military's on his side. What a piece of crap.

What a terrible, terrible human being. All right, but some of the rescues were done with joint Turkish and Italian forces, joint Turkish and German forces. And also the first time the Armenian-Turkish border has been opened in 35 years, and that was so that more aid could come in. So God bless both governments for making that happen. All right, the next story has nothing to do with international relations or international news. So why don't we take a break? And when we come back, I'll show you, I think, a perfect example of how the right wing pretends to hold corporations accountable while simultaneously ignoring the fact that they have captured our political system and made it far more corrupt and against the American people.

That and more coming right up. All right back on TOT with you guys, more news. All right, let's do it. A new report revealing how woke corporate America has become, the 1792 exchange studying the policies and practices of more than a thousand companies ranking the likelihood of the management taking action if employees have a different point of view. While corporate capture of America's political system and rampant corruption is routinely ignored by Fox News, here's an example of how they pretend to hold corporate interests accountable,

whining about pro-wokism. Let's watch. 50% of companies were rated low risk, meaning little chance of them prioritizing ideology, but 30% were found medium risk and even more alarming, 12% were rated high risk. They're literally reporting on a study that somehow measured the wokeness of various companies. And what's really in question here, what they're really talking about, because I think it's important to understand the context, is this whole investment category for retail investors known as the environmental, and governance investments.

So essentially for people who have somewhat of a conscience and they don't want to just invest in companies that are doing harm to the planet or have certain workplace standards that they don't agree with, there's like a category of companies that have some guidelines when it comes to their environmental impact, their social impact, and all of that. And so the environmental social and governments or ESG investing refers to a set of standards for a company's behavior used by socially conscious investors to screen potential investments. That's it. That's all it is. That's all it is to give people options when they want to invest in the stock market in their minds the most moral way they possibly can. Environmental criteria consider how a company safeguards the environment, including corporate policies addressing climate change.

For example, social criteria criteria examine how it manages relationships with employees, suppliers, customers, and the communities where it operates. Governance deals with the company's leadership, executive pay, audits, internal controls, and shareholder rights. Many mutual funds, brokerage firms, and robo advisors now offer investment products that employ ESG principles. But look, Fox News and the conservative right for some reason doesn't want retail investors to be equipped with this information.

about various companies because, you know, knowledge about which company you want to invest in is somehow too woke. And so that's what the right wing is using as their example, as their theater, right, to hold corporations accountable. It's not about the endless legalized bribery, the corporate capture that we see in Congress. It has nothing to do with that. It has nothing to do with terrible treatment of workers, the insane amount that they've invested in corporate stock buybacks instead of investing in their own companies. I mean, the list goes on and on. Foxness has no problem with that. Conservatives, no problem with that. They just have a problem with them being too woke, apparently. Okay, so let me explain why companies are woke and why the right

wing hates it. So there's two different reasons, two different kinds of companies. One is companies value diversity. Why do they value diversity? Number one, studies have shown. that it makes for a more profitable company. And right wing goes, I don't, I hate capitalism. I don't want, why are you trying to be profitable? That's because that's their purpose. And so they're like, well, we don't like it that diversity works. Well, that's a goddamn sad day for you.

But that's the smaller point. The larger point in that category is their customers are diverse. Coke, let's take them as an example, wants to sell Coca-Cola to black people, gay people, Muslim people, white people, Christian people, every kind of people. Because that's their job. Like, oh, why don't you hate black people like we do? Oh, are you supporting black lives matter? Why don't want them to have matter?

Well, go cry about it. I don't know, what do you want them to do? Not have less customers? Why do you hate capitalism this much? And that's because their hatred is overwhelming them. They just live in the darkness. And so if you don't hate the same people they hate, Oh, you woke, you woke.

Go back to sleep like we are. Okay, morons, whatever. So then the second kind of types of companies are like aspiration and they were sponsor of ours. And what do they do? They try to make companies net zero. So they do deals with other companies and try to get them to carbon neutrality. Now, wait a minute, that's saving the planet. And it's between two different companies.

