Speaker 1: When when Doge starts pulling these strings, there's a certain
Speaker 1: group of people who emerge like prairie dogs boop, the
Speaker 1: little heads pop up to complain. Those are the deep
Speaker 1: state operatives. Now maybe there'll be some exceptions, but I
Speaker 1: think you're going to find out the entire architecture of
Speaker 1: the bad guys, because they're the ones who are going
Speaker 1: to start fighting this the hardest. As Elon Musk said
Speaker 1: on X, he said, one lesson I remember from the
Speaker 1: papal days, the PayPal days, He said, do you know
Speaker 1: who complained the loudest, the fraudsters. There would be a
Speaker 1: media over the top indignation from the fraudsters. Normal people
Speaker 1: will say, quote, I think there's something wrong, but fraudsters
Speaker 1: will come hot out the gate with fake outrage. Huh, fraudster,
Speaker 1: fake outrage. We're looking at a rapid growth of bulugurkey.
Speaker 1: We're looking at a rapid growth of the fortunities you
Speaker 1: know a few that We're looking at a rapid growth
Speaker 1: of clipdocacy as well.
Speaker 2: Huh.
Speaker 1: That feels like a coming out of the gate hot
Speaker 1: with fake outrage.
Speaker 3: Elon Musk, you didn't create us, aid, the United States
Speaker 3: Congress did. For the American people, and sounds like Elon
Speaker 3: Musk did not create USAID, he doesn't have the power
Speaker 3: to destroy it, And who's gonna stop him? We are,
Speaker 3: We're gonna stop him.
Speaker 4: Elon Musk, you may have illegally seized power over the
Speaker 4: financial payment systems of the United States Department of Treasury,
Speaker 4: but you don't control the money of the American people.
Speaker 3: The United States Congress does that under Article one of
Speaker 3: the Constitution.
Speaker 2: So it looks like Scott Adams was right that in fact,
Speaker 2: all of the deep state actors are showing themselves. Jamie
Speaker 2: are asking immediately sprints to a microphone, what are you
Speaker 2: doing with USAI D What do you what do you
Speaker 2: you think you run our budget here, that's my job,
Speaker 2: Oh Congress. Congress who doesn't seem to care about ever
Speaker 2: balancing a budget, doesn't seem to care about ever declared
Speaker 2: hiring war or even having a vote on it or
Speaker 2: a debate on it. They're totally happy. They're thrilled, in fact,
Speaker 2: to give away their powers to the executive branch twenty
Speaker 2: four to seven. But not when Donald Trump's in charge. No, no, no,
Speaker 2: not when Elon Musk has dozed breathing down their neck,
Speaker 2: and that's where we're at. That's what's happening USAID, if
Speaker 2: not the head of the snake is a one of
Speaker 2: the hydras, one of the major hydras, and in my opinion,
Speaker 2: what it represents is the funding mechanism for the neoliberal
Speaker 2: world order, which they have talked about at nauseum over
Speaker 2: the past couple of years, ever since Russia decided to
Speaker 2: invade Ukraine, which I might add was a direct response
Speaker 2: to USAID's operations inside of Ukraine in twenty fourteen and
Speaker 2: prior and after, but you get the idea. Anyways, I
Speaker 2: think that this is a truly revelatory moment. I think
Speaker 2: that this is really really important for people to be
Speaker 2: paying attention to who it's the most outraged. People don't
Speaker 2: know this, but AOC was actually plucked out of obscurity
Speaker 2: and backed by a conduit or a subsidiary of USAID
Speaker 2: to get her into Congress in the first place. So,
Speaker 2: needless to say, she loves USAID. So does Chuck Schumer,
Speaker 2: So does Hillary Clinton, so does Victoria Newland, so does
Speaker 2: Chuck Schumer, all of them, all of the normal actors
Speaker 2: that you would expect to love USAID do and that's
Speaker 2: why you should be opposed to it. And also he
Speaker 2: lied there he said that this was created by Congress.
Speaker 2: Well kind of, it was created by Congress in the
Speaker 2: sense that they then instructed the president to create something
Speaker 2: to handle foreign aid. But what happened was in nineteen
Speaker 2: sixty one JFK created via executive order the actual parameters
Speaker 2: for USAID, which means that Donald Trump, via executive order
Speaker 2: can modify that dramatically, if not rescinded entirely, which is
Speaker 2: what I would hope he would do, as opposed to
Speaker 2: funneling it off under the State Department, in which case
Speaker 2: Marco Rubio is that in charge of it. So not
Speaker 2: a perfect solution, but it is a step in the
Speaker 2: right direction. Today I have on Jeremy Kaufman, the Legend,
Speaker 2: the Psycho from New Hampshire, the Free State Project. He's great.
Speaker 2: We go into some of this, we go really deep
Speaker 2: on it, but we talk just about Trump's first two
Speaker 2: weeks and what we're thinking about everything, where it's headed,
Speaker 2: if what we should be supporting, criticizing, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker 2: It's a good conversation. I hope you guys enjoy it.
Speaker 2: If you can believe it. The legends over at My
Speaker 2: Pillow decided to sponsor Liberty Lockdown. I know I can't
Speaker 2: believe it either, but this is real. If you guys
Speaker 2: want to pick up any of the best pillows around, blankets, slippers,
Speaker 2: they got a whole litany of awesome items. You now
Speaker 2: have the ability to do so, and you can support
Speaker 2: the show. Go to MyPillow dot com slash lockdown and
Speaker 2: use code lockdown to get a discount. It's also if
Speaker 2: you want to, you can use the phone. I know
Speaker 2: people still use phones nowadays sometimes one eight hundred and
Speaker 2: eight oh three zero three three nine. You can call
Speaker 2: in place an order, or go to my pillow dot
Speaker 2: com slash lockdown check it out. They've got incredible items.
Speaker 2: I am thrilled with what I've gotten so far from them,
Speaker 2: and I think you guys will enjoy it. They have
Speaker 2: a lot more than just pillows. MyPillow dot com slash
Speaker 2: lockdown check it out.
Speaker 4: When did you first learn that President Trump intends to
Speaker 4: increase tariffs if Canada retaliates and how has that changed
Speaker 4: your strategy.
Speaker 5: I think Canadians understand that we need to respond to this.
Speaker 5: We need to respond in a way that is appropriate,
Speaker 5: that is measured, but force full, that meets the moment.
Speaker 5: We're certainly not looking to escalate, but we will stand
Speaker 5: up for Canada, for Canadians, for Canadian jobs.
Speaker 2: I'm joined today by Jeremy Kaufman. He is the Free
Speaker 2: State vigilante himself. Yeah, so there's I haven't had you
Speaker 2: on in a bit, and the news cycle has been blistering.
Speaker 2: We are in a full fledged trade war with the
Speaker 2: world at this point, as best I can tell, Canada
Speaker 2: and Mexico being the latest too, as well as the
Speaker 2: Panama Canal. Obviously, Trump won, Trump won the White House.
Speaker 2: We've got everything under the sun and more. What are
Speaker 2: your thoughts? First off, I mean, just on the state
Speaker 2: of the world.
Speaker 6: Everything is no I can't tell. So actually this is
Speaker 6: I wanted to talk to you about this, and it's
Speaker 6: annoying to come on and like not and be like
Speaker 6: I don't know the answer, like that's such a boring answer.
Speaker 6: But they they screeched so much about Trump twenty sixteen
Speaker 6: to twenty twenty, when from my perspective, he did very
Speaker 6: little right and so I wasn't sure what to expect.
Speaker 6: Is Trump going to do real stuff? So there's all
Speaker 6: this screeching. Some of it's clearly real, like I never
Speaker 6: would have thought he ended he was going to end USA,
Speaker 6: Like that's amazing. But I can't tell yet how much
Speaker 6: is is real. There's a ton of screeching, which is encouraging,
Speaker 6: but you know, some of this was gonna happen no
Speaker 6: matter what, and and so I can't tell, you know,
Speaker 6: like that some of the radical stuff that that Trump
Speaker 6: and Vivek and Elon were talking about, is it gonna
Speaker 6: happen or not. I want to I want to kind
Speaker 6: of wait and see if it's going to happen for real.
Speaker 6: But the early signs are encouraging.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think I think it is happening. I mean
Speaker 2: that you have h there's an announcement that the FBI
Speaker 2: is going to be protesting today. The FBI agents will
Speaker 2: be protesting.
Speaker 6: I think without the Patriot Front masks is uh.
Speaker 2: They'll actually be protesting as themselves today. But I think
Speaker 2: with anticipation of Cash Mattel's confirmation hearings UH set for tomorrow. Uh,
Speaker 2: I think you know, the U. S A I D
Speaker 2: stuff is major. I think getting rid of all of
Speaker 2: the de I stuff from the federal Departments is made.
Speaker 2: I think that obviously, even though it's not it's not
Speaker 2: the you know, the perfect fix, but it's something. The
Speaker 2: ceasefire in Gaza has been major.
Speaker 1: Uh.
Speaker 2: And then I think Trump is very seriously engaged with
Speaker 2: conversations with Putin to try to end the Ukraine War. Basically,
Speaker 2: what I'm saying is, Jeremy, I think that Trump has
Speaker 2: done almost everything good and bad that he has promised
Speaker 2: in the first ten days of his second term. I mean, like,
Speaker 2: whatever he can do, the executive order, he has done.
