WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.520 --> 00:00:04.240 Well we're talking about Sinatra and using the term chicks. Well we might as 2 00:00:04.240 --> 00:00:07.639 well be the rat pack. We're gonna be kicked out of You know whatever, 3 00:00:07.919 --> 00:00:13.880 Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can 4 00:00:13.919 --> 00:00:21.480 do for your country. Mister garbahaw tear down this wall. It's the Ricche 5 00:00:21.600 --> 00:00:25.239 Podcast with Peter Robbinson and Rob Block. I'm James Lyllax and today we talked 6 00:00:25.239 --> 00:00:29.960 to David de Rojers about the war on Real Clear politics. So let's arisel's 7 00:00:29.960 --> 00:00:33.079 a podcast. How would you put up that kind of money? Because you 8 00:00:33.119 --> 00:00:35.439 have a bomb to put up, even if if you appeal, you got 9 00:00:35.439 --> 00:00:40.359 to put up escrow money. That's it's a lot, a lot of form 10 00:00:40.520 --> 00:00:47.240 of navali. It is a form of communism or fascism. The guys in 11 00:00:47.359 --> 00:00:52.640 Nutsja America is a nation that can be defined in a single word. How 12 00:00:52.719 --> 00:00:57.159 was gonna put him to put? Excuse me? Welcome everybody. This is 13 00:00:57.200 --> 00:01:00.520 the Ricashy Podcast, number six hundred and eighty. James Lilx. Here in 14 00:01:00.520 --> 00:01:03.840 Minneapolis where it's a little bit cool and overcast. So like Jack Webb starting 15 00:01:03.879 --> 00:01:07.879 every drag net with a weather in La who cares? I'm just setting the 16 00:01:07.879 --> 00:01:11.799 stage and different stages across the country. We have rob Long in Gotham, 17 00:01:11.879 --> 00:01:15.040 and we have Peter Robinson in California. Gentlemen, welcome. How are you 18 00:01:15.079 --> 00:01:19.159 today. Well, it's a little cool and overcast here, but again, 19 00:01:19.239 --> 00:01:25.920 who cares exactly. I'm well, it's a nice respite from the ordinary beautifulness. 20 00:01:26.319 --> 00:01:27.840 It was Friday in Los Angeles. It was cold. That was it, 21 00:01:29.239 --> 00:01:30.439 you know, thank you, thank you very much, Joe Friday. 22 00:01:32.439 --> 00:01:37.719 We you know, we never did broadcast live from Seapack, probably never will 23 00:01:37.719 --> 00:01:41.200 in the future, because it seems to be sort of a diminishing concern, 24 00:01:41.959 --> 00:01:46.560 does it not. It's gone from being sort of for everybody goes to do 25 00:01:46.640 --> 00:01:53.879 the seatback thing to being sort of silly and now underpopulated and overrun by guys 26 00:01:53.920 --> 00:01:57.319 who get up and say it's time for us to reclaim our democracy and end 27 00:01:57.319 --> 00:02:02.640 it right Jack who so posso? Who was saying that? And other people 28 00:02:02.680 --> 00:02:06.079 are saying, you're policing his language. He was getting He was just making 29 00:02:06.079 --> 00:02:07.520 a joke in the rest of it. But it seems to be irrelevant, 30 00:02:07.879 --> 00:02:13.199 does it not, As so many parts of the right seem to be just 31 00:02:13.759 --> 00:02:21.280 painting themselves into corners. And climbing the walls. Yes. Yes, However, 32 00:02:22.719 --> 00:02:25.599 it's amazing to think that SEAPAC has to be considered a legacy institution these 33 00:02:25.680 --> 00:02:29.599 days. I think it does as far as I can recall. It was 34 00:02:29.680 --> 00:02:31.599 founded during the eighties, during the Reagan years. In any event, even 35 00:02:31.639 --> 00:02:38.240 as certain legacy institutions seem to wobble and grow less relevant, if not completely 36 00:02:38.280 --> 00:02:42.560 irrelevant, there are new institutions growing up. A lot of activity is taking 37 00:02:42.599 --> 00:02:49.400 place in Florida. The Global Liberty Institute, founded by Scott Atlas and Josh 38 00:02:49.479 --> 00:02:52.800 Raw, two colleagues of mine here at the Hoover Institution, just had a 39 00:02:52.800 --> 00:02:57.319 conference at which it seems to me, frankly, that half of our recent 40 00:02:57.360 --> 00:03:00.080 guests spoke at this conference, including Christopher Rufe. So there's activity. It's 41 00:03:00.120 --> 00:03:07.120 not there's a lot of activity, actually, but things are shifting. Well, 42 00:03:07.199 --> 00:03:08.479 rob let me ask you this. One of the speakers that I would 43 00:03:08.479 --> 00:03:13.560 have liked to have heard was the gentleman who happens to be the head hefe 44 00:03:13.639 --> 00:03:16.039 of El Salvador at the moment, and he yes seatback, talking about how 45 00:03:16.039 --> 00:03:20.000 El Salvador has turned things around and need to write it a quote. The 46 00:03:20.080 --> 00:03:23.000 so called international community d quote the nngos and of course the fake news, 47 00:03:23.039 --> 00:03:25.599 just like it happens here in the United States, he said, and talked 48 00:03:25.599 --> 00:03:31.199 about the you know, the e schlerotic bureaucracy and the indifference that had plundered 49 00:03:31.240 --> 00:03:36.159 and characterized the nation's fall, and how El Salvador has turned things around because 50 00:03:36.159 --> 00:03:39.840 they just said, what if we took all the criminals and put them over 51 00:03:39.879 --> 00:03:45.800 here in a jail? Well, what happened if we did that? And 52 00:03:45.960 --> 00:03:47.759 you're going to see this model elsewhere, and you're going to see a lot 53 00:03:47.759 --> 00:03:53.120 of people in this country fronting and chewing their nails about it because authoritarianism and 54 00:03:53.199 --> 00:03:54.800 the fascism and the rest of it. If you put the kid the gang 55 00:03:54.800 --> 00:03:59.000 members in jail, do you think that's a model that actually is going to 56 00:03:59.039 --> 00:04:02.280 spread the United States, least rhetorically, the model of putting bad guys in 57 00:04:02.360 --> 00:04:06.759 jail. Yeah, uh yeah, I think probably so. I mean, 58 00:04:06.759 --> 00:04:11.199 it's a tried and true law and order is always a big issue. I 59 00:04:11.199 --> 00:04:15.159 mean, I think the seapack problem is really I mean my personal political feelings 60 00:04:15.159 --> 00:04:20.199 about it aside, it's a seatpack. Used to be this place where you 61 00:04:20.240 --> 00:04:24.639 went and it was this you know, the keeping of the tablets and most 62 00:04:24.680 --> 00:04:30.319 of the speeches were our politicians, even the conservative ones, are wavering in 63 00:04:30.399 --> 00:04:35.000 our conservative beliefs. And the idea was you went to Seapack just to remember 64 00:04:35.040 --> 00:04:40.759 what it was, what pure uncut conservatism was supposed to be. We aren't 65 00:04:40.879 --> 00:04:47.040 a political organization where the theoretical organization right now, it's just really so close 66 00:04:47.079 --> 00:04:53.759 to a candidate, specific candidate who also has rallies and conventions and also has 67 00:04:53.920 --> 00:04:59.279 speeches where he sells his merch and sometimes in places that were unlikely. That's 68 00:04:59.319 --> 00:05:01.319 the point of Seapack is sort of well why go I mean, why not 69 00:05:01.399 --> 00:05:04.279 just go to a Trump rally. It's a much much more much more seems 70 00:05:04.279 --> 00:05:10.360 like a much more fun and and then there's the there's the really lingering and 71 00:05:10.399 --> 00:05:14.360 I think serious scandal with the leader of Seapack that isn't going to go away. 72 00:05:15.600 --> 00:05:21.399 So why why go to this broken institution when you can go to the 73 00:05:21.480 --> 00:05:26.560 real thing? Which is a problem I think a lot of the people in 74 00:05:26.600 --> 00:05:30.680 the Trump you know orbit have, which is that there can be only one 75 00:05:30.720 --> 00:05:34.360 Trump. Trump is sort of uniquely Trump and Trump be Trumpiness is really his 76 00:05:34.480 --> 00:05:39.199 and his alone, And the more people try to be you know, Trump, 77 00:05:39.240 --> 00:05:42.759 the more they seem more like Frank Sinatra junior and not Frank Sinatra, 78 00:05:43.759 --> 00:05:47.319 and that ultimately is the problem. Even Donald Trump Junior is Frank Sinatra junior, 79 00:05:47.319 --> 00:05:50.000 if you know what I mean. So I would say, yeah, 80 00:05:50.000 --> 00:05:54.560 that's that's a problem. But in general it's a problem for conservatives who still 81 00:05:54.560 --> 00:05:58.399 believe in conservatism because you end up having to do these weird things like saying, 82 00:05:58.519 --> 00:06:00.879 well, I don't know, I think ten percent across the board is 83 00:06:00.879 --> 00:06:03.240 a good idea, which may be a good idea, but it's certainly not 84 00:06:03.279 --> 00:06:08.680 a conservative idea. It's kind of literally the opposite of conservative ideas. So 85 00:06:10.959 --> 00:06:15.000 yeah, it's all these all these institutions are going to have to fall away 86 00:06:15.079 --> 00:06:18.240 and be busted up and smashed and cracked in half. And that's a good 87 00:06:18.319 --> 00:06:21.800 thing because institutions don't shouldn't last that long, certainly, not these these kinds 88 00:06:21.839 --> 00:06:26.399 of institutions. They should be regenerating, the should be more more relevant to 89 00:06:26.439 --> 00:06:30.639 the people who use the you know, maybe SEPAC in the future will sound 90 00:06:30.680 --> 00:06:36.639 a lot more like old line you know, big government of nineteen fifties liberals 91 00:06:36.680 --> 00:06:42.360 than twenty first century conservatives. Who knows that's that's good. All, that's 92 00:06:42.399 --> 00:06:46.519 good. Well, Peter, let me ask you, do you think that 93 00:06:46.000 --> 00:06:51.560 Frank Sinatra Junior was undervalued as a band leader he busted by Frank Sinatra, 94 00:06:51.600 --> 00:06:55.360 That's for sure. Here's what I think about. First of all, I 95 00:06:55.399 --> 00:07:00.199 am wondering how many of our listeners are now saying what Fank Sinatra Junior, 96 00:07:01.839 --> 00:07:06.839 legacy Robinson and long and we got. So I'm wondering about that one. 97 00:07:06.920 --> 00:07:12.199 I'm conscious of this. Look, Frank, if you're of the if you're 98 00:07:12.199 --> 00:07:16.319 of the younger age, look up Frank Sinatra Junior kidnapping. And yes, 99 00:07:16.439 --> 00:07:20.480 well look, I mean yes, yes that you kind of don't have to 100 00:07:20.560 --> 00:07:28.279 know anything specifics because you kind of understand it exactly. Whatever you imagine is 101 00:07:28.319 --> 00:07:31.519 the difference between Frank Sinatra and Frank Sinatra Junior. You are correct, You 102 00:07:31.600 --> 00:07:35.560 are what I'm saying, Yes, yes, yes, And that is the 103 00:07:35.560 --> 00:07:39.639 point that it's very In fact, I would argue, it's just it's simply 104 00:07:39.639 --> 00:07:44.959 impossible to evaluate Frank Sinatra Junior in his own right. I mean, the 105 00:07:45.040 --> 00:07:49.519 man he he marketed himself as Frank Sinatra Junior. The comparison with the father 106 00:07:49.680 --> 00:07:54.879 is in your head fairly or not fairly. It's just in your head when 107 00:07:54.920 --> 00:08:00.879 you look at him, and he just wasn't his father was he was fairly? 