Will Cain Country - Trevor Bauer: Guilty Until Proven Innocent With Matt Taibbi

Episode Date: October 6, 2023

Story #1: You respond to our mind-blowing conversation with Jeffrey Tucker. Story #2: An enlightening conversation with Independent Journalist and Author Matt Taibbi Story #3: FOX Sports Betting Analyst Chris Fallica's best weekend bets.   Tell Will what you thought about this podcast by emailing [e-mail]   Follow Will on Twitter: @WillCain Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

One, your emails on our mind-blowing conversation with Jeffrey Tucker. Two, a fascinating, interesting, enlightening, challenging, fun conversation with Matt Taibi of Rackett. dot news. Three, bears bet on the biggest games of the weekend, including the Dallas Cowboys versus the San Francisco 49ers and Texas OU. It's the Will Cain podcast on

Fox News podcast. What's up? And welcome to the weekend. Welcome to Friday. As always, I hope you will download, rate, and review this podcast wherever you get your audio entertainment at Apple, Spotify, or at Fox News podcast. You can watch the Will Cain podcast

on YouTube and follow me on X at Will Kane. The Texas Rangers have advanced from the American League wildcard series over the Tampa Bay Devil Rays to now take on the number one-seeded Baltimore Orioles and the American League Division Series. It's the first playoff win for the Texas Rangers since 2016. It's been all too long, and it's sitting there on the mantle. Underneath the fire, that is, the 2010 and 2011 World Series.

We're against the St. Louis Cardinals, the Rangers were one strike away from winning the World Series. Not once, but twice, twice in that ill-fated Game 6 game, just one strike away from winning the World Series. It all feels like gravy. It feels like icing. It feels like arriving to a party early and being offered the first drink. The Rangers time is next year. It's for the next five years. It's when there's a healthy Jacob de Grom, a healthy Max Scherzer.

It's when Evan Carter and Josh Young are no longer rookies. It's when Wyatt Langford arrives in the majors. It's not supposed to be right now, but I've told you before, some of the best sports seasons that you ever will experience are the ones where you are significantly outperforming the bar of expectations. when it all feels like icing, when it all feels like gravy, that's when it feels the best. Next year, it will be baked in with expectations. Oh, we have to win 90 games.

We have to at least get to the ALCS. Next year, it feels like the official window has opened. But this year, it feels like we've arrived at the party before not just the window, but the doors have been opened. And it's all so fun. This weekend might be the most fun weekend for any first. fan in Dallas Fort Worth. We have Texas OU at 12 Eastern 11 Central. We have the Rangers versus the Orioles at 12 Eastern 11 Central. And then we have the Dallas Cowboys taking on the San Francisco 49ers on Sunday night football. That's not to mention the Texas A&M Aggies taking on

the Alabama Crimson Tide. Buckle up, boys and girls. This right here is a fun weekend of sports in the Lone Star State. I was really excited to book the guest on our podcast today, Matt Taibi. You know, I have always had this angel and devil sitting on my shoulder when it comes to this job, when it comes to broadcasting. You know, the angel on my shoulder always says to be big, to be virtuous, to do the right thing. Never to punch down and really don't even to punch petty. There's no point in the personal animosities. There's no point in little fights.

The devil on my shoulder is actually attached, I think, as well to a virtue. And that is to be authentic, to be real, and to be unfiltered. When I had my radio show on ESPN radio, I often vented about people and about ideas because I wanted to be authentic with you. And I still think about this and think, what are these little insults, what are these little fights, what are these little moments worth? And the truth is, they're worth very little. It's usually about my ego or the other side's ego, and that's certainly not worthwhile. And so in the last 24 hours, I've had this angel and this devil sitting on my shoulder a week ago when I kind of twisted off on someone on Twitter here on the Will.

Kane show and evented about whether or not I've changed and I'm a different person than I used to be, the reasonable version of me supposedly that existed on ESPN radio. I felt passion. I felt authentic. A friend of mine whom I highly respect texted me and said, hey, you know, for what it's worth, what often feels like passion can for the listener feel indulgent and a turnoff, this guy who's in the business of persuasion said that when he's making an argument, this is often when he loses, in his case, the jury. I really appreciate the no, and I'm always trying to be

better. And as I begin to talk to you about the angel, the devil on my shoulder in this next moment, I'm not even sure whether or not I'm doing it right or, quote, unquote, doing the right thing. I've been a little bit busy over the past couple of months, apparently being a bad guy. I'm a bad guy. And all my travels back and forth with our work in Maui. It didn't hit my radar until this week that some of the pettiest people in media, not just the ghetto of sports media, but some of the smallest people in media, the lebitard show, had decided to once again wait into the waters of maligning people who disagree with them. In that way, I'm simply a proxy. I'm simply, oh, I don't know, a stand-in for half of America.

In discussing the relationship between Stephen A. Smith and Max Kellerman, my name came up as though it was Voldemort. They laughed in that way that they do, a totally joyless laugh, about having to speak my name into existence. Ha, I made you say Will Cain. The joke was that I should have been Max's replacement. That's what Stephen A was looking for on first take. And in trying to recall my name, they turned to one of the smallest members of the crew and said, who was the guy?

You know, the one that you said wasn't a bad guy when you actually got to know him. And they said, oh, Will Kane. And then everyone laughed. You know, the reason that I am probably wading into these very shallow and petty waters, which I know inside at some level is a big mistake, is because I also think at some point, the people. People need to know the truth. Here's the truth about that lebitrard crew for just one moment. They are some of the most spineless and joyless people in all of media. Again, not relegated to the ghetto of sports media and all of media.

They're the kind of mistake or would actually have you believe that a sneer is a smile. They always embodied the mean girls table at ESPN. And their spinelessness is best represented by the fact that once they rebelled against the big machine and went out on their own, they used that newfound freedom and bravery to create for themselves a cocoon of insulation from any potential disagreement should they ever encounter it in their life. Their fragile little ears sitting on top of a jello of a spine couldn't envision ever hearing someone who sees the world through a slightly different lens. They think of themselves as empathetic and diverse, and they're monolithically tyrannical

about what they hear or see. They cannot encounter anyone that disagrees, lest they be Voldemort. Some of these incredibly, incredibly weak individuals I have invited into my home. You want to talk about true regret? That's regret. Inviting weasels into your home

is a mistake that you have to look back upon. And even as I say that, I think, Will, stop. You are lowering yourself to the, the same level. Stop, man. And it's probably the right call. Stop. Don't twist off. And there's a reason. I'm not just venting. And it has something to do with the conversation our podcast today. In the end, it has something to do with Matt Taibi. But when it comes to this type of mindset, I do think the blinders need to be removed. I do think you need to begin to understand the audience. I think you do need to be able to be able to.

understand the person on the stage. I do think you need to be able to understand the song that is being sung. These are people of words, not deeds, who think that their virtue is defined by mockery, who think that their sanctimonious attitudes are justified by never having to entertain the idea that they could possibly, with any semblance of humility, be wrong. And they walk around the world with that sneer, with that joyless laugh, and think they are the good guys. I'll just ask this. And you have the platform of social media should this ever cross your attention. Point out how I'm a bad guy. I would love to know. Not just simply somebody that disagrees with you, you know, although I think ultimately that is probably your biggest piece of evidence, that anyone

who disagrees with you and therefore 50% of America are bad guys. I would like to know, by the way, an accusation that I have never made of those that disagree with me. That because you disagree with me, you are a bad guy. But I would like to know if you can muster anything than a divergent political opinion as marshaled evidence that I or anyone represent on the other side of a quote-unquote political spectrum that does not exist anymore, you Neanderthal, left and right is long gone, as you'll hear today in this conversation. But marshal any slightest bit of evidence that we are bad.

guys. I know. I know. And I will hear it from my wife. That was a mistake. You should not have indulged. You should not have lowered. You should not have paid attention. You should not have cared. And I know that that will be right. And I will know that also today with you, I've been authentic. Now, there's a reason as well that I bring up that pettiness. At one time when I was in sports media. Matt Taiibi, who disagreed with me, I think it's fair to say, on most issues of the moment, I think went to social media and called me an idiot. I remembered it. And I'm going to tell you why I remembered it. I remembered it not because of a fragile ego or pettiness, but I remembered it in that moment and I only remember a few insults because I respected Matt Taibi. I knew he

was smart. I knew he disagreed. But I knew he, I thought he was someone who intelligently sought out the heart of the issue. Over time, that Neanderthal political spectrum of left and right has fallen apart. We talked about it in the last episode of our podcast with Jeffrey Tucker. It simply doesn't fit the modern reality. Over time, I don't think Matt would describe himself as changed. In some ways, I would readily admit myself as changed. But over time, I think that we both became people more interested in each other, maybe as individuals, but certainly in people with a point of view. For what it's worth, at the end of this conversation with Taibi, he reached out to me personally and apologized like an honorable man would

do for whatever may have happened in the past. I told him, Matt, you don't need to, man. You don't need to apologize. It's water under the bridge. It only resonated because I respect you. And I will look forward in the future to exploring our now and perhaps our past agreements and disagreements. And here's why I guess in a way I indulged the authenticity of the Lebertard crew. I can't and should not twist off in the full way that I feel. Because you've got to be bigger. There's so much better down the road. You know what I mean? This new relationship, which I'm happy to explore, with Matt Taibi could easily have been written off with the authenticity of the moment for me indulging any fragility of my ego. But here we are today with an absolutely, I think,

and I hope you will agree, fascinating conversation with Matt Taibi. But first, story number one, your emails on our conversation, our mind-blowing conversation, with Jeffrey Tucker of the Brownstone Institute. This email comes in from Mark Shanbach. Mark writes in Will, chilling and enlightening interview and discussion today. First time I've shared one of your podcast episodes. Raise in three, sorry, not sorry, Mark. P.S., show your sons that nicotine addiction is not your boss. Hashtag, quit for them.