Speaker 2: It's remarked totally.
Speaker 6: He's totally exceeding you know, twenty sixteen to twenty twenty.
Speaker 6: But you got to remember, Clint, I'm a libertarian. That
Speaker 6: means I'm never happy, right, so I've never I'm same here, Okay, okay,
Speaker 6: and i I'm not. I guess if you have anything,
Speaker 6: it makes for entertaining conversations. So I'll play guy against
Speaker 6: Trump I want, but I want to be clear. I
Speaker 6: think Trump's done more already than I expected, exceeding what
Speaker 6: he did in the first four years. Like there's a
Speaker 6: lot to like, but to me, you know, there are
Speaker 6: fundamental things like Okay, Trump, Trump fixed shower heads. The
Speaker 6: fundamental problem here is we haven't we have a law
Speaker 6: that says the government gets to control how many gallons
Speaker 6: per minute you know, flow through your shower. It's great
Speaker 6: that he's being clever and rewriting, you know, an executive order,
Speaker 6: but like this fundamentally isn't the way that that that
Speaker 6: government should work, right, Like, we are still going with
Speaker 6: nine eighty to ninety percent of the federal budget is entitlements,
Speaker 6: you know, defense funding, et cetera. Right, Like, it's great
Speaker 6: to end the DEI it's great to end some of
Speaker 6: the terrible enforcement of these agencies. Is the budget going
Speaker 6: to actually get balanced? Are we going to actually rein
Speaker 6: in some of these programs? You know? Y Like you
Speaker 6: gotta remember, like and again, this isn't me. I don't
Speaker 6: think I didn't. I don't think Trump was ever going
Speaker 6: to do this stuff. I want to be clear, Like
Speaker 6: I want a government that's a tenth the size that
Speaker 6: it is, right, I want a government that's a smaller
Speaker 6: than a temphesize that it is. You know, So, so
Speaker 6: you know I think that that these It's great that
Speaker 6: Trump won. I voted for Trump, I endorsed him heavily.
Speaker 6: I am encouraged by what's happening, but like, will how
Speaker 6: many how many like fundamental things are going to ultimately
Speaker 6: end up fixed here? And and that's still a question,
Speaker 6: Like already again, I want to be clear, it's encouraging,
Speaker 6: but it's important, I think, to remember that ultimately we
Speaker 6: want these fundamental things to actually be fixed, right, you know,
Speaker 6: like it's like the I R. S is white man
Speaker 6: now instead of.
Speaker 2: Progress. No, I agree, I agree that that's definitely not
Speaker 2: what I'm looking for. I mean, I think that the
Speaker 2: reality basically what I'm saying is And yes, I am
Speaker 2: a you know, perennially discontented, as all libertarians are. However,
Speaker 2: I'm just I'm just contrasting this to our prior experiences,
Speaker 2: and it's it's so I mean, it's just it's unbelievable.
Speaker 2: I've genuinely I've never seen anything like it. I've never
Speaker 2: had a first two weeks of a presidency that made
Speaker 2: me feel as if there was any hope, you know,
Speaker 2: and and well well well Trump, well Trump has done
Speaker 2: a bunch of things that I don't like. He has
Speaker 2: just done a lot and like really done it. And
Speaker 2: I think that's what that's what is most you know,
Speaker 2: inspiring to me is that there's just it gives me
Speaker 2: a chance. The reason I vote, I broke down and
Speaker 2: I ended up voting for Trump is because proxy wars
Speaker 2: with nuclear powers, thirty seven trillion dollars in debt, and
Speaker 2: it's like, you need dramatic action. You need someone to
Speaker 2: intercede on behalf of the American people, on behalf of
Speaker 2: the of the world and say, all right, I'm going
Speaker 2: to negotiate peace here, and I'm going to get our
Speaker 2: budget in order. It seems as if he has a
Speaker 2: plan for that, whether or not it actually works out,
Speaker 2: whether or not, like and also he's doing everything he
Speaker 2: can do via executive order. A lot of this if
Speaker 2: like you're talking about like real fixes, real fixes, is
Speaker 2: going to require legislation for much of this, and will
Speaker 2: he be able to get that passed. I'm doubtful.
Speaker 6: So well, I think a lot of it's a better
Speaker 6: team in terms of in terms of the better stuff
Speaker 6: that's happening, in terms of reigning and spending and all
Speaker 6: of this stuff. I think that's a better team around him.
Speaker 6: He always I was, even twenty sixteen to twenty twenty,
Speaker 6: you know, a kind of scary guy to sit against,
Speaker 6: sit across the negotiation table with you're like Trump representing
Speaker 6: the country is That's actually something I would have always
Speaker 6: rated him very highly on in the sense, not in
Speaker 6: the sense of everything he necessarily did, be in the
Speaker 6: sense that this is a guy who he's representing, you know,
Speaker 6: my people. Would I be intimidated to sit the cous
Speaker 6: with this person and have to deal with them like
Speaker 6: I wouldn't want to deal with them. And there's a
Speaker 6: sense that you want that, right, you want an asshole, sure,
Speaker 6: But it's these kinds of you know what, it's these
Speaker 6: kinds of situation. And another big point here I will say,
Speaker 6: like you know, I'm I'm against all the spending. I
Speaker 6: don't want I don't want the welfare spending, the entitlement spending,
Speaker 6: all this stuff. But there is a sense also in
Speaker 6: which a dollar that is you know, going to you know,
Speaker 6: Section eight housing actually is preferable to a dollar that's
Speaker 6: going to USAID, which is like literally, you know, trying
Speaker 6: to achieve the worst things in the world, like the
Speaker 6: opposite of the direction that I want the world to
Speaker 6: go in. And here this is tax money that's being
Speaker 6: spent to push not just my country but the world
Speaker 6: the opposite of the direction that I want, you know,
Speaker 6: the world to be going in. So there's a sense
Speaker 6: in which like that is the worst, like of all
Speaker 6: the dollars to get cut from the government, this is
Speaker 6: among the best, the best types of dollars to be getting,
Speaker 6: you know, to be getting cut.
Speaker 2: I agree. I mean it's it's basically like, I don't know,
Speaker 2: taking dollars away from the war machine or the irs
Speaker 2: or all of the above. I mean, USAID is very
Speaker 2: bad for those that aren't familiar like USAAD. First off,
Speaker 2: it was created under JFK, and it was basically a
Speaker 2: I guess kind of like a blanket funding system to
Speaker 2: try and encompass what the CIA wanted to be doing
Speaker 2: and the State Department wanted to be doing. So there
Speaker 2: wasn't overlaps that would kind of streamline the funding. But
Speaker 2: I think the thing that people don't talk about what
Speaker 2: it really enabled was for the government to do things
Speaker 2: that it can't do constitutionally. That like you you send
Speaker 2: off funds to NGOs which all of a sudden are
Speaker 2: not under the purview of you know, governmental oversight or
Speaker 2: or actual uh legal rules. And I think that's that's
Speaker 2: Basically what they did through the COVID censorship era too
Speaker 2: is like, oh well, we're the federal government, we can't
Speaker 2: censor you. We'll just pressure big tech to do it.
Speaker 2: And that's kind of what they do with the NGOs
Speaker 2: through us A D. If if it is true, I mean,
Speaker 2: for as of now, just to you know, slow a
Speaker 2: role here, as of now, the plan is to roll
Speaker 2: us A I D into the State Department, which then
Speaker 2: has Marco Rubio running it. That isn't you know, the
Speaker 2: dramatic improvement I want. I wanted to bolish obviously, but.
Speaker 6: And then and this is where you have to you
Speaker 6: have Ultimately it's gonna and it's so unfortunate. I know,
Speaker 6: this is like an anathema to the modern era. But
Speaker 6: like we're gonna have to wait and see, right, it's
Speaker 6: gonna take It's gonna take Bunster years to see which
Speaker 6: of this stuff you know, you know, actually actually happen.
Speaker 6: I mean, because to do what needs to be done,
Speaker 6: you know, it is it is a substantial task, you know,
Speaker 6: I want to be clear, it's like a it's a
Speaker 6: it's a like you know, borderline impossible task. This is
Speaker 6: another this is another part of the picture. I think
Speaker 6: it is so important to remember, Like I'm not a
Speaker 6: Zuckerberg defender. I'll make it, but I'll make an analogy
Speaker 6: here I maybe am compared to some people. It's like,
Speaker 6: when you're the CEO, you don't have the ability to
Speaker 6: like unilaterally make ten thousand people march or in this case,
Speaker 6: two million or three million people bureaucrats working for the
Speaker 6: federal government. Like, if if ninety percent of your workforce,
Speaker 6: you know, wants to subvert you, you you can't really like, okay, workforce,
Speaker 6: like do that. Like it takes it. It takes a
Speaker 6: long time to get that workforce to turn and reority.
Speaker 6: You're gonna have to spend months firing people, making examples
Speaker 6: of people like it's not you know, like so and
Speaker 6: you can see from the posts on our fed news
Speaker 6: on Reddit and all the and the posts that are
Speaker 6: making on the social media, like there is a real
Speaker 6: entrenched force here that it's going to oppose things. And so,
Speaker 6: you know, how does that how does that play out?
Speaker 6: Because the orders won't be enough. The orders are moved one.
