WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.280 --> 00:00:05.160 Ask not what your country can do for you, and 2 00:00:05.480 --> 00:00:09.199 what you can do for your country. Either you were 3 00:00:09.240 --> 00:00:13.000 with us or you were with the terrorists and you 4 00:00:13.160 --> 00:00:17.280 hurt even a little bit. Time counts, So why wait? 5 00:00:17.600 --> 00:00:20.440 Take up bromo when you don't have the time to 6 00:00:20.480 --> 00:00:25.239 feel bad? If the Ricochet Podcast Stephen gone, Charles gone, 7 00:00:25.519 --> 00:00:26.480 Peter gone. 8 00:00:26.559 --> 00:00:29.600 But I'm James Lilax. I'm here, and so is Rob Long. 9 00:00:29.839 --> 00:00:31.320 So let's eversel's a podcast. 10 00:00:34.039 --> 00:00:34.719 Welcome everybody. 11 00:00:34.719 --> 00:00:38.280 It's the Ricochet Podcast, episode number seven hundred and eighty five. 12 00:00:38.719 --> 00:00:40.479 You can join us at I know you can join 13 00:00:40.560 --> 00:00:42.560 us at ricochet dot com and see why we've gotten 14 00:00:42.560 --> 00:00:44.960 a seven eighty five because what's at ricochet dot com Well, 15 00:00:45.000 --> 00:00:48.439 the most stimulating conversations and community on the web. And 16 00:00:48.479 --> 00:00:50.799 that interjection you just heard there was from one of 17 00:00:50.880 --> 00:00:54.039 the founders who was here at the episode number one, 18 00:00:54.479 --> 00:00:56.600 and that's Rob Long, who, if you are looking at 19 00:00:56.600 --> 00:00:59.560 the video stream, seems to be wearing a like a 20 00:00:59.679 --> 00:01:03.000 like a a leisurely rugby player who's in Peru. 21 00:01:03.479 --> 00:01:06.519 Yeah, I'm I just suddenly remembered that we do this, 22 00:01:06.680 --> 00:01:10.439 and there's a video which I don't recommend. I am 23 00:01:10.799 --> 00:01:13.120 sitting outside anybody who's been through the winter and knows 24 00:01:13.120 --> 00:01:16.239 why I'm sitting outside. It's beautiful day, but that means 25 00:01:16.280 --> 00:01:18.079 have to wear a hat. And that also means that 26 00:01:18.159 --> 00:01:20.959 I can't work. I can't figure out how to make 27 00:01:21.120 --> 00:01:24.840 the microphone work on the iPad and the mic, the 28 00:01:24.879 --> 00:01:29.280 big nice mic, and then use earbuds to hear, so 29 00:01:29.359 --> 00:01:32.840 I have to have headphones, and the headphones are from 30 00:01:32.879 --> 00:01:33.280 the back. 31 00:01:33.359 --> 00:01:35.640 Now, so I kind of look, I look very weird. 32 00:01:36.439 --> 00:01:37.239 You do you do? 33 00:01:37.400 --> 00:01:38.959 And that This is why we advise people to look 34 00:01:38.959 --> 00:01:41.760 at the video feed, because you can seek not only 35 00:01:41.799 --> 00:01:45.280 does Rob Long look like he's some sort of uh, 36 00:01:45.400 --> 00:01:48.400 you know, astronaut from a country that hasn't quite figured 37 00:01:48.400 --> 00:01:50.799 out how to put a booster together, but you keep 38 00:01:50.840 --> 00:01:52.319 blurring in and out. 39 00:01:52.079 --> 00:01:53.200 Which is also interesting. 40 00:01:53.760 --> 00:01:56.079 Well, it's because you're fase shifting between this dimension and 41 00:01:56.120 --> 00:01:58.480 the other, and you are in You're in the dimension 42 00:01:58.480 --> 00:02:01.239 of New York. I believe correct. I'm in Princeton, New 43 00:02:01.319 --> 00:02:03.719 jerseyly Garden State. But you do you live in New 44 00:02:03.840 --> 00:02:07.120 York now or do you still do? Because you're I 45 00:02:07.159 --> 00:02:10.360 do not. I live in Princeton. I My life has 46 00:02:10.479 --> 00:02:13.840 changed radically in the sense that what I did, was 47 00:02:13.960 --> 00:02:18.960 I I radically and crazily, and I think probably without 48 00:02:19.000 --> 00:02:22.199 any planning. This is something that you cannot relate to 49 00:02:22.199 --> 00:02:24.319 because I know that you are an obsessive planner. 