Thank you for that, Mark. I told you I intend to quit. Just not today. In retrospect, your advice must be caveated with the fact that it was not. Rais in three, it was Rangers in two. Marjorie Brackett. emails in, fascinated by this discussion and alarmed also. A regular listener and enjoy you on TV. Ronald O'Leary writes in a long message. He said, Demi Mr. Caine, my apologies in advance

for the linked email, but I would like to comment on something in your recent podcast that involves the shortcomings of the recent conservative movement. I'm a blind person and my political positions would put me in today's conservative camp. One thing conservatives point out is that the left's were on cars as evidenced by the left's favoring urban planning and public transportation. I'm sure the left is waging such a war to take away our autonomy and subject us to greater government surveillance. I'm a civil libertarian, so I do not minimize the hazards of a less car-dependent society. Of course, Ronald is talking about some of what we discussed with Jeffrey Tucker, the goals and aims and ambitions of the World Economic Forum of Klaus Schwab. Ronald goes on, if we rely more on public transportation, the government can more easily spy on our conversations and deny a services if a social credit regime is adopted.

the surveillance concerns would also exist in a walkable city. However, I hope conservatives can understand how I would benefit from a tightly packed urban landscape. I obviously cannot drive. Again, Ronald tells us that he is blind. So my transportation options are quite limited. My loved ones cannot always drive me because of their own schedules, and taxi services are incredibly expensive and unreliable. Perhaps self-driving cars will soon become affordable,

but in the meantime, imagine how alluring a city is that either is more walkable or has a regular transportation, despite glaring political risks. I hope this is not just grievance politics, but I am certainly open to that criticism. I do not say conservatives should check their cited privilege and accept a car-free society in the name of equity. But I hope they can at least integrate concerns like mine into the conversation. Again, I apologize for the long email, but I wanted to send it in light of your recent podcast about the conservative movement's shortcomings. I greatly appreciate the work you do and look forward to your views as the election and impeachment inquiry heat up. Thank you. Appreciate the perspective, Ronald. It's always interesting to hear how the world impacts people of different ability who literally see the world through a different, not just lens, but means.

What I would say, Ronald, is I had this conversation at lunch today with a friend. We were talking about capitalism and its production of wealth. We were talking about the stagnation of GDP in Japan, which was on a rate to exceed the United States in the 1990s. It's now been half. Japan's per capita GDP is half of an American. We were talking about, and I was asking him, of course, this is because of the monetization of their debt, money printing, and I was asking if any of their health outcomes have been impacted by having their GDP. And my friend said, no, they haven't. And I said, there is an interesting question about whether or not just increasing wealth

and consumption, which is what is measured by GDP, is the path to a better life, is the path the happiness. And of course, once you start indulging that question, what you have to realize is you're now in a philosophical debate, right? You're talking about how to maximize outcomes. And this takes us to our conversation with Jeffrey Tucker. I think the devil in the details on this is whether or not you believe your life's optimization should be society's life optimization. I don't think it's the best life to get rich, fat, and die of gout. I don't think is to die like Scrooge McDuck on a pile of money. I think it's to be in touch with God and be a part of your community to help as many others around you that is possible. And yes, perhaps along

the way, increase your standard of living, afford a few luxuries, create a better life for your children, and set them up with opportunities. Not all of that is measured in GDP. But those are individual decisions that I believe that I should be free to make. And if your vision of a better life doesn't include some of the description that I just gave, then you should be free to choose that vision of a better life. So for you, Ronald, and the fact that you're blind, some of these cities may very well be the best individual choice for you to pursue a better life. But it shouldn't then in turn the Klaus Schwabs of the world, and I don't think you are arguing for that, Ronald, but it shouldn't then in turn empower the Klaus Schwab's of the world to impose that better life

on all of society. This comes from Andrew Wood. Hey, Will, my name is Andrew, and I'm a 36-year-old from the New York City metro area. Just wanted to drop you a note and let you know I'm a die-hard listener to your Will Kane podcast for over a year now. I appreciate you, are happy to receive and read emails from fans, and I'm confident that a lot of emails put a smile on your face. I was introduced to you watching Fox and Friends weekend after I took a sabbatical from any and all news during COVID. My reintroduction to watching news led me to watch your guys' weekend show,

and I love the production and insightful stories, along with some fun, and has really helped me solidify my views and beliefs. Most importantly, staying informed on just how wrong the direction is that our country is going. This drew me to give your podcast a try, and I've made it a point to listen to every new episode the morning it's released as I commute to work. By the way, thanks a lot, Andrew. Seriously, sincerely. I appreciate you, Andrew.

Sometimes when I hear things on the news, I wonder if I'm alone and what my response or reaction might be, but you've changed that for me, and I've found myself using your arguments and rebuttals and discussions I occasionally have with my peers. The main reason I'm reaching out to you is because I've found your point of view on things to be almost identical to mine. Our inner monologues, thoughts on a variety of political and social topics, even our sense of humor. I find to be eerily similar at this point, and sometimes I can even finish your thought before you eventually vocalize it. Jeez. I'll try to be more unpredictable.

Andrew goes on, almost thought of you as my long-lost older brother at certain points. However, what really sealed the deal for me today was your pontification on Zen. This is my guy. I was laughing uncontrolled. We want to ride down to work this morning hearing your take on how it got you an advice and you'll eventually quit, but not right now. We're really cut from the same cloth. I've been a Zen user for a couple years now,

finding myself making excuses to pop some pouches in, although I know it's probably not great for the long-term health for me to continue. I will quit soon, but just not right now. Anyway, I won't blather on any longer. Just know you have a listener out there who is probably on the exact same wavelength as you for your wide range of topics, but I can't get behind your Dallas Cowboys. So at least we differ there. Keep doing what you're doing and look forward to hearing you on Wednesday morning.

Thank you, man. I appreciate that. What I truly appreciate you about this listenership and this audience is one last note. Some of our Jeffrey Tucker interview went up on social media. Introduced me to a wider audience, people who don't listen to, this show, nor perhaps even know me. Many of them thought in the clip where I was sort of questioning Jeffrey Tucker about the goals and intentions of the World Economic Forum and Klaus Schwab that I was somehow

skeptical of the conclusions of Jeffrey Tucker, which he knew was not true. I, of course, share many of the assumptions and conclusions about the dystopic views of the World Economic Forum. But I asked him to steal man the Great Reset. So some pointed out we've never heard that term. And in case you haven't, here's what Steelman means. A Strawman is a rhetorical and logical trick, right? You set up a weak enemy and you go about knocking it down.

It's easy. It's a false argument because you caricature or weaken your opponent's argument and then set yourself up for some Don Quixote-style win. That's not a good analogy. A better analogy is some, you know, WWE scripted style win. I intend to be stronger, more curious, a better critical thinker. And so what I asked Jeffrey Tucker to do instead of straw man it, meaning give me the weakest version of their argument, is to steal man it. Give me the best possible argument in support of the Great Reset.

Any critical thinker can be able to do that, be charitable, give them the benefit of the doubt, and then and then still defeat the idea. I think that makes you stronger, more interesting, and a better critical thinker. that's the idea of the steel man i appreciate your emails keep them coming in i do read them and perhaps i'll read them right here on the show it is will cane podcast at fox dot com we'll be right back with more of the will cane podcast hey i'm trey gowdy host of the trade gowdy podcast i hope you will join me every tuesday and thursday as we navigate life together and hopefully find ourselves a little bit better on the other side listen and follow now at foxnewspodcast dot com from the fox news Podcasts Network.

Hey there, it's me. Kennedy, make sure to check out my podcast. Kennedy saves the world. It is five days a week, every week. Download and listen at Fox Newspodcast.com or wherever you listen to your favorite podcast. Story number two. Matt Taibi is the publisher of racket. Dot News.