Speaker 6: The orders are step one, You've now got nine steps
Speaker 6: behind that to actually make sure that this stuff gets
Speaker 6: you know seen through that that people aren't subverting you,
Speaker 6: that the wrong people are leaving, that you know, the
Speaker 6: right people are getting put into place, you know, and
Speaker 6: so on and so forth.
Speaker 2: Well this is this is actually why I'm so hopeful
Speaker 2: is because what you just described was like, well, you
Speaker 2: have to have a team, you have to have backup
Speaker 2: that's going to implement what you want, which Trump did
Speaker 2: not have at all. Term one, A lot of people
Speaker 2: were very hesitant or skeptical of DOGE, Like the Department
Speaker 2: of Governmental Efficiency, This sounds like this, you know, performative
Speaker 2: toothless nothing burger. Sure, Elon and Vivek are going to
Speaker 2: be involved, and I like those guys, but you know
Speaker 2: it's not gonna have teeth. Look what happened over the
Speaker 2: past forty eight hours was massive. I mean, what what
Speaker 2: Elon was doing was he was just quote tweeting all
Speaker 2: of the most scandalous stories from USA, AI D. What
Speaker 2: I think, what I think we saw is the teeth
Speaker 2: of DOGE that he's just going to run a negative
Speaker 2: PR campaign against any department that he finds that is,
Speaker 2: you know, spending in an insane fashion, and then he's
Speaker 2: going to use that as the fuel to get action
Speaker 2: to actually see cuts and see reforms. And I think
Speaker 2: it's going to work. I mean so far as you
Speaker 2: as you've said many times, this is TBD. It's you know,
Speaker 2: we'll see.
Speaker 6: Yeah, well I could tell you, but goes to the
Speaker 6: very serious effort. I I don't think I can get
Speaker 6: in any trouble for talking about this. I was pretty
Speaker 6: far in the application process I talked to this. I
Speaker 6: don't want to name all the names, but I was
Speaker 6: pretty I made it pretty far. I'm assuming I didn't
Speaker 6: get this one, but I went through like they had me.
Speaker 6: They you know, they contacted me and spontaneously gave me
Speaker 6: like thirty six hours to prepare a detailed presentation on
Speaker 6: a randomly assigned government department. Uh, you know. And they
Speaker 6: were looking for people who, you know, who could deliver
Speaker 6: very serious, high quality knowledge and recommendations like this. It's
Speaker 6: it's and I think this was part of the problem
Speaker 6: with Trump. He's a good negotiator, he's a good marketer,
Speaker 6: you know. He he's not really like a details kind
Speaker 6: of person, I don't think. And and to to dismantle
Speaker 6: like this, it takes. It takes some serious, serious effort
Speaker 6: and serious detail oriented knowledge that is I think actually
Speaker 6: much more of the engineering mindset. And this is where
Speaker 6: you know, Muskie is going to put in a bunch
Speaker 6: of like a bunch of like autistic dudes who are
Speaker 6: going to obsess over this stuff, and like it's massive,
Speaker 6: there's so much there. I mean, I have a bit.
Speaker 6: I have a bit of this myself. I've spent some
Speaker 6: of my time, you know, And so I think they
Speaker 6: put I think that this is the kind of they're
Speaker 6: putting some real people there who are going to really
Speaker 6: understand these things and try to make real changes at least.
Speaker 6: That's yeah, that's up.
Speaker 2: Yeah, But I mean my point is it's not just tinkering.
Speaker 2: You know, Like first off, Elon's been very public with
Speaker 2: all right, we need to cut four billion a day
Speaker 2: like that that'll be enough to balance the budget. And
Speaker 2: he's like, as of this weekend, we are on track
Speaker 2: for that. That's his claim. You know, this this is
Speaker 2: all TVD, But like, I think he understands that to
Speaker 2: a certain extent, his reputation is tied to these achievements too,
Speaker 2: because we are kind of voting for Trump and Elon
Speaker 2: and Vivek and RFK and Tulsi and Cash and All
Speaker 2: of these people kind of all have their reputations tied
Speaker 2: up into this, and I think that if any of
Speaker 2: them don't perform as they're all being tasked with certain
Speaker 2: subcategories of responsibilities underneath Trump, well then they're going to
Speaker 2: be held to account, which Vivek has already bailed on
Speaker 2: Doge it seems, but the rest of them are still
Speaker 2: kind of in their slots. I just think it's very
Speaker 2: it's a very interesting. Really it's a revolutionary way of
Speaker 2: going about governance in America. I go, I've never seen it.
Speaker 2: I've never seen and also I've never seen a president
Speaker 2: on the campaign trail, you know, negotiate across the aisle,
Speaker 2: get agreements and then actually do what they agreed to.
Speaker 2: I mean, he didn't have to put Rfk Junior into HHS.
Speaker 2: He didn't have to put Tulsi Gabbert as d and I.
Speaker 2: He didn't have to free ross albrig He didn't have
Speaker 2: to you know, like that, all of these things. Like
Speaker 2: the point I really want to get across. This is
Speaker 2: his second term. He doesn't have another presidency. He could
Speaker 2: have just stiffed all of us. He could have he
Speaker 2: could have got in there and said all right, John Bolton,
Speaker 2: get back in here, Marco RUBI will get back in here.
Speaker 2: And that's it. Like I'm giving you no no progress whatsoever.
Speaker 2: But he followed through on all of it. I'm just curious.
Speaker 2: Why do you think he did.
Speaker 6: So i'mmirring on Trump is that he he is not
Speaker 6: He's not very ideological, he doesn't have very many he
Speaker 6: doesn't have much of a sort of sincere political philosophy.
Speaker 6: To the extent that he does. It is you know,
Speaker 6: it's it's one I first I should be the best
Speaker 6: right you personally, and then but then therefore also everything
Speaker 6: associated with me is the best of my country, you know,
Speaker 6: my companies and so on and so forth, and then
Speaker 6: like it's a very much you know who has helped
Speaker 6: me and and who has been against me? And so
Speaker 6: he is someone who I think you stands by people
Speaker 6: who have stood by him. He's very sort of your
Speaker 6: loyalty oriented. And so these are people who who were
Speaker 6: loyal to him, right, these are people worked with him.
Speaker 6: And I think it is I think he's someone who
Speaker 6: who isn't going to betray that. I do think your thing,
Speaker 6: for exactle, like the pardoning of Ross is substantially. It's
Speaker 6: kind of an older form of politics, right, this is
Speaker 6: the way the politics used to work in the you know,
Speaker 6: one hundred years ago. It's like okay, okay, faction like
Speaker 6: if you deliver your votes like it's a it's a patronage,
Speaker 6: you know, kind of an agreement. But I think that's
Speaker 6: his style. He's a salesman, he's a deal maker, you know,
Speaker 6: and he but he wants to honor the deals that
Speaker 6: he makes. I do think he wants to do that.
Speaker 6: And so that's it's as simple as sepp.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but it's it just it shocked me. You know,
Speaker 2: if this was his first presidency he had re election,
Speaker 2: I could understand, you know, him him definitely falling through this.
Speaker 6: As a why so like again, and I'm not trying
Speaker 6: to hear. I feel like I'm like partially roll planning
Speaker 6: a pessimist here because I'm actually more of an optimist
Speaker 6: by disposition. But you know, one way this stuff could
Speaker 6: kind of go off the rails is your Musk is
Speaker 6: going to keep pushing for this stuff. I suspect Musk
Speaker 6: Trump is willing to be unpopular. So I don't mean
Speaker 6: to say he's not willing to unpopular things, but it's
Speaker 6: a different kind of sense. And like you know, Musk
Speaker 6: I think would be much more bullheaded about, you know,
Speaker 6: cutting things, I think than Trump. If some of this
Speaker 6: stuff is starts to upset the right people, starts to
Speaker 6: generate bad optics, starts to upset people who are Trump's friends, right,
Speaker 6: you know again, because Trump is like this a factional
Speaker 6: allegiance based guy, you know, And so that would be
Speaker 6: I think where this stuff could also you could could
Speaker 6: kind of go off the roads. And I also think
Speaker 6: it's got to be at least a bit of a
Speaker 6: problem for Trump, Like Elon's gotta gotta walk a tightrope
Speaker 6: here where he's continually like you're the president, yes, mister president,
Speaker 6: like you know, because Trump's Trump's ego is going to
Speaker 6: get hurt by Musk being you know, more famous and
Speaker 6: more successful. You know, like like if too much of
Speaker 6: the credit is going to Musk and and Doze, you know,
Speaker 6: that's also gonna that This is where Trump turns on
Speaker 6: his enemy on his friends. Rather, it is where his friends,
Speaker 6: uh you know, start to start to outshine him a.
Speaker 2: Little too much shine there, Elon. Yeah, No, I completely
Speaker 2: agree with you on that. In fact, we already know
Speaker 2: that because about I don't know, four or six weeks ago,
Speaker 2: right after the election, when Elon was very much much
Speaker 2: in the mix, you started to hear the Democrats repeating,
Speaker 2: repeatedly calling him, you know, president Musk and and like
Speaker 2: it's called it's obvious that they're trying to strike at
Speaker 2: at Trump's ego and get him to shelve him because
Speaker 2: he doesn't want to be challenged.
Speaker 6: It's not a bad strategy, but I mean, I don't
Speaker 6: know if it'll work because it's coming from them, But
Speaker 6: otherwise I think it's like, not a bad strategy.