108 00:08:01.279 --> 00:08:07.480 It was nobody was completely legitimate. That's an interesting point, isn't it 109 00:08:07.519 --> 00:08:09.439 that when you get to I was thinking of this the other day somehow or 110 00:08:09.480 --> 00:08:15.399 other, what the Academy Awards are coming up, and I thought to myself, 111 00:08:16.439 --> 00:08:18.800 there's good even at the top of the profession, which I suppose. 112 00:08:18.839 --> 00:08:20.879 Hold on, I've got dogs who have just come back from a walk. 113 00:08:22.199 --> 00:08:24.560 I got him. I worried what those were Now that any other dogs much 114 00:08:24.560 --> 00:08:30.360 better? Sound was completely confusing, Ok, it wasn't by stomach. So 115 00:08:31.079 --> 00:08:35.039 you have politics, you have show business, and you look at the very 116 00:08:35.039 --> 00:08:37.440 what you'd think of is the very top, the very best performers, and 117 00:08:37.519 --> 00:08:41.840 even when you get it into that select group, you say to yourself, 118 00:08:41.000 --> 00:08:43.759 oh no, no, no, there's a long tail here. There are 119 00:08:43.799 --> 00:08:50.200 some who just are better. Meryl Streep is just a singular actress. Gary 120 00:08:50.240 --> 00:08:58.360 Oldman is just better than almost anybody else in his generation. I've started Sean 121 00:08:58.440 --> 00:09:01.960 Penn. His politics are so strange to me that I tended to write him 122 00:09:03.000 --> 00:09:07.000 off. But his cameo in Licorice, whatever that movie was was just I 123 00:09:07.039 --> 00:09:11.279 mean, some people just even within the top of the profession in politics. 124 00:09:11.320 --> 00:09:16.000 I just look at the people who might have been president. This goes back 125 00:09:16.039 --> 00:09:18.279 makes me legacy, I know. But look at the people who might have 126 00:09:18.360 --> 00:09:22.080 been president in place of Ronald Reagan. And he was just better than they 127 00:09:22.080 --> 00:09:24.919 were. He was better on camera, he was better, right, He 128 00:09:24.039 --> 00:09:28.159 was just better. And Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin didn't come. All the 129 00:09:28.159 --> 00:09:31.480 people who might have been Frank Sinatra instead of Frank Sinatra, so to speak. 130 00:09:33.679 --> 00:09:37.519 The closest in some ways was Tony Bennett or Jerry Vale, and Sinatra 131 00:09:37.639 --> 00:09:41.799 was just better. Now, I don't know quite what I'm going on about 132 00:09:41.799 --> 00:09:48.000 this for Jerry Vale in a long time Goodloe exactly. Yeah, that one 133 00:09:48.960 --> 00:09:52.000 that one does not contain within itself the message the way Frank Zinat Junior does. 134 00:09:52.799 --> 00:09:56.559 But it is weird about human achievement. Oh, I know what it 135 00:09:56.639 --> 00:09:58.960 is. I was looking at some Twitter posts by Charles Murray, who wrote 136 00:10:00.120 --> 00:10:05.200 book on genius, and discovered that it all took place within a certain geographic 137 00:10:05.240 --> 00:10:09.360 era. He sort of ranked scientific genius and discovered that it was quite specific 138 00:10:09.799 --> 00:10:15.000 and that the geniuses really were geniuses, James, I dropped that one in 139 00:10:15.039 --> 00:10:18.360 your lap and try to give We're going to watch with wonder how you segue 140 00:10:18.639 --> 00:10:24.480 from my total tangent back to the show. Well for him, I mean 141 00:10:24.519 --> 00:10:28.120 genius, is it inheritable? You can look at the work of Lawn Cheney 142 00:10:28.159 --> 00:10:31.159 and then Lawn Cheney Junior and perhaps wonder if there was not to mention Lanhi 143 00:10:31.240 --> 00:10:35.320 Chen it passed along in the jeens there. But then it makes you wonder. 144 00:10:35.399 --> 00:10:39.159 I mean, Lawn Cheney Jr. Was noted for the shambling wreck of 145 00:10:39.200 --> 00:10:45.679 his life. And you wonder whether or not the organizations like like seedback how 146 00:10:45.720 --> 00:10:48.399 they will do if Trump loses. Because you spoke before about the new institutions 147 00:10:48.399 --> 00:10:52.840 that are coming up. Rob spoke about the need to crush, to crack 148 00:10:52.120 --> 00:10:56.919 the new old institutions and either reform them or replace them with new ones. 149 00:10:56.960 --> 00:11:00.480 I'm open to the new ones thing. So that's the question. What happens 150 00:11:00.480 --> 00:11:05.080 then should Trump lose. Do we see then everyone just resetting up ending the 151 00:11:05.159 --> 00:11:07.639 edge of sketch and saying we're going to start from fresh with these or is 152 00:11:07.639 --> 00:11:15.639 there another two to three four remnant years where trump Ism WAPs through the new 153 00:11:15.679 --> 00:11:18.000 and the old institutions. In other words, in twenty twenty four, are 154 00:11:18.000 --> 00:11:20.759 they just if he loses, will they open the windows and let the fresh 155 00:11:20.840 --> 00:11:26.840 breeze in? Or is the institutions just simply corrupted for good and corrupted dependency 156 00:11:26.840 --> 00:11:30.960 in your opinion, just changed for good. If there can be no Trump 157 00:11:31.039 --> 00:11:35.320 Junior, if he loses, what happens, well, the Republican Party is 158 00:11:35.320 --> 00:11:37.000 going to have to sort that out. I mean, they're going to have 159 00:11:37.039 --> 00:11:39.720 to sort out what happens. I mean, that's that's gonna be a big, 160 00:11:39.759 --> 00:11:46.600 big challenge, challenge anytime there's a leader who seems to rewrite the rules 161 00:11:46.759 --> 00:11:52.960 a little bit of or rewrite the standards of what the movement has believed. 162 00:11:52.039 --> 00:11:56.480 I'm trying to be as fair and judicious as it can be. The institution 163 00:11:56.559 --> 00:12:01.759 then has to decide whether it's primary loyalties to a set of principles or it 164 00:12:01.799 --> 00:12:05.519 needs to change some of its principles to maybe updates of its principles, or 165 00:12:05.519 --> 00:12:09.519 its primary loyalty is to the leader. That's always go an issue that's always 166 00:12:09.519 --> 00:12:11.840 going to be hard. Let me pivot on this one. How do you 167 00:12:11.840 --> 00:12:16.799 think Trump would approach the student loan bailout the student loan forgiveness thing. Biden 168 00:12:16.840 --> 00:12:20.720 announced one point two billion dollars in the student loan forgiveness right, which is 169 00:12:20.720 --> 00:12:24.360 one hundred and thirty billion dollars to do this, any plans to spend three 170 00:12:24.440 --> 00:12:28.320 hundred and forty five billion over the next few years, presuming he gets in. 171 00:12:28.759 --> 00:12:31.639 Biden d that quote. The Supreme Court blocked that, he said, 172 00:12:33.320 --> 00:12:37.320 but that didn't stop me. Now people are looking at saying, well, 173 00:12:37.399 --> 00:12:39.799 imagine if Trump said that, I can use Donald Trump is the risk to 174 00:12:39.840 --> 00:12:43.759 democracy. It is just astounding, right. I can I imagine any of 175 00:12:43.799 --> 00:12:48.799 them saying that. The reason being is that the sentiment on the right is 176 00:12:48.480 --> 00:12:52.639 if the old institution's block what needs to be done, let's not be a 177 00:12:52.639 --> 00:12:56.639 constance, Let's not be a vellum fetishist. Let's not just say, well, 178 00:12:56.679 --> 00:12:58.080 you know, the Supreme Court blocked it. We don't have to listen 179 00:12:58.120 --> 00:13:01.679 to them. We have to do the right thing. I can easily see 180 00:13:01.679 --> 00:13:05.200 that idea taking taking a purchase on both sides. If it hasn't already, 181 00:13:05.320 --> 00:13:09.200 well, I don't know, I've had contracts. Phrase fetishist. By the 182 00:13:09.200 --> 00:13:11.799 way, I don't want to I don't want to go too far from that 183 00:13:11.840 --> 00:13:16.399 without without yes. As you speak, James, rob and I are taking 184 00:13:16.440 --> 00:13:20.639 notes on what what what phrase that you toss out the title for the episode 185 00:13:20.720 --> 00:13:26.399 The fetishist thought so far as upending the edges sketch, which I like that 186 00:13:26.440 --> 00:13:28.759 where the episode is going to go, I don't know. Well, I 187 00:13:28.840 --> 00:13:31.600 tell you where. I'll tell you where it goes, and it goes here. 188 00:13:33.159 --> 00:13:35.440 All of this money is being spent in higher education. I was seeing 189 00:13:35.480 --> 00:13:37.519 something today where there's a class and I think a University of New Mexico on 190 00:13:37.639 --> 00:13:41.919 fat acceptance and fat fashion and the rest of it. You can get a 191 00:13:41.960 --> 00:13:46.080 degree now in fat studies. And the person the the the instructor, declined 192 00:13:46.200 --> 00:13:50.960 to grade anybody, because to grade anybody is ableism. To establish any sort 193 00:13:50.000 --> 00:13:56.120 of hierarchy of abilities whatsoever is ableism. And you wonder why I mean, 194 00:13:56.360 --> 00:14:01.840 And I speak to somebody who poured an extraordinary amount of money into an institution 195 00:14:01.919 --> 00:14:03.080 on the East Coast for my daughter to be educated, and they did a 196 00:14:03.080 --> 00:14:07.039 pretty good job of it. But at the same time, if you're a 197 00:14:07.039 --> 00:14:11.399 parent looking around it, you wonder is there any place safe from this madness? 198 00:14:11.399 --> 00:14:16.240 And the answer is up on a shining Hill Hillsdale is where you want 199 00:14:16.360 --> 00:14:20.960 to say, is true? It is a segue and I like that one. 200 00:14:20.240 --> 00:14:24.399 Okay, History, economics, great works of literature, the meaning of 201 00:14:24.440 --> 00:14:28.000 the US Constitution. Did you study these things in school? Maybe so? 202 00:14:28.120 --> 00:14:31.759 Probably not, or even if you did, maybe it's time for a refresher. 