He is an absolutely independent, critical thinking, investigative journalist. And he is animated by preserving civil liberties and civil liberties. specifically fighting for free speech. I was happy, excited to reunite with Matt Taibi and explore our disagreements and our agreements. Here is Matt Taibi. Matt Taibi, I really honestly can't believe that I'm sitting here with you. And I don't know, but you probably cannot either that you'd end up one day sitting here

talking to Will Kane. Of course. It's true. I probably watched your show like much more. more often than you've ever read me, I would say. I'm a huge sports fan among other things. Wait a minute. So would that mean you're talking about first take,

the Will Kane show on ESPN Radio, or Fox & Friends? First take, mostly. But definitely a little bit of the radio as well. And last week we had you on Fox and Friends, which is another super weird worlds collide. It is. That's part of what I want to talk to you about today, because I think I find your thought process,

and I find who you are and sort of the changes that not only you have experienced, but me as well, endlessly fascinating. And it's not true because I do read your substack a ton. And unfortunately, I read you before as well at Rolling Stone and on Twitter. So it'll be some of the fun things to revisit. But yeah, man, I'm actually a big fan. And I only say actually because I don't know that I would have always said that to be the case. but there's something that's happened to all of us.

I don't know. Not just you. As I said, me as well. And probably many people listening are something that's happened to us in the past three to five years. And you've become, I think, a real good emblem of what's happened. And what do you think it is, Matt? Like, mostly what you write about is censorship and free speech. Is that sort of the main or even the exclusive prism through which you see the changes in the world?

No, I mean, I think there have been dramatic changes. I first noticed them just in the media business, frankly. For me, a lot of the changes that I first noticed were around the coverage of the Russia story and just the way that veteran reporters who I had known for a long time were taking a different approach to covering that than they had. For instance, during the Iraq period where there was so much condemnation of reporters who swallowed anonymous sources. sources, you know, who hadn't been able to prove their stories, you know, there was so much recrimination for people like Judy Miller. And suddenly that was completely different in 2016. And it was kind of a mystery for a bunch of us. We didn't really understand what was going on. I think there was a kind of a political sea change in the business after Donald Trump got elected. And some of us went along with it and others were disillusioned and had to kind of drop out. And I'm one of the ones who had to drop out. How would you describe yourself today, by the way? I wouldn't even know, hey, is Matt Taeebee on the left?

Is Matt Taeeby now on the right? What, like, I don't even know if we're just talking about your political prism, but just like, how would you describe your worldview? I think it's relatively the same as it's always been. First of all, I'm not terribly political. I'm, you know, as a reporter, I'm always much more interested in how things work. And, you know, whether something's a good story or not. I've never been much of an activist-type writer.

Well, maybe on occasion, but not that much. But I was always very strongly supportive of civil liberties. That was one of the big reasons I was very much against a lot of what was going on during the war and terror period. I was made very nervous by a lot of the changes beginning with the Patriot Act. And I don't think my opinions on that have changed. It's just that the way people think about those issues has changed pretty dramatically. Obviously, my audience has changed a good deal. I have more sympathy now for Republicans and than I probably did before and understand what

their thinking is in ways that I didn't before. And I got to own that for sure. Yeah, but, you know, I think the traditional dichotomy or spectrum of left and right on this sort of flatline prism doesn't work anymore. And actually, I don't know that it ever worked, but I certainly at one point in my life saw things much flatter. I saw this polar spectrum. And, you know, I'm, in retrospect, man, I think I need to grow and learn from where I was wrong. And I think back to one of the first times that I met which I really think that's the only time that we met outside of being on Fox and Friends recently in any interaction on social media was we're on CNN discussing Occupy Wall Street. And you,

You were pretty active at that time in reporting, of course, on Goldman Sachs and Occupy Wall Street. And I remember, you know, I probably was too doctrinaire. I've had conversations about this recently. I was probably too doctrinaire, libertarian or conservative in believing in the, not perfection of capitalism, but the idea that it produces the best possible outcomes in a society. And you were there reporting on, you know, people who had, I think in retrospect, very legitimate complaints about what. what wasn't capitalism, but corporatism. And that's where we are. And I think that's manifested, you know, what we're 13 years later.

And even through the prism of censorship, we're not really talking about necessarily just state action. We're talking about corporate marriage to state in a kind of weird techno-corporatism. Yeah. I mean, if you go back to that Occupy episode, one of the things that's commonly a source of frustration for me is when I first started doing that reporting, all of my sources were Wall Street people. They were all arch-capitalist hedge fund, you know, people. They were very wealthy, most of them. And what they were mad about wasn't that things were too capitalists. They were mad about the perversion of capitalism.

They were mad that some actors were getting bailed out when they shouldn't. And that people who were breaking the law were getting away with it, where the smaller and mid-range players were getting hit harder. So, you know, that was really more of a capitalist critique. that I was doing, but, you know, because people, you know, the class issue, I think, is what people latched on to with that. But you're right. I mean, I think the traditional left-to-right distinctions, you know, aren't really coherent right now. And we're on the censorship issue, there are very few people who have a principled view of this left in public life now.

I mean, certainly not in the, you know, in the mainstream press. they were once against it now they're for it and I think it just entirely has to do with who they're looking at do you think that is baked into an ideology Matt or do you think that is a marriage of convenience so that

what you're saying is many of the people may be listening to you right now or they're fans of you today think they're on the side of free speech but what they really are is on the side of the being censored and if they had the levers of power they'd be exercising those same muscles

In other words, the left has control of most of the government institutions, behind the scenes, most of the political frontline offices as well, and the corporate boardroom. But if that shoe were on the other foot, you'd still be making the same critique and you'd have a different audience? Yeah, I think so. I would hope it's not true that the people who are upset about this now are only upset about it because it's people like them who are being censored or people with whom they agree who are being censored. I've certainly met people who are principled opponents of, you know, restrictions on free speech or principled advocates of the First Amendment. I was very impressed, for instance, by Jim Jordan on the, you know, the committee for weaponization of the government.

You know, he's someone who knows a lot of members who I was friendly with on the Democratic side back in the day. And, you know, once upon a time, things like the First Amendment were. sacrosanct across party lines, even it would have been very unusual to have somebody openly come out and say, we need to censor, you know, 15 years ago. So I think that some of these people who are coming out now and presenting themselves as speech champions, I think they're for real. I hope they are. I hope so, too, because, I mean, yeah, I hope so too. I hope it's not just a victim mindset and I mean human nature kind of suggests to me that that you always want to silence your opponent it's a hard thing to say I hate what you have to say but I'll defend

to my death your right to say it I think that's like a really it's easy in theory and hard in practice because everyone essentially wants to yell shut up it's true but I've always been impressed by the American attitude toward this I think you know having lived in countries where the appreciation for free speech is not baked into the history. I mean, I lived in Russia for, you know, almost a dozen years, and they had true free speech for only a very little time, and even then it was fraught with all kinds of problems. But Americans don't generally stand, or at least they didn't.

They don't tolerate being told that they have to be quiet about something. And I've always thought that that was true across the board, whether it was you were talking about Republicans or, You know, people on the left, you know, when I was growing up, the litmus test for somebody who was a liberal was the free speech issue. Whether it was, you know, the Nazis marching in Skokie or, you know, the Jerry Falwell case, or Tipper Gore and the PMRC, or, you know, NWA or Maple Thorpe, whatever it was, these were all the issues that turn people on. now they're much more serious and all those people are quiet. I don't really understand it. I think it's kind of one of those things that you take for granted if you are from it and live.

What you just said, like how unique America's relationship is with free speech on the world stage. I don't think anyone who hasn't done what you've done, and I haven't done it, which has lived someplace else for an extended period of time, can really appreciate how unique this is. I mean, even those other Western democracies that we seem to think we have kinship with don't have any need. the same relationship with free speech. I mean, the easiest of that is Canada right now, where I believe in the last 24 hours, Justin Trudeau is proposing new regulations in Canada over Internet streaming, including, and this may apply to you. I think you're doing very well.

Well, I'm going to, yes, it will apply to me. And I don't know how well you're doing at the racket, but anyone making over $10 million a year has to register with the Canadian government, reveal who their subscribers are, and basically subject yourself to thumbs up, thumbs down from Canada's censors. Yeah, and there is some very strange language in there about whether or not the broadcast promotes, I forget exactly what it was. It was Canada's objectives and, you know, diversity or, I forget what the language was. But there was some very vague catch-all phrase in there that was sort of laden with implication that they can just take that wherever they want to go.

But you're right. I mean, other countries, particularly in Europe, there's a long tradition since World War II of hate speech laws and accepting the idea that the government has some say, not just some, but a lot of say over what you can and cannot express in public. I was very surprised by this. In my experience, when I lived in the former Soviet Union, there was a moment where they decided to try to outlaw the former symbols of communism. So that would have been included the hammer and sickle emblems and that sort of thing. It just would never have occurred to an American to do that. But that's the kind of thing that's normal in other parts of the world. And we are unique in that sense.

And that's something to be proud of. You know, I've always been curious about that part of your story, Matt. I mean, you know, I know you said that I don't read you as much as perhaps you've watched me, but that was disinformation. The truth is, I'm pretty familiar with your story, and I've always found that fascinating that I think we're roughly the same age. You moved to Russia right at the fall of the Soviet Union. You moved in the 90s when it was described by most, and I've read some of the stuff you've written about it as the Wild Wild West. First of all, I'm kind of, I mean, I'm not kind of. I am envious of that sort of adventurous spirit and experience.