And one of them helps them to get to protect their environment. And other companies says, I'm going to pay you money to protect the environment. Why do you care, Fox News? Why is that your business? That's a transaction between the two of them. They want to do good in the world. I'll tell you why they care. Because that hurts the oil companies.

Because if you become carbon neutral, you rely on less on oil. And they're like, oil companies must be helped at the expense of the planet. Because that's the greed of the right wing to support, ironically, giant corporations. But as long as they're doing evil in the world. So Rachel Compost Duffy, the host that you see on Fox News, spoke to Paul Fitchpatrick, who's with the 1792 Exchange. They're the ones who did this goofy study on so-called woke companies. And so he kind of breaks down their findings in this next clip.

Let's watch. ESG is a set of principles that are ill-defined, which is really the answer. environmental, social, and government principles that activists can use to fill and weaponize corporations. They can cancel customers, as we've heard, and you talked about, can deny service. They can choke off funding based on these principles, and they're raiding companies based on whatever the political position of the day is. Yeah, it's scary stuff. It feels like a Chinese social credit score of sorts. What are these people talking about?

What are they like literally like Fitzpatrick did a study on what? Because what he's saying literally makes no sense. ESG is just an umbrella of companies that I will admit vaguely make promises that seem good to Libs who are looking to invest their money. What happened to the invisible hand of the market, right? If you offer a good product or if, you know, customers, consumers like your product, They invest in it, they buy your product. What they're trying to do here is essentially do away with any information that could inform retail investors about whether or not a particular or potential investment goes along with their morality.

That's all this is about. That's literally all this is about. And let me just be clear about something, okay? The corporations, again, engage in like these vague promises that at the end of the day mean nothing. Okay, the only real goal these companies have all companies, all corporations, is to maximize. profit and to return on investment for their shareholders. That's it. That is their goal. That is their fiduciary responsibility. That is it. And look, I think, Jenk, you're reading into it too much. The right wing notices smartly, by the way, that there is a rise in economic populism among the electorate. They don't want to be left out of the conversation.

They want to posture as if, oh, no, we hate corporations too. Just like Dennis Prager said when I was debating him on this show. Oh, I hate corporations. They're too woke. That's the angle that they're coming at. No, no, no, it ain't because they're too woke. It's because they underpay their workers. It's because they don't invest money into their companies and do corporate stock buybacks instead, essentially turning the stock market into a massive house of cards because it's not in any way tied to productivity or revenue. It's just dependent on how much money executives are funneling into their shares.

I mean, like the list goes on and on and on. They have no problem with that. That's been going on forever. Corporate capture of Congress. They have no problem with the legalized bribery. They just want to pretend like they too have issues with corporate America, but they don't want to touch the profit motives. Yeah. That's all it is.

100%. I think it's both of what we're saying. But we're going to get you the real problems with corporations in a second and what Fox News will never, ever share with you. Because as Anna points out, it's actually their beloved corporations that they're trying to protect. This is all a smokescreen. But first, I want to talk about the moron that Rachel Campos stuff he is, okay? She said, this sounds really scary. Some companies are trying to help the planet and other human beings.

That sounds scary. Why are they helping? I don't like to help. Sounds Chinese. You idiot, it's capitalism. If you're implying that it's communist, as in the Chinese Communist Party is the right we always say, it's literally the exact opposite. it. But you don't need a single brain cell to work at Fox News. So now let's show you what the

real problem is. So actually, before we do that, Fitzpatrick does have advice for anyone who's just as worked up as he and Rachel Campos Duffy are about these ESG companies. He says that, you know, you should demand to speak to the manager. Let's watch. The problem is we need to change our behavior. We recommend that folks go under our database, 1792 Exchange.com, find the companies that they patronize, print off the report, walk into the office, the local branch, and if it's a high risk company, asked politely to calmly speak with the manager and say, why are you doing this? Are you going to cancel me? And if you're a business or a nonprofit, ask to have the terms of your agreement changed. If it's a low risk company, go into that office, thank them, encourage

your friends to shop there. terms of what agreement? Like, what is this guy talking about? No, these guys are all maniacs. Insane, insane. But, you know, go to their website and then go ask to speak to some managers. I'm sure it'll work out real well for you. And they're training, in a best case scenario, they're training a generation of Karen's, right?