Speaker 2: Oh no, it's It's what I would advise. I'd be like, yeah,
Speaker 2: just keep hammering that Trump is in the president, just
Speaker 2: say president Elon president, Like it'll it'll absolutely put a
Speaker 2: wedge between them here. I I what I really want
Speaker 2: to get into with you is the the trade war stuff.
Speaker 2: Like I think it's very it's very interesting. I've been
Speaker 2: thinking about this a lot for weeks now months, And
Speaker 2: here's here's my thesis as to what what I think
Speaker 2: they may be trying to do. And this is not advocacy,
Speaker 2: this is just my analysis. I think that there's a
Speaker 2: chance that they are genuinely accepting a multipolar order, that
Speaker 2: they are most interested in hemispheric domination that they want
Speaker 2: to go back to, just like we're going to dominate
Speaker 2: the western hemisphere and we're not going to have anything
Speaker 2: to do with the Middle East and you know Asia.
Speaker 2: And I think that because you're so much in debt
Speaker 2: that like if I was if I if I actually
Speaker 2: had a president that was interested in solving our fiscal crisis,
Speaker 2: I'd be like, Okay, how how do we how do
Speaker 2: we actually migrate away? And also I'm a protectionist and
Speaker 2: a nationalist, right, so my thought process would be, We're
Speaker 2: going to tear if everyone into oblivion. We're going to
Speaker 2: force them off the US dollar so that we I mean,
Speaker 2: short term, it will strengthen the US dollar. But I
Speaker 2: think that then you bring industry home, you create tear
Speaker 2: tariff barrier that make domestic production, you know, more cost
Speaker 2: effective and more competitive. Eventually you migrate away to some
Speaker 2: sort of like I don't I don't want to say
Speaker 2: asset back currency, but something something that gets us away
Speaker 2: from the US dollar and puts a limit on the government.
Speaker 2: Like like I'm just trying to think of like intermediate
Speaker 2: to long term what would these guys be attempting to do?
Speaker 2: Because I know a lot of people portray Trump's trade
Speaker 2: war bomb bast as just that this is like ego battles.
Speaker 2: Trudeau talk shit, you know, shine bomb in Mexico, she
Speaker 2: talks shit. We're just gonna hammer these people. I'm just
Speaker 2: this is all ego stuff. This seems to have a
Speaker 2: more concerted plan attached to it. I'm just curious. Am
Speaker 2: I giving him too much credit? What do you think
Speaker 2: him specifically?
Speaker 6: Again, I would say probably. I mean it's possible that
Speaker 6: that's a plan that some people have Trump specifically, I mean,
Speaker 6: I think, first of all, I think he does genuinely,
Speaker 6: dispositionally kind of engage in a sort of market antelistic,
Speaker 6: you know, kind of thinking he sees trade with somewhat
Speaker 6: in a in a somewhat zero sum way. And we
Speaker 6: could circle back to if there is anything to that
Speaker 6: view versus the pure full you know, sort of pretty
Speaker 6: margot libertarian view. But I think that's part of it.
Speaker 6: I think he loves this stuff. I think I think
Speaker 6: he is why he wants to be present. I think
Speaker 6: he loves the idea of like of having of negotiating
Speaker 6: with people and like playing bricksmanship games, and like being
Speaker 6: and bringing a hammer. And I think I think a
Speaker 6: big part of phim is like and he's quite possibly correct,
Speaker 6: is that you can simply get stuff from other countries
Speaker 6: by doing this, you know, like we we do have
Speaker 6: the upper hand and a lot of these negotiations and
Speaker 6: like the there was a trade war with Mexico lasted
Speaker 6: about I looked up today the shortest war in world history,
Speaker 6: and there's a Britain want to war in forty minutes
Speaker 6: once it killed five hundred people and want to war
Speaker 6: in forty minutes. So this this war went on a
Speaker 6: little bit longer, uh than that. I didn't.
Speaker 2: I didn't hear the notice the Mexico trade war is over.
Speaker 6: It's over, okay, though, I think, am I wrong? Made?
Speaker 6: And maybe update me?
Speaker 2: Update me? I haven't.
Speaker 6: I thought I thought that like Mexico agreed to put
Speaker 6: ten thousand troops along the border, and they would. I don't.
Speaker 6: I could be wrong. I could I could be wrong.
Speaker 6: There's a sense in which like like you have, Trump
Speaker 6: can like you know, demand this and and and get this,
Speaker 6: you know, and get these kinds of kind you know,
Speaker 6: he likes doing this kind of negotiating. Uh. And and
Speaker 6: so I would attribute it to at least like to
Speaker 6: at least somebody. Oh oh, and also the prior thinking
Speaker 6: that I laid out, like there are plenty of of
Speaker 6: of Trump supporting factions that want tariffs that that also
Speaker 6: get you know, into like Somemby's delivering to a constituency
Speaker 6: that supported him, you know during his you know, during
Speaker 6: his his his run for president. So you know, I
Speaker 6: would think I would think some of it is that
Speaker 6: although that theory, look, I I would be interested in
Speaker 6: learning more about Like I hadn't heard that theory that
Speaker 6: you gave me about the decollarization, and.
Speaker 2: It's not I guess it's I guess it's a theory,
Speaker 2: but it's just mine. I'm just I'm literally I'm just
Speaker 2: thinking through logically, like what is the if I had
Speaker 2: a longer term goal of trying to migrate away create
Speaker 2: a little bit more uh independence as as opposed to
Speaker 2: interdependence with the entire global economy. Well, let's let's actually
Speaker 2: let's just get.
Speaker 6: Thinking what's the thinking that Like my perspective is that
Speaker 6: it's it's it's mostly good if other countries use the
Speaker 6: so long as we're not you know, subservient to them
Speaker 6: in some way or you know, are losing some point
Speaker 6: of autonomy, like basically like not that inflation is good,
Speaker 6: but when we inflate our currency, there were taxing them, right,
Speaker 6: like they're effectively subsidizing spy holding dollars. Is my perspective on.
Speaker 2: I completely agree. I mean the whole reason.
Speaker 6: What's the idea behind? Uh, you know, why would why would?
Speaker 6: Why would? Why would they want to do this?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Well, I think that from Trump's perspective and his
Speaker 2: his kind of orbits perspective, they want industry because they
Speaker 2: are very concerned about being reliant on other economies all
Speaker 2: over the world in case of war, in case of
Speaker 2: you know, trade wars, whatever that they want to have
Speaker 2: more industry domestically, like physical production industry. And I think
Speaker 2: that as long as you're the reserve currency, it's very
Speaker 2: challenging to do that because you're going to have the
Speaker 2: most purchasing power from the US dollars as they're printed
Speaker 2: and borrowed because you have first access via cantalon effects.
Speaker 2: So it's like it's very challenging for the labor market
Speaker 2: to compete because you are you are the home base
Speaker 2: and therefore that is the that is the trade off
Speaker 2: is that essentially the rest of the world, you know,
Speaker 2: gets to sell to us, but then we also lose
Speaker 2: out on our industry. I think that's that's the trade
Speaker 2: off that they're trying to reverse. Do you disagree with
Speaker 2: their assessment on that?
Speaker 6: Uh, you know, I'm not I'm not certain. I'm not
Speaker 6: certain about that. I would I would think that there
Speaker 6: is a a mild sense in which that's true. Uh
Speaker 6: my sort and I might be you know, doing some
Speaker 6: some spherical cow economics here, is that that the that
Speaker 6: you're you're mostly going to get, you know, a roughly
Speaker 6: equivalent balance of of trade, that that that this would
Speaker 6: not be the reason that you know, us that sort
Speaker 6: of your domestic steel is you know, not competitive with
Speaker 6: with with steel from uh you know, with steal from
Speaker 6: China or from other places.
Speaker 2: So you think it's not competitive just strictly because I think.
Speaker 6: I think like strictly speaking, I think at the margin,
Speaker 6: this is true. So I think at the margin it's
Speaker 6: a it would help, you know, at the margin domestic
Speaker 6: and you know, some of these domestic industries would you know,
Speaker 6: would probably get But but I don't I don't. I
Speaker 6: don't think that's the like explanatory factor.
Speaker 2: Okay, Well, what what is the just regulatory and taxation?
Speaker 6: Uh? And I mean you know, I don't, I don't.
Speaker 6: I don't know, uh, specifically what the breakdown. So if
Speaker 6: we're talking about like so like steel specifically, like why
Speaker 6: is why why is the US not competitive?
Speaker 2: Well, well, I mean just considered consider our entire industrial base.
Speaker 2: It's like we have hemorrhaged that for fifty years. I
Speaker 2: think that is true. So why this is? This is
Speaker 2: not an a partic This is not an individual industry.
Speaker 2: This is a broad based phenomenon. When it's broad based,
Speaker 2: I assume it's currency related. I mean that's my analysis.
Speaker 2: But I'm just curious what you think.
Speaker 6: Okay. So I mean that the default, the default economic
Speaker 6: answer right here would be that that labor that it was,
Speaker 6: it was either labor flowed to higher valued uses you
Speaker 6: know in the US, or there were you know, reasons
Speaker 6: that the same thing you know could be you know,
Speaker 6: could be produced, could be produced for in you know,
Speaker 6: in foreign places for cheaper, which I would assume is
Speaker 6: like I would assume labor is the is the primary
Speaker 6: cost here, like the raw cost of commodities on the market,
Speaker 6: Like I assume the market is like fairly efficient, Like
Speaker 6: maybe there's some economies where you're closer to the right.