50 00:02:25.400 --> 00:02:28.319 I just I went from ah. I went from a 51 00:02:28.439 --> 00:02:30.479 basically the past ten years, went from a big house 52 00:02:30.560 --> 00:02:34.439 in California to a fairly large apartment but not you know, 53 00:02:34.439 --> 00:02:39.840 but still an apartment in Manhattan, to a large kind 54 00:02:39.919 --> 00:02:43.120 of townhouse in Princeton. And then I decided last year 55 00:02:43.159 --> 00:02:46.840 that that was ridiculous, that I'm I need to downsize radically, 56 00:02:46.919 --> 00:02:51.919 and I radically downsized in my mind, which is not 57 00:02:52.840 --> 00:02:57.439 in my will. I wanted to and I decided to. 58 00:02:57.639 --> 00:02:59.319 But what I didn't do is I didn't go through 59 00:02:59.360 --> 00:03:03.639 everything and then do the work necessary. And so I 60 00:03:04.240 --> 00:03:06.879 basically crammed into a very small kind of graduate student 61 00:03:07.120 --> 00:03:09.039 kind of it looks like like a person going to 62 00:03:09.039 --> 00:03:11.879 Divinity school with how they live, surrounded by books. It's great, 63 00:03:12.240 --> 00:03:15.639 but it's small. And I have a storage facility down 64 00:03:15.719 --> 00:03:17.360 a few, you know, not about two miles from here, 65 00:03:17.520 --> 00:03:21.639 and I'm my goal is by October to get rid 66 00:03:21.680 --> 00:03:24.240 of it. So I'm giving myself till October to kind 67 00:03:24.240 --> 00:03:31.719 of get get get manageable. And I just I did 68 00:03:31.800 --> 00:03:32.319 very bad job. 69 00:03:32.360 --> 00:03:34.520 But you're living in a month's sell and you want 70 00:03:34.520 --> 00:03:37.240 to get it down, so you have a single gladstone 71 00:03:37.240 --> 00:03:38.960 that you can use to go from place to place. 72 00:03:39.400 --> 00:03:42.520 I'm living my foot My physical footprint is a monk sell, 73 00:03:42.879 --> 00:03:46.680 but my actual number of possessions is considerably more. And 74 00:03:46.759 --> 00:03:48.360 so what I have is like, look, if you went 75 00:03:48.400 --> 00:03:50.120 into my apartment right now and you looked at it, 76 00:03:50.199 --> 00:03:52.560 you would say to yourself, let's call the cops because 77 00:03:52.599 --> 00:03:56.120 we found the guy. There's just a lot of stuff 78 00:03:56.159 --> 00:03:58.400 there and I need to I need to get rid 79 00:03:58.439 --> 00:04:00.360 of it. And what with the upside of the stuff 80 00:04:00.400 --> 00:04:02.120 is that you discover that you know, for instance, I 81 00:04:02.159 --> 00:04:05.199 have this, you know, from the Rugby seven's rugby shirt 82 00:04:05.199 --> 00:04:06.800 which I hadn't looked at for a million years, and 83 00:04:06.800 --> 00:04:09.039 it's in one of those boxes. And you know this 84 00:04:09.120 --> 00:04:11.560 is this shirt is thirty years old, thirty five years old. 85 00:04:11.599 --> 00:04:15.080 It's from ninety I don't know, yep, ninety three, so 86 00:04:14.680 --> 00:04:18.839 it's thirty six years old. That's time was at the 87 00:04:19.199 --> 00:04:20.319 Rugby Seven's in Hong Kong. 88 00:04:20.399 --> 00:04:21.800 Well, two points about this one. 89 00:04:21.839 --> 00:04:23.920 The Wall Street Journal had a story yesterday a couple 90 00:04:23.959 --> 00:04:27.040 of days ago about storage facilities and how they're exploding. 