He'd like to speak to the manager. And in a worst case scenario, they're weaponizing all these people to go attack these companies. Now, he said to not, to do it politely, to be fair. It's like the first time I've ever seen a right winger say, be do it politely. So, but I will say this is very important. When he says, ask them, are you going to cancel me? What does that even mean? What lunatic raving thing are you saying?

I don't know what you're saying. Speak English. Are you going to cancel me for what? Which company is going to cancel you and not make money from you, you morons? Okay. But you see that, but their audience doesn't know. taking advantage of these poor folks. So they're going to go print out things and they're going to go into like Kentucky fried chicken

and be like, are you going to cancel me? And people are going to be like, what the hell are you talking about? I just hope someone films it as it's happening. Oh, it's just going to happen all over the country. It's going to be amused. It's not going to happen all over the country because they don't even explain what they're really talking about here. They're just like making this vague critique of companies being woke, but they don't explain

what, you know, again, what this whole umbrella. of socially conscious companies are about why they're doing what they're doing and how this is again really just about retail investors looking for a way to morally invest their money. It's just so incredibly stupid. Now let's talk about the real issue with corporations and the system of legalized bribery we have in this country which makes their voices much more important than ours. Okay. So let's go to give me one second. Okay, so let's talk about. corruption as it pertains to the fossil fuel industry, since they love talking about the environment and all of that and how it's BS. It's too woke to be concerned about that. The Environmental and Energy Study Institute reported that direct subsidies to fossil fuel to the fossil fuel industry totaled $20 billion per year with 80% going toward oil and gas.

In addition, from 2019 to 2023, tax subsidies are expected to reduce federal revenue by around $11.5 billion. I start with that data point. Because how exactly did the fossil fuel industry get such preferential treatment here in the United States? Could it have something to do with? I don't know, the insane amount of lobbying they engage in. The top oil and gas companies spent more than 12.4 million on lobbying in just the first quarter of 2022. In just three months of 2022, about one million more than they spent by this time last year, that time a year prior, as Russia's invasion of Ukraine upends the global energy market. Let's take a look at this fun graph that shows you the top players when it comes to lobbying

in oil and gas. Of course, Coke Industries, $3.3 million in the first quarter of 2022 alone. You have Occidental Petroleum, $2.8 million in the first quarter of 2022 alone. But, you know, maybe I'm too focused on one point in time, Jank. It's only three months. Maybe it was just like a big spike in those three months and then everything leveled off, except it didn't. Total lobbying in 2022 by the fossil fuel companies totaled. Get a load of this, 122,873, I'm sorry, 122 million, 873,864. Think about that. Over nearly $123,123 million in oil and gas lobbying in just one year alone. Yeah, guys, so they spent $123 million.

There's a lot to invest if you're a company, right? But what do they get back? We just showed you. Just take the oil and gas companies. So 80% of $20 billion is $16 billion. $130, $23 million, and then you get $16 billion back. I did the math on that. That's an awesome investment.

If you had a product where you spend only $123 million and you get $16 billion back, that'd be the world's greatest product. And that's exactly what corruption is in America. It's the world's greatest product for these companies. And so they buy off all these politicians. Yes, definitely Democrats as well as Republicans. Oh, I mean, I could show you a perfect graph. Let's go to graphic nine here because the top recipient of fossil fuel money in 2022 was a Democrat,

Senator Joe Manchin. Of course. To the tune of $763,559 that we know of because I'm sure there was some dark. Oh, there's tons of dark money. That's the tip of the iceberg. And of course, number two was the leader of the Republicans in the House, Kevin McCarthy, right? So this is by the way, what does the press call them? Bipartisan, moderates, moderate Joe Mansion.

Okay, hey, I don't want progressives or anyone on the left calling Fox News. If you're a right winger, though, why don't you call foxers? They like having people call people, right? Or go to their office, by the way, do not do anything physical, okay? But ask them, if you're right wingers, ask them, hey, how come you guys never cover corruption? Like the number one issue back in 2016 was drained the swamp, but you guys never ever talk about the obvious bribes that all these politicians take. I mean, every once in all you make an oblique reference to George Soros. But there's all charts and charts of companies giving hundreds of millions of dollars to corrupt politicians, including Democrats.