203 00:14:31.120 --> 00:14:33.519 Time and technology have changed a lot of things, but they have not 204 00:14:33.679 --> 00:14:37.720 changed basic fundamental truths about the world and our place in it. Right, 205 00:14:37.799 --> 00:14:43.240 that is correct, and that's why we are so excited that Hillsdale College is 206 00:14:43.279 --> 00:14:48.519 offering more than forty three online courses in the most important and enduring subjects the 207 00:14:48.759 --> 00:14:52.080 Western civilization and beyond. Is provided you can learn about the works of C. 208 00:14:52.240 --> 00:14:54.759 S. Lewis, the stories in the Book of Genesis, the meaning 209 00:14:54.840 --> 00:14:58.480 of the US Constitution, the rise and fall of the Roman Republic. Oh 210 00:14:58.519 --> 00:15:03.000 there's a tale to our times? Could be or the history of the ancient 211 00:15:03.080 --> 00:15:09.440 Christian Church. With Hillsdale's online courses all available for free, that's right free. 212 00:15:09.200 --> 00:15:13.519 I personally recommend that you sign up for Constitution one oh one, the 213 00:15:13.559 --> 00:15:16.360 Meaning and history of the US Constitution. It will help in your arguments when 214 00:15:16.360 --> 00:15:18.600 you talk to people about these things, because there are people out there that 215 00:15:18.600 --> 00:15:22.279 still believe that applies and want to argue the specifics of it. Treasure those 216 00:15:22.320 --> 00:15:24.639 people. In this twelve lecture course, you will explore the design and the 217 00:15:24.639 --> 00:15:28.919 purpose of the Constitution, the challenges it faced in the Civil War, and 218 00:15:28.960 --> 00:15:33.240 how it has been undermined for more than a century by progressivism and biliberalism. 219 00:15:33.519 --> 00:15:37.240 The course is self paced, so you can start whenever wherever. You can 220 00:15:37.360 --> 00:15:41.440 roll now at Constitution one oh one, because our country needs more Americans. 221 00:15:41.519 --> 00:15:46.759 More more Americans will understand the Constitution and can defend the freedom of the American 222 00:15:46.799 --> 00:15:52.720 people against the encroachments of an increasingly large and unaccountable government. So go right 223 00:15:52.759 --> 00:15:56.639 now to Hillsdale dot edu slash ricochet to enroll. There's no cost. Then 224 00:15:56.639 --> 00:16:02.600 it's easy to get started. That's Hillsdale dot com edu slash ricochet to register 225 00:16:02.919 --> 00:16:07.000 Hillsdale dot edu slash ricochet. You've been hearing so much about Hillsdale over the 226 00:16:07.080 --> 00:16:10.320 years, wondering, Gosh, I wish I could have gotten there when I 227 00:16:10.360 --> 00:16:12.440 was young. Well, whatever age you are now, you can go there 228 00:16:12.720 --> 00:16:18.399 Hillsdale dot edu slash ricochet. And of course we thank Hillsdale for re sponsoring 229 00:16:18.440 --> 00:16:22.799 this for the Ricochet Podcast and now we welcome to the podcast David de Rozer. 230 00:16:22.200 --> 00:16:27.480 David is the president of Real Clear Foundation and as the publisher of RealClearPolitics 231 00:16:27.480 --> 00:16:30.679 dot com along with its many other sister sites. David, welcome to the 232 00:16:30.679 --> 00:16:34.360 podcast. It's great to be on. Thanks for having me. Those of 233 00:16:34.440 --> 00:16:38.000 us have been reading Real Clear products for years are happy to have you here, 234 00:16:38.519 --> 00:16:41.639 Bob. So let's just start off telling us about the Real Real Clear 235 00:16:41.679 --> 00:16:47.440 Foundation and the Real Clear Mission. Well, I mean, we started in 236 00:16:47.519 --> 00:16:51.200 two thousand and it was really at the day in the dawn of I think 237 00:16:51.240 --> 00:16:55.320 the promise of what you know, kind of the Internet could do to kind 238 00:16:55.360 --> 00:16:59.279 of free up and democratize communication. You know, So we were right there 239 00:16:59.279 --> 00:17:02.960 at the beginning of it. And our kind of simple insight was to say 240 00:17:03.080 --> 00:17:07.920 that we live in a fifty to fifteen nation and we should give a curated 241 00:17:07.279 --> 00:17:12.519 account of that conversation that's happening. And we've done so for really you know, 242 00:17:12.599 --> 00:17:17.839 we're going to be celebrating our twenty fourth year and wow. Yeah, 243 00:17:18.400 --> 00:17:21.000 but you know things have changed. What I mean, you know this when 244 00:17:21.000 --> 00:17:22.640 we started it was Bush v. Gore. You know, we're in a 245 00:17:22.759 --> 00:17:26.559 very different world with you know, Trump versus Biden. I mean, I 246 00:17:26.599 --> 00:17:30.400 think, you know, the news has gone through some fundamental changes, But 247 00:17:30.440 --> 00:17:36.039 I really think what has changed is the attitude that we as the people have 248 00:17:36.279 --> 00:17:42.000 to really our cornerstone political value, which is the First Amendment. I think 249 00:17:42.160 --> 00:17:48.559 we've taken a dangerous turn since twenty and sixteen and it really is having effect 250 00:17:48.640 --> 00:17:52.680 on the American mind in the future of this experiment of ours. So could 251 00:17:52.680 --> 00:17:55.640 we talk a little bit. Hey, David is Rob Long in New York. 252 00:17:55.640 --> 00:18:00.559 Thanks for joining us. So most people, I mean, I'm not 253 00:18:00.599 --> 00:18:04.839 saying most people. I'm really generalizing from me me. Most people go to 254 00:18:04.920 --> 00:18:07.839 Real Clear most of the time. Yeah, you go to Real Clear, 255 00:18:07.960 --> 00:18:11.640 and you uh, you got Real Clear, Politics, you got Real Clear 256 00:18:11.680 --> 00:18:14.079 all sorts of different verticals, like if you're interested whatever, you're interested in. 257 00:18:14.079 --> 00:18:18.599 Real Clear it hasn't has a really thoughtful curated aggregator for the news that 258 00:18:18.720 --> 00:18:21.480 day, for the longer stories. I mean, you really get a you 259 00:18:21.519 --> 00:18:23.880 get a snapshot not just of the world news and political news, but also 260 00:18:23.920 --> 00:18:29.759 specific news. And it's pretty fair. I mean, I know people who 261 00:18:29.759 --> 00:18:33.359 are really on the left who are extremely proud when they get uh, are 262 00:18:33.440 --> 00:18:37.400 actively trying to get a link from Real Clear because it means something, means 263 00:18:37.400 --> 00:18:40.880 that their readers are going there. Smart readers are trying to follow up. 264 00:18:41.640 --> 00:18:44.519 It's a place to go where you want to see both sides. And then 265 00:18:44.559 --> 00:18:47.680 you have Real Clear investigations, which is I mean our friend, well, 266 00:18:47.720 --> 00:18:49.000 Molly Hemingway was here for a long time, her husband Mark ham and Way 267 00:18:49.039 --> 00:18:53.000 is a friend of ours for a long time. He's uh, he participates 268 00:18:53.000 --> 00:19:00.839 in that great investigative stories. You've broken some big stories. But it doesn't 269 00:19:00.920 --> 00:19:03.720 and of course everyone knows the Real Clear polling average. That's a big, 270 00:19:03.799 --> 00:19:12.799 big deal for people, trusted brand. And then suddenly somebody decides that you 271 00:19:12.920 --> 00:19:19.240 are disinformation and I mean not just different disinformation. Top ten. We're in 272 00:19:19.240 --> 00:19:26.799 the top ten. Congratulations. So somebody decides this and it's a I mean, 273 00:19:26.799 --> 00:19:32.519 it's a complicated chain of events, right, but it isn't the same 274 00:19:32.559 --> 00:19:37.359 thing as the government sending an email to Twitter or to Facebook saying, hey, 275 00:19:37.400 --> 00:19:41.880 this guy squashed him. It's in my opinion just reading the story, 276 00:19:42.000 --> 00:19:45.599 I want you to tell it. It's a lot more complicated and a lot 277 00:19:45.680 --> 00:19:52.440 more nefarious. Oh yeah, and sadly it's supported by our own government. 278 00:19:52.079 --> 00:19:56.599 Right, So I do think the origin story has to start there. But 279 00:19:56.799 --> 00:20:00.240 you know, what has happened is that, you know, there are are 280 00:20:00.240 --> 00:20:07.279 two kind of corporate entities, right that exist in order to censor media through 281 00:20:07.359 --> 00:20:10.799 advertising starvation, if I could have put it that way. So the way 282 00:20:10.920 --> 00:20:15.480 to brown out like opposing viewpoints is to choke them off to access to capital. 283 00:20:17.119 --> 00:20:19.519 So there's two primary outlets for that. You know, one is a 284 00:20:22.720 --> 00:20:27.440 United States based company called NewsGuard and the other one is a UK based company 285 00:20:27.519 --> 00:20:33.559 called GDI Global Disinformation Index. Like, you know, everybody in media knows 286 00:20:33.559 --> 00:20:37.880 how hard it is to do the business. Everybody has kind of looked at 287 00:20:37.359 --> 00:20:41.599 like the competition for eyeballs and you know, and not the rising CPMs but 288 00:20:41.640 --> 00:20:47.920 the following. But it's you know, it wasn't until Matt Kaminski, you 289 00:20:47.920 --> 00:20:52.119 know, at the Washington Examiners. It's not until he kind of exposed a 290 00:20:52.240 --> 00:20:56.480 story that kind of showed that Real Clear was on a top ten blacklist, 291 00:20:57.119 --> 00:21:00.799 right, And you know, and not only was there blacklist, there was 292 00:21:00.839 --> 00:21:04.079 a whitelist too, And I think both of those lists were indicative of what 293 00:21:04.160 --> 00:21:08.960 their vision of a proper media diet and future of media is. So you 294 00:21:10.000 --> 00:21:15.920 know, Real Clear is labeled by all sides to be independent and centrist. 295 00:21:15.319 --> 00:21:19.720 Right on that list, the blacklist, there were only conservative outlets. You 296 00:21:19.759 --> 00:21:22.480 look over at the whitelist side of things, and what you do is you 297 00:21:22.519 --> 00:21:27.359 find one centrist to conservative about with the Wall Street Journal, and then nine 298 00:21:27.480 --> 00:21:33.720 other kind of liberal to progressive entities. So the world that they're working towards 299 00:21:33.799 --> 00:21:37.759 is a nine to one world where that one entity that is allowed to be 300 00:21:37.960 --> 00:21:41.400 you know, to survive with advertising dolls, just happens to be behind a 301 00:21:41.440 --> 00:21:45.200 paywall. So but just because the mechanics of this, I think are really 302 00:21:45.200 --> 00:21:49.160 interesting. So if you read a piece of you read the newspaper and it 303 00:21:49.200 --> 00:21:53.279 says the Global Disinformation in dex has put Real Clear on it as a disinformation 304 00:21:53.480 --> 00:21:56.279 you know whatever, and you've got to roll your eyes and you think, 305 00:21:56.319 --> 00:22:06.119 oh, there's ridiculous progressive. What possible ripple effect downstream effect could be on 306 00:22:06.160 --> 00:22:10.680 this stupid list by this shadowy NGO or whatever it is that I've never heard 307 00:22:10.720 --> 00:22:15.799 of before. I don't care about what possible effect could this have downstream? 