But why? Why did you move to Russia right then? It's weird. I was real nerd in high school and in college. I had a real love of Russian books. My favorite authors were all Russian, so I wanted to learn to speak Russian so that I could read the books in Russian, basically. So I went to college.

I was a transfer student at a university in what was then Leningrad, starting in 1989. I was there for a year, a year and a half, and I loved it. I got along really well with Russian people. I was kind of a depressed kid, and everybody in Russia is depressed. So I felt like I got along with everybody. And, yeah, so after I learned the language, I came right back, and it turned into a very strange and interesting place.

I also had a belief that when you're young, you shouldn't spend that period of your life in a cubicle. You should be out there doing crazy things because you're never going to get the chance to do it again. You want to have the physical strength to do it again. And so, yeah, I did all kinds of odd stuff. I played basketball in Mongolia. You know, I had some near misses. It was fun. Wait, what do you mean near misses?

You know, I got very sick in Mongolia, I almost. I almost died, getting home. So I had to have an emergency operation. I had a couple of brushes with the law in Russia. There were some things where I could have gotten in real trouble and didn't. I did a story, actually, in partnership with some Russian muck-wracking reporters, where we worked with somebody who had formerly been in the KGB, and we wiretap Putin's sheep of staff and actually published the transcripts of that.

And that could have landed us in very serious trouble. They decided to let us get away with it. So there were all kinds of scrapes that we got in. So wait, I think you're from the Northeast. So you describe yourself as this depressed nerd that turns into this adventure seeker who is playing basketball in Mongolia. But if I'm from a small town in Texas, if I had somebody in my high, school class who was super fascinated with Russia. At that time, and again, I think we're roughly the same age, you know, at that time it would have been, okay, Lee Harvey. Like, what, what was the,

how do you explain? Was it coming out of politics? Was it because, I don't even know if you were on the left, but why a fascination with Russia? No, no, the, the, this was had entirely to do with, I was obsessed with, um, comic writers. Uh, and there are some very, very funny, uh, slapstick satirist writers in Russia. One of the first stories I read as a teenager was this thing called Howa Muzig fed two officials. It's just a hilarious short story. Then I got into this writer Nikola Gogol, who was a, he was sort of a comic fantasist.

For instance, he wrote a story about a guy who wakes up and his nose is missing and he has to go chasing it around St. Petersburg. There's a very, very strong tradition of this in Russian literature. They really, really value humor in writing. Even if you probably heard of books like Master and Margarita, they're very, very funny. So that's what I was into. I read books that cheer myself up that were funny. And that's what I wanted to be when I grew up.

It was a comic novelist, and it just didn't turn out that way. But I certainly was trying to read those books. Let's take Russia for a moment, your experience there, and apply it to sort of contemplative temporary politics. So one of the books that I've read, it's been a year or two now, a couple years, about Russia is Bill Browder's Red Notice. And Bill, like you, spent a lot of time in Russia in finance, I believe, running a fund in Russia. And he writes about his experiences there with Vladimir Putin. And I already can kind of see your facial expressions. But, you know, you both have, in that way, maybe a somewhat similar experience. And the thing

about you, Matt, is I don't even know, I don't know that I could say where you are on Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Actually, I think you've condemned it. But your critique has been of the media propaganda atmosphere around that war, which I think is just objectively true. People can see that the American public's been manipulated on this war. But you know, you and Browder, from a similar experience, seem to have come to a different place in how you view the threat of Russia, either existentially to the United States or just to the Western world. Browder's all in, right? I mean, whatever it takes, you must, I think he's all in. You have to defeat Putin. He's this threat, where I'm not suggesting you're sanguine about it, but you're certainly somebody who's

been on the side of, well, at least let's address this truthfully, not manipulatively. Yeah, and these are complicated questions. I don't want to criticize Bill specifically about this. We all know each other. I mean, the XPAC community over there was not that big. But when Putin came to power my newspaper, I had a newspaper in Moscow, and we were very critical of him from the start. I actually had friends who knew him, who had reported on Putin all the way back to his days as deputy mayor of St. Petersburg. He was a known figure in the journalism community over there. Feared. Everybody knew exactly what he was all about. He was brought into office specifically to help Boris Yeltsin escape prosecution for things

that he was under investigation for at the time. Initially, he was welcomed by the Western press because they thought he was going to be like a sober version of Yeltsin with whom the West could do business. And he presented himself that way and then quickly kind of turned on the Western community, booted them all out of the Kremlin, and that's when the negative media vibe started. My view of the Russian invasion of Ukraine and a lot of the issues involving, you know, Russia's sort of territorial ambitions. I have zero sympathy for Putin. I think a lot of his ambitions are rooted in nostalgia for what they call the Dajava in Russia, like this gigantic, great map that they used to have on everybody's wall of the Soviet Union's

huge piece of territory. They want it back. I mean, there's real longing for that. If you can imagine what America would look like if you lost Texas, Alaska, and New England, and you know, one day, you know, you were dreaming to have that all back. That's what a lot of Russians feel. I think Putin thinks that way. You know, there are Russian communities in a lot of those countries, most of all in Ukraine. So I don't necessarily have sympathy for those territorial ambitions. However, I'm also very critical of the American policy. which was very aggressive towards Russia from the very beginning. Despite making promises that we wouldn't expand NATO in their direction,

we made sure to do it as quickly as we could as fast as we could, which to them is very threatening, and I think just sort of made this kind of confrontation inevitable. I don't think we had to do that. We could have had a universe where Russia was at least a strategic partner of the United States, and that could have worked as opposed to making them, you know, again into this military sort of arch enemy. So it's subtle, but I think there might have been a different way to do it. Yeah, and now what I see you write about the most when it comes to this war is just the blatant.

You know, it's interesting. On one level, we have to deal with censorship. On the second level, we have to deal with propaganda because it's not simply the silencing of voices, but it's the feeding of the constant feeding of untruths, whether or not that's COVID or the Russia hoax, Russia collusion, anything involved, basically anything and almost everything involving Donald Trump. And now this story, the war in Ukraine. Yeah, and that's very, very troubling. You know, I don't know how you feel about it.

I always thought it was really healthy when media titles criticized one another, and that's what kept us honest and prevented us. from all getting behind some huge lie. You know, of course we had episodes where that would happen, like the WMD episode, but there were always some detractors who would, you know, point out that there were mistakes being made and that's very healthy for the business.

The situation we have now is really bad in a couple of ways. One, it's completely siloed, so basically the right talks to the right and, you know, the center left or the left talks to the left. So nobody is hearing the criticism of their own side. But also, among the media titles, they're not criticizing one another. So, like, the New York Times doesn't go after the Washington Post when they make mistakes. And it becomes like this wall.

It's like the blue wall in the police, right? They won't think on each other when they make mistakes. And I think that's become really bad. And that's why we've had all these episodes where, you know, these blatant fictions get repeated for months and months and months without interruption. I don't even know that, though, there is an appetite for, in fact, I would actively argue there is no appetite for that critique, much less debate. You know, I think one of the things that I've always loved and what kind of brought me into this world is I've loved the clash of ideas. I was excited to have you in the program. even considering, you know, any small skirmishes that have cropped up on social media,

because I love the clash of ideas, man. Like, I loved first take, even if we're stupidly debating Jay Cutler. I love it. I think there's something fun and endorphin releasing about it. And Max Kellerman, who, Max and I are friendly, but we were definitely adversarial on that show. By the way, that show is not an act, at least in my experience. Nobody's playing a role. You're just heightening and honing places of disagreement.

Max used to say when it comes to debate. Oh, did you, let me disavowal you of any notions. I'll say exactly how it works. 7 a.m. meeting, topics on a board. If there's agreement, move on. That one's not making the show. If there's disagreement, if there's disagreement, it makes the show. But, you know, Max said about debate, Max said about debate, either I win or I get smarter.

And I think that's a really smart thing about debate. But, I mean, I think culturally, debate is almost frowned upon now. Like, certain ideas should not see the light of day. They shouldn't, they're not honor, they're not worthy of being heard. I mean, that's kind of what you saw, you saw the Coleman Hughes thing with the TED Talks. Did you see that, Matt? No, I didn't see that. What happened with him?

Oh, Coleman Hughes, you know, writer, thinker. I know, I don't know what his politics are. I think it may be libertarian. I'm not sure. But Coleman, African American, by the way, I said that for the audience. Coleman gave a talk on race color blindness, advocating for the idea that we should be, we should strive. Not, I don't, it's stupid to ever pretend that we can be colorblind, but strive for colorblindness personally and in public policy. And it was received with such that it's unsafe, that it was beyond offensive, that it didn't deserve promotion.

And then it was depressed on the TED Talks YouTube channel or TED Talks website channel. And it was made to be accompanied by a debate with Jamal Bowie. And, you know, the point is no one wants debate. They don't even want to hear other ideas now. And I think that's the mainstream media. Yeah, and it's a business model. I think it's rooted in the business model, which is, you know, you need subscribers, so you tell your audience what they want to hear.