91 00:04:27.040 --> 00:04:29.279 The industry is just absolutely taken off because people have 92 00:04:29.319 --> 00:04:32.480 too much, in the words of George Carlin, stuff, and 93 00:04:32.639 --> 00:04:34.759 a lot of people don't like them. They push back 94 00:04:34.839 --> 00:04:37.839 on them because they are fairly inert contributors to the 95 00:04:37.879 --> 00:04:41.319 civic landscape. There is something hulking and silent about them though, 96 00:04:41.360 --> 00:04:45.240 as though they're they're they're forced to keep secrets unwillingly 97 00:04:45.360 --> 00:04:47.920 that they do not wish to. You know, there's a 98 00:04:48.040 --> 00:04:52.839 concentrated stillness to them that is part shame, you know, 99 00:04:53.040 --> 00:04:57.360 part you know, silence, part Yeah. Apparently there's four these 100 00:04:57.560 --> 00:05:00.720 that have that that caused people to get a storage locker. 101 00:05:00.800 --> 00:05:04.439 There's dislocation, death, divorced, something I can't forget the fourth d. 102 00:05:04.959 --> 00:05:08.120 Some someplaces are actually trying to make them look like 103 00:05:08.160 --> 00:05:10.959 they belong to the neighborhood. They're putting on facodomy shows 104 00:05:10.959 --> 00:05:11.360 that they have. 105 00:05:11.639 --> 00:05:15.079 It's like like houses, or they put a little strip 106 00:05:15.120 --> 00:05:16.920 mall touch to it so it doesn't look so bad. 107 00:05:17.439 --> 00:05:19.639 But the article was linked to something that somebody else 108 00:05:19.639 --> 00:05:19.800 in the. 109 00:05:19.759 --> 00:05:21.800 Wall Street Journal had written about how he'd spent one 110 00:05:21.839 --> 00:05:23.959 hundred thousand dollars over the course of the years to 111 00:05:24.759 --> 00:05:27.240 rent a storage locker simply because he dumped the contents 112 00:05:27.240 --> 00:05:28.839 of a house in there and kept throwing things in 113 00:05:28.879 --> 00:05:31.040 there and then moved, moved to New York, didn't have 114 00:05:31.079 --> 00:05:32.399 a car one. 115 00:05:32.279 --> 00:05:34.959 Hundreds I'll go back and get it all that stuff, 116 00:05:34.959 --> 00:05:37.839 you say yourself, yeah, right, right, So, but you, unlike 117 00:05:37.839 --> 00:05:39.279 most people who just say, all right, I'm going to 118 00:05:39.360 --> 00:05:41.040 concentrate it down, I'm gonna move, I'm gonna put it 119 00:05:41.040 --> 00:05:42.480 into storage locker, and I'll leave it there. 120 00:05:42.560 --> 00:05:46.120 You actually your goal is to get is to get 121 00:05:46.240 --> 00:05:49.040 past that so that there's no a storage locker. 122 00:05:49.560 --> 00:05:49.800 Yeah. 123 00:05:50.000 --> 00:05:52.360 I mean when I looked for it, I decided to 124 00:05:52.399 --> 00:05:54.199 not do one of the nice ones because they're nice. 125 00:05:54.199 --> 00:05:55.560 I mean some of them are like have this kind 126 00:05:55.560 --> 00:06:00.040 of mysterious clean antiseptic quality. I drive by this that 127 00:06:00.079 --> 00:06:02.399 when I'm driving back from Manhattan into into New Jersey 128 00:06:02.439 --> 00:06:04.480 and they're on sort of the root one wherever I am, 129 00:06:04.839 --> 00:06:07.439 and they're beautiful. They look and they're all lit up 130 00:06:07.480 --> 00:06:09.319 on the inside. It looks like a sci fi movie, 131 00:06:09.439 --> 00:06:11.759 you know, they look like the you know, the the 132 00:06:11.800 --> 00:06:14.920 woman in the weird jumpsuit walking down said you know 133 00:06:14.959 --> 00:06:18.319 command here we've found the whatever. But I am in 134 00:06:18.439 --> 00:06:22.480 one that looks like sadness. It's the corner of sadness 135 00:06:22.480 --> 00:06:24.800 and the Princeton Airport, and it's fine for me. It 136 00:06:24.839 --> 00:06:26.839 is cheap, so I I just but but what I 137 00:06:26.839 --> 00:06:28.600 really should have done? Maybe I should have spent more 138 00:06:28.639 --> 00:06:33.040 money so that I would have felt stupider. But what 139 00:06:33.600 --> 00:06:36.040 that's my goal anyway. So the upside is I discovered 140 00:06:36.040 --> 00:06:39.920 that I have these cool, old like items of clothing. 