0:20

Hello and welcome to

0:22

another episode of Radio

0:25

Warner. The date today

0:27

is January 24th 2025

0:30

and this is episode

0:32

496 getting to that

0:35

half a millennial

0:37

episode pretty soon.

0:39

We don't have to

0:41

order a cake or

0:44

something. I know. You

0:46

are listening to Radio

0:48

Warner subscribe at patreon.com/Radio

0:51

Warner. I'm the co-host Mark Ames

0:53

in Western New York and I

0:55

am on the line with the

0:57

Warner John Dolan aka Gary

1:00

Bretcher in Italy. When

1:02

I was listening to the I

1:04

watched some of the inauguration as

1:06

much as I could stand. Was

1:09

that like whatever a week ago?

1:11

or earlier in the week and

1:13

there was the honorable this and

1:15

the honorable that and I

1:18

just wanted to start referring

1:20

to everybody I like as

1:22

the honorable the honorable John

1:25

Dolan I mean not very

1:27

but with certain asterisks yes

1:29

uh covering entire decades yes

1:32

me too I mean, you

1:34

know, we could be fair

1:36

and say the dishonorable Martians

1:38

and I'd be proud of

1:41

that too. The spotty. Just

1:43

as long as there's a

1:45

title in there, you know. Yeah.

1:47

So today we're going to catch

1:50

up on wars. It's the

1:52

new year and, you know, lots

1:54

been going on. Of course,

1:56

we have Trump taking office

1:58

and... active as always. It's

2:00

the same Harlem Globetrotters versus

2:02

Washington general story over and

2:04

over. The Republican comes to

2:07

power immediately gets to work,

2:09

does all these things, the

2:11

Washington generals, i.e. the Democrats

2:13

say, can they do that?

2:15

Because when we try pushing

2:17

our agenda, there was something

2:19

called a parliamentarian, no one

2:21

ever heard of, who stopped

2:23

everything cold. How can they

2:25

do that? It's like, how

2:27

fucked me? And then they

2:29

run for the sidelines and

2:31

get a typewriter and just

2:33

say, how can he do

2:35

this? In fact, he can't,

2:38

except he just did. You

2:40

know, he's been, Trump has

2:42

been very busy both in

2:44

terms of foreign policy. In

2:46

fact, he's, uh, put a

2:48

90 day freeze on all

2:50

foreign aid. I'm assuming there

2:52

is an Israel exception there

2:54

because there's always an Israel

2:56

exception for everything on both

2:58

sides of the aisle. But

3:00

it would be, it would

3:02

be interesting. I mean, that

3:04

would be kind of interesting.

3:06

And I think that one

3:08

thing that was kind of

3:11

heart warming with Israel, because

3:13

They regularly let down Biden

3:15

by saying, no, no, no,

3:17

it's a religious day. You

3:19

can't come and see us

3:21

then. And Trump, they did

3:23

Shomer Fokken Shabbas. Yeah. Yeah,

3:25

his own boy, yeah, his

3:27

own boy said, Fok Shomers

3:29

Shabbis. You're meeting with me

3:31

and we're doing this deal.

3:33

Yeah. In fact, there's a

3:35

bit of a freakout right

3:37

now because. There have been

3:39

a couple of appointments, at

3:42

least one appointment, Mike DiMino,

3:44

from defense priorities, which is

3:46

a really good, I don't

3:48

know, conservative slash realist slash,

3:50

you know, kind of, I

3:52

wouldn't say necessarily like fully

3:54

anti-interventionist, but a lot more

3:56

drawn-down sort of view of

3:58

the empire. group of people

4:00

and one of them, Mike

4:02

DiMino, I think we followed

4:04

each other on Twitter at

4:06

least. He was going to,

4:08

he has been nominated to

4:10

a pretty top policy spot

4:12

in the Middle East for

4:14

the Pentagon. And he's on

4:16

record saying he doesn't think

4:18

we should go to war in Iran.

4:21

And that of course is a

4:23

terrible thing. So there's a whole

4:25

campaign by sort of the Apak

4:28

Neokon crowd. to get him removed.

4:30

And because he's on record

4:32

saying he doesn't want a

4:34

war, and the person sort of

4:36

organizing, I was blown away by

4:38

this, the main person organizing all

4:40

of the different sort of media

4:42

attacks and assaults on. on Domeno's

4:44

appointment is none other than David

4:46

Worms or I don't know, maybe

4:48

he flew a little bit under

4:50

the radar in terms of the

4:52

new, you know, the Iraq war

4:54

Neocons, but he was, he was

4:56

an A-lister. I mean, he was, he

4:59

was one of the brain bugs of

5:01

everything, going back to his work for

5:03

Lekkud and Netanyahu in the

5:05

mid-90s, but a big proponent of the

5:07

Iraq war, and then after that war

5:10

went so well, he was already pushing

5:12

for an Iran war. by 2000,

5:14

I don't know, six or seven.

5:16

And I just thought he'd been

5:18

kind of hound, I mistakenly thought

5:20

he'd been kind of hounded out

5:22

of existence a little bit, but

5:25

that didn't happen. They never seem

5:27

to go away. No. They just,

5:30

they've got those think tanks and

5:32

they just burrow deep into the

5:34

mud and then pop out when

5:37

they're needed again. Yeah, it's, you

5:39

know, and I honestly, I blame

5:41

Obama for a lot of that.

5:43

Obama came in and a lot

5:45

of people were ready for accountability

5:47

as the polite word would be.

5:49

And he went up there and

5:51

said, I apologize. Remember how Bush,

5:53

it was such a big deal

5:55

that Bush couldn't say, I apologize.

5:57

It's all that norms and manner,

5:59

manner. and decor and stuff. So

6:01

Obama just ran around and said,

6:04

you guys just stay back there.

6:06

I apologize. I apologize. What are

6:08

you going to do, like attack

6:11

a black man for apologizing? And

6:13

that was it. He ran cover

6:15

for them. In fact, I remember

6:18

it was either right before he

6:20

took office or right after he

6:22

had this sort of, um, peacemaking

6:24

dinner with like a Bill Crystal's

6:27

house that was very widely publicized

6:29

to let them all know that

6:31

basically they were safe and compare

6:34

that to Trump who is all

6:36

about vengeance and you need that

6:38

in politics man yes and he

6:41

did you see what he did

6:43

to Bolton he he he he

6:45

openly shaved his moustache that would

6:48

be nice but in some ways

6:50

kind of better he rescinded Bolton's

6:52

not just his security clearance, so

6:55

we won't have access to classified

6:57

material that he could pass on

6:59

to journalists, but also took away

7:01

his security details since supposedly the

7:04

Iranians want to get him for

7:06

the Sulamanic killing. And then he

7:08

gave a press conference boasting about

7:11

it and he said, I worked

7:13

with him and he was a

7:15

very stupid man, very stupid man,

7:18

but he was useful for me,

7:20

but just a really dumb person,

7:22

you know. I don't disagree with

7:25

that. I mean, I've heard him

7:27

interviewed. He's, he seems to be

7:29

one of those people who functions

7:32

like a door stop. You put

7:34

him in position and he never

7:36

moves no matter what happens. Yes,

7:39

yeah, that's a really good way

7:41

of putting it. So, yeah, I

7:43

mean, it would be nice. I

7:45

mean, it would be nice, if

7:48

you're... for the Democrats, I don't

7:50

even think Democrats are for the

7:52

Democrats anymore at this point. But

7:55

if you had somebody who did

7:57

some accountability like that, real accountability,

7:59

like for people who fuck things

8:02

up. Well, you know, they've been

8:04

saying for 20 years, they finally

8:06

stopped. saying it I gather. When

8:09

they go low we go hard

8:11

and it's like what do you

8:13

just despair of someone like that?

8:16

Yeah. I mean they they saw

8:18

the reaction to Luigi who shot

8:20

a health care executive and there

8:22

was cross-spectrum joy, delight and their

8:25

only reaction was that is shocking.

8:27

That is a sign of how

8:29

bad things have gotten. Yeah, rather

8:32

than, oh, this is an opportunity.

8:34

This is like where our politics

8:36

should move towards. But God forbid,

8:39

they're fools. I mean, it is

8:41

interesting. People have been pointing this

8:43

out. There has been no resistance.

8:46

I mean, both the capital are

8:48

hashtag resistance, but just no resistance.

8:50

at all this time around with

8:53

Trump coming in and Trump is

8:55

Trump the Trump sort of apparatus

8:57

is far more formidable this time

8:59

than last time around I mean

9:02

last time it's funny that it's

9:04

just like no more Mr. Nice

9:06

guy like yeah what nice guy

9:09

last time was the nice but

9:11

yeah I mean Obama could have

9:13

done that Obama just didn't have

9:16

it in him and Rahm Emanuel

9:18

probably wouldn't have let him do

9:20

it anyway or whoever was I

9:23

don't think he had it in

9:25

him he I mean look at

9:27

him as a post president Jimmy

9:30

Carter's going around you know in

9:32

slums and in places where there's

9:34

death and ruin and Obama is

9:36

in Martha's vineyards and hang gliding

9:39

or whatever paragliding with with Richard

9:41

Branson and I mean it's like

9:43

that's that's who he is you

9:46

know and and and Biden Well,

9:48

whatever's left of Biden is, I

9:50

don't want to talk about that

9:53

idiot. But anyway, I just wanted

9:55

to say that this lack of

9:57

resistance, I just saw, I've seen.

10:00

I've seen people kind of try

10:02

and make sense of it a

10:04

little bit. Why there is just this

10:06

sullen, quiet rolling over.

10:09

And, you know, there are a lot of

10:11

reasons, but one thing I want

10:13

to add to this discussion is

10:16

that I think the absence of

10:18

a Russia Gate hysteria is a

10:20

big reason. And I, Russia Gate

10:23

is something that everybody

10:25

to the left of magga. has

10:27

forgotten about, buried, you know,

10:29

for four, they don't, they don't

10:32

really care, don't want to

10:34

talk about it. Trump World,

10:36

MAGA World is still, like, Russia

10:38

Gate is still hot fuel.

10:40

And they want vengeance. I

10:42

can absolutely confirm that because

10:44

they bring it up all

10:46

the time. And the New

10:48

York Times readers just flinch

10:50

away from it and they

10:52

don't want to talk about

10:54

it. But the MAGA people.