308 00:22:15.640 --> 00:22:19.440 Oh my god, it's a media extinction. That's the downside of this. 309 00:22:21.039 --> 00:22:23.440 I mean, but this is just not just you know, news Guard and 310 00:22:23.519 --> 00:22:29.319 GDI aren't just some efforts of folks that sit out there and say this is 311 00:22:29.359 --> 00:22:33.440 what we think you ought to do. I mean these folks are you know, 312 00:22:33.559 --> 00:22:38.119 paid entities. They have put themselves as like the guardians of advertising dollars 313 00:22:38.200 --> 00:22:41.799 right, right, And what they do is they go out there and they 314 00:22:41.839 --> 00:22:48.680 label a marketplace according to disinformation, misinformation, malinformation, and then they give 315 00:22:48.799 --> 00:22:52.519 ratings to entities. Right. So we made the top ten lists on GDI. 316 00:22:53.039 --> 00:22:56.519 I got rating on NewsGuard at sixty two. That's not a good number, 317 00:22:56.880 --> 00:23:00.880 right. So what they do is that as they go out there and 318 00:23:02.079 --> 00:23:06.279 advertisers actually do their media buys on this stuff, right, That's what that's 319 00:23:06.319 --> 00:23:07.880 kind of what I want to talk about. So if I'm a company I'm 320 00:23:07.920 --> 00:23:14.599 selling tied detergent, I just you know, or I'm I'm I'm I'm giving 321 00:23:14.640 --> 00:23:21.440 information to uh, you know, my ad buys for Google. I'm just 322 00:23:21.440 --> 00:23:22.519 gonna say, well, give me what's the list I don't want to be 323 00:23:22.559 --> 00:23:26.440 on. I don't want to be on that gd I list, right, 324 00:23:26.440 --> 00:23:27.079 I don't want to be on the news Guard list. I don't want to 325 00:23:27.079 --> 00:23:37.000 be there. So everybody but that and suddenly I have stepped on the artery 326 00:23:37.039 --> 00:23:44.079 that it pays for and funds Real Clear. Is that kind of what happens. 327 00:23:44.200 --> 00:23:47.000 Yeah. The thing that I think, you know, I don't think 328 00:23:47.079 --> 00:23:52.279 Real Clear is on that list by accident. I think you know, I 329 00:23:52.319 --> 00:23:55.920 think we're the crown jewel of the design of that list, because if you 330 00:23:55.960 --> 00:24:00.000 bring down Real Clear, Real Clear's job is is to kind of be the 331 00:24:00.000 --> 00:24:06.079 Bloomberg News terminal through media and politics and polling. You come to our site 332 00:24:06.119 --> 00:24:10.160 to see what's happening. You get a sense of the media arc by being 333 00:24:10.160 --> 00:24:12.559 on our page. And what we've done is we've built a business model and 334 00:24:12.599 --> 00:24:18.519 an editorial kind of approach that's viewpoint diversity. If you blow a hole in 335 00:24:18.559 --> 00:24:22.640 the floorboards of our ship, right, if you attack us on traffic, 336 00:24:22.680 --> 00:24:26.880 you attack us on advertising, if you bring us down, you know, 337 00:24:26.079 --> 00:24:32.799 the ascendant republicanism and conservative movement that we do our best to curate every day, 338 00:24:33.200 --> 00:24:37.279 all of a sudden that gets broken apart and diluted. So, I 339 00:24:37.279 --> 00:24:40.240 mean, I think they purposely put on us on this list, and it's 340 00:24:40.240 --> 00:24:44.240 because we believe in viewpoint diversity. We'd like to show all sides. We 341 00:24:44.400 --> 00:24:48.400 like our people to think outside their own tribe. Right, But I think 342 00:24:48.559 --> 00:24:52.200 that in today's America, you know gets you marked for, you know, 343 00:24:52.240 --> 00:24:56.759 for death through you know, advertising starvation. That's the beautiful thing about it, 344 00:24:57.039 --> 00:25:02.559 you know. Don Draper's and Madison ab have outsourced the guardians of news 345 00:25:02.599 --> 00:25:07.720 and advertising dollars to a cutout group that was funded by the State Department and 346 00:25:07.480 --> 00:25:12.880 supported by left wing the philanthropies. Now has grown into an industry where I 347 00:25:12.920 --> 00:25:15.599 think, you know, they really can control the news, the future of 348 00:25:15.599 --> 00:25:19.759 the news, and they've done it in a particularly I mean, just to 349 00:25:19.759 --> 00:25:29.640 give them props clever way, because the the no one no one's hands are 350 00:25:29.680 --> 00:25:34.160 specifically dirty here, right. You have you have this NGO and they're just 351 00:25:34.200 --> 00:25:37.519 putting a list together you don't like to listen, sorry, And then you 352 00:25:37.599 --> 00:25:40.400 have advertisers who's saying, well, just give me a list. I'll follow 353 00:25:40.400 --> 00:25:44.839 any list. And what you have as a squeeze on probably one of the 354 00:25:44.880 --> 00:25:52.279 last places on the web where you can reliably get a fair balanced picture of 355 00:25:52.359 --> 00:25:59.160 the national political, economic, social cultural conversation. And there's like one more 356 00:25:59.240 --> 00:26:02.599 part of that. It gets a little worse. So the origin story of 357 00:26:02.640 --> 00:26:08.839 this I think came really in the response in twenty sixteen and the really the 358 00:26:08.920 --> 00:26:15.680 coordinated but really kind of started with one a couple of people against Breitbart. 359 00:26:15.960 --> 00:26:19.839 So Breitbart had its hands harry because of Trump but also Brexit. There was 360 00:26:21.200 --> 00:26:23.960 there was a small little effort a guy I think at San Francisco and you 361 00:26:25.000 --> 00:26:29.319 know, and a partner in crime. What they did was they went out 362 00:26:29.319 --> 00:26:34.240 there and started pressuring all the advertisers that had the temerity to actually want to 363 00:26:34.240 --> 00:26:38.839 get a bright biot audience. I think it was called Sleeping Giants. Sleeping 364 00:26:38.880 --> 00:26:44.839 Giants, I think was and Breitbart was, you know, victim one and 365 00:26:45.119 --> 00:26:48.039 sleep the Giants was the kind of the code to the future and how to 366 00:26:48.079 --> 00:26:51.319 move forward on this. But it's like that has developed. In fact, 367 00:26:51.400 --> 00:26:55.680 one of the co founders of that, she went on and she has this 368 00:26:55.920 --> 00:26:59.839 entity called check my Ads. Check my Ants is supported by George Soros. 369 00:27:00.079 --> 00:27:03.279 The purpose of Checking my Ands is if you don't take NewsGuard and gd I 370 00:27:03.440 --> 00:27:07.160 seriously enough, they'll do that to you. They'll go after and harass you 371 00:27:07.279 --> 00:27:11.640 have people signed petitions, call you all every name in the book. You 372 00:27:11.640 --> 00:27:17.640 know, you're against your transphobe, you're a hitler, and the rest and 373 00:27:18.400 --> 00:27:22.480 pretty much what happens, you know, you know, what's to be expected, 374 00:27:22.519 --> 00:27:26.599 happens that you know, these guys cave. And what happens is free 375 00:27:26.640 --> 00:27:30.960 speech gets diminished, and instead of having a vibrant dialogue, we have a 376 00:27:30.000 --> 00:27:36.039 monologue. And sadly, when it happens and it's exposed, instead of the 377 00:27:36.079 --> 00:27:41.640 Fourth Estate being jealous of its prerogative and privileges, they're either silent or cheerlead 378 00:27:41.720 --> 00:27:45.279 for it, you know. And am I thing this is sound democracy dies 379 00:27:45.319 --> 00:27:48.279 in broad daylight and actually with the clapping of the fourth of State, right 380 00:27:48.799 --> 00:27:53.839 David, David, I'm getting all this information for the really sort of the 381 00:27:53.880 --> 00:27:59.000 first I was only dimly aware of all that you're describing. Can you go 382 00:27:59.680 --> 00:28:06.480 go right back to the beginning. Where did news Guard come from? Gordon 383 00:28:06.519 --> 00:28:10.079 Krovitz is the founder of NewsGuard, who used to be at the Wall Street 384 00:28:10.160 --> 00:28:14.559 Journal, also of the Wall Street Journal, right, yeah, and also 385 00:28:15.039 --> 00:28:18.759 something you know, I'm forgetting his partner's name, but kind of you know, 386 00:28:18.880 --> 00:28:23.039 came from kind of the legal profession. They you know, I think 387 00:28:23.720 --> 00:28:29.240 I think they saw the opportunity and quite frankly they were supported by our State 388 00:28:29.279 --> 00:28:33.960 Department, so they got seed funding for their company by our government, which 389 00:28:33.000 --> 00:28:40.680 is an obvious violation of First Amendment. And on what possible justification if you 390 00:28:40.680 --> 00:28:44.519 were making the argument that the State Department official had in his or her head, 391 00:28:44.599 --> 00:28:47.079 what would the argument have been, I mean that it makes sense for 392 00:28:47.119 --> 00:28:52.119 the State Department to get in the business of grading websites. Well, I 393 00:28:52.160 --> 00:28:57.400 think it gets back to I think the State Department is became conserved, not 394 00:28:57.440 --> 00:29:02.359 only in the United States, but with populism, right, you know, 395 00:29:02.480 --> 00:29:07.759 so they saw like the shock of like of what Bresit did to Europe. 396 00:29:07.279 --> 00:29:11.880 They saw the you know, kind of the ascendancy of Trump. You know, 397 00:29:11.160 --> 00:29:14.960 you know, whether true or not, I think it's not. You 398 00:29:15.000 --> 00:29:18.279 know, it's like, you know, they were part of a narrative that 399 00:29:18.400 --> 00:29:22.440 was saying Russia, Russia, Russia, like about a danger tow ourd to 400 00:29:22.440 --> 00:29:26.319 mind danger. And again there's there's and this is something that's really happened. 401 00:29:26.720 --> 00:29:32.319 There has been a complete shift, you know, from this kind of recognition 402 00:29:32.400 --> 00:29:36.119 of free speech and what it means and what it requires, right and you 403 00:29:36.160 --> 00:29:40.200 know, in healthy speech and healthy speech is the things that you know, 404 00:29:40.519 --> 00:29:45.759 like disinformation, misinformation and malinformation in the whole idea of malinformation the definition of 405 00:29:45.799 --> 00:29:48.960 it. I'm probably going to butcher it. But malinformation is not untruthful. 