And if you do present other ideas, it's only to show them being defeated or ridiculed. But mostly, it's just preaching to the choir. You know 100% of the time when you turn on almost any television. channel, what someone's opinion on a subject is going to be, which is, I mean, I think it's boring. First of all, intellectually, it's just not interesting, but it's also very detrimental. I agree with you. I mean, the lack of any interest in debate has just stultified our culture.

It's just made it, you know, it's like frozen us in time. I think it's terrible. You've written about that, by the way, the business model of mainstream media, but It's bigger than media, I guess, as well. I mean, college campuses, everywhere you go, it's like debate and contradictory ideas are not all, I guess, mostly the ones that I seem to gravitate towards are frowned upon. It's not no place in American society. And this is one of the things that we noticed when we first started looking at the Twitter

files, too, was like we would see the discussions between the people who work in this quote-unquote anti-disinformation space. And they would use language that you would see, like, epidemiologists use when they were describing ideas. So they would be talk about contagion or infection, right, or vectors. You know, whenever they use words, talk about disinformation. So it tells you that these people view ideas as things that are destructive and, you know, deadly like viruses. and that they're trying to, you know, do the same kind of intervention. They even use those words.

It's the same words that you would hear the CDC use if they were talking about how to stop an outbreak of a certain kind of disease. That tells you how people think of ideas now. Yeah, but then that leads to the obvious question. Destructive to what? What are these ideas threatening? I mean, I think the obvious answer is it's threatening to anybody who has power. There's a demystifying asking. aspect of a free press.

I mean, I think that's the thing that's most valuable about the American system. It always has been, which is, it's pretty hard to, you know, be corrupt for too long in a country where everybody gets to say what they want. You will eventually get outbreaks and protests and pushback and all kinds of things that I think are healthy in the society. Sometimes it's messy. And sometimes, you know, the people who you wouldn't want to see in power, end up in power. But that's better than the alternative of, you know, guaranteed silence and guaranteed

repression. That's where we're headed, you know, is a sort of stage-managed version of democracy. And that's terrifying to me. I don't know. But when do you think it's absolutely terrifying. I think it's what brings you and I together. And possibly a lot more, by the way, now. I think we have, my suspicion is that you and I have more Venn diagram overlaps of agreement than we ever would have anticipated in our past. Hey, when do you think that started like this transition into this is threatening to the pervasive ideology or the power structure i mean the easy answer i think is 2016 right donald trump is a threat to democracy and then therefore anything you do any lie you tell any anything you do behind the scenes

you were recently writing on on your substack about the clinton campaign and uh not just the the hoax of of russia collusion but russian interference it's easy to say it probably started in 16 because the excuse that Donald Trump's with that threat to democracy. We have a greater moral truth we have to fight for than the truth. But when do you think it started to change in the media? I'm writing a book now on some of these topics, and in the research of that, I'm learning a lot about the origins of some of these programs. And one of the things that's really interesting is that after 9-11,

there were a lot of devotees within the national security world of a, a so-called Weimar thinker. He was really a Nazi, but a guy named Carl Schmidt, he's a famous political theorist. And one of his chief ideas is that all politics is just a matter of sorting out friends and foes.

That, you know, if you strip away all of the verbiage, really, when it comes down to it, governing is just about deciding who's on your side and who's on the wrong side. And during the war and terror, we employed those methods,

basically to try to track down people in the Middle East who might have been, you know, sympathetic to ISIS or Al-Qaeda. But we gave the government and the national security apparatus unbelievable tools to monitor, surveil, and see where people are, what they were thinking, predict. And then I think you're right. I think it's 2016 is the moment where this apparatus is turned inward. And instead of looking out in search of terrorists, we're now looking inward in search

of what they call domestic violent extremists or HVE's human violent extremists. And they're using exactly the same methodology of separating friends and foes. And they think friend is anti-Trump and foe is basically the other side. And that's my understanding of it right now. But, you know, it's complex and scary, I think. So let's go back and share with each other our moments where you sort of saw the crack in the kaleidoscope or whatever it may be. So here's when I met you probably, let's call it 2011, it was mostly a traditional political debate left and right, although Occupy Wall Street and the Tea Party were these interesting sort of pressure in the balloon, little places where the balloon popped out in odd ways that were unexpected. him. When I went to ESPN, Matt, like, the first time I was really obviously aware, I think, that, and maybe it was before ESPN, it could have started when I was at CNN, that there's no interest in critical thought. There's no interest in actually getting to the facts. For me, was often through the prism of issues of race, because that's what everything happened to on, that's where culture and sports collided, right? Like, everything is racist? And I'm the guy on first take going, well, hold on a minute, you know, is that the reason that this thing happened? What?

it may be, right? And by the way, I think, I'm not sure that may be why you called me an idiot, which I joked about on Fox and Friends. Like, did I? I'm sorry, I'm sorry. You don't need to call, you don't need to apologize for that. You did it on Fox and Friends. I do it, I'm bringing it up for fun, but also because I think it's interesting. And I was trying to think back, what was the issue where Matt Taibi said, well, Will Kane's always been an idiot or something like that. And you know what I think it was, Matt? It was the, I don't remember the player. Maybe running back from LSU. I know you're an NFL draft junkie like I am.

Kevin Falk? No, more recent. So we're talking about like drafted in, let's call it, 16 or 17. Stephen Ridley? Look at it, you're just going through LSU running backs. Hold on, let me give you more details and you'll get it. It was a Des Bryant type story. And at the NFL draft Combine, at the Combine,

some scout asked this running back if his mother was a prostitute. Right? Oh, right. Yes, I don't remember the player. though. I remember that story. I don't remember the player. I think it was a running back. And everybody ran with, well, it's racist. I don't know. Easiest explanation.

And I said, hey, listen, there might be another reason. I didn't excuse it, but I said the reason that this coach might have asked a player, that question, was just to see what his emotional reaction might be, anticipating that you're going to see or you're going to hear horrific stuff on the field, which they do. Right. And he wants to see if it provokes this guy. Like, does he lose his cool?

Does he lose his temper? So that's what I had said at the time. But Deadspin or whoever else turns it into, Will Kane apologizes for calling your mother a hooker. You know? And so, and that's, I think, where you came at me. But the point I'm getting at is, for me, at that time, it was always, everything has to be racist.

You cannot critically think about anything based upon its individual facts. Yeah, and it's interesting, though, but, I mean, I always thought that sports journalism, and they had more leeway to talk about racial issues than we do in the news. Was that not true? I mean, um... There was a moment in time. It sounds like... It sounds like I'm patting myself on my back, but when I was there, now I don't think

there's no fly in the ointment. I was the fly in the ointment to just, you know... Like what you saw the story of what happened with Trevor Bauer. That's another example. Did you see what happened with Trevor Bauer, the pitcher? No, I mean, I know about his case. but what happened so within the last 48 hours he's released a video showing evidence revealing how this girl basically um set up an a sting he's got texts and videos and everything

and i don't know if what he has to offer is 100% true but she was running a scam to get money from him saying like he's got 50 million here's my plan you know and uh and but the but the what sports media does is you have to be the first one to the top of mountain virtue and he's say, this guy's horrible. Let's condemn him because, of course, we're all opposed to domestic violence, as though there's some other constituency out there. And then, and never actually care about the truth, the facts of what, and the same thing applies to race. Let's run really quickly to, this is horrific and this is racist, because that's safe and virtuous, never taken a moment to go, but what is the actual facts of this particular case? Obviously, that's a very

dangerous thing for journalism. I mean, I know that because I actually wasn't at the magazine, that I was temporarily not there, but I came back just as the UVA rape story was ending. And that was a classic case where all the checks and balances that we have set up. And we still had a lot back then to prevent that kind of thing from happening, kind of collapsed because everybody was afraid to be the one to push back on, you know, the story of a quote unquote survivor.

You don't want to be the one to say, you know, is that true? Do they make that up? That's a difficult place to be, both in the office and out in public. But if you don't do it, you know, the alternative is worse, as we saw with that story. And I think that's a real lesson for, you know, for people in journalism that some of us didn't get until recently. I now firmly believe that, like, you can't try people in the media. for stuff like this. Right.

You got to wait. You've got to be behind the law on these things. That's why the Russell Brand story drives me crazy. It's an unbelievably serious accusation, but there's no case. So how do you talk about it? If there is at some point a trial, you can talk about it. But that's a bad place for journalists to be. But get back to your point about race.

Yeah, I mean, sports media, sports talk shows. It's incredibly obvious that race is the subtext for a lot of the, you know, the hottest hot takes. And sometimes it's done in a way that's really clever and sometimes it's not. I'm sure that must have been frustrating for you. Well, the thing for me, because here's the thing. I just rarely thought it was about the proposed victim. It was always about the speaker. So whoever was speaking was, whatever they were saying was about themselves.

They were trying to communicate to the audience. I'm a good person. And more so, that's more important than I'm a critical thinker, or I'm a truth seeker. It's, I'm a good person. And it's not limited to race. We just talked about others. But again, by the way, why do you love the NFL draft? I know that you love it.