10:56

are still furious about it.

10:59

And they know that they're

11:01

in the right on this.

11:03

And they know that their

11:05

opponents are sort of shamed,

11:07

and they're gonna run

11:09

with it forever. And the

11:12

reality is that the

11:14

resistance to Trump, like

11:17

it or not, was

11:19

fueled by this xenophobic

11:22

hysteria. Xenophobia is a

11:24

powerful organizing force. And it's

11:26

not just a force that works

11:29

on the right as we've learned.

11:31

It works for the, it crosses

11:33

party lines. It was a powerful

11:35

organizing force for the resistance. People

11:38

believed deeply, thanks to the

11:40

sort of the media, Democratic

11:42

Party, and the kind of

11:44

Republican establishment as well, the

11:46

McCain's and all those people,

11:49

that They did not believe that

11:51

they lost an election and that

11:53

they were, you know, rejected in

11:55

2016. They couldn't face that. They

11:57

believe that an alien, Asiatic

11:59

bar... had planted their own puppet,

12:02

their mentoring candidate in the

12:04

White House, and used disinformation

12:06

sorcery to subvert our institutions

12:08

in our way of life.

12:10

And people thought they were

12:12

organized out into the street,

12:14

like foaming at the mouth,

12:16

if you watched them as

12:19

NBC for four years, thinking

12:21

there were the heroes in

12:23

Independence Day. And this time

12:25

around, it just, it... They

12:27

all have to recognize no

12:29

one's even pretending Russia won

12:31

this election. They realize they

12:33

lost their losers and they

12:36

were rejected and they have

12:38

to recognize that Trump is

12:40

100% American. The Trump MAGA

12:42

is as American as anything,

12:44

you know, and I think

12:46

that's a big reason why

12:48

they're not out this time

12:50

the way, compared to the

12:53

way they were out in

12:55

2016. There are a lot

12:57

of other reasons too. You

12:59

can't get people worked up

13:01

about the assault on migrants

13:03

because Biden and Harris made

13:05

assaulting immigrants a whole cornerstone

13:07

of their 2016 campaign. Yeah,

13:10

that's what I was going

13:12

to mention, like, in brilliant

13:14

response to the Trump summoning

13:16

of xenophobia, they said, well,

13:18

we can expel Mexicans too.

13:20

Yeah. I mean, too little

13:22

and too late. to make

13:24

any difference in the campaign,

13:27

but early enough for people

13:29

to notice it and realize

13:31

the depth of their amorality.

13:33

Yeah, in fact, I even

13:35

remember when this was some

13:37

brilliant DNC strategist idea, we're

13:39

going to move to the

13:41

right of Trump's immigration policy

13:44

and dare them to pass

13:46

it. And they won't pass

13:48

it because they don't want

13:50

to give the Democrats that

13:52

win. So they put forward

13:54

this bill, Biden's humor, they

13:56

all pushed it. That was.

13:58

to the right of in

14:01

terms of restrictiveness to Trump

14:03

where Trump had been shocked

14:05

everybody and as they calculated

14:07

that the Republicans ultimately didn't

14:09

pass it and then they

14:11

spent the next several months

14:14

mocking the Republicans as soft

14:16

on immigration compared to them like

14:18

who is that even fooling I

14:20

don't think the Republicans in Trump

14:22

need to prove that they're anti-immigrant

14:24

all it did was just make

14:27

Their own base think what

14:29

the fuck you are lying

14:31

to us again. Yeah Yeah,

14:33

yeah, it's it's sort of

14:35

like Well a lot of

14:37

things remind me of election,

14:39

but it's like dirty tricks

14:41

in election You know at the

14:44

high school presidency level you

14:46

you can't jump in late

14:49

and deal with people who

14:51

are really serious about it,

14:53

the way Trump was really

14:56

serious about it. I mean,

14:58

one thing I've noticed

15:00

in years of reading comment

15:03

sections is that if you

15:05

try saying to right-wing

15:07

commenters, which I have

15:09

tried under various identities,

15:12

you really think the

15:14

people with money don't want

15:17

the immigrants, they want

15:19

them here. They're easy

15:21

to manipulate. They're frightened

15:23

and they don't demand anything.

15:26

They never answer. They know

15:28

that. They know very well that

15:30

they're being fooled. But they

15:32

sort of want to call

15:34

in an air strike on their

15:37

own position because they're so pissed

15:39

off. Yeah. I mean, that's people, you

15:41

know, I don't know, like, it's not

15:43

pretend that that's not how people, that's

15:46

not who we are. Yes, we are.

15:48

That is who we are. And, you

15:50

know, tap into that and use it

15:52

in a different direction, in a

15:54

better direction, instead of... But,

15:57

you know, they're still saying

15:59

that, I mean... someone who'll

16:01

shall be nameless was scolding

16:04

like Chapotrop House and Radio

16:06

Warner for using mean rhetoric

16:09

and you just despair. It's

16:11

like you've learned nothing? Yeah.

16:13

Well anyway, plenty of other

16:16

polite podcast out there I'm

16:18

sure. But not ours I

16:21

guess. So, where do we

16:23

want to start? Well, I

16:26

guess we kind of started

16:28

already, you know, in a

16:31

sense with Trump. Yeah, immigration

16:33

is really dramatic. Yes. I'm

16:36

already seeing videos people are

16:38

putting out of raids in

16:41

some of the cities that

16:43

had defined themselves as refuge

16:46

cities for migrants, are the

16:48

first ones that are being

16:51

targeted. I saw some of

16:53

this in Boston, Chicago. And

16:56

he's sent, I guess, 1,500

16:58

troops to the Mexican border,

17:01

but apparently it's going to

17:03

be 10,000 total. Whatever that's

17:06

going to do, I'm not

17:08

sure, but it's happening. I

17:10

think it does, it does

17:13

probably filter down to people

17:15

who want to try to

17:18

cross the border that now

17:20

may not be the right

17:23

time. I mean, it probably

17:25

will lower. crossings in a

17:28

big way just because... But

17:30

you know, I was wondering

17:33

what it might do because

17:35

it could be a moment,

17:38

although this would give an

17:40

awful lot of credit to

17:43

the progressive opposition. Credit doesn't

17:45

really deserve, but you know,

17:48

I remember the moment when

17:50

the Dred Scott decision came

17:53

down and mobs in Boston

17:55

actually fought the police to...

17:58

protect slaves who'd escaped. to

18:00

New England from being retaken

18:03

back to the South. I don't

18:05

really think that will happen,

18:07

but it is possible that,

18:09

I mean, the Mexican community

18:11

or the Central American Hispanic

18:14

community will react. Churches, I

18:16

think, well, that's what happened

18:18

in the 80s, when the

18:20

dirty wars, Reagan's dirty war

18:22

since, you know, I don't

18:25

know, a couple million at

18:27

least, refugees into America.

18:30

they were given sanctuary,

18:32

sanctuary cities, right? They

18:35

were given sanctuary churches,

18:37

and then that movement

18:39

got raided and infiltrated

18:42

by the FBI and

18:44

other spooky forces. But

18:46

I think, yeah, I

18:48

would imagine churches particularly

18:51

and, yeah, Latino, like

18:53

communities. Well, I was

18:55

also looking into the

18:57

history of armed. Latino

18:59

resistance, not that I

19:02

think that's very likely,

19:05

but it's a distant

19:07

possibility when people

19:09

are humiliated and

19:12

when they're armed. There

19:14

are some interesting precedents,

19:17

like I've mentioned the

19:19

Green March a few

19:21

times in which a

19:23

few, sorry, many hundreds

19:26

of thousands of Moroccan

19:28

without weapons, just marched

19:30

into the desert of

19:32

what had been the

19:35

Spanish Sahara, which Spain

19:37

was now abandoning, and

19:39

dared the Spanish troops

19:41

who were sort of

19:43

lackadaisically manning the outpost

19:45

and just waiting to

19:47

go home, to shoot

19:49

them, and they didn't.

19:52

So Morocco claimed the

19:54

Spanish Sahara, or what

19:56

had been the Spanish Sahara,

19:59

by by a nonviolent invasion.

20:01

Of course, it's tricky because

20:04

Palestinians tried to claim some

20:06

of their land in the

20:08

same way. And you know,

20:11

the idea doesn't have those

20:13

qualms. They fired and a

20:16

lot of people were shot.

20:18

But there could be some

20:20

possibility of large scale. civil

20:23

disobedience just to see if

20:25

the American truth would open

20:28

fire, except I think they

20:30

would. But if they did,

20:32

then that's kind of an

20:35

interesting reaction to. I mean,

20:37

there have been a lot

20:40

of well-organized radical Hispanic groups.

20:42

I mean... But there's been

20:44

nothing like armed revolt as

20:47

far as I can tell

20:49

by Hispanic groups, but there's,

20:52

um, well, you know, yeah,

20:54

well, that was sort of

20:56

spontaneous, though, I don't think

20:59

it kept up for very

21:01

long, but, uh, there have

21:04

been, I mean, there's, I

21:06

mean, there's Vince at Ramos,

21:08

which actually was headquartered around

21:11

Stanford. I checked that out.

21:13

It was really weird history.

21:16

The non-violent, of course, United

21:18

Farm Workers, but they were

21:20

very powerful. Very, very active.

21:23

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. The

21:25

Zachavas was amazing. In fact,

21:28

I still don't understand why

21:30

he doesn't get the respect

21:32

he deserves. I mean, he

21:35

left his kind of flinch

21:37

away when he's mentioned, and

21:40

I don't quite get why,

21:42

but... I haven't heard that

21:44

he killed anybody or anything.

21:47

But he was not as,

21:49

it's a good question actually.

21:52

I was going to say

21:54

he was not, he went

21:56

through a couple of incarnations.

21:59

And he was, as they

22:01

say, a complicated figure.

22:03

If you look what he

22:06

did for farm workers, which

22:08

were the most underrepresented powerless

22:11

workers in the country, it's

22:13

extraordinary and overwhelmingly, of course,

22:15

you know, Hispanic, Latino, it's

22:18

extraordinary what he did. But

22:20

I think a lot of

22:23

his tactics, some of his...