Speaker 6: You don't know, but I would assume. So I would assume,
Speaker 6: and again I would assume labor for capital, equipment and
Speaker 6: so on is a relatively efficient market. So you're not
Speaker 6: seeing these these big market So I would assume it's
Speaker 6: that labor is cheaper. But that's that's part of part
Speaker 6: of being a rich country is that labor here is
Speaker 6: more valuable. So simply and this is this is this
Speaker 6: is why uh, of course why immigrants want to come here,
Speaker 6: right like, so even lower less skilled labor is worth
Speaker 6: much more, you know, in the United States. So this
Speaker 6: means that it's frequently efficient for us to let people
Speaker 6: in other countries, like you know, like at least again,
Speaker 6: and you can you can try to find sort of
Speaker 6: problems with this sort of spherical type of analysis, you know,
Speaker 6: which I mean is like this is the very theoretical
Speaker 6: and like you know, perfect efficient whatever. But I think
Speaker 6: it's still like I think this is directionally correct. You
Speaker 6: know that that it doesn't that for the like I
Speaker 6: think the best argument for any kind of anything in
Speaker 6: the direction of merchantilism or like sort of non totally
Speaker 6: free trade. Is these arguments about externalities that you know,
Speaker 6: if if it could theoretically I could see it theoretically
Speaker 6: being bad for my nation to have like no ability
Speaker 6: to produce its own weapons right in a way that
Speaker 6: like you know, like they I can, and I could
Speaker 6: see theoretical reasons that it might not be good for
Speaker 6: my nation to not be able to produce any of
Speaker 6: its own like I can. I can. I can potentially
Speaker 6: see some of these where where that's a sort of
Speaker 6: market failure in sort of in sort of typical libertarian.
Speaker 6: I'm not saying I'm convinced by that, but I can
Speaker 6: like see the argument. I don't see. I don't. I
Speaker 6: don't really I think the I don't think I think
Speaker 6: to the extent that manufacturing is not in the US.
Speaker 6: I don't think you're bringing it back with uh, well
Speaker 6: you could. Look, you said, a high enough tariff, of
Speaker 6: course you could bring it back. But I don't think
Speaker 6: that makes Americans better off to do that.
Speaker 2: Well, I think short term it doesn't. I think long
Speaker 2: term it might. Like the here's here's my concern, and
Speaker 2: this is this is you know, unpopular thought processing amongst
Speaker 2: libertarian audiences. But you and I both don't seem to
Speaker 2: care about saying things that upset libertarians. We do it
Speaker 2: all the time. I am. I am concerned about, you know,
Speaker 2: opportunities for young people in this country, and I think that,
Speaker 2: like there has been, there's there's a lot there's a
Speaker 2: lot of downsides to being the reserve currency. Like there's
Speaker 2: a lot of upsides, like you get to have a
Speaker 2: debt that's explosive, you get to print and borrow into oblivion,
Speaker 2: you get to basically conquer the world for a time.
Speaker 2: But the downside is that, like ultimately you end up
Speaker 2: having housing be too expensive for the younger generation, and
Speaker 2: then they end up kind of rudderless and and and
Speaker 2: left a drift, and then you end up in World
Speaker 2: War three and that's how you kind of reset everything.
Speaker 2: And that's what I felt like we were on the
Speaker 2: brink of, which is ultimately why I voted for Trump.
Speaker 2: But anyways, I am concerned about because of global globalization.
Speaker 2: I mean, do you feel that there's enough opportunity for
Speaker 2: young people? You're you're a father, you've got a lot
Speaker 2: of kids. Do you think that there's enough opportunity. Well,
Speaker 2: your kids are very special because they're home school and
Speaker 2: probably awesome, but like, broadly speaking, I am concerned about
Speaker 2: the amount of opportunities for young people in America, like
Speaker 2: domestic labor, and I think that libertarians oftentimes are I
Speaker 2: mean not just dismissive, but like they genuinely are abrasive
Speaker 2: if you even bring up, like why do you care
Speaker 2: about American labor? We just fucking open the borders and
Speaker 2: you let immigrants work whoever's cheapest, that's all that matters.
Speaker 2: I think it is a problem that we have to
Speaker 2: concern ourselves with. I do.
Speaker 6: Yeah. Well, look, there's a version of libertarianism that I'm not,
Speaker 6: although I have some appreciation for. That's like you're very
Speaker 6: much your number go up, maximalism, Like it's not it's
Speaker 6: it's it's very close like sort of neoliberalism. I mean,
Speaker 6: to me, libertarianism a system of property rights and agreement
Speaker 6: that lets people build all kinds of different things so
Speaker 6: you can value whatever you want under libertarianism. And if
Speaker 6: you want to value your various things or want a
Speaker 6: society structure a certain way, like libertarianism allows you. It's
Speaker 6: a system that actually allows for diversity and competition. You're
Speaker 6: sort of at the societal level, and so I don't
Speaker 6: I never see I often don't see libertarianism as like
Speaker 6: taking these strong stances on some of these issues that
Speaker 6: other people seem to see say that it does. I
Speaker 6: am absolutely concerned about that a kind of thing, you know,
Speaker 6: to the extent that I have concerns about a class
Speaker 6: of people beyond you know, my immediate concerns, and and
Speaker 6: you know, and and of course the free staters here
Speaker 6: in New Hampshire is certainly one of my circles of concerns.
Speaker 6: But I I care about I care about these things.
Speaker 6: It's it's a direction, it's the thing I care about
Speaker 6: in society quite a bit. I'm skeptical of the specific
Speaker 6: claim that this is is highly coupled to America as
Speaker 6: a reserve you know, currency, uh specifically, but I think
Speaker 6: it would be really interesting to talk like I find
Speaker 6: that area of just like really interesting. You know, what
Speaker 6: is causing these that whole, that whole you know, the
Speaker 6: whole Chipotle, you know, debate and and and what kind
Speaker 6: of job should be available to these kinds of people.
Speaker 6: I think a lot of it is there's who who's
Speaker 6: the guy has that elite theory is that like church
Speaker 6: in like this idea that like uh like basically and
Speaker 6: this is it explains all the woke stuff too. But
Speaker 6: from the other side, like there's all of these people
Speaker 6: who sort of have these aspirations to sort of be
Speaker 6: you know, elites in society, you know, and there aren't
Speaker 6: enough you know, positions, right, like the complaints about and
Speaker 6: I'm not saying this is an unfair complaint, but like
Speaker 6: the complaint about the Chipotle things, like these people are
Speaker 6: supposed to have a higher position in society, right, It's yeah,
Speaker 6: all right, you know, you're making money, you have a
Speaker 6: place to live, you're not desperate. But like this is
Speaker 6: they're supposed to The complaint is they're supposed to have more,
Speaker 6: not that it's like an objectively terrible life. Right. The
Speaker 6: complaint is that there was supposed to be something that
Speaker 6: was you know, that there was something that was supposed
Speaker 6: to be more and and you know, I don't know
Speaker 6: this like bringing men you like, what is bringing what
Speaker 6: is bringing men? You action in to the United States back?
Speaker 6: Like who are these people? Is this is this? Is
Speaker 6: this the one hundred This is like we're talking about
Speaker 6: like jobs, for the average American, but below average American,
Speaker 6: Like who is the class a person that you know,
Speaker 6: I'll just.
Speaker 2: Give you my answer, you know, my my concern is
Speaker 2: the kind of the middle you know, not the exceptional,
Speaker 2: not the h one B guy, but the middle of
Speaker 2: the you know, ninety five to one hundred and five
Speaker 2: IQ guy that may may go to high school or
Speaker 2: may graduate high school, but may make his associate's degree.
Speaker 2: Like in the past, there was a period in American
Speaker 2: history where you could be that guy and have a family.
Speaker 2: It's very tough to be that guy and have a
Speaker 2: family these days. Like it's just very challenging because of inflation,
Speaker 2: because of the printing press. And you're right, I mean,
Speaker 2: as reserve currency, theoretically we don't have to be such
Speaker 2: profligate spenders and inflate and make our lifestyle so much
Speaker 2: more expensive year after year, but we have. And now
Speaker 2: what And I think that's that's my concern, is that
Speaker 2: those guys, the middle guy is kind of left out.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I mean, I this is why I think that
Speaker 6: part of this has to hinge a little bit on,
Speaker 6: like that they feel that there's a feeling that there
Speaker 6: was like a higher position in society, because my impression
Speaker 6: is that you can as one of these people like
Speaker 6: get get a job and any number of you know,
Speaker 6: in any number of trades, any number of things where
Speaker 6: you can be making enough money to afford a house
Speaker 6: and have a family, even a single urner family, you know.
Speaker 6: I think this is possible, and a lot of places
Speaker 6: in America, you know, for people to do this. And
Speaker 6: I'm not trying to defend the status quo because I
Speaker 6: agree that inflation has been a problem, and I agree
Speaker 6: that there have been, you know, a lot of problems.
Speaker 6: I think that this is I think that and I
Speaker 6: think that there are directionally like there's a problem here,
Speaker 6: like but I think that it's kind kind of like
Speaker 6: this whole thing about.
Speaker 2: Like let's think it's.
Speaker 6: A desire to go back to like a different set
Speaker 6: of values and a different sort of structure of society.