406 00:29:49.680 --> 00:29:56.279 It's just not helpful to you know, insular minorities in blah blah blah. 407 00:29:56.480 --> 00:29:59.119 Right right, Okay, So I just want to I just want to understand 408 00:29:59.119 --> 00:30:03.799 where this. So the State Department gives NewsGuard some sort of seed funding, 409 00:30:03.359 --> 00:30:08.200 and now their business model is what they go around to all the big advertisers 410 00:30:08.200 --> 00:30:15.079 in Manhattan and say, bias subscription to us. We'll keep your advertisers out 411 00:30:15.079 --> 00:30:22.000 of trouble. And if your P and G or some name it, you're 412 00:30:22.160 --> 00:30:26.400 a big you're an executive, and say, look on General Mills, I 413 00:30:26.480 --> 00:30:30.640 make cheerios. I don't want trouble. Okay, I don't want trouble. 414 00:30:30.880 --> 00:30:37.000 I don't want trouble. And that's and then NewsGuard starts. Is there competition 415 00:30:37.079 --> 00:30:41.559 to NewsGuard? GDI? Where's the push? I mean GDI? Oh, 416 00:30:41.680 --> 00:30:47.720 the competition to NewsGuard. I mean, you know there's people who like fire 417 00:30:48.160 --> 00:30:52.519 Phil Hamburger at American News Civil Liberties Unions. They're pushing back into the courts. 418 00:30:52.920 --> 00:30:56.400 But you know the difficulty that you have is that you know they're embedded 419 00:30:56.440 --> 00:31:00.359 in advertising, right It you know they have they you know, they have 420 00:31:00.440 --> 00:31:04.960 a ranking system. They'll defend their ranking system. They invite you to participate 421 00:31:06.319 --> 00:31:10.240 in arguing your score. Right, but news Guard does news Guard, but 422 00:31:10.240 --> 00:31:12.680 it's so to give you a quick sense, So State Department NewsGuard GDI, 423 00:31:14.440 --> 00:31:17.880 I check my ads as the enforcer. But then outside of that, there 424 00:31:17.920 --> 00:31:22.880 are sixty universities across the United States and a lot of the big name philanthropies 425 00:31:22.920 --> 00:31:26.640 are funding the universities. They're funding NGOs around it, and you have a 426 00:31:26.759 --> 00:31:30.880 whole I would it's too big to be called a cottage industy once you hit 427 00:31:30.880 --> 00:31:36.640 sixty. Just in the in higher education, their job is to go out 428 00:31:36.680 --> 00:31:40.400 there and be the media minders, to go out and say this is different, 429 00:31:40.839 --> 00:31:44.759 this is misinformation. They keep in the Nadia Knights list. So NewsGuard 430 00:31:44.799 --> 00:31:49.400 can say, we're looking at these trusted, you know, independent NGOs. 431 00:31:49.920 --> 00:31:55.359 We're looking to these higher universities Harvard and the like, and we're getting this 432 00:31:55.480 --> 00:32:00.000 information. It's going into our rating and then you know, then the advertise 433 00:32:00.160 --> 00:32:04.480 there's you know, act on it. The thing is the advertisers always wanted 434 00:32:04.519 --> 00:32:07.519 the excuse to do this too, like, so everybody's pushing on an open 435 00:32:07.599 --> 00:32:12.640 door here, right, It's like, you know, like I don't like 436 00:32:12.680 --> 00:32:15.960 any of this stuff. I hate Fox News. Therefore, give me a 437 00:32:15.039 --> 00:32:17.759 reason not to funded. I don't like the New York Post. Give me 438 00:32:17.799 --> 00:32:22.720 a reason not the funded. And then all of them are kind of working 439 00:32:22.119 --> 00:32:28.400 in this kind of coordination, coordinated circle of jerk and happening. This happened, 440 00:32:28.440 --> 00:32:32.400 and net effect is they're browning out the free speech rights of half of 441 00:32:32.440 --> 00:32:38.240 America, and it's being done in the notion of safe speech. David, 442 00:32:38.279 --> 00:32:43.599 I'm in the fourth Estate. I'm here in a large, luxuriously appointed newspaper 443 00:32:43.640 --> 00:32:45.480 office which happens to be empty at the moment. And one of the things 444 00:32:45.480 --> 00:32:50.720 that is one of the things that has afflicted my profession is thankfully not evident 445 00:32:50.759 --> 00:32:53.160 here in our new hires. But elsewhere I hear, and I hear from 446 00:32:53.160 --> 00:32:55.039 people who are in Jay school, and the rest of it is that the 447 00:32:55.039 --> 00:33:00.160 new idea amongst journalists who are coming up is that they're really the The idea 448 00:33:00.200 --> 00:33:07.920 of objectivity is outdated because we face so many existential extinction level events coming at 449 00:33:07.920 --> 00:33:10.759 our society. We're about to have a fascist government, We're about to lose 450 00:33:10.759 --> 00:33:15.400 the world to global warming, we're about to all of these things that are 451 00:33:15.440 --> 00:33:20.200 wrong. So therefore the idea of an even handed approach is hopping right in 452 00:33:20.279 --> 00:33:23.920 the cradle with evil. There's no there's no time for objectivity. So people 453 00:33:24.000 --> 00:33:29.799 like you who are facilitating the end of the world because of your refusal to 454 00:33:29.799 --> 00:33:32.759 go along with every single prescription that we need to do, now that it's 455 00:33:32.839 --> 00:33:37.839 a natural reaction to say no, that these places should not be subsidized, 456 00:33:37.359 --> 00:33:40.319 How the devil do you get around that? When you have as you say, 457 00:33:40.319 --> 00:33:44.119 when you mentioned with the clapping of the fourth estate, do you just 458 00:33:44.119 --> 00:33:49.359 simply give up up in them entirely? We can't. They're still senting agenda. 459 00:33:49.519 --> 00:33:52.400 I mean, I think we have to, Like Houston, we have 460 00:33:52.480 --> 00:33:57.200 a problem. The problem is that, you know, academia, the commanding 461 00:33:57.240 --> 00:34:00.920 heights, have been corrupted by this thinking. I mean, the Atlantic did 462 00:34:00.920 --> 00:34:05.400 a survey and find it turns out, you know, not surprisingly but short 463 00:34:05.400 --> 00:34:08.679 surprisingly to most out there, that the higher levels of education you receive, 464 00:34:09.159 --> 00:34:15.119 the less tolerant you are of other people's opinion. And you have these monocultures 465 00:34:15.119 --> 00:34:16.920 out there, I mean, like you know, so you know, the 466 00:34:17.000 --> 00:34:22.159 left started their long march in entertainment you know, you know, you know, 467 00:34:22.679 --> 00:34:27.239 it started to Bill you airs what he goes to the university, they 468 00:34:27.280 --> 00:34:30.000 go into entertainment, but did march through everything, you know. So now 469 00:34:30.000 --> 00:34:35.639 they have like that big company, they have big tech, they have advertising 470 00:34:36.159 --> 00:34:38.760 and pretty much they're at a point where I think they know what their power 471 00:34:38.880 --> 00:34:43.440 is and they're projecting it. And the real thing is, it's like, 472 00:34:44.000 --> 00:34:46.079 try to stand up against it, you'll be labeled a fascist. You'll be 473 00:34:46.199 --> 00:34:51.800 chilled out right. So I think they've created something that's very dangerous. But 474 00:34:52.119 --> 00:34:54.320 you know, my thing is it's I think a lot of this has happened, 475 00:34:54.320 --> 00:34:57.840 and you know, and I think it can be stomped. You know, 476 00:34:57.880 --> 00:35:01.119 maybe I'm kind of reading too much to hovel right and the courage of 477 00:35:01.199 --> 00:35:05.880 you know, being not afraid. But if you if we keep on being 478 00:35:05.960 --> 00:35:09.559 adjacent and looking at our shoes and we don't say this is Unamerican. What's 479 00:35:09.599 --> 00:35:14.679 happening here? This is the hallmarks of red or brown fascism, whatever you 480 00:35:14.719 --> 00:35:17.119 want to call it, right, but this is not America. This is 481 00:35:17.320 --> 00:35:22.880 we have a First Amendment protection. Sadly Europe doesn't, but we do. 482 00:35:22.480 --> 00:35:25.360 And I think we have to stop looking at our shoes and stand up and 483 00:35:25.400 --> 00:35:30.519 straighten our spines and say no, right, we have to go after this 484 00:35:30.679 --> 00:35:32.400 and rip it out, root and branch. You know. It's like if 485 00:35:32.440 --> 00:35:37.280 it's being funded by any state universities. Of these sixty, I think there's 486 00:35:37.320 --> 00:35:40.360 more than a few that are, and they're in red states. I think 487 00:35:40.440 --> 00:35:45.079 Republican governors should lean on these things, right. I think it should be 488 00:35:45.159 --> 00:35:49.840 very clear. You know, if advertisers are doing this, I think they 489 00:35:49.880 --> 00:35:53.079 have to be realizing there has to be just it's an all of society effort 490 00:35:53.159 --> 00:35:57.519 that they've built. I mean, so they're enlisting civil society plan to be 491 00:35:57.880 --> 00:36:02.239 higher education, advertising, big tech. It has to actually be at least 492 00:36:02.320 --> 00:36:07.360 recognized and refuted. And what ultimately I think is the best thing is just 493 00:36:07.400 --> 00:36:13.079 to replace a bad idea for a better idea. Right. I think these 494 00:36:13.119 --> 00:36:15.800 folks who are out there with it, miss Dish and mal they really think 495 00:36:15.840 --> 00:36:21.039 they're doing a good I think we have to show this as for what it 496 00:36:21.119 --> 00:36:25.159 is. It's an Awellian project that is like being pushed and you know, 497 00:36:25.320 --> 00:36:29.960 and this is something I think that you know, I don't care who you 498 00:36:30.000 --> 00:36:34.840 are, like a Democrat Republican. If we do not actually have the First 499 00:36:34.880 --> 00:36:38.920 Amendment in a real sense, you know, you know, the one that 500 00:36:38.960 --> 00:36:43.239 follows it is kind of the recourse, and we don't want to go to 501 00:36:43.400 --> 00:36:45.400 such a world. And I think the way that we do it is to 502 00:36:45.440 --> 00:36:50.639 come out and say what separates us is we don't have an unum something that 503 00:36:50.679 --> 00:36:54.320 connects our plur of us anymore. I would say, you know, one 504 00:36:54.360 --> 00:36:58.280 of the foundational ones is the First Amendment, and that's why it's first. 