Or is it the NFL draft or the NBA that you love more? Both of them. Me too. Me too. But, yeah. I love the draft. I don't know why it's, maybe it's that sort of like finding diamonds in the rough thing. It's just a fun exercise.

I used to read all those magazines. You ever... Everyone. When they still had them. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. No, it's a great thing. The way sports talk shows are set up, you're right.

There's a lot of virtue signaling that goes on, but there's also like a lot of phony confrontation and phony drama. If you remember the old Hannity and Colm show, the whole point of that show was for Colms to lose, right? It was like a wrestling engagement where he gets pinned every time. And in some of the debates on sports, you know, on sports talk shows, the whole point is to see, you know, basically Skip chewed out, you know, he ends up taking the wrong side and he gets called out on it and that becomes viral fodder or whatever it is. And we all know what the setup is, but it's not real thought. It's just the show, you know.

But my perspective on that, always Matt, was that's harmless fun. Like, that's mostly, even skip on LeBron, you know, ultimately is harmless. Like, there's no real victim in constantly hating on LeBron. I mean, he's a multi-hundred millionaire. I don't even know. He could be getting close to a billion. And his life is charmed and great. And it wasn't always, and LeBron built himself into this, and bravo to LeBron for that.

But the one that I always found more to Ferris was the one where it's not, there is no K-Fabe. There is nothing like that. but it's actually, hey, I want to communicate that I'm a good person. So it really, it even progresses beyond the Russell Brand type story. And it does coalesce around the NFL draft often where you go through Josh Allen's tweets when he was 14 years old. You go through Kyler Murray's tweets because it wasn't race. It wasn't just race. Kyler Murray, it happened to him.

And it always happens on the best night of your life. You know, I think Josh Hater, when he's elected to the Major League Baseball, I think it was Hater. All-Star Game. Okay, let's comb through his tweets and see anything. he said he was awful that was awful when he was 13. And that's what makes me think journalism has turned into this thing about, let me just always be the good guy. I'm the modern day freedom bus rider. And I might have to find my issue and I don't know where the bus is, but I'm going to be on that bus and I'll be the good guy. Yeah. Yeah. And that's, maybe that's why people

hate journalists so much now, right? They perceive us as holier than thou, self-proclaimed. you know, pious authorities where that wasn't our role previously, right? I mean, I think the job was not about showing how good you were, or even sometimes, you know, the audience wouldn't necessarily even know who you were. Like, they would see your name in the byline, but they had no idea what you looked like or, you know, what your politics were. The job was much more about explaining how things work or what happened or getting information. But that's not what we do now.

Now we're about getting peltz and, you know, racking up winds. And these stories that involve individual people, the thing that drives me crazy about that is that you're very often not talking about a wider social issue. It's often this very weird, idiosyncratic, narrow story about some person who's screwed up somewhere along the line. It's not something that people are going to learn from or is going to result. and some big policy change. It's just the destruction of that person's life.

You know, sometimes it's deserved, but usually not, I think. You talked a moment ago about the price you pay, for example, had you been, I don't know if you said you might have been back in the building at the time of the UVA story, but at least virtual building. But you talk about the price you pay if you're the guy that stands up and

goes, hold on a minute, is that true? I mean, you've clearly paid that price now, right? Because you've done it on a whole host of stories, people that were not just former colleagues, but I can imagine friends. I mean, you've paid the price, right? Oh, yeah. I've lost a lot of friends in the last six or seven years, but particularly in the last couple.

Well, really, the two episodes that were really bad were the Rushagate episode and then the Twitter files. You know, the Russia Gate story, there was a small handful of us who were kind of, I would say, more left-leaning reporters like myself, Glenn Greenwald, Aaron Mote, who worked at Democracy Now. There are some older reporters who were quiet, but they were, you know, privately. They were grousing about this and they lost some friends. But we were out in public saying, hey, this thing has holes in it.

There's an issue. And immediately there was this tremendous condemnation about. speaking out. And that was new. Again, we didn't have that before where somebody who was a reporter says, yeah, I'm not sure about the sourcing on that. And all of a sudden, everybody's piling on. Like, how come you're not agreeing? They would call you a denier. That was such a strange term. But yeah, no, I went through that. And then again, with the Twitter files, it was kind of the same thing. I'm a little more surprised that it happened on the Twitter files. On Rushgate, everybody had divided themselves on the lines of Trump. I guess Twitter Files and Elon became a proxy for that in a way. But Twitter Files is a, I'm not saying you should have been surprised. You probably at that point were pretty cynical or prepared, but I'm a little surprised myself. Because again, that was basically on the issue of free speech, the Twitter Files.

Yeah, and we also didn't know where it was going, right? I mean, we got access to all this stuff. We didn't know what the story was going to be. we just sort of dove into it and whatever we could make a coherent story out of it, we just threw it out there and it seemed just like a public service. I mean, there wasn't a whole lot of commentary

that went with it. We would say, okay, this email says that, this says that, this says that, take a look. And, you know, people, the immediate accusation is that we were curating it to make it look worse for Democrats. But that's not, really what the situation was. And we also

published a lot of stuff about suppression of leftist movements abroad. Nobody paid any attention to that either. So it was really strange. But you're right. I shouldn't have been surprised by it. I was a little bit surprised though. Mainly

because once we got into the stuff about the FBI and the director of national intelligence and the CIA even getting involved with this issue, I thought, okay, now Now the cavalry is going to come and they're going to investigate this stuff, but they weren't interested. So having been in this, look, I don't think anybody is reported on it more, probably therefore, has more information and background knowledge on the censorship regime here in the United States than you, Michael Schellenberger and yourself.

So I want to share with you this, and I want your feedback. So in an episode earlier this week here on my show, I had Jeffrey Tucker of the Brownstone Institute, who's kind of a, I don't know how he would describe himself anymore. He was probably like a narco-libertarian-style thinker. But he and I talked about that. I don't know anymore. I don't know how prior political descriptors apply to the modern world. Because when you and I first met, I was skeptical, perhaps, of the state, or more skeptical of the state,

and you were more skeptical of the corporate America corporations. now we have 10 years later this this marriage between the two and Jeffrey talks about as kind of this techno-corporatist future where the interests of the state and the interests of these corporations be they Google or Facebook or you know whatever they may be are made to dovetail so much that they just become one in the same arms of one another and so I don't even know how a I don't know how to describe myself but B Matt I also don't know how to address that. Like, I don't know what the remedy for that is in the future. So my question for you then off of that is, do you think that's right? Like, is that your concern having been under the hood

as we move forward? Like, what is a civil libertarian? Somebody that truly and principally believes in free speech, what are you supposed to do with the way this thing is headed? You've got it right on the, you know, you ever seen the movie The French Connection? The old 70s, Gene Hackman. I don't think I ever watched it. Yeah. Oh, there's a scene where he's in a bar and he looks over at a table and there's a bunch of crooks there and there's like one person who's running numbers

and another person who's a drug dealer but they're all like they're all in the different rackets but they're sitting at the same table and he's like you know what that table is definitely wrong like there's something wrong when all those folks are together

that's what we sort of we're looking at under the hood with the Twitter files I expected it to be this sort of simple thing where the FBI would reach out to Twitter and there would be some kind of instruction, even if it was veiled about how to do this or that, and it would be a straightforward, you know, back and forth relationship.

What we found instead is that there's this entire galaxy of agencies and organizations. There's some in the military that are like just basically military parts of the Pentagon, you know, DoD agencies, then there's Department of State, there's the FBI, there's DHS. But then radiating out from all those are hundreds of these organizations that are quasi-private, quasi-public, they're half-funded by the government, they're staffed by ex-government people, and then along with that, you have the companies themselves. In the upper ranks of Twitter, for instance, there were just tons of these people who used to work for the National Security Council and the CIA and J-Soc and the Department of Defense, same thing at Facebook. So it's all the same people.

The money flows just go in a circle where the government ends and the corporation begins is almost impossible to define. But what's the incentive for a guy like Jack Dorsey or Mark Zuckerberg, is the incentive, well, by having this incestuous relationship, I've created my walled garden. I will always have this power and wealth center. Well, I think for both of those characters, especially Jack Dorsey, who I believe deep down is really a civil liberties advocate, or at least you started out that way. You know, they had it thrust upon them that if you don't go along with this, you're going to have problems, right? We're going to have all kinds of regulatory issues that are going to magically pop up. You're going to be taxed differently. We're not going to let you put your headquarters in Ireland anymore.

You know, like, there's all these things that they can lean on. We can tinker with a Section 230 protections and make sure that you face all kinds of litigation. And so they all fell in line and where there was initially some hostility or at least some distrust between, say, a company like Twitter and the FBI or the Intelligence Committee and the Senate, you know, by about 2018, 2019, they were essentially partners. we saw the communications you see them they don't even talk like people who work in different companies it's like it's like an intramural office email uh so i the incentive i think was just if you want to stay in business this is the way it's got to be do you see at all i mean i say this this is the second show in row what i've done this like i don't like pessimism and i know i know you're reporter your job is simply to tell us the facts and the truth i have a hard time

seeing how you unwind it i mean not just these particular institutions, but this sort of inertia of the future. I don't know, and I want to be. I want to be an optimist, and I want, you know, I'd love to be some political ideology that solved it or an antitrust law that solved it, but I don't, man. I don't know how it gets fixed. Yeah, I don't know. I wish I had a better answer for you, but I had moments during the reporting of this story where, you know, I kind of like sagged like an animal taking a bullet when I would like, I looked at a list once of all of the subcontractors just for one agency, you know, in the Pentagon that was doing this kind of work. And that's one of dozens, you know, government agencies.