Speaker 6: And in that time, it's like, oh, there also happen
Speaker 6: to be manufacturing jobs. Like it's a form of cargo cultism.
Speaker 6: Is it would be a way put it, like like
Speaker 6: you're this isn't the thing, Like it's not the manufacturing
Speaker 6: job specifically, and to say like we we we need
Speaker 6: to bring those back and teriffs will be I think
Speaker 6: that's I'm not. I'm not. I'm not saying it's out
Speaker 6: of out of like there's something that might be coming
Speaker 6: from that's like a correct feeling. And I think that
Speaker 6: it's tariffs and MANUF and then we'll bring back manufacturing jobs.
Speaker 6: I don't think. I don't think. I don't. I think
Speaker 6: it's I think it's incorrect, and I think.
Speaker 2: You think it's you think it's the wrong answer. Yeah, look,
Speaker 2: I'm not saying that like, oh, we have to bring
Speaker 2: back auto manufacturing. I think many of these jobs, if
Speaker 2: not most, are going to be totally replaced by AI
Speaker 2: and automation. I mean many of them already have been.
Speaker 2: So like, this is this is a problem that is
Speaker 2: only going to get worse. I think that in some
Speaker 2: sense it is performative. It is it is demonstrating concern
Speaker 2: for these people because everyone has basically shit on them
Speaker 2: and not listen to their concerns. And Trump is like
Speaker 2: the first guy that goes, yeah, I hear you, here's
Speaker 2: the answer, and maybe it isn't the answer. So I'm
Speaker 2: not and i'm not I'm not claiming that it is.
Speaker 2: I when when I opened up with my kind of
Speaker 2: thesis as to what I think they may be doing.
Speaker 2: I was just trying to give a guess as to
Speaker 2: what the game plan might be long term. Yeah, but
Speaker 2: I don't know. I mean that they It could just
Speaker 2: be all dick measuring contests and ego battles and nothing.
Speaker 2: There's nothing more behind it. I don't know.
Speaker 6: Never never underestimate how many substantial things in world history happened,
Speaker 6: because there's just it's either a dick message contest or
Speaker 6: a fight over a girl.
Speaker 2: All right, So, like you know, absolutely, health insurance is confusing,
Speaker 2: expensive and frustrating. Claim denials are becoming more and more common.
Speaker 2: In fact, one of five Obamacare claims were deny last year.
Speaker 2: That's unacceptable. The headache of health insurance is exactly why
Speaker 2: crowdhealth was created. Would you like the freedom to choose
Speaker 2: a different path, Well you have one now it's not
Speaker 2: health insurance. It's a better way to pay for healthcare
Speaker 2: through crowdfunding. So stop sending money to big insurance companies
Speaker 2: who profit off of not paying your bills and check
Speaker 2: out crowd health. Welcome to crowdhealth, the health insurance alternative,
Speaker 2: for one hundred and seventy five dollars for an individual
Speaker 2: or five hundred and seventy five dollars for a family
Speaker 2: of four or more. You'll get access to a community
Speaker 2: of people who are willing to help out in the
Speaker 2: event of an emergency. You get access to telemedicine visits,
Speaker 2: discounted prescriptions, and so much more without doctor's networks getting
Speaker 2: in the way. And of course, you'll join the crowd
Speaker 2: group of members just like you who want to help
Speaker 2: pay for each other's unexpected medical events. Let crowdhealth help
Speaker 2: with your healthcare needs. Get started today for just nine
Speaker 2: to nine dollars per month for your first three months
Speaker 2: by using code lockdown at join crowdhealth dot com. Crowdhealth
Speaker 2: is not insurance. Learn more at join crowdhealth dot com.
Speaker 2: That join crowdhealth dot com code lockdown. Yeah, people are like, no,
Speaker 2: the you know, World War was to establish Central Bank
Speaker 2: and World War two was to do this and that.
Speaker 2: It's like, maybe it's just because there are a bunch
Speaker 2: of asshole powerful guys who think that they're better than
Speaker 2: everybody and then they you know, they one of them
Speaker 2: took off their glove and slapped the other in the
Speaker 2: face at what egg or whatever?
Speaker 6: Yeah, this is my this is my actual theory of
Speaker 6: world history.
Speaker 2: Well, no, then I would I would like to to
Speaker 2: get kind of your thesis as too. So if if
Speaker 2: the AI and automation pathway is probable, and I think
Speaker 2: it is, I think it's I think it's assured. Honestly,
Speaker 2: what what is your answer for kind of because I'm
Speaker 2: not I'm not, I'm one hundred percent not a UBI libertarian.
Speaker 2: I think that's an atrocity. What do you think? What
Speaker 2: do you think is going to fill the void? And
Speaker 2: I know this is kind of like asking you to
Speaker 2: guess what comes after the horse and buggy and it's like,
Speaker 2: who the fuck knows? But do you have any any
Speaker 2: like optimism as to can we actually replace all those jobs?
Speaker 6: It's, Oh, it's gonna be it's it's gonna be very interesting.
Speaker 6: Uh there. I mean, I I do think that jobs
Speaker 6: performed by humans like will be some of the last
Speaker 6: things to go. Like there are things that we want,
Speaker 6: you know, people to do, and even in a world
Speaker 6: that's like very wealthy, I think it will remain like
Speaker 6: a status symbol for humans to do them. So uh uh,
Speaker 6: not like endorsing that life for that outcome, but I
Speaker 6: think it's like a likely a likely aucomymy. So we're
Speaker 6: so we're talking about the scenario here, and like AI
Speaker 6: you know, really does work, not just for knowledge work,
Speaker 6: but also we're able to it's able to manifest itself
Speaker 6: in the real world. So we're able to construct robots,
Speaker 6: you know, so you can have intelligent humanoid robots. Uh,
Speaker 6: I mean the sort of there's an idea here that
Speaker 6: like this would be basically a massive return to capital, right,
Speaker 6: so so you know that labor effectively becomes very very
Speaker 6: cheap in this world. And so if you're spherical cow
Speaker 6: economicating here, right, you've got uh capital, capital can all
Speaker 6: of a sudden get way more stuff, right, so physical
Speaker 6: stuff gets cheaper. Things in the real world get you know,
Speaker 6: get get way, you know, get way cheaper. It would be,
Speaker 6: it would make our lives a lot different. Uh, it
Speaker 6: would have It would probably cause an incredible amount of
Speaker 6: political turmoil. You know what, how will humans derive? You know,
Speaker 6: I think this idea that will ever be sort of
Speaker 6: post labor, I think is is kind of fake. So
Speaker 6: I don't think that will necessarily like this isn't gonna
Speaker 6: necessarily happen, of course, Like there's lots of outcomes where
Speaker 6: AI just becomes a force multiplier like other kinds of technology,
Speaker 6: you know, and uh and so simply becomes like, look,
Speaker 6: we have we have just as many people, you know,
Speaker 6: doing the similar jobs, but you know a lot of
Speaker 6: them are just leveraging AI, you know, to more of
Speaker 6: a degree. So uh, it's it's it's it's unpredictable. It
Speaker 6: certainly could trigger another communist revolution. Uh.
Speaker 2: I mean, so this is this is why I get
Speaker 2: fresh traded with libertarians that do dismiss, you know, domestic
Speaker 2: employment concerns and they just go like, you know whatever,
Speaker 2: you know, like figure it the fuck out. It's like
Speaker 2: all right, yeah, but well if you don't, then people
Speaker 2: oftentimes will you know, burn everything down. And like communist
Speaker 2: revolutions do happen from time to time, and guess what,
Speaker 2: that's not very good for property rights libertarians. So you
Speaker 2: might want to concern yourself with that. And that's kind
Speaker 2: of where I'm at is. I am very nervous about
Speaker 2: particularly young men in this country. And I've talked about
Speaker 2: this a few times, like, because there was this movement
Speaker 2: to really lay at the you know, at their feet,
Speaker 2: all of the ills of civilization. It's particularly straight white man.
Speaker 2: It was like, you fucking son of a bit, you
Speaker 2: your fucking great grandfather did X, Y Z, and therefore
Speaker 2: you are beyond redemption. And it was just such an
Speaker 2: evil way of treating people, like no, no more or
Speaker 2: less evil than how you would treat black people in
Speaker 2: the early nineteen hundreds or eighteen hundreds. It was like
Speaker 2: it was atrocious what they were doing young white men.
Speaker 2: And then on top of that, you have this inflationary
Speaker 2: wave that that makes it so that you can't outpace
Speaker 2: the success of your father. Very it's very rare these
Speaker 2: days because like all you had to do was buy
Speaker 2: a house in nineteen eighty and you were a millionaire
Speaker 2: by the two thousands, and like that's just not an
Speaker 2: option for a lot of young people. And I can
Speaker 2: I can sense in you that you're like You're like you,
Speaker 2: you don't want to give that much credence to the
Speaker 2: fact that, like, the younger generations have it harder than the.
Speaker 6: Housing one's real, the housing one's real. I've been meaning
Speaker 6: to I actually have a like half started, do you
Speaker 6: know I do these like effort threads on X sometimes
Speaker 6: And yes, I have one that I've been working on.