141 00:06:40.040 --> 00:06:41.800 And the downside is that I think, oh, well, I 142 00:06:41.800 --> 00:06:45.279 don't want to get rid of this, and that's not that's. 143 00:06:45.439 --> 00:06:48.360 I know exactly what you mean. The one to which 144 00:06:48.399 --> 00:06:51.439 I go grudgingly smells of fish. 145 00:06:51.439 --> 00:06:53.800 Occasionally it makes me wonder whether not somebody's storing something 146 00:06:53.839 --> 00:06:54.639 in there for a business. 147 00:06:54.680 --> 00:06:56.720 At the rite the other day, somebody. 148 00:06:56.399 --> 00:06:59.680 Moved out on the floor was speckled with glitter, and 149 00:06:59.720 --> 00:07:02.040 I thought, well, a stripper had this one for a while, 150 00:07:02.120 --> 00:07:04.120 or you know, some fashion toys as the rest of it. 151 00:07:04.439 --> 00:07:06.480 I had to go to it yesterday to remove a 152 00:07:06.639 --> 00:07:08.519 very large object that I was going to write about. 153 00:07:08.519 --> 00:07:10.680 Something that I found in the course of emptying out 154 00:07:10.720 --> 00:07:14.279 the house a family bible that was posed by my 155 00:07:14.360 --> 00:07:16.680 great grandfather at the end of the nineteenth century. 156 00:07:16.720 --> 00:07:22.240 These elaborate, incredible compendions of knowledge. They're just stunning. 157 00:07:22.759 --> 00:07:25.959 They have, for example, all the coins of the Roman era, 158 00:07:26.720 --> 00:07:29.639 and there would be biographies of all of these people 159 00:07:29.680 --> 00:07:32.040 who had nothing to do whatsoever to the Bible except 160 00:07:32.079 --> 00:07:34.279 one of them. One of the biographies was it was 161 00:07:34.319 --> 00:07:37.920 noted here because because Socrates was accused of corrupting the youth, 162 00:07:37.959 --> 00:07:39.680 which they also said about Paul. 163 00:07:39.720 --> 00:07:41.480 And there's a reference to Paul and being here. 164 00:07:41.800 --> 00:07:45.160 I mean, I mean, there's the illustrations, the plates, the 165 00:07:45.240 --> 00:07:48.120 wood cuts, and then also writing in it. 166 00:07:48.360 --> 00:07:50.639 So does somebody keep you sometimes they keep family records 167 00:07:50.639 --> 00:07:53.639 in it? Absolutely, absolutely genealogy. 168 00:07:53.800 --> 00:07:56.480 There was writing, there was and I noted the marriage 169 00:07:56.519 --> 00:07:58.199 is stopped at one point. But there I noticed that 170 00:07:58.240 --> 00:08:00.839 my cousin Bruce, is a very young boy twelve or so, 171 00:08:01.120 --> 00:08:03.000 had written that he was going to marry a certain 172 00:08:03.000 --> 00:08:05.079 woman in nineteen seventy seven or. 173 00:08:05.000 --> 00:08:08.319 Something in the future. He added this. He added this 174 00:08:08.360 --> 00:08:09.519 sneakily to the Bible. 175 00:08:10.120 --> 00:08:12.720 So I found, well, my grandmother had pressed wondering why 176 00:08:12.839 --> 00:08:16.879 this glass, seine bag of leaves, why this you know, 177 00:08:16.920 --> 00:08:21.399 this diamond Jubilee celebration, bookmark pictures and the rest of it. 178 00:08:21.839 --> 00:08:25.319 Can't throw it away. I never cannot throw it away. 179 00:08:25.360 --> 00:08:28.959 What I have to wait and do is die because 180 00:08:29.040 --> 00:08:32.519 I'm the last I'm the last person who remembers my 181 00:08:32.639 --> 00:08:36.240 grandmother right, and well my cousin too, And so when 182 00:08:36.279 --> 00:08:39.120 I'm gone, there's no living person who can lay his 183 00:08:39.159 --> 00:08:41.639 hands on this book and know that hands that he 184 00:08:41.720 --> 00:08:43.759 knew and hell that helped it. 185 00:08:43.759 --> 00:08:46.000 It'll mean nothing to my daughter. My daughter can take it. 186 00:08:46.000 --> 00:08:49.120 So my goal is to reduce my storage facility down 187 00:08:49.120 --> 00:08:51.360 to half the size and have it be pretty much 188 00:08:51.919 --> 00:08:54.000 my personal archives. 