22:25

shifts made people uneasy.

22:27

I'm sure there were personal

22:29

issues. Him being a leader

22:32

and all that's some other

22:34

reasons. He does get, he

22:36

does get some respect,

22:38

but not on the level of

22:40

Martin Luther King or Malcolm

22:43

X. Yeah. And if we're

22:45

talking like minority leaders.

22:47

Yeah. But what about, I'm

22:50

just reminded of that

22:52

that Hunter Thompson article. Yeah,

22:54

on the on the on

22:56

the on Rubens Salazar who

22:58

was right. Is that the

23:00

one that you're talking about?

23:02

And I'm talking about when

23:04

he describes being with his

23:07

attorney who's accompanied by about

23:09

a dozen brown burets who

23:12

are Hispanic militants and

23:14

kind of scary. And

23:16

he keeps muttering to

23:18

himself about. how he's got

23:20

a 357 slug for them.

23:23

So I think they were

23:25

fairly intimidating as a group

23:27

and they were avowedly willing

23:30

to use violence, more or

23:32

less modeled on the Black

23:34

Panthers, but I don't know

23:37

what happened to them. They

23:39

don't seem to be around

23:42

now. So there was an

23:44

article that... It's in the

23:46

great shark hunt that Hunter Thompson

23:48

wrote in the early 70s. And

23:50

I just looked it up. It's

23:52

called Strange Rumblings, and Azotlan.

23:55

Azotlan is like the Mexico

23:57

that retakes its land stolen

23:59

from them. And it's about

24:01

the killing of Ruben Salazar.

24:03

I don't know if you

24:05

remember that article or it's,

24:07

you know, that entry in

24:09

the Great Sharkon. It's a

24:11

very, as I recall, it's

24:13

been a long time, it's

24:16

a very long article and

24:18

it's very much, as I

24:20

recall, a serious, more or

24:22

less straightforward, you know, not

24:24

gonzo, but much more kind

24:26

of straightforward. I think because

24:28

he had a lot of

24:31

respect for the story he

24:33

was writing. And it was

24:35

kind of about the... beginnings

24:37

of Chicano activism like in

24:39

a big way, there was

24:41

an anti-war rally in 1970

24:43

in Los Angeles put on

24:46

by a, I don't know,

24:48

a Chicano movement and LAPD

24:50

fired tear gas as was

24:52

their want and Salazar who

24:54

was a reporter. for a

24:56

Spanish language station in L.A.

24:58

and I guess he was

25:01

a calmness for the L.A.

25:03

Times. He was hit in

25:05

the head by a tear

25:07

gas shell and killed, I

25:09

believe. Yeah, he was killed.

25:11

And that radicalized the Chicana

25:13

movement in sort of the

25:15

early mid-70s. And yeah, his

25:18

lawyer, the guy who's described

25:20

as my lawyer, is, you

25:22

know, one of the great

25:24

buddy flicks of all time

25:26

or buddy stories of all

25:28

time. Fear of living in

25:30

Las Vegas, yeah. So there's

25:33

that connection. And he sort

25:35

of spun out and, I

25:37

mean, well, that may be

25:39

what happened to a lot

25:41

of brown burets. Like, it

25:43

was a time when a

25:45

lot of people spun out.

25:48

And I don't know, I

25:50

don't know what happened to

25:52

them. But there's, there's certainly

25:54

a tradition and there's good

25:56

enough reason for, Latino Chicano

25:58

organizing in opposition to a

26:00

right wing government. And I

26:03

don't know. you're kind of

26:05

poking the bear a little,

26:07

like, I don't know if

26:09

it will happen, but there

26:11

are other examples, like, you

26:13

know, examples of, say,

26:16

non-political money-making

26:18

organizations that

26:21

are ethnically restrictive

26:24

that have expanded

26:27

into insurgency. I mean,

26:29

in Southeast Asia, in

26:31

Latin America, all over

26:34

the place, actually. There

26:36

are examples of

26:38

organizations that champion

26:41

or pretend to

26:43

champion various oppressed

26:45

groups because it's

26:47

good for their

26:49

recruiting, it's good

26:51

for their general

26:53

reputation, and it generally

26:56

ends pretty badly

26:58

for everybody except

27:00

the top leadership.

27:02

But if the US

27:04

does get really radically

27:07

Trumpy, it's possible that,

27:09

you know, other powers

27:11

will be sufficiently

27:14

alienated to

27:16

start funding something like

27:18

that. Right. On the

27:21

other hand, you know,

27:23

famously came out that

27:25

Latino males in particular,

27:28

probably a majority voted

27:30

for Trump this time.

27:32

That was a really big swing. In

27:34

fact, here's just some stats.

27:37

Close to one in 10

27:39

people in the United States,

27:41

about 32 million are

27:43

Hispanic males. And then

27:45

there's an equal number

27:47

essentially of Hispanic women.

27:49

Latino males are younger than

27:51

men in the U.S. overall,

27:53

have a higher participation in

27:55

the workforce than any other

27:57

racial group. And exepoles showed

27:59

from NBC anyway showed Trump

28:02

won 55% from Hispanic men.

28:04

Some progressive groups reported it

28:06

was lower. So I guess,

28:08

you know, it depends on

28:10

the poll and the biases

28:12

of the poll. I don't

28:15

know that NBC was looking

28:17

to overstate it. No, I

28:19

believe that there's there. This

28:21

was a very gendered election

28:23

and in a way that

28:26

was completely bungled by the

28:28

DNC. Yeah. There

28:30

are Latino and well Latino

28:32

in particular is a vast

28:35

group and a really Multi

28:37

multi oriented group and some

28:39

of the newer factions Who

28:42

will have been kicked out

28:44

might not react in the

28:47

same way because I've seen

28:49

the stats on Hispanic families

28:51

reaction to uncontrolled immigration. And

28:54

it's the same as what

28:56

the Irish were. It's like,

28:59

you know, like, oh, we're

29:01

being persecuted. It's the Protestants

29:03

and then within a couple

29:06

of generations, ah, throw them

29:08

all out. You know, that's

29:10

what happens. There's a lot

29:13

of like Mexican-American sort of

29:15

that attitude. as happens to

29:18

with, yeah, as you said,

29:20

most, most immigrant groups that

29:22

are first persecuted, then become

29:25

Americanized and become in some

29:27

ways more, you know, more

29:30

worked up about immigration than

29:32

other groups. There, a lot

29:34

of them have been very

29:37

anti, like the Venezuelan migrations,

29:39

it's a lot of Venezuelan

29:42

migration groups. Migration waves since

29:44

Obama slapped these heavy sanctions

29:46

on Venezuela. I think back

29:49

in 2015, and then Trump

29:51

tightened them to a whole

29:54

new level. And it just,

29:56

I mean, it's just a

29:58

cause and effect. immediate waves.

30:01

Also, you know, Honduras and

30:03

some of the Central American

30:06

countries. And Mexican, I mean,

30:08

a lot of Mexican Americans

30:11

don't want to be identified

30:13

with those new groups because

30:15

new immigrant groups You know

30:17

they they attract a lot of

30:19

attention. I mean this happened with

30:21

Jews the German Jews didn't want

30:23

the East European Jews coming in

30:25

because it made them look bad

30:27

These European Jews were poor a

30:29

lot of them were involved in

30:31

crime. It's the same god damn

30:34

thing every time you know Yeah,

30:36

so yeah, and that's happening

30:38

there so it's as a large. There's

30:40

a wide variety But more than that

30:42

in the sense. There's not a whole

30:44

lot of organized left radicalism,

30:47

I guess. Luigi radicalism there.

30:49

And that cuts across every

30:51

demographic right now. There just

30:53

isn't. Yeah, well, it wouldn't

30:55

have to be left exactly.

30:57

Yeah. It would have to

30:59

be ethnic chauvinist. Yes. I

31:01

don't really think there's a

31:03

lot of that. Yeah, that's

31:06

a lawnmoor. Yeah, that's true.

31:08

It's hard, you know, at

31:10

some point that might have

31:12

been called left, but it's

31:14

more just nationalist or ethnonationalist

31:16

or something, which

31:19

it gets tricky. Yeah, so moving on,

31:21

I did see he's trying to

31:23

end birthright citizenship, which

31:25

is in the 14th Amendment. If

31:28

you're born here, you're automatically

31:30

a citizen. They're trying to

31:33

come up with, I remember

31:35

first seeing this when I was

31:37

like, you know, researching the

31:39

libertarians and Ron Paul. I

31:41

mean, Ron Paul has been

31:43

pushing for this for many,

31:46

many years and end to

31:48

birthright citizenship. And, but

31:50

Ron Paul has also been for

31:52

open borders, more or less.

31:54

And it's pretty clear why. Like,

31:57

it, yes, they can come in, but

31:59

no, they can. have any rights,

32:01

like what Koch brother wouldn't

32:03

want that, you know. Yeah.

32:05

So, but Trump is trying

32:07

to make this law. It's

32:09

extremely unlikely that he's going

32:11

to be able to push

32:13

that through with like an

32:15

executive order. It's probably going

32:17

to, I mean, almost for

32:19

sure it's going to have

32:21

to become a constitutional amendment

32:23

in order to change that

32:25

because the language is pretty

32:27

damn clear in the 14th

32:29

Amendment. in the Constitution. And

32:31

it's hard to get an

32:33

amendment passed, especially like this,

32:35

but I could see the

32:37

political angles. I mean, anti-abortion

32:39

was such an organizer, even

32:41

though it was a large,

32:43

worked-up minority that helped fuel

32:45

election victories for Republicans. But

32:48

now that they got Roe

32:50

rescinded, it's kind of become

32:52

a political negative. certainly hurt

32:54

them in 2022. And if,

32:56

you know, if they're able

32:58

to push that further, for

33:00

example, actually a national ban

33:02

on abortions, for example, like

33:04

I think that would seriously

33:06

hurt the Republicans, and Trump

33:08

has been on record not

33:10

wanting that. But if, but

33:12

I could see how pushing

33:14

for an end of birthright

33:16

citizenship could. could work in

33:18

a similar way. It would

33:20

take a long time to

33:22

get a constitutional amendment like

33:24

that passed a very long

33:26

time, but it could it

33:28

could divide and conquer in

33:30

elections. Who is for immigrants

33:32

and who's against immigrants, illegal

33:34

immigrants, you know? And so

33:36

I think maybe they're testing

33:38

it out to see if

33:41

this is going to be

33:43

a big GOP organizer for

33:45

future elections. And the other

33:47

constitutional amendment, I saw this

33:49

Republican already is proposing in

33:51

the House, is to repeal

33:53

the 22nd Amendment, which puts

33:55

a term limit on president.