Speaker 6: It because I'm in trouble because I want to understand,
Speaker 6: because like I think that it's just so easy to
Speaker 6: fall into these narratives and sometimes they're true and sometimes
Speaker 6: they're not. And I think, I think one of the
Speaker 6: things I notice all the time in politics is you
Speaker 6: get these like clouds of beliefs that it's like clearly
Speaker 6: like people just join a tribe and then they adopt
Speaker 6: all these adjacent, you know, beliefs. And I've always been
Speaker 6: like a bit heterodox, try to like look at things,
Speaker 6: you know, independently rather than just be you know, the
Speaker 6: cloud guy.
Speaker 2: And so I am up, you're more than a brother.
Speaker 6: And I'm sure I get it wrong sometimes like I'm not.
Speaker 6: But no, housing is more expensive like this one's. This
Speaker 6: one's real, like this one's real, dude.
Speaker 2: Housing is insanely more expensive, and.
Speaker 6: At the margin, does immigration help with it?
Speaker 2: It does not know, But libertarians usually just tell people
Speaker 2: to shove it up their ass. If you bring that up,
Speaker 2: they go, oh, there's no fucking evidence that housing is yes, bullshit,
Speaker 2: more this more demand.
Speaker 6: A huge part of it is that we don't allow
Speaker 6: more building to happen, though, like we have to really
Speaker 6: like knowledge that this is this is you know that
Speaker 6: this is a huge part.
Speaker 2: I was a developer. I know, I know better than
Speaker 2: the libertarians a bitch about regulations. Regulations are a nightmare
Speaker 2: in real estate development.
Speaker 6: And I will say this is another part of it.
Speaker 6: When I was doing that. Someone actually only taught me
Speaker 6: this in the last couple of weeks. There is a
Speaker 6: decent argument that some portion of the increased housing costs
Speaker 6: is that people simply expect more house and expect more housing.
Speaker 6: Like if you look at a graph of construction costs
Speaker 6: per square foot, like if you b they've certainly grown
Speaker 6: beyond like what we would expect, but construction costs per
Speaker 6: square foot haven't grown nearly as much as square feet
Speaker 6: of houses. So houses have actually gotten way bigger now,
Speaker 6: you know, than they used to be. And so it's possible.
Speaker 6: One of the things that's interesting is like humans don't
Speaker 6: actually tend to work that like humans will work less
Speaker 6: up to a point. If if humans who have like
Speaker 6: a lot of humans, will just continue to work and
Speaker 6: spend more money on status symbols. They'll buy fancier cars,
Speaker 6: they'll buy bigger houses because they see themselves as in
Speaker 6: these maybe not incorrectly as in these your status competition
Speaker 6: games with their peers and society you know around them,
Speaker 6: And so I think, like there is a and again
Speaker 6: this relates to what is this housing thing actually about? Like, right,
Speaker 6: people don't want to go back to the nineteen fifties house,
Speaker 6: you know, with a sick like, so they want to
Speaker 6: go back to the nineteen fifties in terms of where
Speaker 6: they were in society, but they don't want to actually
Speaker 6: go back to the way I don't think that people
Speaker 6: lived in the nineteen fifties, Like if you look at
Speaker 6: what a starter home looked like in early nineteen hundreds
Speaker 6: of America, Like, again, I don't think these are the
Speaker 6: houses that people are actually asking for, you know, for
Speaker 6: the most part.
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, I mean the housing is much better today.
Speaker 2: Like well, grant that there's arguments as to quality, which
Speaker 2: some people say that the older stuff was made a
Speaker 2: little bit better, don't. I don't have a firm opinion
Speaker 2: on that. I think a lot of it's just preferences,
Speaker 2: like what do you want to invest your money and
Speaker 2: do you want to have the new tech gadgets or
Speaker 2: do you want to have the best masonry. And some people,
Speaker 2: you know, a lot of people there's differences in preferences,
Speaker 2: but you know, as a lifelong you know, real estate
Speaker 2: investor and spectator of the market, I know for a
Speaker 2: fact that like the cost of production of real estate
Speaker 2: has gone up a lot. And now, granted the past
Speaker 2: four years was a huge part of that because the
Speaker 2: lockdowns and that was catastrophic.
Speaker 6: But even we got all these we've got all these
Speaker 6: men who need better jobs to me, building, construction, contracting,
Speaker 6: like these are pretty decent. These are very respectable professions
Speaker 6: you're building.
Speaker 2: Completely completely agree, But.
Speaker 6: Why can't Why can't a bunch of these people up?
Speaker 6: We built a bunch of houses. There's more houses for everybody.
Speaker 6: They're gonna start having kids again, Like, why can't we
Speaker 6: get this gallop?
Speaker 2: The answer is labor costs. They don't they because you
Speaker 2: can do it with illegal immigration. They are Okay, okay,
Speaker 2: that's I mean, that's the answer. You you walk onto
Speaker 2: any job site in America in construction, you're going to
Speaker 2: see probably half the guys early okay, and.
Speaker 6: Here look and look, I'm very sympathetic to this is
Speaker 6: one like I'm not, uh, you know, the kind of
Speaker 6: libertarian that's like, you know, illegals or heroes like we're
Speaker 6: in competition. You know, that's a it's a kind of
Speaker 6: there is a sense in which that's unfair. They're not contributing,
Speaker 6: you know, to society, and you know, and so on.
Speaker 6: I do still encourage libertarians to illegally move to New Hampshire,
Speaker 6: but you have to put all of you have to
Speaker 6: donate all the money you don't pay taxes to help create. Uh,
Speaker 6: I love it. Uh So, Yeah, no, I think I
Speaker 6: think that one. I think that was that one's totally
Speaker 6: fair and and your libertarianism should not entail this form
Speaker 6: of what I would consider far leftism, which is where
Speaker 6: you think, like a stranger in China has the same
Speaker 6: you know, you have the same ethical obligation to them,
Speaker 6: and and and so on, as as your neighbors and
Speaker 6: your countrymen. Right, I think I think this is totally ridiculous.
Speaker 6: And there's nothing in the in the philosophy that should
Speaker 6: suggest that we have to believe.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, you, you and I tend to tend to
Speaker 2: agree on these things more than uh. I guess this
Speaker 2: is what makes us, you know, right right leaning libertarians
Speaker 2: is the concentric circles, uh, you know, philosophy of the world.
Speaker 2: But I think it's just like it's just obviously logical
Speaker 2: and rational that you ought to concern yourself more with
Speaker 2: your neighbor's issues than you know, the war in Ukraine. Like,
Speaker 2: it's obvious to me that like what matters most to
Speaker 2: the survival of my family and my friends and my
Speaker 2: network is the local environment more than the foreign. But
Speaker 2: for whatever reason, some libertarians, I guess the left ones,
Speaker 2: they don't see it that way. They see anyone starving
Speaker 2: anywhere on Earth is just as important as my own
Speaker 2: child starving. It's like, yeah, that's that's fucking crazy. But anyways,
Speaker 2: that's my thought process on it. But do you have
Speaker 2: any any deep dive threads that you're working on it?
Speaker 2: So you said that you're trying to work on the housing.
Speaker 6: Is that I want any one on housing? Yeah? I
Speaker 6: want to. I want to. I want to well because
Speaker 6: I want to get to the bottom. Like again, like
Speaker 6: I'm and this is where maybe I probably broadly in
Speaker 6: that sort of right You're definitely I'm in the right
Speaker 6: wing cluster. But where I do break probably the most off.
Speaker 6: And it's like an exumit like like the sort of
Speaker 6: directionally spherical count market arguments or are often like that.
Speaker 6: I agree, they can sometimes be missing a piece, but
Speaker 6: it doesn't make them wrong, you know. And uh, and
Speaker 6: I think that often that it's hard. It's hard to
Speaker 6: think correctly about economics. It's not it's not intuitive, okay,
Speaker 6: And and and I think, like, but it doesn't make
Speaker 6: it wrong, right, like the things you know, and we
Speaker 6: can't we actually can't just like as much as I
Speaker 6: like your vibe checks and so on, we can't just
Speaker 6: get our way through everything like the times where we
Speaker 6: step back and think about things that really.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think the reason, the reason I'm so interested
Speaker 2: in in you know, thinking these things through is that
Speaker 2: you know, we are we are in the position of
Speaker 2: being the reserve currency of the world, and the global
Speaker 2: economy rests on our decision making like it does. And
Speaker 2: does that mean that you know, we have to sacrifice
Speaker 2: ourselves to keep them alive. No, that's not what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: But like, it's super important that you get this right,
Speaker 2: like this, this wind down of US dollar as deserve currency,
Speaker 2: which will I think will is inevitable, not to say
Speaker 2: that it's imminent, but it is inevitable at some point,
Speaker 2: Like do you want to do you want to be Uh,
Speaker 2: in front of that, do you want to be a
Speaker 2: victim of it? Do you want to just have it
Speaker 2: happen as a consequence of debts that get untenable and
Speaker 2: then you have either a hyperinflation or a default outright? Like,
Speaker 2: I think that there's real reason to be thinking these
Speaker 2: things through like thoughtfully, because less you end up in
Speaker 2: a world war or something you know, catastrophic. Do you
Speaker 2: do you have any concerns about that? Or do you
Speaker 2: not spend any of your time on it?
Speaker 6: Uh? I'm I'm not. I'm not too much of a doomer.