189 00:08:54.039 --> 00:08:56.799 The stuff that I don't want, that's my mild clips. 190 00:08:56.879 --> 00:08:57.679 That's for you and me. 191 00:08:57.799 --> 00:09:01.679 I mean you, I mean, there's an argument for you 192 00:09:01.799 --> 00:09:07.039 because you are incredibly detailed and thoughtful and careful archivist. 193 00:09:07.200 --> 00:09:10.679 So your stuff isn't all jumbled, as my guess is. 194 00:09:10.720 --> 00:09:13.039 It's got some I mean, I'm sure you look at 195 00:09:13.039 --> 00:09:15.159 it think what an incredible disorganized mess, and the rest 196 00:09:15.200 --> 00:09:17.320 of us think, my god, what kind of weirdo has 197 00:09:17.360 --> 00:09:21.480 this organized by whatever? But there's something valuable about that, 198 00:09:21.679 --> 00:09:24.039 especially the books and the things that people touched. 199 00:09:24.039 --> 00:09:26.000 I think the things that people touched is kind of amazing. 200 00:09:26.080 --> 00:09:32.840 I mean, I have a silver baby cup that is. 201 00:09:34.480 --> 00:09:35.519 That for a long time, I just thought I just 202 00:09:35.559 --> 00:09:37.440 thought was mine. I just because it has my name 203 00:09:37.480 --> 00:09:39.279 on it except for my but I didn't really look 204 00:09:39.279 --> 00:09:42.720 at it carefully. But it's actually my uncle's and my 205 00:09:42.799 --> 00:09:45.639 uncle who died when he was I think, I don't know, 206 00:09:46.279 --> 00:09:48.440 in his five, five or six. He was very young 207 00:09:49.159 --> 00:09:53.559 my mom's family that were living in Mexico, and my father, 208 00:09:53.720 --> 00:09:55.399 my grandfather, was in the mining business. He had gold 209 00:09:55.399 --> 00:09:58.039 and silver mines, and so I don't know what he 210 00:09:58.080 --> 00:10:02.639 died of. He died of something, and and then my grandmother, 211 00:10:02.720 --> 00:10:05.600 my maternal grandmother, died I think a few years later. No, 212 00:10:05.799 --> 00:10:07.639 my uncle died it too, and I think it was 213 00:10:07.679 --> 00:10:11.720 childhood leukemia. And then my grand my maternal grandmother, died 214 00:10:11.960 --> 00:10:13.720 when she was when my mom was like five or. 215 00:10:13.679 --> 00:10:16.679 Six, because that's what happened back then. 216 00:10:17.120 --> 00:10:20.480 And I've had this baby cup, but I realized that 217 00:10:20.679 --> 00:10:22.399 I've been hanging on to it because I always thought 218 00:10:22.399 --> 00:10:24.639 it was mine, but in fact it's not. It's my namesakes. 219 00:10:25.399 --> 00:10:27.320 And there I know that there are three people who 220 00:10:27.399 --> 00:10:31.519 touched it, my grandmother, my namesake, uncle, and me and 221 00:10:32.679 --> 00:10:34.559 more than that, but at least those three touched it, 222 00:10:34.639 --> 00:10:36.840 and that's sort of a I mean, you can't get 223 00:10:36.919 --> 00:10:39.039 rid of that. You gotta I gotta's by the bed. 224 00:10:42.159 --> 00:10:45.559 At some point, probably this summer at James Alex at 225 00:10:45.559 --> 00:10:47.879 substack dot com, I'm going to be doing small videos, 226 00:10:47.960 --> 00:10:50.240 very short videos. I know people hate videos at longer 227 00:10:50.279 --> 00:10:52.960 than ninety seconds. You start looking at your watch. Yeah, 228 00:10:53.080 --> 00:10:55.240 called small things. I bought a light box and I've 229 00:10:55.240 --> 00:10:57.480 been photographing a lot of the small. 230 00:10:57.240 --> 00:10:59.440 Little objects that I've managed to accumulate over the years. 231 00:10:59.440 --> 00:11:01.200 They have no great value. 232 00:11:01.440 --> 00:11:04.519 Nobody really needs a Matt Mason action figure at this point. 233 00:11:05.080 --> 00:11:06.720 But there's a story behind every one of them, and 234 00:11:06.759 --> 00:11:08.720 I try to tell that story as quickly as possible. 