Why don't you, I mean, for, okay, let's say you're foxes, you're biased, you want to hide the fact that Republicans are the most corrupt people on earth, the Republican politicians. You just want to hit the Democrats. Why don't you hit Democrats on corruption? Isn't that super weird? Please do it. Yeah. Yeah, I have no problem with that. If you're a right winger, I'm asking you, why doesn't Fox News hit the Democrats on corruption?

These are obvious bribes. Oh, right, because the whole point is to distract you and cover up the corruption. Because they're actually a giant, multi-billion dollar corporation like the rest of them. Well, we have more on corruption in a different story, this time with the cloak of diversity to kind of distract Americans from what's really going on. 11 sitting members of Congress attempted, or I should say attended a gala called the diversity across the aisle gala. Now that sounds great, except for the fact that the event wasn't really about diversity. It was more about lobbying. In fact, diversity across the aisle

was hosted by a lobbying group known as Farrox Strategy, which often uses identity politics to essentially serve as like a smokescreen to hide its true purpose, which is funneling money, to corporations. Now, Farrak Strategies claims to support diversity, but let's show you who they really represent because this graphic will show you who their clients are. It's from their website and notice there are pharmaceutical companies like Viatris and Eli Lilly represented there. You also have the Gap, Walt Disney Company.

And so those are their clients. Those are the people they serve. So why are we pretending like this meeting was about diversity? when in reality, it was about lobbying on behalf of their clients. Now, in terms of who went to this event, you have a long list of Republican, I'm sorry, Democratic lawmakers, including Representative Nanette Diaz Barrigan. You also have Representative Tony Cardenas, Representative Joaquin Castro, Yvette Clark, Robert Garcia, Jimmy Gomez, Robert Menendez.

The list goes on. Now, congressional staffers also attended the event in one paragraph from the east. event, Irene Bueno, a lobbyist for Pfizer and Comcast, huddles with staffers to House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Representative Doris Matsui, a Democrat from California and Senator Brian Schatz, Democrat from Hawaii. In another picture, Tiffany Williams, a vice president for the Dashel group named after former Republican Senator Tom Dashel, along with Lisa Fang of Alexion Pharmaceuticals, both grin alongside a large group of other congressional staff members to senior Democratic lawmakers. And again, the Daschel group is in fact a lobbying group

led by former Senate Majority Leader Tom Dashel. Jank. All right. So this is classic democratic corruption where they go, no, no, it's okay. It's minorities doing it. So this is good. This is positive. Now, you know, the right way he uses woke as a negative thing. Like, oh, can you believe people care about diversity and humans being equal? to one another, right? But the left, not the left wing, but the left isn't the Democrats, use like woke politics as a cover story to not be woke at all. 100%. Okay, to actually 100% do corruption while pretending that they care about minorities. A hundred percent. This happens all the time. In addition to that, the other thing they do

is weaponize identity, right? Elizabeth Warren did it during the Democratic primaries when she was running against Bernie Sanders and she pretended like Bernie Sanders had said something stupid and sexist to her about how a woman could never win president when he was the one who's encouraging her to run for president in the first place. I see it happen with Democrats all the time. I see it happen in a workplace context where they weaponize identity in order to basically move up the economic ladder or get promotions within the given company. I see it all over the place and it's pretty freaking self-serving and disgusting. Okay, so to give you a sense of how bad this is.

So they're going to do a swearing-in ceremony for nine members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus at a nightclub. All right, already, this is super weird, right? And they've invited a bunch of diverse legislators to it. And what did Biden call him, the HHS Secretary Javier? Baccaria. Bakaria was there to do the swearing-in. So he's about to do the swearing-in, and he gets interrupted by a lobbyist because the lobbyist

paid for the party, right? They're at a lobbyist party to get sworn into Congress. I mean, that is so fitting, okay? And the lobbyist goes, oh, oh, hey, hey, cabinet secretary, shut off for a second. It's time to do plugs, okay? They just pay the bills. So Marco Davis, the president of

CHCI, who only represents J.P. Morgan, Chase, MasterCard, Exile Mobile, Apple, Airbnb, DaVita, Toyota, Reynolds, a Becker, Microsoft, New York Life Insurance, among other interests, steps in and says, to be very honest with you, General Motors and I are personally extremely committed to diversity in the public policy

profession. Okay. Now, are they going to ask you to vote with General Motors and give them subsidies and all sorts of other goodies? Of course. Do they give a damn whether you're Hispanic or black or white or anything else? They don't care at all. Okay?