33:57

He wants Trump to have

33:59

a third term. And so

34:01

they want to have a

34:03

new constitutional amendment allowing presidents

34:05

to have as many terms as they want

34:07

in power again. And I bet you just

34:09

more of that. The guy, yeah. The

34:11

guy looks like he's on his last

34:14

legs. I know. I can't believe he's

34:16

thinking about a third term, but who

34:18

knows? Maybe they have secret documents. No,

34:20

I know he's in perfect shape. I

34:22

mean, I'm sure he probably has that

34:24

from some sick of... You know, you

34:26

can get doctors to tell you anything,

34:28

anything, I guess. But yeah, I look

34:30

at him, I think like, I think

34:33

we're gonna have a war in

34:35

Harding or a FDR four situation

34:37

with him. He does not look

34:39

in good shape at all. He's not

34:42

gonna last. Yeah, like Biden's

34:44

brain is rotted, but the

34:46

body still seems more or less.

34:48

Oh yeah, he runs around on

34:50

his little bike and whatever and

34:53

maybe do yourself for all. Yeah,

34:55

it's too bad. He doesn't run

34:57

into the freeway. Yeah. He's spry.

35:00

Yeah. Right. Did you want to

35:02

say anything about Musk's Nazi

35:05

salute or awkward gesture? I

35:07

don't know if you saw

35:09

this. I think the ADL

35:11

came out and said, Oh,

35:13

that was hilarious. We denounced

35:16

ourselves for having a, you

35:18

know, having run cover for

35:20

this. And we now say

35:22

it was a bad thing.

35:24

Yeah. Because, I mean, Elon,

35:26

that was one moment I

35:29

actually sympathize with Elon. Like,

35:31

the ADL, a totally corrupt

35:33

organization, says, now, let's not

35:35

go all off half-cocked. It

35:37

might be anything. He might

35:40

have just had an arm

35:42

spass. He has special needs.

35:45

And then, yeah, special needs.

35:47

And then, Elon. I imagine

35:50

trying to be funny.

35:52

post a tweet with

35:54

like eight bad

35:57

Nazi jokes in

35:59

a row. And then the ADL

36:01

says, that's not funny, you

36:03

laugh. You're making us look

36:05

bad, you know, I thought

36:07

we had a deal. Yeah,

36:10

it's really amazing. To me,

36:12

it looked like Musk had

36:14

decided he was going to

36:16

do that well before, practiced

36:18

that Nazi salute in the

36:20

mirror, knew and riled that

36:22

he wants people talking about

36:24

him, you know. practiced it,

36:26

was nervous, took some gummies,

36:28

was clearly tripping out on

36:30

some cocktail of something while

36:33

he was there having a

36:35

good time, and then when

36:37

it finally came for his

36:39

moment, he rushed it kind

36:41

of, you know, you can

36:43

see he was nervous when

36:45

he did it, it was

36:47

like, ah, and so it

36:49

was done, it was an

36:51

awkward gesture because it was

36:53

done a bit awkwardly. But

36:56

he got everybody talking about

36:58

him and yeah, and then

37:00

when the ADL ran cover

37:02

form it was almost like

37:04

he was annoyed like no

37:06

I want everybody to be

37:08

angry Yep, yeah, and he

37:10

had a bit of a

37:12

real snarl at the time

37:14

too. I mean, yeah, I

37:16

think there's some real nastiness

37:19

under there except it's it's

37:21

in so much chaos that

37:23

it doesn't get out very

37:25

easily. I just thought it

37:27

was interesting that the ADL

37:29

which You know, as I

37:31

got to know personally, had

37:33

secretly allied with apartheid South

37:35

Africa's intelligence agencies to spy

37:37

on Americans, including Nancy Pelosi

37:39

and Ron Dellums and Alan

37:42

Cranston and the ACLU and

37:44

so on, and passed information

37:46

back to basically the Gestapo.

37:48

Yeah, then the ADO runs

37:50

cover for this. white South

37:52

Africans Nazi salute. It's like

37:54

it's totally consistent. And meanwhile

37:56

wearing a kaffia is evidence

37:58

of anti-Semitic machinations. Also, Netanyahu,

38:01

famous Holocaust expert,

38:03

came out also and ran cover

38:05

for Elon and said, no,

38:07

that was, that was nothing

38:10

bad. Benjamin, Netanyahu, who famously

38:12

said that the Holocaust, Hitler

38:14

didn't want to do the

38:16

Holocaust. He was more or

38:18

less all right with Jews.

38:20

And then the Mufti, the

38:22

Palestinian Mufti, visited him

38:24

in the late 30s and

38:27

retroactively wrote mine comp for

38:29

him and like zapped little

38:31

like Palestinian rays into Hitler's

38:34

eyes and turned him into

38:36

a Holocaust lover after that.

38:38

I mean, I actually said

38:41

that by the way. I

38:43

know, I remember it's like,

38:45

yeah, because the Germans in

38:48

the 1930s desperately needed

38:50

intellectual input from

38:52

the the peasants of the

38:54

Middle East. Yeah. Yeah. They

38:57

weren't sure until that

38:59

happened. Yeah, it's a

39:01

very ridiculous time right

39:03

now. Yeah, we're gonna be, I

39:06

mean, I guess wrapping up the

39:08

border part of this, you

39:10

know, border is going to

39:12

be again a very, an

39:14

ongoing story because both

39:16

closing off the borders

39:19

and with Canada. It's

39:21

hard not to it's hard not to

39:23

cheer that in some way. I mean,

39:25

he better not close it for tourism

39:27

because it's the easiest way for us

39:29

to get to a big city is

39:32

from here to go into Toronto. But

39:34

just in terms of putting a

39:36

bug up some of the Canadians,

39:38

but it's it is mildly amusing.

39:40

I don't expect a lot to

39:42

really come from it. But to

39:44

troll Justin Trudeau and basically

39:46

ruined Justin Trudeau's career. fuck

39:48

Justin Trudeau because Trudeau didn't

39:50

handle his Trump meeting very

39:52

well. I think that was

39:54

kind of the last straw

39:56

after a series of straws

39:59

and Trump. to him as

40:01

the governor of the great state

40:03

of Canada. That was funny. You

40:05

know, you got to admit it.

40:08

Yeah. Oh, well, he's definitely funny.

40:10

He's funny in a bare lusconi

40:12

way. Yeah. And that will take

40:15

you a long way. I was

40:17

surprised to see that he had

40:20

a bit of his humor left

40:22

because this Trump is also kind

40:24

of a low energy Trump. Like

40:27

if again, if you listen to

40:29

his inaugural speech this time compared

40:32

to If you go back and

40:34

listen to how he was, there's

40:36

just not a lot of energy

40:39

in his voice. He is older.

40:41

I mean, he is fucking old,

40:44

78, and not healthy, but he

40:46

still has a few good one-liners

40:48

and a few good burns in

40:51

him, and so at least we'll

40:53

get a little bit of that

40:55

side along with all the horribleness

40:58

that we're going to get from

41:00

Trump. I mean, I think the

41:03

bullying is the last to go.

41:05

I mean, it's such a... sadistically

41:07

satisfying part of your brain that

41:10

I would think it lasts till

41:12

the last minute. I mean, for

41:15

me, it's like Dr. Hubit, like,

41:17

you know, the dollx, like they're

41:19

totally crippled and stuck in these

41:22

little machines, but the one thing

41:24

that sticks in their brains is

41:26

Exterminate! Exterminate! Yeah. Well, you see

41:29

that with Biden. I mean, there

41:31

is nothing like the Biden's brain

41:34

except Exterminate. It's all he thinks

41:36

about is there's nothing left. It's

41:38

just, I killed a lot of

41:41

people. They're going to be writing

41:43

great history books about me. But

41:46

what I was going to say

41:48

is on the one hand, closing

41:50

off borders and on the other

41:53

hand expanding borders, buying or taking

41:55

Greenland, taking the Panama Canal supposedly.

41:58

taking Canada. You know, it's the,

42:00

it's old school. American imperialism shut

42:02

off the borders, but also expand

42:05

the borders. It's an old story

42:07

of this country. And we will

42:09

have more to say about that.

42:12

Let's move on to forward.

42:14

Yeah, well, also exporting the

42:16

grief, exporting the rage, opening

42:19

up a new front. That's

42:21

classic. That's a great point

42:23

because I listened again to

42:26

another sort of, I don't know.

42:28

sound bites, a few sound bites

42:30

of Trump this morning on the

42:32

radio. And he's talking about, I

42:34

can't remember regarding which country, Canada

42:37

or whoever, about our countries,

42:39

everybody is ripping America off.

42:41

Everybody's having a laugh at

42:43

America and ripping everybody and

42:45

ripping us off. And that's

42:47

going to change. And that's

42:49

what the tariffs are about.

42:51

And that's what America First

42:53

is about. That's a really

42:55

strong, I have to say, message,

42:57

because the opposite of that

43:00

message, which is the message

43:02

of the Democratic Party, and

43:04

what used to be the Republican

43:06

Party establishment, is we are the

43:09

leaders of the world, and the

43:11

world looks up to us, and

43:13

we must lead, and this is

43:16

how we'll lead. In other words,

43:18

it's more about, like, no, we

43:20

actually rule the world, and it's

43:22

all for good. the world gets

43:25

better and we get better and

43:27

that appeals to a class of

43:29

people in america demographic basically

43:31

people with higher education yeah

43:34

higher incomes yes absolutely i

43:36

mean if you're doing well

43:38

that's a good message if

43:40

you're not doing well and

43:43

you feel laughed out by

43:45

every movie you see then

43:47

no it's not going to work

43:49

yeah so let's get to Israel

43:51

and Gaza I mean At least

43:53

some good news, there is

43:55

a ceasefire. The ceasefire, we

43:58

talked about it some with. John

44:00

Elmer in the episode before

44:02

two episodes ago. It is

44:04

holding still. I don't know.