505 00:36:59.559 --> 00:37:04.840 I think it's pretty interesting theory. The uh the best way you know, 506 00:37:05.280 --> 00:37:09.000 uh stricted here is to the First Amendment means we probably don't have to go 507 00:37:09.039 --> 00:37:14.480 down to the second Amendment. Right. It seems like a good idea. 508 00:37:15.400 --> 00:37:17.000 So, I mean, I guess what I would say is that what surprised 509 00:37:17.039 --> 00:37:20.960 me at the story was that I just never I mean, I look, 510 00:37:21.039 --> 00:37:22.559 I mean, there are other there are other names on that list. I'm 511 00:37:22.599 --> 00:37:27.039 like, I I know why the liberals don't like the federalists. I get 512 00:37:27.079 --> 00:37:31.039 it. Like it's not good, but I understand, right, but real 513 00:37:31.119 --> 00:37:36.880 clear makes a scrupulous effort. I mean Carl Cannon, who is the editor 514 00:37:36.880 --> 00:37:39.760 in chief and pretty much the editorial guide there is about as scrupulously down the 515 00:37:39.800 --> 00:37:44.000 middle as you can get and whenever you ask, I'm all my liberal friends 516 00:37:44.000 --> 00:37:46.199 and pretty much that's all my friends when they say, look, I just 517 00:37:46.239 --> 00:37:50.519 want I just want to be fair. I just want both sides. And 518 00:37:50.559 --> 00:37:55.480 then here you have an institution that was started with both sides in mind and 519 00:37:55.519 --> 00:38:00.079 continues to do that being labeled and then the idea and we're done punished for 520 00:38:00.119 --> 00:38:06.519 showing that again, punished financially. So let's talk a little bit about obviously 521 00:38:07.360 --> 00:38:08.960 you're you're fighting that the way you can fight that, but you're also sort 522 00:38:08.960 --> 00:38:14.400 of celebrating free speech was a new thing for the Real Clear Foundation. So 523 00:38:14.639 --> 00:38:16.400 I could tell us a little bit about the Summits Dot Prize, and I 524 00:38:16.400 --> 00:38:24.199 should say spoiler alert to our listeners. You are honoring a dear friend of 525 00:38:24.360 --> 00:38:28.679 ours, of mine and Peters and James and also of the podcast. And 526 00:38:28.719 --> 00:38:31.559 I think your dear friend and sent and in many ways of America. Uh 527 00:38:31.639 --> 00:38:37.840 Jay Battacharia, who who needs not just this award but all the awards I 528 00:38:37.840 --> 00:38:39.000 think for the next couple of years. Could you tell us a little bit 529 00:38:39.000 --> 00:38:42.559 at the beginning of that, the reason for that, and and then we 530 00:38:42.599 --> 00:38:45.079 can talk about howmuch Wheel of Jay for a minute. I mean, and 531 00:38:45.119 --> 00:38:47.440 also I want to say to people listening, just because I don't want you 532 00:38:47.480 --> 00:38:50.679 to have to do it. Uh. The prize is actually going to be 533 00:38:50.679 --> 00:38:53.119 in a couple of weeks March seventh, in Palm Beach. So it's going 534 00:38:53.159 --> 00:38:55.480 to be if you're if you're in a cold place right now and you want 535 00:38:55.519 --> 00:38:58.760 to go to a warm place, this is a perfect reason to go to 536 00:38:58.760 --> 00:39:00.119 a warm place. Uh. It's going to be at the Breakers, which 537 00:39:00.159 --> 00:39:05.280 is a gigantic I Peter Wrotel, and you're honoring a couple other people. 538 00:39:05.280 --> 00:39:08.159 But you know, for me, it's just all about Jay. Thanks. 539 00:39:08.320 --> 00:39:14.960 I mean, you know, we wanted to actually create an event that highlighted 540 00:39:15.000 --> 00:39:17.719 what we think is the cornerstone, you know. So like everybody likes the 541 00:39:17.880 --> 00:39:22.079 reference that we're in eighteen sixtiesh moment. I think, you know, for 542 00:39:22.159 --> 00:39:27.480 Lincoln, it was the principle of equality. I think equality needs a better 543 00:39:27.519 --> 00:39:31.159 redefinition now because with the DEI stuff. But I think what we want to 544 00:39:31.199 --> 00:39:37.119 do is stand up what we see the parament political value and you know, 545 00:39:37.239 --> 00:39:40.119 and the thing that keeps this experiment in self government going, it's the source 546 00:39:40.119 --> 00:39:45.119 of American exceptionalism and why an event? You know, why are we doing 547 00:39:45.159 --> 00:39:49.760 a prize program? Look at what the Oscars has done. Look at what 548 00:39:49.800 --> 00:39:53.519 the Pulitzer Prize and Poke Prize has done. You get the world that you 549 00:39:53.639 --> 00:39:58.840 praise, right, And I think part of the reason why we were living 550 00:39:58.880 --> 00:40:04.760 in this orwell world is because we've praised and rewarded it. Right. What 551 00:40:04.880 --> 00:40:08.920 we want to do is stand up a rival to that that that that rewards 552 00:40:08.960 --> 00:40:15.320 people about standing courage who when the rest of us look at their feet or 553 00:40:15.440 --> 00:40:19.920 bend or would hem like in pulling their sales. People who stand up in 554 00:40:19.960 --> 00:40:23.039 front of history and do what Buckley said and yell stop, and they'll stop 555 00:40:23.119 --> 00:40:27.800 by actually living up to the highest standards of their profession. You know. 556 00:40:27.880 --> 00:40:31.519 So you know doctor J. I mean he's you know, that is the 557 00:40:31.599 --> 00:40:39.320 scientific method. Here's a man who stood up for science and he was instead 558 00:40:39.400 --> 00:40:43.559 he was kind of told that he was a flat earther in a sense. 559 00:40:44.159 --> 00:40:46.360 And and and that you know, you know that that you know in Fauci 560 00:40:46.800 --> 00:40:51.159 was Galileo. I think the reverse roles is, no, Fauci was a 561 00:40:51.199 --> 00:40:54.920 pope and doctor J. Bobichario was Galileo. And one of the things I 562 00:40:54.920 --> 00:40:59.519 would say about our prize program, and we'll go into the other people there. 563 00:41:00.360 --> 00:41:05.159 We're not just defenders of free speech. We're looking and I think if 564 00:41:05.199 --> 00:41:07.159 you look at the people that we've chosen, we aren't looking for people who 565 00:41:07.239 --> 00:41:14.719 stand up for free speech that modeled the behavior of their profession and also have 566 00:41:14.880 --> 00:41:19.840 been proven right. Jay has been proven right. We're not just giving We're 567 00:41:19.880 --> 00:41:22.960 not just giving him an award because he had a certain you know, like 568 00:41:22.199 --> 00:41:27.119 you know kind of m D. Cojones. We're giving him an award because 569 00:41:27.159 --> 00:41:30.239 he was right. He stood up to the truth while everybody was bending a 570 00:41:30.280 --> 00:41:34.079 knee and he was right and they were wrong, and you know, and 571 00:41:34.119 --> 00:41:37.320 I think that really carries over into the other two people that we have, 572 00:41:37.440 --> 00:41:40.639 you know, David, Before you get to the other two people, I 573 00:41:40.800 --> 00:41:46.239 just I have to engage in this much self promotion. The place Jay stood 574 00:41:46.320 --> 00:41:53.079 up first was my show uncommon Knowledge. That's right, that's right as Jay. 575 00:41:53.400 --> 00:41:55.960 So what I want to know is is this a cash prize? Because 576 00:41:57.000 --> 00:42:01.400 I figure j ow's me fifteen percent, it is okay. On on to 577 00:42:01.480 --> 00:42:07.039 the other two people and maybe he'll let you let you have like visitation rights 578 00:42:07.039 --> 00:42:13.280 to his beautiful trophy. We talked earlier about this kind of shift in journalism 579 00:42:13.400 --> 00:42:19.480 where we've gone from you know, kind of a recognition of a fact based 580 00:42:19.559 --> 00:42:24.360 discipline, trying to capture and render a true reading of things so readers can 581 00:42:24.440 --> 00:42:29.719 decide from themselves, to activist journalists. And you know, one of the 582 00:42:29.719 --> 00:42:32.000 things that we liked in terms of the choices that we made about the two 583 00:42:32.079 --> 00:42:40.679 journalists that we're honoring is that Matt Tahebe is like you know, Rolling Stone 584 00:42:40.760 --> 00:42:45.840 Magazine, Za Cardi Park, you know, but it's like, it turns 585 00:42:45.840 --> 00:42:52.920 out that this progressive believes in journalism, right. He believes in persuasion, 586 00:42:52.000 --> 00:42:58.360 not coercion. And you know, when someone gave him the Pentagon Papers opportunity 587 00:42:59.039 --> 00:43:01.760 that Elon did, he walked in it and he actually lived up to the 588 00:43:01.800 --> 00:43:07.760 standard of journalism, right. And then on the other side, you know, 589 00:43:07.920 --> 00:43:12.880 Miranda Devine at The New York Post, what journalists in the right mind. 590 00:43:13.119 --> 00:43:16.559 You know, if you would say no to Hunter Biden's laptop and the 591 00:43:16.599 --> 00:43:21.480 story that is actually in that, you wouldn't be a journalist, You'd be 592 00:43:21.519 --> 00:43:25.800 a hack. But you know, both of these folks went into things, 593 00:43:25.920 --> 00:43:32.199 rose to the occasions didn't bend there in these showed the courage of a profession 594 00:43:32.280 --> 00:43:37.920 like day that Jay did for medicine, and what came of it was a 595 00:43:38.039 --> 00:43:43.320 real awakening to the American people because it turns out, like again getting back 596 00:43:43.360 --> 00:43:47.239 to hindsight, well it turns out those fifty plus intelligence operatives that actually said 597 00:43:47.519 --> 00:43:53.440 Russian disinformation that wasn't true, that wasn't true, and and it turns out, 598 00:43:53.599 --> 00:44:00.000 well everybody would apologize for Twitter or Google because there even though they saw 599 00:44:00.119 --> 00:44:02.719 themselves when they came into their origin time, when they went public, that 600 00:44:02.800 --> 00:44:07.599 they were free speech utilities, they would say they are private companies and therefore 601 00:44:07.639 --> 00:44:09.360 they can do what they want. But when you open up and you get 602 00:44:09.360 --> 00:44:13.960 to look inside the kimono there all you see is an alphabet stup of federal 603 00:44:14.000 --> 00:44:20.199 agencies in this marketplace of you know, kind of the censorship industrial complex working 604 00:44:20.239 --> 00:44:24.719 hand in glove to actually brown out one side. I could understand if you're 605 00:44:24.719 --> 00:44:29.400 going after, you know, the outliers, you know, because in a 606 00:44:29.440 --> 00:44:32.719 free world there are dangerous outliers. But if you look at it, they're 607 00:44:32.760 --> 00:44:39.760 going after a certain type of mainstream, like a populous mainstream Republicanism and conservatism 608 00:44:40.159 --> 00:44:45.159 right, and they're going after it in the most brutal way because they're just 609 00:44:45.280 --> 00:44:47.840 trying to start