And it's, you know, dozens and dozens of organizations along, and they're all elaborately funded. There's just not going to be an easy way to untangle all this stuff. And even if you pass a law, a lot of these organizations are secret or they have secret budgets. or they're already openly defying laws. So you have no, I mean, I have no idea what's actually going to happen. I mean, there's a big case that's going to the Supreme Court right now, Missouri v. Biden, and the Supreme Court could easily rule that all this stuff is illegal. But how do they enforce it?

How do they enforce it? Yeah. What is that going to mean? Maybe nothing, you know? Right. That's one of the oldest Supreme Court cases. Great. now you've ruled now enforce your your ruling supreme court um because before we go so you wrote about

this recently can i ask you this have you moderated your tone even when i read you man you seem to be and when you're going back at your critics on twitter you're the dude that like i don't know i don't think you saved a single bullet in the gun back in the day and now i feel like um and i'm i actually like moderation a little bit i think come i think come not with venom but with flowers wins people over a little more. Are you consciously doing that? Have you, like, how to change of heart and how you respond or write?

Yeah, I got a lot of criticism when I was younger for using profanity. And that's partly because I was a big fan of writers that used profanity when I was growing up. Like, Hunter Thompson was, you know, was one. I'm trying to remember who else,

who were some of the others. Hitchens, Hitchens, yeah, but, you know, some people, it works for some people, and for others it doesn't. And when I went back and looked, I could see that, yeah, it was usually not called for. Also, I'm just older and I have kids now. I don't know about you, but when you become a dad, you know, like you do change. But I think that's part of what being a writer is, is you have to listen to your audience and you have to honestly assess. what you're doing incorrectly and, you know, when you go back and you look, you know,

you have to be, have your mind open to the possibility that things that you were pretty sure about before maybe aren't true. So, yeah, I've definitely moderated. Among other things, I think it's just more effective. You're right. I think that humility inspires trust as well. So what I was going to ask you is, having been under the hood, what I would like to know really quickly, is you recently wrote honestly that you feel like you were late to the game on the censorship when it came to COVID. So when you got under the hood and you saw this huge apparatus that we're describing, like what were the subjects that were, I mean, I don't even know if you could give me an

exhausted list of subjects that were targeted for censorship. If you can't give me an exhaustive list, what are the main ones? Well, the main ones were quote unquote election misinformation. Anything having to do with Russian interference, basically anything that the Russian government had put out on their official messaging, if he repeated that in a text or a post, that was in danger of being deamplified or removed. But what we found is that COVID was really like the epicenter of a lot of the innovation in terms of how they were censoring people. And the really important issue, which I didn't really understand at first, was that with COVID, that was the first place where they took stuff that was factually true, but just inconvenient. And they deleted or suppressed those people, and they did it in kind of a sweeping, systematic way. And I didn't see it at first because I didn't know enough about COVID to realize how wrong they were. but that's definitely what happened.

And unfortunately, they set a template for how to censor people politically in the future by basically saying that if you're promoting the wrong idea, that is disinformation. And that's what they did. Man. You have an awesome call-in-law. No, I know. I know. I know. But, you know, let the chips fall away May.

If the truth is depressing, then let us all. all be like Matt Taibian move not to Russia that if I say that on this podcast and it's all going to be then we're all agents of Putin but let us all lean into our depression yeah or move to St. Martin that's a good place I think I like that Tahiti yeah by the way what I was saying is great call him up on Fauci and that he's sort of the the test case for dictatorship up at your substack as well hey you're welcome back anytime and in fact I hope you'll come back I love the conversation with you and I think there's a lot more interesting things for us to explore I really appreciate it, man.

Thank you. I'd love to. Thanks so much, Will. I appreciate it. Thanks for having me on. There you go. I hope you enjoyed that conversation with Matt Taibia. Again, go to racket.

Dot News. That's his substack, his website, where he's doing a lot of this investigative reporting that I think is critical and indispensable. You should subscribe to his substack. We're going to step aside here for a moment. Stay tuned. Following Fox's initial donation to the Kerr County Flood Relief Fund, our generous viewers have answered the call to action across all Fox platforms

and have helped raise $7 million. Visit go.com forward slash TX flood relief to support relief and rebuilding efforts. And now, story number three. Chris Felica is the bear at Fox Sports, and he now has a podcast, Bear Betts, at the Fox Sports Podcast Network. Chris has been joining us for the last several weeks

to give us his picks of the week, and we got some big ones this week. We have Texas A&M, Alabama. We have the Dallas Cowboys and the San Francisco 49ers, and of course we have Texas OU. Here's the bear. Go ahead. Introduce yourself with just the way you wanted to start the day.

Huck them. That's right, baby. Hook them. It's for you. I've been waiting all week to say that since I knew I was hopping on with you. Chris Felica of Bear Betts on Fox Sports Network here on the Will Kame podcast. Man, I just literally came in the door from a run. I ran upstairs to take a quick shower before talking with you,

and I'm doing that thing where you sweat, even after a shower. Oh, yeah. Oh, yes. It's the worst. Your eyes are all sunken in, and I'm not a runner. You don't want to put your shirt on too soon, but you know you got to get out and start doing it. Yes. It's a problem.

It's a problem. Everything's wet, and I don't know if it's sweat or if it's shower water. All right, man, yes, hook them. Let's start with the weekend. Let's talk about the big game of the week. That is the Red River rivalry, or the Red River Shootout. The name of it changes so often. I can't keep up.

political correctness is what it is changes the name on a yearly basis it's still though as always is texas oh you and hookham's looking good but man you always have to take seriously the sooner's bear you do and i think what i mean you followed this this rivalry around enough to realize just the emotion of it and a 49-0 win by the longhorns last year probably hasn't sat well in norman for the last 365 days. And as a result, we saw Brent Vettables and that staff really do a number in the transfer portal and shoring up some things on that defense to try and alleviate some of the problem. And so far, so good. Now, it's not exactly like the schedule has been great so far. I mean, you're looking at teams like what, Cincinnati, Tulsa, SMU, Arkansas State, Iowa State last

week. So it hasn't necessarily been the most high-powered offenses in the country, but at the same time, their defense has played much better than it has this year. Statistically, however, I will say this. There are people out there who follow this league closely and follow Oklahoma, follow Texas closely, and have called their games in the past and played them in the past, that they look on the film and they don't necessarily see massive improvement. So I'm one, I think this week will be a kind of a litmus test to see of what we've seen so far from OU is real on defense because we do know Gabriel on that offense and put up some pretty incredible numbers this year. So I can't wait to settle in once Big Noon gets off the air on noon on Saturday, head inside

and watch this game right next to Ohio State Maryland as well because it's a great noon window. So, you know, as opposed to OU, I think I've read almost every respected coach and scout look at the film on Texas and say they're for real like they really beat Alabama not a fluke and although that game's in the past what they're talking about and why people go back to that game bear is because they beat Alabama in ways that haven't been Texas for more than a decade and have been Alabama for more than a decade and that is big on the defensive line big on the offensive line that being said um it's one of the more unpredictable rivalries that I can think of in college sports like Ohio State Michigan

is kind of been dominated by Ohio State, right? And Alabama, Auburn has been dominated by Alabama. You don't really know, I mean, even though one team might be on paper way better or in the rankings rate higher, I don't think you have a good sense of what to expect in Texas OU. So what is your prediction in this game? I think the line is Texas six and a half? Yeah, it seems kind of high.

I don't know if this is a game that I want to get involved in in terms of laying six and a half or taking six and a half. But I do think Texas is better. And I think what you said was exactly right. And what everybody noticed, it was not a fluke the way that they beat Alabama. They bullied them around. They got after the quarterback. They ran the ball. They were better on both sides of the ball. They were better at quarterback. They were better at receiver. And if you're better than Alabama, that makes you a national title contender. So my hunch says that Texas is better and Texas will win. But like you said, at the same time,

we've seen instances in the past where underdogs have stepped up and just rallied and won this game. But I do think Texas is better. I think Brooks and that secondary will give Gabriel problems. I do think Texas will win. Don't know if I want to lay six and a half, but this very well could be meeting one of two

because I think there is a high likelihood that both these teams can wind up meeting in the Big 12 title game with a college football playoff berth at stake. All right, welcome. I want to do quick other two other college football games before we move to pro football. We can do these much more quickly.