And all these guys get paid by them. And then by the way, when you criticize the lobbyists, they just pick a ran. ethnic group. They're like, oh, in this story, oh, Hispanics are so offended. But really, did you poll them? I bet you if you pulled them, they'd be way more offended at what you're doing than us pointing it out. No, but Jake, we- No, no, no, I found an elite Hispanic. And they represent all Hispanics. And they have taken tons of money from General Motors and all those companies that I've told you about. And they are here to say, you are racist,

okay? Are you actually? No, it doesn't matter. You're pointing at corruption. So we're going to bury you. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know about you guys. but corruption just feels better when it's being done by a diverse group of people. Oh, yeah. Right? When is someone from my ethnic group, then I don't mind it at all. I mean, that's absurd. No actual human being thinks that.

But in Washington, they repeat it as if it's just the most obvious thing in the world. And so they use, look, guys, it's ironically a Fox News tactic. You know how Fox News will bring on someone black to criticize black people? And all right-wing media does it. Here's Candace Owens to tell you how awful black culture is, right? And so in this case, they bring in corrupt Democrats from the different variety of cultures, and they come and tell you how great corruption is. No, it's okay.

Black people are in favor of corruption. Latinos are in favor of corruption? Are they? Are they? I think you're making that up. You just got a couple of figureheads to just charge everyone who actually talks about corruption with racism and pretend that you're on the people's side. And by the way, I don't give a damn what anybody in Washington says.

Go ahead, say blah, blah, blah, whatever the hell you want. All of you are corrupt. Okay, finally, you know, for obvious reasons, since the story focused on a specific event where Democrats were in attendance, I don't want you to think that this is a partisan issue because the same company, Farrox strategies, has done similar events with Republicans, and they have lobbied for awful. I would say awful policies that people concerned with diversity would not be in favor of. In 2019, for instance, the Intercept reported on hacked emails from a surveillance company called Perceptics. The email showed how Farahk strategy had worked with tough on immigration Republican lawmakers to insert provisions into legislation that would have enabled its client to win contracts for reading the license plates of vehicles crossing the U.S.-Mexico border.

I just I feel the love and diversity already isn't it so great oh yeah okay I've got two last ones for you let's stick with ferricks for a second they had a message that said ferricks clients Walmart alexiana and waste management joined a who's who of corporate sponsors to generously celebrate the most diverse Congress ever how look at how generous they are are they generous to Latinos and everybody no no no they're just generous to the politicians who represent them while taking tons of cash from these guys to do the exact opposite. And finally, remember the guy who interrupted the, the HHS secretary, health and human service secretary, and the swearing in. So that was Vargas. Nobbing disclosure showed

that Vargas has focused on influencing Congress on tax credits, emission standards, and recycling issues, among other policies important to GM's bottom line. The company did not disclose any lobbying on issues related to diversity. Oh, wow, what a surprise. Turns out diversity was a cover story for doing more corruption. And this party was not a swearing-in ceremony. It was a place where they handed out bribes. And by the way, of course, presiding over all of this was Hakeem Jeffries,

who were all supposed to respect and bow down to. And so that's what the mainstream media will tell you. I'm going to tell you the truth. They're all crooks. All right. When we come back for the second hour of the show, we'll talk about how Trump paid quite a bit of money to look into voter fraud in 2020. He didn't like the results and he suppressed them.

You don't want to miss that story. We've got that and more coming up in the second hour of the show. Can't let that happen. Thanks for listening to the full episode of the Young Turks. Support our work, listen ad-free, access members-only bonus content, and more by subscribing to Apple Podcasts at apple.com at t-y-t. I'm your host, Shank Huger, and I'll see you soon.