44:06

It's anybody's guess whether it's

44:08

going to hold or not.

44:10

But I guess a few

44:12

things that sort of do

44:14

stand out. One is Israel

44:16

is turning its attention back

44:18

on what matters most to

44:21

the Israeli right, which is,

44:23

as they call it, Judea

44:25

and Samaria, the West Bank,

44:27

with this Gaza-style operation on

44:29

Janine. And you know you

44:31

can see why BB has

44:33

so much room to operate

44:35

there was a pole taken

44:37

and the percentage of the

44:39

Israeli public that considered the

44:41

measures in Gaza might have

44:43

been too extreme. Two percent.

44:45

Yeah, two percent. It's amazing.

44:47

Two percent. Yeah, and I've

44:49

heard some, the few Israeli

44:51

anti-war people I've heard on,

44:54

you know. talking in different

44:56

shows. Say it's because these

44:58

Israelis are not getting the

45:00

same, like they're getting a

45:02

very sort of circumscribed view

45:04

of what's going on in

45:06

Gaza. But we had a

45:08

friend of the show and

45:10

Israeli in the Radio Warner

45:12

community saying that's really not

45:14

true. They're getting, and I

45:16

know this from being an

45:18

American and all the wars

45:20

we're in, like they are

45:22

getting the information. if they

45:25

want to absorb it. It's

45:27

just that everybody has put

45:29

a little shield over themselves

45:31

and they're absorbing what they

45:33

want to absorb and not

45:35

absorbing what they don't want

45:37

to absorb. Yeah, just think

45:39

of how Americans reacted to

45:41

the bombing of Iraq in

45:43

the early stages of the

45:45

war. I mean, those were

45:47

big, big bombs and you

45:49

had to realize if you

45:51

wanted to. That it would

45:53

not be such a clean

45:56

operation and a lot of

45:58

people huddling in there, you

46:00

know. concrete, walled bedrooms

46:02

would die. But that was

46:04

a bummer and nobody wanted

46:07

to think that. Before we

46:09

move on, I just want to

46:11

say something about, and

46:14

it's a very pedantic

46:16

point, about Trump's project

46:18

to rename the Gulf

46:20

of Mexico to the

46:22

Gulf of America.

46:24

This triggers my little

46:26

pedantic instinct because Look,

46:29

if you walk down

46:31

to the sea on

46:33

the west coast of

46:35

Britain, you have a

46:37

view of salt water.

46:40

And that salt water

46:42

is called the Irish

46:44

Sea. It is not

46:46

called that because the

46:48

Irish dominated the place.

46:51

Oh, contrary. It's because

46:53

the people who did

46:55

dominate the place, the British.

46:57

thought of that as, oh,

47:00

that's where the foreigners start.

47:02

You know, like the old

47:04

jokes about wags begin at

47:06

Calais. And in the same

47:08

way, Gulf of Mexico, this

47:11

is where we end

47:13

this big dominant Anglo

47:15

culture and something else

47:17

begins. So it's not

47:19

evidence that the Mexicans

47:21

have been repressing us

47:24

all this time. It's funny,

47:26

but it's so classic Trump. I

47:28

mean, I'm, I'm, I feel like something

47:31

is going to be named

47:33

Trump, maybe Greenland will be

47:35

renamed Trump land or something

47:37

like his name. Something will

47:39

get Trump's name on it.

47:41

And we've done sort of

47:43

bipartisan stuff that was just

47:46

as stupid like freedom fries

47:48

and all that. Yes. Yeah,

47:50

okay. So getting back to

47:52

the world. just this morning I think

47:54

it was and Netanyahu said that actually

47:56

they're not fully withdrawing troops from

47:58

Lebanon by the day. deadline of

48:01

the ceasefire deal. I don't

48:03

think anybody is surprised by

48:05

that. I think at this

48:07

point, most people don't really

48:09

expect what they hope for

48:12

is no more large-scale bombing.

48:14

And nobody expects Israel to

48:16

be anything less than what

48:18

Israel does, which is violating

48:20

deals, violating ceasefires, keeping troops

48:23

where they are. But so

48:25

long as they're not spreading

48:27

complete mayhem. That at least

48:29

for a while, I think,

48:31

is enough for a lot

48:33

of people for now. It's

48:36

my sense anyway. Moving over

48:38

to Syria, where of course

48:40

they're also staying beyond their

48:42

welcome and holding on to

48:44

a nice big chunk of

48:47

territory on top of the

48:49

Golan Heights, Syria's going on.

48:51

Apparently the quiet cooperation of

48:53

Shalani. Yeah. That fierce radical.

48:55

Yes. His foreign minister, who

48:58

was also a member of

49:00

al-Qaeda, was the toast of

49:02

Davos, the Davos World Economic

49:04

Forum Conference. And Tony Blair

49:06

brought his microphone and headphones

49:08

there for his podcast, and

49:11

he interviewed this former al-Qaeda

49:13

butcher turned foreign minister. And

49:15

in their interview, Syria's new

49:17

foreign minister said that they

49:19

plan on doing mass privatization.

49:22

and bringing in foreign investors.

49:24

What are the odds, man?

49:26

I mean, all this is

49:28

just music to their ears.

49:30

It's funny how that works,

49:33

isn't it? Solophism and free

49:35

market economics. Oh, my God.

49:37

Yeah, it does have a

49:39

flavor of worst of all

49:41

worlds. Yes, like. Yeah. And

49:43

then of course, the other

49:46

story, and you mentioned it

49:48

here, and I've been following

49:50

a friend of the show,

49:52

controversial friend of the show.

49:54

Joshua Landis on this, but

49:57

yeah, the police, the new

49:59

police for Syria. are going

50:01

through basically jihadist

50:03

indoctrination training or, you

50:05

know, Islamism training, I

50:08

guess, which is a

50:10

way to weed out

50:12

minorities and secular people.

50:15

But the assaults on all

50:17

the whites have been ongoing,

50:20

widespread, brutal, and

50:22

it's being blacked out

50:24

as much as possible. I

50:26

mean, you know, the memo

50:29

went down. to the local

50:31

level, to the various groups

50:33

that you don't film and

50:35

post this anymore. Do it,

50:37

but don't post it. And that's

50:40

ongoing and Joshua Landis

50:42

has been documenting a lot

50:45

of this on his Twitter

50:47

feed and it's brutal and no

50:49

one cares because all you have

50:52

to do is attach pro

50:54

Assad or, you know, Assad. friend

50:56

whatever just pro-assawed olive whites

50:58

and that's it do what

51:01

you want so no one really

51:03

gives a shit it's very surprising

51:05

to me I thought I don't

51:08

know I guess I was raised

51:10

on like you know that Woodward

51:12

and Bernstein generation and Seymour Hirsch

51:15

and I thought I really had

51:17

a funny and rather stupid idea

51:19

about journalists I guess but I

51:21

thought they were a lot braver

51:24

yeah It keeps surprising me less and

51:26

less. I mean, we've been calling

51:28

this out for more years than

51:30

I want to think about, but

51:32

certainly since the start of the

51:34

exile in 97. And yet it

51:36

still shocks. And I think it's because

51:39

that period, that Glasnos period

51:41

in the 70s, made such

51:43

a powerful impression. And people

51:45

keep repeating over and over.

51:48

That's what American journalism is,

51:50

even though it hasn't been that.

51:52

It's just been degradation ever since

51:54

then, you know, step by step.

51:57

But it's still shocking. It still

51:59

is. Yes. shocking, does not

52:01

cease to shock. Right, speaking

52:03

of journalism, the New York

52:05

Times today, I guess it

52:07

was yesterday, had a piece

52:10

on the Ukraine war. The

52:12

headline is, Ukraine is losing

52:14

fewer soldiers than Russia, but

52:16

it's still losing the war.

52:18

But what the article really

52:20

is about, is about how

52:22

devastatingly large. Ukraine's losses are

52:24

and how little effort there's

52:26

been into finding out what

52:29

their losses are. This is

52:31

the first time I recall

52:33

the New York Times seriously

52:35

trying to investigate this because

52:37

there are a lot of

52:39

foundation-funded media projects and mainstream

52:41

media outlets and intelligence agency

52:43

analysts geared towards adding up

52:45

Russian losses, Russian casualties. And

52:48

the goal has always been

52:50

to show that Russia is

52:52

casualties are so large that

52:54

all we have to do

52:56

is hold out another three

52:58

or four months and it's

53:00

over. And this has been

53:02

going on since the middle

53:04

of 2022. But never anything

53:07

on the Ukrainian losses. So

53:09

this is the first time

53:11

we're now three years into

53:13

the war. And they point

53:15

out there are a couple

53:17

of open source sites and

53:19

also open source, open source,

53:21

open source. intelligence, you know,

53:23

all the belling cats and

53:26

all the, all the spawns

53:28

of belling cat have also

53:30

been tallying up, again, this

53:32

is just another type of

53:34

propaganda, but tallying up Russian

53:36

losses, Russian armor losses, and

53:38

so on and so forth,

53:40

but they don't do that

53:42

for the Ukrainians. And it

53:45

turns out there are a

53:47

couple of Ukrainian oriented, very

53:49

small, very little known websites

53:51

that have tried to use

53:53

some of the similar... open

53:55

source documentations like funerals and

53:57

things and obituaries to try

53:59

to get a number. And

54:02

they're coming up with a

54:04

number roughly of 100,000 Ukrainian

54:06

soldiers dead by

54:08

December, probably closer to

54:10

150,000. That sounds right to

54:13

me. And Russian dead about

54:15

150,000, maybe some more, maybe

54:17

less. But of course,

54:20

that's far more devastating

54:22

for Ukraine because Ukraine

54:25

has a far smaller

54:27

population than Russia. And

54:29

perhaps worse than that,

54:31

because Ukraine is able to,

54:33

Ukraine has a full-on draft

54:36

in the way Russia doesn't.