Georgia, Kentucky, probably the biggest test for Georgia so far this season. Kentucky, not to be overlooked, Georgia sort of feels, I know they've gone up against Auburn, but it's not untested, maybe it's unproven. They've left people with questions. What do you think with Georgia and Kentucky? And it's amazing how they have left people with questions biggest. You look at what they've lost from last year, and you lost the offensive

lineming. You lost Stetson Bennett. You lost Jalen Carter, who didn't play about half the season last year. So you figure out what have they really lost? And it's like all the, all the pieces, I mean, with Stetson Bennett, that important to the offense? Maybe he was. And is that the reason why they seem to be struggling? You have an offensive coordinator. Is that the problem? But you're right. Georgia has been leaving you. wanting more. They have been an extremely slow-starting team. And ultimately, I think one of these weeks,

that could catch up with them. I just don't know this week if that's the spot. Kentucky has been a team that struggled mightily to score points against Georgia in the past, but is this Georgia defense up to snuff? Are they what we've seen the best? So far, we haven't seen that until

the second half against Auburn when they've needed stops. So what's your pick? Or the second half, or the second half, or the the second half of the South Carolina game. Like, until we see 60 minutes from Georgia, like, I don't know how you could be ranking them number one in the country right now, because they certainly have not played the part of this number one.

It's more of a reputation ranking than anything else. However, that being said, I think this week, we've seen this number come down quite a bit. I think it was right around 16 or 15.5, and now it's come down to 14, 14. and I do think that there might be a good opportunity to buy low on Georgia this week with Kentucky having the big win over Florida last week. So I'm inclined to lay the points here with Georgia. So just out of curiosity, if you don't think Georgia's number one in the country, how would you rank, what would be the Bears college football rankings right now, top five? Well, I think the most complete team from what we've seen right now is Michigan. I think Michigan,

what they've done defensively. Last week, they finally turned it on offensively. I think that combination probably is deserving of being the best team in the country. Now, has Michigan's level of competition been great? No. But I think what we know about Michigan is more than anybody else. I probably have Texas, too. I think if you're voting in the poll,

you have to be deciding between Texas and Michigan right now. for number one. And obviously, none of this matters right now. We have seven games left in the regular season. But I do think that it matters in the sense of you should not be factoring in all of your priors from last year before the season. Now that we have some games and some data to work on, it's kind of hard to make the case for Georgia to be number one right now.

Okay, two programs that it's kind of interesting. They're in a naval gazing existential moment. moment. Like, who are we and where is this program headed? One is Texas A&M and the other is Alabama. One may be deserved. One may be undeserved. A&M fans were on the verge of going, okay, it's worth a $70 million buyout to get rid of Jimbo Fisher. Now, they haven't, they haven't looked terrible since that moment, right? Alabama may be prematurely freaked out after losing to Texas. I think they prematurely benched Jalen Milrow. But there are those that are beginning to question the long-term future of Alabama.

So these two meet, and in a game, by the way, that has been Alabama's sort of Achilles heel. A&M has had their number on a couple of occasions. So what do you see with A&M, Alabama? I'll tell you what, Will, I tweeted something out yesterday about asking if, like, this was the most, like, significant game in the Sabin era at Alabama. I say it used significant because it kind of alludes to, like, an infliction point with the program, like, if Alabama were to lose this game, you're looking at two losses before the end of October for the first time since Nick's first year in Tuscaloosa, you're looking

at them losing at A&M, one of their bigger rivals in that division at a massive recruiting base in the state of Texas coupled with a loss to the Longhorns already who are moving into the SEC next year. We've seen LSU beat them last year. We've seen other teams play them close. I'm not saying like the Alabama dynasty is going to end, but at the same time, I think it would represent a point in time where all of these other programs in the, in the, in the NIL era have reloaded and reached a point now in their recruiting level that they can play with an Alabama on a week-in, a week-out basis, and it's not just automatic that Alabama is going to go 11-1 or 12-0 every year.

So that's all I was getting at. And then on the flip side, a lot of people said, I understand what you're saying, but at the same time, I think it's a bigger game for Jimbo Fisher at A&M than it is for Alabama long-term because you're probably never going to get a better opportunity to be. beat Alabama with questions at quarterback, with questions on the offensive line. Like, the A&M defensive front is really, really good. The offensive line is very... People kind of overreacted to, I think, that A&M loss against Miami.

And what I kind of said at the time was, what if Miami just happens to be really good? And by the end of October, that loss may not look terrible. So I like A&M on Saturday. I think even with that Conner Wegman, I think Matt Johnson can do the job behind that running game. And that defense, when we saw South Florida, have success against the Alabama running game. I know Mill Road didn't play. But I think if you have a lot of people watch the film of the Alabama offense, they say it looks nothing like what we would expect from Alabama. People, football people that I trust.

So I think this is going to be a very difficult game for Alabama to go in there and win. And I like the Aggies on Saturday. Okay. I'm still sweating like Booker in Church here. And it's not because I'm about to ask you about the big professional. football game of the week. I'm still cooling down. And so let's, let's deal with, before it gets too heated here, let's deal with the Dallas Cowboys and the San Francisco 49ers. That's the big NFL game of the week. Here's my thought, Bear. I think in one sense, everybody sort of looks at

this and says the Niners have owned the Cowboys. It's because they have put them out of the playoffs two years in a row. But what we forget is that both of those games were actually really close. And both of those games, Dallas's defense did a number, at least in the most recent game, Dallas's defense did a number on the 49ers. They stopped them from running, at least for most of the first half in the third quarter. And that's the key. I think that's the entire analysis of the game. Can Dallas stop San Francisco's run? If they can, look out Brock Purdy, because here comes Micah Parsons and DeMarcus Lawrence and Dorrance Armstrong and Sam Williams. Here comes the house.

But on the other hand, and I'm trying to be a realist here, even though those games were close, it's sort of a theme that's consistent with the Cowboys that the other team comes up with the play that's needed when it is needed. And I am a DAC lover. You know that. I'm not out on DAC, but it won't mean as much in the regular season. It's got to happen in the playoffs. but I'm going to need to see the Cowboys, and, you know, by extension, DAC, come up with the play to win that tight game.

Yes, the games were close, but yes, also, Brock Purdy made the play that wasn't made by DAC. I think what you started with the Dallas defense against the 49ers, not only the running game, but the past, the short screens, the quick hitting plays that they kind of use as an extension of the running game will be key to. And what was the one area about San Francisco? that everybody focused on before the year that might hold them back with our offensive line. I mean, outside of Trump Williams, I think there are massive questions. Who cheats? Who, by the way, cheats. Trent Williams, can we just get it on record now?

I'm going to be complaining about it on Sunday. Trent Williams is a false start almost every play. He takes off early. And who isn't on the Eagles, too? The other offensive linemen on the tackle on for names, you're right i can't remember who it is takes that first step early and it just doesn't get called and it's a massive deal but but at the same time i almost wonder if the slip up at arizona a couple of weeks ago where you were down to offensive linemen and and maybe the

offense struggled in the red zone and and maybe doc got a little rattle because of the of the pressure he was under i wonder if that's a little bit of a benefit in the long term you kind of okay we got our bad game out of the way and they came out last week and looked like a king completely different team, absolutely focused. They were looking to score before a half. It looked like they wanted to send a message to not only Belichick and the Patriots, but the entire league. I think this is a good spot to bet Dallas plus the four.

I know it opened it three and now it's up to four. So it looks like 49ers money is coming in. But I think this matchup on Sunday, everybody's so high on the 49ers. I'm like, I am as well up. I had to bet one team to win the Super Bowl. And even Jerry Jones said it earlier. in the week, like, they're the one team that you would pick. But you just wonder at some point, will something not click?

And I think the Dallas defense presents the ingredients to really be disruptive to the 49ers offense. If they can stop the run. I mean, I will tell you, in the blowout of the Giants, the one sort of chink in the armor was Sequin was running on that first drive. And it did make me wonder, oh, we haven't trouble stopping the run again. And then comes Arizona and couldn't stop the run. And here now we run into the Niners, and that's what they're really good at, is running. Oh, by the way, the guy who right now might be the offensive player of the year, maybe the MVP in the league.

But by the way, can we stop putting the Giants on primetime? Like, how many more week, are we going, as football fans, are we going to be subjected to watching the New York Giants in a standalone prime time? That's an old Ryan Rosillo take. Ryan used to complain about that on SVP and Rosillo. He said, I'm so sick and tired of the Giants. They're terrible. All right, man, Chris Felica, there's our games of the week. Always good to talk to you.

Check him out at Bear Betts at the Fox Sports Podcast Network. Thanks, Bear. Have a great week. You too. There you go again. If you want to keep up on those best bets of the week from Bear, check out Bear bets at the Fox Sports Podcast Network. That's going to do it for me today.

A long, jam-packed, fun, insightful, stimulating edition, I think, of the Will Kane podcast. If you think it's so worthy, go give it. five stars. I'll see you again next time. Listen to ad free with a Fox News podcast plus subscription on Apple Podcasts and Amazon Prime members. You can listen to this show ad free on the Amazon music app. I'm Janice Dean. Join me every Sunday as I focus on stories of hope and people who are truly rays of sunshine in their community and across the world. Listen and follow now at foxnewspodcast.com