it. And everybody thinks out there, that's like, I 610 00:44:47.880 --> 00:44:52.880 don't know how I get my media. I guess that they they're able to 611 00:44:52.880 --> 00:44:57.960 pay themselves through advertising. Well, they're going to brown that out, show 612 00:44:58.000 --> 00:45:01.039 can and then we'll be scratching our head and saying, you know, whatever 613 00:45:01.079 --> 00:45:06.639 happened to conservative media, right of center media, because you know, the 614 00:45:07.159 --> 00:45:09.079 tea party once existed, it was vibrant, and then all of a sudden 615 00:45:09.079 --> 00:45:12.480 it didn't show up one day. And then you find out it's because we 616 00:45:12.480 --> 00:45:16.000 always learned killed it. You know, they if they see something, they 617 00:45:16.079 --> 00:45:21.159 kill something. And I think that we have to be aware about it because 618 00:45:21.480 --> 00:45:24.719 this is this is foundational. I mean, I do think that the fact 619 00:45:24.719 --> 00:45:30.679 that real clears on this list is an offense and it should offend anybody because 620 00:45:30.719 --> 00:45:35.920 it just shows its nature. They're not protecting, you know, they're not 621 00:45:36.000 --> 00:45:40.239 protecting from that you know, evil outlier. They actually think that there is 622 00:45:42.000 --> 00:45:46.199 that in a just world, there's nine liberals progressive to one centrist conservative, 623 00:45:46.599 --> 00:45:52.400 and that person's able to that person's on that list because someone has to be 624 00:45:52.480 --> 00:45:55.519 on that list, and it's behind a paywall, and then people who have 625 00:45:57.000 --> 00:46:00.400 it will offend people who have principles, and that's what we need more of. 626 00:46:00.599 --> 00:46:02.519 So when it comes to strengthening principles, or for that matter, for 627 00:46:02.599 --> 00:46:06.599 those people who have different principles and just want to read the other side, 628 00:46:06.639 --> 00:46:09.159 that real clear politics will provide them from time to time. I'm looking at 629 00:46:09.159 --> 00:46:14.920 the I'm looking at that. I just clicked to the homepage today, right 630 00:46:15.000 --> 00:46:19.320 this minute, RealClearPolitics dot com. Number one link is from MSNBC. Number 631 00:46:19.320 --> 00:46:22.639 two is from New York Post. Number three is the Washington Monthly. Number 632 00:46:22.679 --> 00:46:27.280 four is our old friend VDH Victor Davis Hanson. Then it's The Daily Beast, 633 00:46:27.320 --> 00:46:30.679 the Federalist New York Magazine, Washington Times, The Atlantic, Emerican Conservative, 634 00:46:30.760 --> 00:46:34.000 MSNBC again Kim Strassel, and the Wall Street Journal, another good friend 635 00:46:34.000 --> 00:46:37.599 of ours, Washington Monthly. I mean it goes down. This is this 636 00:46:37.840 --> 00:46:39.440 one, I mean the other one. It feels like the news. David 637 00:46:39.480 --> 00:46:45.719 doesn't feel like the fake news. I think, you know, and I'd 638 00:46:45.760 --> 00:46:50.079 love the opportunity. I appreciate the opportunity to come out. And it's like 639 00:46:50.559 --> 00:46:55.360 people have to recognize that what these people want to take away in terms of 640 00:46:55.440 --> 00:47:00.000 voices and finances behind those things what they want to take away. I think 641 00:47:00.119 --> 00:47:05.000 readers in philanthropy has to get behind and come to the aid of it, 642 00:47:05.079 --> 00:47:07.199 because if not, it's going to be browned out and it's going to be 643 00:47:07.239 --> 00:47:12.400 over. We're going to be living in a uni party state with a you 644 00:47:10.960 --> 00:47:15.840 like, like an idea that everybody has to go along with, and that's 645 00:47:15.880 --> 00:47:20.159 not an America that I want with real clear politics. Stop going to false 646 00:47:20.239 --> 00:47:23.679 murky politics dot com people, and go to RealClearPolitics dot com. And David, 647 00:47:23.719 --> 00:47:27.719 we thank you so much for showing up today, and good luck with 648 00:47:27.719 --> 00:47:29.960 the prize, and we'll talk again down the road. I hope that you 649 00:47:30.000 --> 00:47:34.360 can come to our event all of you wants call, and all your viewers 650 00:47:34.559 --> 00:47:37.119 you're welcome as well. I'll hope to see you next next week. But 651 00:47:38.159 --> 00:47:42.519 thanks, thanks, thank you. You know, one of the things we 652 00:47:42.519 --> 00:47:44.599 saw this week, gentlemen, before we go, we get a little time 653 00:47:44.639 --> 00:47:45.960 here before Rob has to run and Peter has to run and I have to 654 00:47:45.960 --> 00:47:50.519 amblocked to my lunch, and that is this. We saw the mask pulled 655 00:47:50.559 --> 00:47:53.800 off of Google this week when they made the mistake of releasing Gemini. I 656 00:47:53.840 --> 00:47:58.320 think it was one point five, and with their image generator that seemed to 657 00:47:58.360 --> 00:48:04.039 be oddlysed to falsifying history in every single possible way, no matter what prompt 658 00:48:04.039 --> 00:48:06.239 you gave it. Gentlemen, you know the story, right, I assume 659 00:48:06.239 --> 00:48:10.559 everybody does by now, probably shouldn't assume. But what people found out was 660 00:48:10.559 --> 00:48:15.000 when they typed in show me the founding fathers, the founding fathers did not 661 00:48:15.039 --> 00:48:21.679 look like the founding fathers. Showed me a typical person from North Dakota, 662 00:48:21.800 --> 00:48:25.440 well you would get, shall we say, not the typical. In other 663 00:48:25.480 --> 00:48:30.719 words, the whole system had been devised, as we quickly learned to insert 664 00:48:30.840 --> 00:48:35.519 the word diverse into any sort of prompt that you put. It was designed 665 00:48:36.039 --> 00:48:40.800 with a specific bias that steered your image generation results in one direction. And 666 00:48:42.639 --> 00:48:45.079 all of a sudden people looked at that and realized how they were forcing you 667 00:48:45.159 --> 00:48:49.440 to do a thing that you were not requesting it to do, and thought, 668 00:48:50.760 --> 00:48:57.880 might this characterize the rest of Google? Do you think so? Just 669 00:48:57.920 --> 00:49:01.760 as we may have spent twenty twenty through twenty twenty three learning about the usual 670 00:49:01.800 --> 00:49:06.519 institutions and government and education and medicine, and the rest of it not actually 671 00:49:06.519 --> 00:49:08.440 being up to the job and being actually quite incompetent. Now we're finding out 672 00:49:08.440 --> 00:49:12.400 that the company with whom we made a deal, as Corey Doctor put it, 673 00:49:12.480 --> 00:49:14.960 we made a deal with Google. We'll give you control of all this 674 00:49:15.000 --> 00:49:19.239 information. We'll give you the ability to sort it all. But in exchange, 675 00:49:19.679 --> 00:49:22.400 you have to not be evil, as you used to say you did 676 00:49:22.400 --> 00:49:23.280 not want to be. You've got to be on the up and up. 677 00:49:23.320 --> 00:49:27.079 And it turns out if they're cooking the books and steering people this way and 678 00:49:27.159 --> 00:49:30.199 this thing, people are thinking, well, wait a minute, the whole 679 00:49:30.320 --> 00:49:36.320 enterprise is suspect. The entire enterprise is suspect. What do you think of? 680 00:49:37.039 --> 00:49:38.599 Is this the start of a conversation about Google, or do we just 681 00:49:38.679 --> 00:49:42.320 drift off to duck duck go and bing for a while before we go back 682 00:49:42.320 --> 00:49:46.840 to Google, because its tendrils are everywhere in our lives, using duck duco 683 00:49:46.880 --> 00:49:50.559 would not be a bad place to start. I thought of this as we 684 00:49:50.559 --> 00:49:54.320 were talking with David. I thought, because as usual I'm slow on the 685 00:49:54.400 --> 00:50:04.159 uptake, that when Elon bought Twitter and made public all the files that indicated 686 00:50:04.239 --> 00:50:09.400 censorship on the part of Twitter, and Elon invited. This circles back to 687 00:50:09.480 --> 00:50:15.199 Jay. Elon invited Jay, but I saw Jay the day after he's Jay 688 00:50:15.239 --> 00:50:20.719 went up to San Francisco, and Elon was there to greet him personally and 689 00:50:21.119 --> 00:50:28.480 sat Jay down with It was all much much worse than even Jay, who 690 00:50:28.639 --> 00:50:30.920 knew he was being censored. He could feel it and see it. But 691 00:50:31.000 --> 00:50:38.119 it was even worse than Jay had imagined. I thought, Okay, Elon 692 00:50:38.320 --> 00:50:43.800 called them on it. It was COVID, it's over, We've turned a 693 00:50:43.840 --> 00:50:50.800 page. Totally wrong, totally wrong. David de Rozier just sat here and 694 00:50:50.840 --> 00:50:58.360 told us about the blob that's coming after him. Google. I'm sure they're 695 00:50:58.840 --> 00:51:04.000 red faced with Embarres because what they did was permit us all to inadvertently, 696 00:51:04.519 --> 00:51:08.719 they permitted us all to peek inside. It's, of course still it is 697 00:51:08.800 --> 00:51:14.559 part of the That's the other thing it has In the old days. It 698 00:51:14.599 --> 00:51:22.000 felt to me as though the Soviet Union and dissidents had that we're seeing the 699 00:51:22.039 --> 00:51:29.119 same structure. Repeated that the Soviet operat was just a blob. Certainly by 700 00:51:29.119 --> 00:51:32.159 the time you got to Breshnev, who could there were no great figures. 701 00:51:32.199 --> 00:51:39.079 They were all just bureaucrats. So you had this blob against individual heroic figures. 