54:38

Ukraine could presumably, I mean,

54:40

on paper they feel more

54:42

troops in the war in

54:45

the battlefront than Russia, but

54:47

in reality, they don't because

54:50

of mass desertions, because

54:52

of incredible corruption

54:54

where you have ghost

54:56

brigades and commanders. basically

54:59

rent seeking, rent

55:02

extracting off of

55:04

conscripts and everything

55:07

is just very hollowed

55:09

out. I mean, Ukraine

55:12

had an official population

55:14

of 37 million, I

55:17

see, in 2023, and

55:19

that population dropped

55:23

particularly for draft

55:25

age males. as soon as

55:27

the war was a prospect.

55:30

I mean, we interviewed

55:32

someone who was getting

55:34

out of Ukraine. Yeah,

55:36

because he thought he

55:38

might be drafted. And

55:40

when you talk to

55:42

people as we have

55:44

recently from the Balkans

55:47

or Central Europe, They

55:49

talk about the flood

55:51

of young Ukrainians who

55:53

have come into their

55:55

country since the invasion.

55:57

And there aren't that

55:59

many. young Ukrainians. The birth

56:01

rate, the fertility rate is

56:04

1.26 births per woman and

56:06

that's not much of a

56:08

birth rate. And yeah, that's

56:11

an awful lot of casualties

56:13

for a population that size.

56:16

Their population was officially 37

56:18

million. I think it was

56:20

closer to about 32 because

56:23

they had such mass... sort

56:25

of work migration, especially after

56:27

the Maidan Revolution in 2014,

56:30

it became much more of

56:32

a remittance economy. One of

56:35

the world's largest remittance economy,

56:37

that is to say workers

56:39

moved to Russia, Poland, wherever

56:42

they could, between 2014 and

56:44

22, and then sent their,

56:46

or a big part of

56:49

their paychecks back home. And

56:51

then you had a massive...

56:54

wave of immigration after the

56:56

war started. I mean, their

56:58

population, I would guess, is

57:01

more, is closer to around

57:03

25 million, and Russia's is

57:05

140, 130 to 140 million.

57:08

But again, it's, you know,

57:10

you could be a smaller

57:13

country fighting for your existence

57:15

if you have good governance.

57:18

You know, united people, good

57:20

governance, people have in good

57:22

command, good politics, like that

57:24

cocktail. But instead, you have

57:26

terrible governance, people have a

57:28

terrible relationship with the state

57:30

by design since the Soviet

57:32

Union collapsed. It's like what

57:34

Vladimir Ishin, you know, guest

57:36

owner show, talked about how

57:38

the contracts such as it

57:40

was between Ukrainians and people,

57:42

and the collapse was as

57:45

the state. dedeveloped and de-industrialized

57:47

and turned into an oligarchy.

57:49

It was sort of like,

57:51

you don't know us anything

57:53

and we don't know you

57:55

anything. And then suddenly in

57:57

February 2020. to

57:59

the state said,

58:01

actually you owe us your lives. And

58:04

that worked at first when things were going

58:06

well to a certain degree, the shock

58:08

of being invaded. But, you

58:11

know, if you've watched videos

58:13

and read the Ukrainian press,

58:16

because you won't get in

58:18

our press over certainly since

58:20

like early 2023 and

58:23

more so since Bakhmut, it's

58:25

endless videos and stories of

58:27

forced mobilization, endless stories of

58:29

poorly trained fresh recruits who

58:31

can't bribe their commanding officers

58:33

getting sent to the very

58:35

part of the front where

58:38

other soldiers who have been

58:40

able to bribe their way

58:42

and have experience but have bribed their way

58:44

out of it, they're not there. And these

58:46

troops then either get immediately killed because they

58:48

don't know what to do or they desert.

58:50

And so you have, you know,

58:52

officially 80 ,000 but probably

58:55

closer to 200 ,000 soldiers have

58:57

deserted in Ukraine. You have

58:59

millions who have not signed

59:01

up for the under the

59:03

new mobilization law that

59:05

was passed in April

59:07

under threat from Biden and

59:10

Blinken. And now,

59:12

yeah, now they're talking about lowering it

59:14

from 25, lowering the draft age from

59:16

25 to 18. And on top of

59:18

the fact that it would be just

59:20

wildly unpopular and I don't think this

59:22

regime could handle alienating more of their,

59:26

alienating their citizens more than

59:28

they already have by

59:30

lowering the age and

59:32

having just, it

59:34

could break things in a bad way. But

59:37

on top of it, they wouldn't even be

59:39

able, I mean, they wouldn't be able to,

59:41

they don't have a proper system in

59:44

place that starts from the top that

59:46

would even be able to properly

59:48

use them. Like they can't use the

59:50

people they have in any proper

59:52

way. They can't, they can't structure

59:54

proper defenses because there's so

59:56

much corruption in the

59:58

trench work. you

1:00:00

know, business that they've contracted

1:00:03

out. Everything's privatized. Everything is

1:00:05

profoundly corrupt. Peter Karatayev and

1:00:07

his events in Ukraine has

1:00:09

done these great newsletters on

1:00:11

just the brutality that goes

1:00:14

on in the Ukrainian army

1:00:16

now, where, you know, recruits,

1:00:18

you get forcibly mobilized, named

1:00:20

after those shitty bus vans,

1:00:22

you know, Mikrobusi, that you

1:00:24

remember those from Russia. Yeah,

1:00:27

they stuff, you know, they

1:00:29

poach people off the street

1:00:31

and shove them into a

1:00:33

microbus and they call it

1:00:35

busification and then send them

1:00:38

to the front and people

1:00:40

who can't pay, they get

1:00:42

tortured. And there was a,

1:00:44

there was the commander of

1:00:46

one brigade that was run.

1:00:48

purely as a rent extraction

1:00:51

business, nothing else. And from

1:00:53

the commander on down and

1:00:55

his son, this commander of

1:00:57

this brigade's son, was sort

1:00:59

of the brute enforcer, while

1:01:01

Papa at the top was

1:01:04

one who collected the money.

1:01:06

And the son, to make

1:01:08

an example of one recruit

1:01:10

who wasn't paying, crucify, like,

1:01:12

took photos of him, yeah,

1:01:15

crucifying one of his own

1:01:17

Ukrainian soldiers. And this even

1:01:19

got into like Ukraine's geprada,

1:01:21

which is the most sort

1:01:23

of Western backed, Western friendly

1:01:25

of the Ukrainian papers. Like

1:01:28

it's so bad that even

1:01:30

they had to talk about

1:01:32

it to do something about

1:01:34

it. So this is the

1:01:36

state of the Ukrainian military

1:01:39

and it's top down. Again,

1:01:41

it's completely counter to the

1:01:43

image we've been given. The

1:01:45

way we were sold this

1:01:47

war, democracy versus autocracy, freedom

1:01:49

versus, you know, good versus

1:01:52

evil, rather than a country

1:01:54

defending itself from an invasion,

1:01:56

it had to be pure

1:01:58

good versus pure evil, pure

1:02:00

democracy. and human rights versus

1:02:02

pure barbarism. And that's just

1:02:05

not the fucking case at all.

1:02:07

No. But now there's the additional

1:02:09

factor. I don't know how it

1:02:12

will play out because Trump

1:02:14

bluffs a lot and often

1:02:16

ends up aligned more with

1:02:19

the standard right-wing position

1:02:21

than he claims to be. He has

1:02:23

been making a lot of noises about,

1:02:25

you know, this is bad for business,

1:02:28

let's get it over with, come on,

1:02:30

come on, come on, come on. He

1:02:32

sends out in his usual way kind

1:02:34

of some mixed signals. I'll read you,

1:02:36

he said, he put out this statement

1:02:39

on what's it called truth social,

1:02:41

whatever his shitty social media

1:02:43

company is, and I'll read it

1:02:45

here. It's worth reading since he's

1:02:47

the president. He says, I'm not

1:02:49

looking to hurt Russia. I

1:02:52

love the Russian people and

1:02:54

always had a very good

1:02:56

relationship with President Putin. And

1:02:59

this, despite the radical left,

1:03:01

Russia, Russia, Russia, Russia, is,

1:03:03

there's so many... The toxicity is

1:03:06

incredible. I mean, yeah, and he's

1:03:08

right. They did do a Russia,

1:03:10

Russia, Russia. He goes, we must

1:03:12

never forget that Russia helped us

1:03:14

win the Second World War, losing

1:03:17

almost 60 million lives in the

1:03:19

process. He says 60 million. And

1:03:21

I think the, I think historians say the

1:03:23

number is 27 million. And I was

1:03:25

wondering where to get 60 million? Is

1:03:27

that the total number of people who

1:03:29

died in World War II? Or is

1:03:31

that because, to sort of show, you

1:03:34

know, My friends the Jews had six

1:03:36

million and my friends the Russians had

1:03:38

10 times more like is that I

1:03:40

don't know what's going on or is

1:03:42

just being pro-Russian at the moment so

1:03:44

he's just going to give them the

1:03:46

numbers after all they don't cost him

1:03:48

anything no no I know all of

1:03:50

that being said I'm going to

1:03:52

do Russia whose economy is failing

1:03:55

and president Putin a very big

1:03:57

capital all caps favor settle now

1:03:59

and caps Stop this ridiculous war.

1:04:01

caps. It's only going to get

1:04:03

worse. If we don't make a

1:04:06

deal and soon I have no

1:04:08

other choice but to put high

1:04:11

levels of taxes tariffs and sanctions

1:04:13

on anything being sold by Russia

1:04:15

to the United States and various

1:04:18

other participating countries. Let's get this

1:04:20

war which never would have started

1:04:22

if I were president over with.

1:04:25

We can do it the easy

1:04:27

way or the hard way and

1:04:29

the easy way is always better.

1:04:32

It's time to quote caps. Make

1:04:34

a deal. No more life. be

1:04:37

lost. That definitely explains the expression

1:04:39

I saw on the face of

1:04:41

Zilinsky when he was talking to

1:04:44

Trump. He looked like he was

1:04:46

about to vomit. He was getting

1:04:48

very very very bad news and

1:04:51

Trump of course didn't notice and

1:04:53

just kept talking. Yeah. I think

1:04:56

because Zelenski started getting used to

1:04:58

and all of the sort of

1:05:00

pro-Ukraine crowd. But Zelenski, in particular,

1:05:03

being able to kick around and

1:05:05

blame things on the American president,

1:05:07

because Biden is half dead and

1:05:10

everybody started kicking him around, you

1:05:12

know, everybody helped out, Netanyahu, whoever.