Speaker 6: I'm like, I'm I'm like a things will you know,
Speaker 6: maybe get a little things will things will maybe get
Speaker 6: a little bit better. They won't change much, but they
Speaker 6: still they still could you know, things things change. The
Speaker 6: thing is when things change suddenly, it's it's often very
Speaker 6: unpredictable that it was gonna happen. You know, it looks
Speaker 6: predictable in hindsight, but it often wasn't here when you're
Speaker 6: and so you know, I don't I'm not someone who
Speaker 6: believes that history is over. So I think we will
Speaker 6: still see, like you know, big changes and and big
Speaker 6: shake ups. I think that I think the AI stuff
Speaker 6: is by far, you know, going to be the most
Speaker 6: interesting thing.
Speaker 2: Is this is a perfect perfect way to end it then,
Speaker 2: because you know you, people that aren't super familiar with
Speaker 2: you may not know that you're uh, you know, big
Speaker 2: tech background. What what is your expectation as to like
Speaker 2: what do you have any opinion as to the threshold
Speaker 2: by which it maximize? Mises like, do you think that
Speaker 2: this has the potential to actually replace artists and movie
Speaker 2: production and you know, just just obliterate all human endeavors.
Speaker 2: It sounds as if you don't think so, but I'm
Speaker 2: is it possible?
Speaker 6: Uh? Yeah? Like yes? And now uh, I think I think,
Speaker 6: I think things are going to change tremendously. I think
Speaker 6: that the idea that like, I think it's fairly likely
Speaker 6: that humans will still end up being in the loop
Speaker 6: for you for a long time. That I think things
Speaker 6: I think things will plateau, like I and probably already
Speaker 6: kind of are plateauing on this a little bit more
Speaker 6: than people. I think my understanding of it, I attempted
Speaker 6: to kind of go through uh and get a better
Speaker 6: understanding of how it all worked from a technical perspective.
Speaker 6: I mean, this stuff is new, Like I went I
Speaker 6: did get a college degree computer science back in the
Speaker 6: David this they there's much different then. I'm old now,
Speaker 6: but I did try to go through. I read some
Speaker 6: of the old papers and and and tried to get
Speaker 6: up to speed. And I think like the core thing
Speaker 6: is it's effectively you can almost reduce it down to
Speaker 6: it's it. There's a shockingly simple well not simple, you
Speaker 6: can reduce it. The insight, it's two things. It's like
Speaker 6: how much compute power are you throwing at at your
Speaker 6: the ll M that you're creating? And then what's the size?
Speaker 6: What's the body of work you know that you're that
Speaker 6: you're training it on. And part of why it's slowing
Speaker 6: down is like they've got it all, Like you know,
Speaker 6: this is these they've got, They've they've these agents have
Speaker 6: already been trained on like most of the Internet and
Speaker 6: like all available texts that they can find. This is
Speaker 6: also why they're so good at I don't know if
Speaker 6: you've used them for this, Like they're shockingly good at
Speaker 6: understanding like laws and all this political stuff, like they
Speaker 6: are they understand an incredible amount and that's because they
Speaker 6: were able to suck down a bunch of bodies of text,
Speaker 6: uh you know, uh, you know about all of this.
Speaker 6: So I think it will plateau a little bit because
Speaker 6: I don't think there's a ton more out there. And
Speaker 6: but what it can already do is so impressive that
Speaker 6: it's going to take that simply fine tuning it and
Speaker 6: and and the time it's going to take to propagate
Speaker 6: into all of these corners of our society and all
Speaker 6: of these areas of our society. I mean, my kids
Speaker 6: talk to a computer and like normal human language. It's
Speaker 6: like mind like, this was mind boggling that this would be,
Speaker 6: you know, possible five years ago. And yeah, yeah, I
Speaker 6: mean it is remarkable. I will also say the same time,
Speaker 6: how normal it feels, right like, because I I use
Speaker 6: this stuff all the time, and it feels like it's
Speaker 6: already like it's like it worked its way into my head.
Speaker 6: And I'm like, oh, I had the AI. Like it's
Speaker 6: like a brain, you know, it becomes a part of
Speaker 6: your It becomes a part of you like a tool. Right,
Speaker 6: We're good at integrating tools. This is part of what's
Speaker 6: sort of special about being human. It just feels normal
Speaker 6: now that this that I exist. But it's going to
Speaker 6: keep eating into all these various sectors of the economy,
Speaker 6: and it's going to go for a lot of things.
Speaker 6: We're gonna have to see how it plays out. I
Speaker 6: mean the optimist case is it becomes a tool that
Speaker 6: everyone can use and uh, you know, it allows people
Speaker 6: to force multiply and gets rid of things that that
Speaker 6: people didn't you know, have to do. So that would
Speaker 6: be that. Yeah, and we kind of talked about the
Speaker 6: downside before. So but this is it's gonna be the
Speaker 6: biggest thing to change the world, I think, uh in
Speaker 6: the coming you know, decade or two.
Speaker 2: Well, I totally agree. I mean, I think this is
Speaker 2: why I'm I'm concerning myself more with the plight of
Speaker 2: the the you know, the midwind American where like like,
Speaker 2: what are we going to do about these people? And
Speaker 2: you know, I care about them, like I know a
Speaker 2: lot of them. It's like I want I want to
Speaker 2: make sure that everybody is able to to contribute to
Speaker 2: society and have Yeah.
Speaker 6: Well, so okay, that's not I don't have much from
Speaker 6: Atomrapher because I think that's a really good question because
Speaker 6: it gets back to like these sort of more fundamental
Speaker 6: philosophical questions. People are getting less religious, you know, what
Speaker 6: does it mean to lead a good life? You know,
Speaker 6: what's the purpose of being here at all? You know,
Speaker 6: sound like you know, college like start or whatever, but like, hey,
Speaker 6: these are these are the these are kinds of the
Speaker 6: questions that uh, like it comes back to because you know, like,
Speaker 6: are we saying because I'm not saying that you're saying this,
Speaker 6: but like, could it be an implication? Would it really
Speaker 6: be an implication that if if we could invent a
Speaker 6: technology that's simply like like made work you know, much
Speaker 6: less necessary, that we should say no just so we
Speaker 6: can continue to to what you know, what are these
Speaker 6: people and you know, and what would they say if
Speaker 6: you ask them? Who's you know, these people whose jobs
Speaker 6: you're you're you know, you're you're you're trying you know,
Speaker 6: you're trying to protect so like and I think I
Speaker 6: think that like people won't also not that I trust,
Speaker 6: you know, like Sam Altman of all people, but you
Speaker 6: know this idea that like, even if there's massive returns
Speaker 6: to capital, like I don't think like billionaires are going
Speaker 6: to start like eating people for sport or like you know,
Speaker 6: hosting like hungered game. Like, Like I think that I'm
Speaker 6: optimistic about the future. I think like it can we
Speaker 6: can be it can be a little bit like nerve wracking,
Speaker 6: but like generally, like the Internet was great, like the
Speaker 6: internal combustion engine was great, like technical technological innovation, like
Speaker 6: they've generally it's very very rare that we've regretted them,
Speaker 6: and I understand that this is like an one that
Speaker 6: should make us nervous and like rightfully, so I'm not
Speaker 6: trying to paint too like a two rose of a picture,
Speaker 6: but like I think we should have baseline optimism that
Speaker 6: this will like ultimately make things better because it's really
Speaker 6: powerful tool. It's a cool tool for anyone who's used that.
Speaker 6: And so rather than being fearful, like I think we should, generally,
Speaker 6: it's better to like, you know, approach up from a
Speaker 6: place of of of of optimism, not like reckless confidence,
Speaker 6: but from a place of like.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah no. And I I I mean, ultimately, I
Speaker 2: think I am optimistic. It's just that in the in
Speaker 2: the interim, I'm like, oh, it's gonna get rocky. But anyways, Jeremy,
Speaker 2: go ahead and tell people where they can follow you.
Speaker 6: I'm approaching two thousand followers on x X dot COM's
Speaker 6: last Jeremy Coffin followers.
Speaker 2: Yeah you said two thousand you passed.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I think I'm technically racing you to beat reason,
Speaker 6: although you're gonna crush me. So, but I could use
Speaker 6: charity followers, please if you follow Clint, I need charity follows. Okay,
Speaker 6: I've gotta be I've gotta beat him. Uh. And then
Speaker 6: I'm very active in the New Hampshire Libertarian movement. Libertarians
Speaker 6: are winning uh in New Hampshire. So you know, if
Speaker 6: you think Trump's not going far enough, you know, New
Speaker 6: Hampshire might be the place the place for you.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 6: So come on out to Portfast this summer or any
Speaker 6: of the Free State Project events. It's we're taking over
Speaker 6: the government here in New Hampshire. We're gonna we're gonna
Speaker 6: drive them in the bathtub.
Speaker 2: So I'm about to hop on the Tom Wood Show.
Speaker 2: You want me to ask Tom if you if you
Speaker 2: could join us?
Speaker 6: Uh, I don't If he if he wants me on,
Speaker 6: I'm happy to come on. I feel like he normally does.
Speaker 6: Uh you know, one on ones. But yeah, I'm a
Speaker 6: I'm around.
Speaker 2: Okay, let me let me ask him. I'll get back
Speaker 2: to you in like one minute, right.
Speaker 6: All right, welcome to Liberty Lockdown.
Speaker 2: Let's kind of your block hole, you liberty in come,
Speaker 2: but yeah, it's on hole. It's where did it come from?
Speaker 6: And where did he