702 00:51:39.840 --> 00:51:44.960 You could name the figures who had the courage to stand up against it, 703 00:51:45.880 --> 00:51:52.320 individual human beings Soljian Neats and hovel like Vansa and so forth. And 704 00:51:52.519 --> 00:52:00.400 now it's happening here. We've got this nameless, faceless blob. People like 705 00:52:00.440 --> 00:52:04.039 Matt Taibi are doing hard work to name names so we can go after but 706 00:52:04.719 --> 00:52:09.800 we all experience it as a faceless blob and individual heroic figures. I do 707 00:52:10.480 --> 00:52:15.039 I love this Samist Prize because it's pointing this out, the Ja Bodicharis, 708 00:52:15.079 --> 00:52:22.239 the Matt Taiebe's but and where AI plays into this. I fear it makes 709 00:52:22.239 --> 00:52:29.519 everything worse, but we're in. But what we saw of Google is again, 710 00:52:29.599 --> 00:52:31.760 every time we get a glimpse of it, it's worse than we could 711 00:52:31.840 --> 00:52:37.119 have imagined, more deeply embedded, more prevalent. Yesterday was I mean, 712 00:52:37.280 --> 00:52:42.880 in one sense it was hilarious. I was delighted that Google was so thoroughly 713 00:52:42.960 --> 00:52:46.440 embarrassed, but it was very unnerving at the same time. It's a gigantic, 714 00:52:47.239 --> 00:52:52.679 immensely profitable corporation and look at the AI it was prepared to roll out 715 00:52:52.679 --> 00:52:59.360 on the rest of us did roll out it? Did? I get? 716 00:52:59.440 --> 00:53:05.639 Yeah, I actually don't think that Google, And it's probably what you said, 717 00:53:05.639 --> 00:53:07.840 Peter, But I don't think Google was it. I don't think the 718 00:53:07.280 --> 00:53:09.920 respond to me. There's some crazy ones like show me a picture of a 719 00:53:09.960 --> 00:53:15.960 pope and it was like a black woman and an Indian woman like that. 720 00:53:17.599 --> 00:53:24.840 I don't think that Google is originated this craziness. I think that you can 721 00:53:24.880 --> 00:53:30.599 find this attitude in every public school in America. I mean, I think 722 00:53:30.639 --> 00:53:36.639 this is the institutional attitude. And I think what the strange part of it 723 00:53:36.679 --> 00:53:39.280 is that you can't actually control people's thoughts. You can't actually do that. 724 00:53:39.320 --> 00:53:43.840 You can, you could control people's beliefs for a little bit, but eventually 725 00:53:44.400 --> 00:53:45.800 tyrants fall. That's what they do. They take a lot of people with 726 00:53:45.880 --> 00:53:51.880 them, but that's what they do. The theory behind all of this is 727 00:53:51.920 --> 00:53:58.960 that if you if you have the information, you will make a decision that 728 00:53:59.000 --> 00:54:02.360 we don't like correct. So we're not going to give you the information and 729 00:54:02.400 --> 00:54:07.440 we're saving you from making errors. So the emblematic of that was COVID. 730 00:54:07.559 --> 00:54:13.639 If you knew that the masks don't really work, if you knew that it's 731 00:54:13.679 --> 00:54:19.239 just old people. You would then go about your business, and we don't 732 00:54:19.239 --> 00:54:22.440 think you should make that decision. So we're simply we're simply gonna lie to 733 00:54:22.440 --> 00:54:25.559 you and we're gonna say later what we had to, because you cannot be 734 00:54:25.639 --> 00:54:31.880 trusted with information. And the sad part about that is is that that only 735 00:54:32.000 --> 00:54:36.440 drives more. I mean, one of the reasons why we live in a 736 00:54:36.440 --> 00:54:40.519 world now which seems to be exploding with conspiracy theories and exploding with crackpot politics 737 00:54:42.119 --> 00:54:46.320 is because in a world in which I'm not going the trusted information givers are 738 00:54:46.360 --> 00:54:52.480 not giving you the information, then almost anything can be true. Years and 739 00:54:52.559 --> 00:54:57.480 years and years ago, we had on this podcast Peter Pomeranzev I'm probably miss 740 00:54:57.559 --> 00:55:05.679 Perconsi's name A young I met in Budapest with Jonas Solivan actually and his because 741 00:55:05.719 --> 00:55:09.320 his father is a poet living in Budapest, and and he wrote a book. 742 00:55:10.119 --> 00:55:15.159 Uh, and I cannot, I mean, every enough, everything is 743 00:55:15.199 --> 00:55:16.519 possible and nothing is true. I think it is the name of the book. 744 00:55:16.519 --> 00:55:21.800 And he was a guest and he was talking about Putin's Russia. It's 745 00:55:21.800 --> 00:55:23.880 really kind of worth rereading that book. And I don't want to say I'm 746 00:55:23.920 --> 00:55:27.679 not trying to Tucker Carlson this, but it is something that we have to 747 00:55:27.719 --> 00:55:30.719 be careful of, which is that information, even from the and the right, 748 00:55:30.880 --> 00:55:39.079 has that problem too. Information is uniformly good. It is not something 749 00:55:39.119 --> 00:55:45.280 that can be shaped or trimmed or massaged or spun so that you come to 750 00:55:45.320 --> 00:55:51.119 the right outcome. And that's why I feel like things like but David is 751 00:55:51.119 --> 00:55:53.280 doing it real clear and the Samisdat project, et cetera, and why we 752 00:55:53.320 --> 00:55:58.000 have to celebrate people like Jay is really really important. By the way, 753 00:55:58.159 --> 00:56:01.480 I can put your mind at ease on one point, no one will ever 754 00:56:01.559 --> 00:56:07.599 confuse you with Tucker Carlson. That actually wasn't true at a certain point. 755 00:56:07.599 --> 00:56:12.280 I did get confused a couple of times. True truly, when we're both 756 00:56:12.280 --> 00:56:16.480 considerably younger. Reason why we have to push back as much as loudly and 757 00:56:16.719 --> 00:56:22.400 as often as possible, because what Google revealed that it was doing is inserting 758 00:56:22.440 --> 00:56:30.199 a poison into American and Western civilization, and acidic poison that drips down is 759 00:56:30.199 --> 00:56:32.280 intended to drip down. I don't want to sound conspiratorial, but drips down 760 00:56:32.280 --> 00:56:36.000 to the foundation and eats away at the stones that hold the whole thing up. 761 00:56:36.559 --> 00:56:39.440 Somebody asked Gemini to generate some works in the style of Norman Rockwall. 762 00:56:39.559 --> 00:56:44.239 It wasn't me, and Gemini refused to do so. I could have said 763 00:56:44.639 --> 00:56:47.239 no, sorry, copyright. But what it said was that there were ethical 764 00:56:47.280 --> 00:56:52.039 considerations in portraying something in the style of Norman Rockwall. And I'll read that 765 00:56:52.239 --> 00:57:01.320 to you representation, quoth the AI. Rockwall's paintings often presented an idealized version 766 00:57:01.400 --> 00:57:07.679 of American life. Well, first of all is the thought omitting or downplaying 767 00:57:07.760 --> 00:57:13.480 certain realities of the time, particularly regarding race, gender, and social class. 768 00:57:14.840 --> 00:57:22.519 Creating such images without critical context could perpetuate harmful stereotypes or inaccurate representations. 769 00:57:22.239 --> 00:57:28.119 So the only context in which one can look at a painting of a fat 770 00:57:28.159 --> 00:57:30.320 cop sitting at a small diner looking at a kid who's got a bendle and 771 00:57:30.320 --> 00:57:36.039 who's running away, the only real you can. You can show that, 772 00:57:37.480 --> 00:57:42.559 but you have to explain why there's harm, why there's stereos, why there's 773 00:57:42.719 --> 00:57:45.320 what it's emitting. You can show the picture of the cop at the small 774 00:57:45.360 --> 00:57:47.840 town little dinner talking to the kid, but you would damn well better come 775 00:57:47.880 --> 00:57:52.079 up with the nineteen fifty three crime statistics that show exactly how the Department of 776 00:57:52.119 --> 00:57:58.480 Police and that in that city was actually performing poorly towards this group that we 777 00:57:58.679 --> 00:58:04.639 now elevates. It says that you there must be a critical intermediary between every 778 00:58:04.679 --> 00:58:07.760 aspect of American history that that nudges you and points you in the right place, 779 00:58:07.800 --> 00:58:13.239 in the right direction. Norman fricking Rockwell. Now, the people who 780 00:58:13.280 --> 00:58:15.079 wrote this thing, and this isn't written right. That nobody sat down and 781 00:58:15.159 --> 00:58:19.400 wrote this and coded it into it. It arose out of the mindset of 782 00:58:19.400 --> 00:58:22.920 the people who did it because they have a contempt for Norman Rockwell for a 783 00:58:22.920 --> 00:58:25.559 couple of reasons. One the wrong stupid people like them. Two, it's 784 00:58:25.599 --> 00:58:29.519 been al kitchy art. They've been told they've never actually seen it, they 785 00:58:29.519 --> 00:58:32.960 couldn't identify it, but that's the idea. And three just sort of wafting 786 00:58:34.039 --> 00:58:36.880 up from the swamp of all the places that they scraped, like read it 787 00:58:36.880 --> 00:58:38.719 and the rest of them, is the general idea that all of these things 788 00:58:38.760 --> 00:58:44.519 backed that an idealized version of American life is not something to which we should 789 00:58:44.519 --> 00:58:46.559 look and aspire and figure out how to attain and fix, and all the 790 00:58:46.559 --> 00:58:51.639 rest of it. It is a it is a It is a bad, 791 00:58:52.880 --> 00:58:57.639 onerous, odorous thing to even consider that there can be an idealized version of 792 00:58:57.639 --> 00:59:02.039 American life, because American life itself, by definition is full of every evilism 793 00:59:02.159 --> 00:59:06.639 in the world. And that's why the year zero. Dare I say, 794 00:59:06.719 --> 00:59:09.559 upending the etch of sketch desire comes? That's it. I'm done. Anybody 795 00:59:09.599 --> 00:59:16.360 else no, No, I think Rob has to fly, I think Peter 796 00:59:16.440 --> 00:59:20.400 has to amble. I have to lunch. This podcast is brought to you 797 00:59:20.400 --> 00:59:22.760 by Hillsdale College. Support them for supporting us, and we thank Hillsdale again. 798 00:59:22.920 --> 00:59:27.159 That's free Hillsdale classes for free. What more do you need? Time 799 00:59:27.239 --> 00:59:30.000 with that five star review at Apple Podcasts if you wouldn't mind it, if 800 00:59:30.039 --> 00:59:32.239 you're any place else, you getting us on some other platform to look to 801 00:59:32.239 --> 00:59:36.239 see if they can say something with some rating system, because we love it 802 00:59:36.280 --> 00:59:37.840 and it gets more people to go to Ricochet. And it's been months, 803 00:59:37.920 --> 00:59:42.920 I tell you, months since Rob has given you a pitch to join Ricochet. 804 00:59:42.960 --> 00:59:45.280 When next he joins us, you're welcome. I expect you. When 805 00:59:45.320 --> 00:59:49.599 next he joins us, I expect you will. But in the meantime, 806 00:59:49.639 --> 00:59:52.559 I want to thank everybody for listening, Peter rob it's been a pleasure. 807 00:59:52.639 --> 00:59:57.559 We'll see everybody in the comments, said Ricochet. For if you join that 808 00:59:57.800 --> 01:00:00.719 is, and have the right to do so, which she is where the 809 01:00:00.719 --> 01:00:02.880 fun begins. See you all a Ricochet and we'll see you all next week. 810 01:00:04.559 --> 01:00:13.480 Lunch amble and fly should the worst law firms? All right, next 811 01:00:13.480 --> 01:00:21.159 week, boys, next week, next week Ricochet Join the conversation.