1:05:14

And he was blaming all their

1:05:17

problems on... Biden as did the

1:05:19

whole pro-Ukraine corner, pro-Ukraine war corner.

1:05:22

I say pro-Ukraine with quotes around

1:05:24

because these people have basically killed

1:05:26

that country under the guise of

1:05:29

being pro-Ukraine. You know, you can

1:05:31

read this Trump thing a lot

1:05:33

of ways. Yeah, he wants to

1:05:36

end the war. I just don't

1:05:38

think a threat like that to

1:05:41

Putin who's already endured what we're

1:05:43

called nuclear sanctions that every expert

1:05:45

said was going to collapse. I

1:05:48

don't think he's... I don't think

1:05:50

Russia actually really wants to end

1:05:52

the war right now because the

1:05:55

war is going so well for

1:05:57

them unless they get it on

1:05:59

their turn. It has a grim

1:06:02

logic that requires a certain... amount

1:06:04

of time to work out. This

1:06:07

is sort of the opposite of

1:06:09

a Blitz Creek. It's more like,

1:06:11

you know, open pit mining. You

1:06:14

just have to grind through a

1:06:16

lot of dirt and eventually you'll

1:06:18

get what you want. But the

1:06:21

funny thing is, I can just

1:06:23

imagine Zilinsky trying to pull that

1:06:25

move of sudden snapping at... Trump

1:06:28

like Trump would pursue him until

1:06:30

the fifth afterlife, you

1:06:33

know, not just this

1:06:35

afterlife, but forever in

1:06:37

the afterlife. Well, I mean,

1:06:39

again, going back to the

1:06:41

Russia Gate hoax, let's remember,

1:06:44

the first, I mean, it

1:06:46

was Ukrainians working

1:06:48

with the Hillary campaign.

1:06:51

who fed the idea

1:06:53

that Paul Manafort, Trump's

1:06:55

campaign manager, was being

1:06:58

run by the Russians. Then

1:07:00

that regime was voted out

1:07:02

of office, the Potoshenko regime,

1:07:04

and Zelenski won. And it

1:07:07

was a phone call that

1:07:09

the first time that Trump

1:07:12

was impeached was because of

1:07:14

a phone call where he

1:07:16

basically... threatened Zalinsky said, you know,

1:07:19

get me some dirt on the

1:07:21

Biden family and I'll give you

1:07:23

some, you know, some weapons or

1:07:26

something. This is when we just

1:07:28

had the sort of the local

1:07:31

Dunbar separatist war going on and

1:07:33

he was impeached for that.

1:07:35

So Trump obviously does not

1:07:37

have Trump's a vengeful person

1:07:39

and so is his base.

1:07:42

He does not have naturally

1:07:44

warm feelings for Zalinsky and

1:07:46

Ukrainians. And he saw, you know,

1:07:48

Zolinsky, I think it was at

1:07:51

the same Dava's conference. Zolinsky's

1:07:53

kind of trying to change his tune

1:07:55

a bit and saying he'd now be

1:07:57

willing to start negotiating.

1:07:59

in which not, where you

1:08:01

would not have to start with

1:08:04

getting back all of the 1991

1:08:06

borders back, which is to say

1:08:08

Crimea and the Don Bus, but

1:08:10

he's willing to start with the

1:08:13

February 2022 borders, which is to

1:08:15

say, without half of Don Bus

1:08:17

and without Crimea, which is oddly

1:08:20

enough, this was the peace deal

1:08:22

in March and April that Zalinsky

1:08:24

and Putin almost agreed on and

1:08:26

Biden said no and Boris Johnson

1:08:29

went in and said you can

1:08:31

get a better deal. Don't do

1:08:33

it. Now he's saying that we

1:08:36

can do that deal, but we

1:08:38

need peacekeepers. This is what Zalinsky

1:08:40

said and we need minimum of

1:08:42

200,000, he says this to Davos,

1:08:45

200,000 European, like NATO peacekeepers to

1:08:47

enforce the deal. And most of

1:08:49

them, or a big chunk of

1:08:52

them, must be American or else

1:08:54

it's worthless because Europeans can't feel

1:08:56

anybody. And I heard Trump, I

1:08:58

think it was just today, basically

1:09:01

calling Zelenski a loser. He said

1:09:03

Zelenski is Zelenski's fault. Zelenski went

1:09:05

into this war that there was

1:09:08

no chance of winning. He said,

1:09:10

you know, he said Russia had

1:09:12

30,000 tanks. 30,000. And Zelenski had

1:09:14

zero. And he goes into this

1:09:17

war. What is he thinking? So,

1:09:19

you know, from that sense, it

1:09:21

doesn't look good. But on the

1:09:24

other hand, I just wonder how

1:09:26

Trump is going to react when,

1:09:28

like I'm sure Putin and the

1:09:30

Kremlin are smart in terms of

1:09:33

talk to him. You know, sure,

1:09:35

we talk to him. We make

1:09:37

a show of it. We go,

1:09:40

we show respect. But they're not

1:09:42

going to come to a deal

1:09:44

that is anything less than what

1:09:46

they want at this point. They

1:09:49

are hollowing out Ukraine that's been

1:09:51

the war plan since the initial

1:09:53

phase went badly, and it's been

1:09:56

working. And a big part of

1:09:58

that plan was relying on Ukraine

1:10:00

to... be profoundly dysfunctional as it

1:10:02

was before the invasion and as

1:10:05

it has been since, let's say,

1:10:07

the beginning of 2023. And it

1:10:09

has been profoundly dysfunctional.

1:10:12

It wasn't for six or

1:10:14

eight months in 2022, which

1:10:16

is part of what screwed

1:10:18

up Putin's initial war plans,

1:10:20

but it's back to being

1:10:23

maximally dysfunctional. I mean, just

1:10:25

today. And we saw this

1:10:27

battle developing for a long

1:10:29

time, very key city, Valika

1:10:31

Nova Silka, in the south

1:10:33

of Danitzk Obelis. In

1:10:36

fact, the counter-offensive was

1:10:38

pretty much like a big

1:10:40

part of the campaign in

1:10:42

the counter- Ukrainian summer 2023

1:10:45

counter-offensive that failed, was run

1:10:47

out of Valika Nova Silka.

1:10:49

It's a key logistical hub,

1:10:52

key military hub, and...

1:10:54

Sierski, who became commander in

1:10:56

chief a year ago this

1:10:58

next month, who's terrible, he

1:11:00

was the general, when he was

1:11:02

like a number two guy, who

1:11:05

in early 2023 convinced Zelenski

1:11:07

to hold on to Bakmut that

1:11:09

it could be held on to,

1:11:11

and that was the first huge

1:11:14

strategic failure of the,

1:11:16

you know, Ukrainian military effort.

1:11:18

Then he got promoted for,

1:11:21

but for being a loyalist.

1:11:23

He has shown over and over

1:11:25

again that he refuses for

1:11:28

whatever reasons to

1:11:30

organize timely retreats, strategic

1:11:32

withdrawals. He never does

1:11:34

it. And over and

1:11:36

over because the Russian

1:11:38

way, the bakmut way,

1:11:41

was puritrician using

1:11:43

convicts, used, you know,

1:11:45

economically negative for the

1:11:47

state convicts to kill the

1:11:50

best trained. you know, and

1:11:52

ideological Ukrainian troops. It was

1:11:54

just an enormous failure on

1:11:56

the Ukrainian side and enormous success

1:11:59

for them. for the Russians.

1:12:01

Since then, though, they basically

1:12:03

enveloped larger cities or logistical

1:12:05

hubs. They don't generally go

1:12:07

straight on. They go on

1:12:09

the flanks and they spend

1:12:11

their time. They take their

1:12:13

time looking for weeks points.

1:12:15

That's what they did in

1:12:17

Avdivka. Then they had Avdivka

1:12:19

fairly well surrounded, and Sierski,

1:12:21

his first gig, you know,

1:12:23

his first big task, his

1:12:26

commander in chief was to

1:12:28

order a retreat there. He

1:12:30

didn't. And you had hundreds

1:12:32

of Ukrainian troops, needlessly slaughtered,

1:12:34

more taken prisoner. And this

1:12:36

has happened again and again,

1:12:38

and it just happened literally

1:12:40

this morning or in the

1:12:42

last 24 hours in Valika

1:12:44

Nova Silka, there are videos

1:12:46

coming out that are just

1:12:48

gruesome of probably hundreds of

1:12:50

Ukrainian, I mean, completely enveloped,

1:12:52

completely encircled. Right. But this

1:12:55

wasn't like a Blitz Creek

1:12:57

thing. I mean, you've watched

1:12:59

on this war. It's an

1:13:01

incredibly slow war. You had

1:13:03

all the fucking time in

1:13:05

the world to withdraw them.

1:13:07

Right. But there's a decree

1:13:09

from, essentially from Washington, but,

1:13:11

you know, filtered through Kiev

1:13:13

that you're not going to

1:13:15

withdraw. So it would look

1:13:17

bad. And you end up

1:13:19

defending indefensible places. I mean,

1:13:21

it's kind of a miniature

1:13:24

of Stalin grad. You won't

1:13:26

let them leave, you won't

1:13:28

let them withdraw, and you

1:13:30

really shorten the war because

1:13:32

they're all lost. The whole

1:13:34

garrison is lost instead of,

1:13:36

well, I mean, the Eastern

1:13:38

front was always going to

1:13:40

end with Russia winning, but

1:13:42

it could have taken a

1:13:44

lot longer. Yeah. And this

1:13:46

is part of why you

1:13:48

have desertions. I mean, everybody

1:13:50

knows this in Ukraine. It's

1:13:53

only... the Western audiences, the

1:13:55

American audiences, who are still

1:13:57

protected from this part of

1:13:59

the war. In fact, there's

1:14:01

this really telling paragraph in

1:14:03

this article about Ukrainian losses, which

1:14:05

is framed as, yeah, but Russia's

1:14:08

losing more, but this paragraph

1:14:10

here, I'll just read it, says, Western

1:14:12

intelligence agencies have been

1:14:14

reluctant to disclose their internal

1:14:16

calculations of Ukrainian casualties for

1:14:18

fear of undermining an ally.