235 00:11:09.000 --> 00:11:11.200 One I recently did was like a little hatpin box 236 00:11:11.320 --> 00:11:15.360 at eighteen ninety three Colombian Exposition. My great grandfather had 237 00:11:15.399 --> 00:11:18.039 gone to the Colombian Exposition and he came back with 238 00:11:18.080 --> 00:11:19.639 a ticket for it too. And I know that he 239 00:11:19.679 --> 00:11:22.120 went to the Republican Convention in Minneapolis in the nineties 240 00:11:22.120 --> 00:11:24.000 as well, because he came back with the ticket for 241 00:11:24.039 --> 00:11:24.559 that as well. 242 00:11:24.799 --> 00:11:27.960 So it's this happen that's sat on my grandmother's desk 243 00:11:28.320 --> 00:11:32.639 for decades, and I don't know what did he buy 244 00:11:32.679 --> 00:11:34.320 it for her? Did he slip it in his pocket 245 00:11:34.360 --> 00:11:35.759 and think of his little daughter when he was going 246 00:11:35.799 --> 00:11:37.840 to get all of these things that you can glean 247 00:11:37.879 --> 00:11:39.720 from it, that you can into it, that you can guess, 248 00:11:39.799 --> 00:11:40.519 that you can build. 249 00:11:41.600 --> 00:11:43.720 And no, I can't get rid of that. 250 00:11:43.759 --> 00:11:45.480 But what I find interesting in you might too on 251 00:11:45.519 --> 00:11:47.879 the audience probably doesn't. Is that a lot of the things, 252 00:11:47.919 --> 00:11:50.279 when you remove them from one text to the other, 253 00:11:50.840 --> 00:11:53.679 they lose significance. Things in your house that you had 254 00:11:53.720 --> 00:11:56.000 on the mantelpiece, when you take it elsewhere, all of 255 00:11:56.039 --> 00:11:58.840 a sudden, it's homeless, It doesn't belong and it goes 256 00:11:58.840 --> 00:11:59.440 in a box. 257 00:12:00.120 --> 00:12:00.480 Finance. 258 00:12:01.039 --> 00:12:04.120 The smaller your unit gets, the more the things that 259 00:12:04.159 --> 00:12:07.600 you have out, the more potent and concentrated their meaning 260 00:12:07.720 --> 00:12:10.840 is like a Matt Mason action figure. Well, that's enough 261 00:12:10.840 --> 00:12:13.440 of us reminiscing about downsizing, and the rest of us 262 00:12:13.759 --> 00:12:16.360 yours willingly mind not so much. We should probably do 263 00:12:16.360 --> 00:12:19.240 what the Ricochet podcast does, and that is speak with 264 00:12:19.279 --> 00:12:22.360 complete confidence about things that we are completely ignorant of. 265 00:12:22.799 --> 00:12:28.519 Generally, that's our motest I have been in the opinion 266 00:12:28.559 --> 00:12:31.679 that virtually nothing that I hear about what's going on 267 00:12:31.840 --> 00:12:35.039 in the Strait and the war in Iran is something 268 00:12:35.240 --> 00:12:37.000 about which I can base conclusion. 269 00:12:37.039 --> 00:12:39.399 And that's not because we're being lied to or fog 270 00:12:39.399 --> 00:12:40.399 of war or the rest of it. 271 00:12:40.480 --> 00:12:41.639 Maybe we are being lied. 272 00:12:41.480 --> 00:12:45.480 To, but part of the cycle of that we've had 273 00:12:45.759 --> 00:12:50.759 is what did I see the other day a political headline, 274 00:12:50.960 --> 00:12:55.440 political headline House fails to curb Trump's war powers as 275 00:12:55.559 --> 00:12:57.919 war in Iran drags on. 276 00:12:58.159 --> 00:13:01.799 I think that's what they said, drags on our seventy two. 277 00:13:02.120 --> 00:13:06.159 Yeah, so the latest is has to do with the 278 00:13:06.159 --> 00:13:08.279 Straight And I don't know why we even bothered to 279 00:13:08.279 --> 00:13:09.960 talk about it, because by the time this is posted, 280 00:13:10.000 --> 00:13:12.159 there will be something else about the Straight. We were 281 00:13:12.159 --> 00:13:15.039 closing it to Iranian ships. They couldn't get out. Anybody 282 00:13:15.039 --> 00:13:17.759 else could come in. We were telling the NATO people 283 00:13:17.799 --> 00:13:19.279 to come and get it. 284 00:13:19.360 --> 00:13:19.960 The other day. 285 00:13:20.200 --> 00:13:21.639 I think today, as a matter of fact, it's a 286 00:13:21.639 --> 00:13:24.080 tweet that said the leaders of Great Britain and France 287 00:13:24.519 --> 00:13:28.320 that Macron and Starmer have gotten together to talk about 288 00:13:28.320 --> 00:13:31.919 the Strait of horrormone situation, and the tweet commentator said, 289 00:13:31.960 --> 00:13:33.639 this is like me and my wife getting together to 290 00:13:33.679 --> 00:13:36.440 discuss the optimal landing site on the Moon. 291 00:13:37.039 --> 00:13:37.799 Yeah, that is. 292 00:13:37.840 --> 00:13:38.480 Kind of what. 293 00:13:39.519 --> 00:13:42.440 So let's take this in the absence of Charlie C. W. 294 00:13:42.639 --> 00:13:42.919 Cook. 295 00:13:44.080 --> 00:13:47.200 Where does this leave Europe? And is that a question 296 00:13:47.639 --> 00:13:50.759 that nobody really cares what the answer is one way 297 00:13:50.879 --> 00:13:53.799 or the other. I do, but let me take your take. 298 00:13:54.080 --> 00:13:54.600 Get your take. 299 00:13:54.759 --> 00:13:58.120 Well, I mean, you know, everybody decides, you know, decided 300 00:13:58.120 --> 00:13:59.919 twenty years ago that we were gonna not rely on 301 00:14:00.120 --> 00:14:02.480 fossil fuels. So what they did was they said, we're 302 00:14:02.480 --> 00:14:04.200 not going to rely on fossil fuels. And what they 303 00:14:04.200 --> 00:14:06.919 didn't do is not rely on fossil fuels. Right, these 304 00:14:07.000 --> 00:14:09.039 pronouncements they made that they didn't actually fall through on, 305 00:14:10.159 --> 00:14:12.840 which is anyone could have told them was going to happen, 306 00:14:12.879 --> 00:14:17.360 because actually, fossil fuels are fantastic and fuel the world 307 00:14:17.600 --> 00:14:21.080 and productory. Right, you know, they're portable, they have so 308 00:14:21.159 --> 00:14:25.200 much concentrated fantastic and there's tons of it so and 309 00:14:25.279 --> 00:14:27.159 tons of it is still in the North Sea apparently 310 00:14:27.440 --> 00:14:28.679 and certainly the Norwegians. 311 00:14:28.799 --> 00:14:30.320 So so there's that problem. 312 00:14:30.399 --> 00:14:33.639 Right, So there's that slow I'm looking more glacier moves, right, 313 00:14:33.759 --> 00:14:36.200 slow moves and then there's the the slow move of NATO, 314 00:14:36.279 --> 00:14:39.360 which is not in addition to the sort of the 315 00:14:39.360 --> 00:14:42.480 their their unwillingness to fund their fair share, which I think, 316 00:14:42.519 --> 00:14:44.879 you know, Trump is absolutely correct to point out, and 317 00:14:44.919 --> 00:14:47.159 to point it out many times. There was also this 318 00:14:47.240 --> 00:14:49.320 kind of sense that, well, what does this do? What 319 00:14:49.440 --> 00:14:52.960 is this for anyway? Right the end of the Soviet Union? 320 00:14:52.960 --> 00:14:54.000 What are we doing here? 321 00:14:54.080 --> 00:14:54.159 Like? 322 00:14:54.440 --> 00:14:58.519 Why are why are there American servicemen in Hamburg, Germany? 323 00:14:58.639 --> 00:15:02.120 It just doesn't make any sense, right, And so we 324 00:15:02.240 --> 00:15:04.960 petered out of that of the you know, the twentieth 325 00:15:05.000 --> 00:15:06.639 century in the early twenty first century. 326 00:15:06.639 --> 00:15:07.840 Now we're trying to figure out what it is that 327 00:15:07.879 --> 00:15:08.200 we do. 328 00:15:09.080 --> 00:15:11.399 And I suspect that part of the problem we have 329 00:15:11.519 --> 00:15:15.519 right now is that we have not decided. 