1:14:20

American officials have previously said

1:14:22

that Keve withholds this information

1:14:24

from even the closest allies

1:14:27

are trying to blame it

1:14:29

on Keve. But I just

1:14:31

thought that was so telling

1:14:33

that we've known this, but

1:14:35

it's kind of interesting to get

1:14:37

this from the horse's mouth. What the New

1:14:39

York Times is saying is that our

1:14:41

main source spies that we rely on and

1:14:43

our editors. have been reluctant to

1:14:45

disclose for the last three

1:14:47

years Ukrainian casualties for fear

1:14:49

of undermining an ally. How

1:14:51

would this undermine the ally?

1:14:54

Ukrainians know how bad this,

1:14:56

how many people are dying.

1:14:58

Just read again events in Ukraine,

1:15:00

like this is not a secret

1:15:02

in Ukraine. People know how horrible

1:15:04

this war is going. The people

1:15:06

who need to be kept in the dark

1:15:08

to help Ukraine is us. The less

1:15:10

we know, the less we will start to

1:15:13

question. the war effort of

1:15:15

sending hundreds of billions

1:15:17

of dollars to keep

1:15:20

this slaughter going. And

1:15:22

the amounts have

1:15:25

been extraordinary,

1:15:27

even by DOD standards.

1:15:29

Yeah. Well, all right,

1:15:31

let's just finish up

1:15:33

with a moral duty,

1:15:35

which is we mourn

1:15:38

the death of David

1:15:40

Lynch and damn the

1:15:42

begrudgers. Eileen Jones's excellent

1:15:45

tribute to Lynch, because

1:15:47

there was a surprising amount

1:15:50

of carping on social

1:15:52

media when people attempted

1:15:54

to show how much they

1:15:56

revered Lynch. Oddly enough, it

1:15:59

was most from East Coast

1:16:01

University people. I don't quite

1:16:03

know why. Really interesting. Yeah.

1:16:05

But as she said, it's

1:16:08

important to point out that

1:16:10

there are idiots who regard

1:16:12

Lynch as some random weirdo

1:16:14

who only appeals to pretentious

1:16:16

synophiles. Lynch was one of

1:16:19

the few directors who took

1:16:21

up the film noir project

1:16:23

of seeing American life as

1:16:26

a cratering disaster through an

1:16:28

appropriately dark and disoriented lens.

1:16:30

He found a way to

1:16:33

meaningfully continue that necessary vision

1:16:35

without sinking into the weak

1:16:37

pastiche that's typical of so

1:16:40

much so-called neo-noir. And

1:16:42

this is really, really

1:16:44

true. Like, if you

1:16:46

got something called neo-noir,

1:16:48

it will usually be

1:16:50

a project by a

1:16:52

bunch of second-tier stars

1:16:54

who are buddies and,

1:16:56

you know, drink together

1:16:58

and all that. And

1:17:00

everybody in it is

1:17:02

kind of cool, and

1:17:04

they betray each other.

1:17:06

And for no particular

1:17:08

reason. Lynch doesn't really

1:17:10

do that. There are deep

1:17:12

issues in every Lynch

1:17:15

plot and people respond

1:17:18

to those. And the idea

1:17:20

that he's just, I mean,

1:17:23

someone said, yeah, I thought a

1:17:25

razorhead was kind of

1:17:27

funny. And I thought,

1:17:29

no, I mean, I

1:17:31

have to be. a

1:17:34

fanatic here. Eraserhead was

1:17:36

not funny. Eraserhead is

1:17:38

about life at the

1:17:40

bottom of the Mariana

1:17:43

trench about intense compression

1:17:45

and heat and utter,

1:17:47

yeah, fear and loneliness,

1:17:49

utter loneliness. And it

1:17:51

wasn't funny at all. And

1:17:53

maybe you don't understand that,

1:17:56

but if so, just stay

1:17:58

away from it. Then the,

1:18:01

I looked up, why

1:18:03

did I do this?

1:18:06

But I looked up

1:18:08

Roger Ebert, blue velvet,

1:18:11

one star, lost highway,

1:18:13

two stars because it's

1:18:15

pointless. It's like, dummy's

1:18:18

gonna dumb. Yeah. The

1:18:20

first one you saw

1:18:23

was Eraserhead, right

1:18:25

as a midnight

1:18:27

movie. Yeah. Lynch movie I

1:18:29

saw as a student was Blue

1:18:31

Velvet in some arthouse

1:18:34

movie theater or something in

1:18:36

Berkeley. I think it was

1:18:38

Oakland, maybe it was in Oakland.

1:18:40

And I didn't know what

1:18:42

to expect because I had heard

1:18:44

of Eraserhead and I

1:18:47

mistakenly confused it with

1:18:49

bad arthouse. cinema. It

1:18:51

was sort of a two people

1:18:53

who claimed to like it, which

1:18:55

were sort of pretentious, as Eileen

1:18:58

Jones said, you know, pretentious art

1:19:00

film types, but then also like

1:19:02

punk druggies, who kept saying

1:19:04

it was almost like a dare to

1:19:06

see it. It was so gross. And

1:19:08

so I don't know, for something like

1:19:10

a lot of things, I just thought,

1:19:13

oh, I don't need to see it,

1:19:15

it's probably already. And then I saw

1:19:17

a blue velvet and I just didn't

1:19:20

know, I didn't expect it

1:19:22

at all. And the way you

1:19:24

described Eraserhead's effect on

1:19:26

you, I mean, for me

1:19:28

it was just, especially coming,

1:19:30

you know, at kind of

1:19:32

in the later part of the

1:19:35

Reagan culture freeze time. It

1:19:37

was just, it was so positively

1:19:39

shocking. It was such a

1:19:41

life changer. It was like,

1:19:43

You came out of there thinking

1:19:46

so many more emotions and

1:19:48

stuff were possible. It just

1:19:50

shocked me in the best

1:19:53

sense of the word. I

1:19:55

mean, I still remember the

1:19:57

first scene of Blue Velvet,

1:19:59

which is... just a thing

1:20:01

of beauty. Yes. Well, maybe

1:20:03

not the first scene, but

1:20:06

his father is out watering

1:20:08

the lawn and finally you

1:20:11

trace the hose back

1:20:13

and the hose has a

1:20:15

kind of block in it

1:20:17

or a kink. And then

1:20:19

his father slaps the

1:20:21

back of his neck

1:20:23

and falls down and

1:20:25

the dog, this little

1:20:27

Jack Russell's Terrier. is

1:20:29

slowed down, playing with

1:20:31

the stream of the

1:20:33

hose, biting it, and

1:20:36

then you see the

1:20:38

water seeping into the

1:20:40

ground, and you're down

1:20:42

under the ground, and

1:20:44

the ants begin to

1:20:46

chew, and you hear

1:20:48

the chewing noises. A

1:20:50

lot of greatness in

1:20:52

Lynch comes down to...

1:20:55

miniaturizing the world like

1:20:57

you know the radiator

1:20:59

in the racerhead and

1:21:01

that that terrifies

1:21:03

and and excites me but I

1:21:05

don't know where we're out of

1:21:08

time but can I just read

1:21:10

a poem in in in not

1:21:12

in praise of Lynch but you

1:21:14

know it applies to Lynch somehow.

1:21:17

Sure. This is loneliness in

1:21:19

Jersey City by Wallace

1:21:21

Stevens. The deer and

1:21:23

the docks and are one.

1:21:25

Well, the gods grow out

1:21:28

of the weather. The people

1:21:30

grow out of the weather. The

1:21:32

gods grow out of the

1:21:34

people. Encore, encore,

1:21:36

encole d'y. The distance

1:21:39

between the dark

1:21:41

steeple and cobble

1:21:43

ten thousand and three is

1:21:45

more than a seven-foot

1:21:47

inch worm could measure

1:21:49

by moonlight in June.

1:21:53

Kiss cats for the deer

1:21:55

and the dachshund are

1:21:58

one. My window is 29-3

1:22:00

and plenty of window

1:22:02

for me. The steeples are

1:22:05

empty and so are the

1:22:07

people. There's nothing whatever

1:22:09

to see except Pollocks

1:22:12

that pass in their

1:22:14

motors and play

1:22:16

concertinas all night. They

1:22:18

think that things are all

1:22:20

right since the deer and

1:22:23

the dachshund are one. Yeah, it's

1:22:25

a great poem. I remember that

1:22:27

one. I think we can wrap

1:22:29

it up here. I should just,

1:22:32

last thing so that it's on

1:22:34

record, I did wind up seeing

1:22:36

a razorhead after, at a

1:22:38

very lonely and depressed part

1:22:41

of my life, and it fucked

1:22:43

me up in a whole nether way,

1:22:45

but in a positive way, in the

1:22:47

sense of the world doesn't look

1:22:50

the same anymore. And there

1:22:52

are very few artists who've

1:22:54

had that effect on me that

1:22:56

made me want to... Create and

1:22:59

do something and David Lynch is

1:23:01

one of them and he's dead

1:23:03

now and Since we started the

1:23:05

show it just kind of hit

1:23:07

me some of the handful of

1:23:09

people who really had a powerful

1:23:11

influence They've done both of us

1:23:13

have died since we started the

1:23:16

show Charles Portis died Vius Nipal

1:23:18

died Edward Lomon of died Markey

1:23:20

Smith died, you know, there aren't

1:23:23

a whole lot left that had that

1:23:25

kind of life-changing influence made

1:23:27

me want to do

1:23:29

something made me want to

1:23:31

create like these people I don't

1:23:34

know the cone brothers are left

1:23:36

may they stay alive for a

1:23:38

long time yeah yeah they look

1:23:40

healthy too yeah I mean as

1:23:43

opposed to Marky Smith every time

1:23:45

you saw a photo was like

1:23:47

god he made it again yeah

1:23:49

it's speed keeping him alive at

1:23:51

this point yeah yeah All right,

1:23:54

anyway, thanks again everybody. Thanks John

1:23:56

Brandon. Thanks everybody. Talk to

1:23:58

you soon. Bye.