330 00:15:16.440 --> 00:15:18.720 As a country really what. 331 00:15:21.000 --> 00:15:23.080 Steps we want to take in the world to shape 332 00:15:23.080 --> 00:15:25.279 the world the way we want it to be shaped, 333 00:15:25.799 --> 00:15:27.519 what things were going to protect and what things were 334 00:15:27.519 --> 00:15:29.799 not going to protect, what we're willing to pay, and 335 00:15:29.799 --> 00:15:31.960 what we're not willing to pay, And a lot of 336 00:15:31.960 --> 00:15:34.240 that has been this sort of astonishing amount of failure 337 00:15:35.360 --> 00:15:38.600 that you know, I'm skirting the issue, the Trump issue 338 00:15:38.639 --> 00:15:41.120 of that happened before Trump, which is really the Iraq War. 339 00:15:41.600 --> 00:15:43.759 We had a war that didn't really accomplish much and 340 00:15:43.960 --> 00:15:47.480 was kind of there were no weapons of mass destruction. 341 00:15:47.559 --> 00:15:48.919 I think we can say that now safely. 342 00:15:51.000 --> 00:15:58.480 This well okay, but okay, but whatever. This is where 343 00:15:58.519 --> 00:16:01.039 I sort of agree with Trump. Right in twenty sixteen, 344 00:16:01.080 --> 00:16:04.879 the general understanding was that it was it was, it was. 345 00:16:05.600 --> 00:16:08.200 It did not unfold the way we were told it 346 00:16:08.240 --> 00:16:10.440 was going to unfold. And the second thing we were 347 00:16:10.480 --> 00:16:12.080 told in later is that it doesn't. That doesn't matter 348 00:16:12.120 --> 00:16:14.240 anymore because we have these precise weapons. It can get 349 00:16:14.320 --> 00:16:16.720 right into this thing and can actually these bunker busters 350 00:16:16.759 --> 00:16:18.600 and we can just you know, six months ago we said, oh, 351 00:16:18.600 --> 00:16:21.320 well it rans they're nuclear programs have been sent back years. 352 00:16:22.039 --> 00:16:24.480 Well apparently it hasn't. So apparently that was a failure. 353 00:16:25.919 --> 00:16:27.600 So we just have to decide what it is we 354 00:16:27.639 --> 00:16:29.240 want to do and who is we want to do 355 00:16:29.279 --> 00:16:31.080 it for, and who do we want to do it with, 356 00:16:31.120 --> 00:16:34.559 and who we want to do it against? And none 357 00:16:34.639 --> 00:16:37.159 of those dots have been connected, and none of those 358 00:16:37.519 --> 00:16:40.279 there's no there's no strategy you're understanding. So if you're 359 00:16:40.320 --> 00:16:43.240 the people and you're watching this thing unfold. It does 360 00:16:43.279 --> 00:16:45.799 feel like seventy two hours is forever because I don't 361 00:16:45.840 --> 00:16:47.639 know what the plan is. The planet is to open 362 00:16:47.679 --> 00:16:49.639 the Straight, it's to blockade the strait. The planets to 363 00:16:49.639 --> 00:16:53.519 secure the Straight. The plan is to protect the protect oil. 364 00:16:53.639 --> 00:16:58.679 The plan is to destroy it rans oil exporting capacity. 365 00:16:58.679 --> 00:17:00.919 We don't quite know. It's change the regime, it's not 366 00:17:00.919 --> 00:17:03.120 to change the regime. It's all sorts of things. And 367 00:17:03.159 --> 00:17:07.359 in absence of a very clear plan, what happens is 368 00:17:07.359 --> 00:17:09.720 a lack of confidence. And I think that's what you're 369 00:17:09.720 --> 00:17:12.880 seeing from people. Not that it's not specific to Trump 370 00:17:12.960 --> 00:17:16.720 necessarily he inherited a lot of it, but you know, 371 00:17:16.799 --> 00:17:19.960 you play the character Dill, and he's not playing them 372 00:17:20.039 --> 00:17:22.599 very well. It seems to me he needs and mostly 373 00:17:22.599 --> 00:17:26.039 because he's an erratic person and he's driven by poles 374 00:17:26.160 --> 00:17:31.359 and he's he speaks erratically and he doesn't project confidence. 375 00:17:31.400 --> 00:17:32.920 And then we have sort of Colonel Kurtz it's the 376 00:17:32.960 --> 00:17:36.200 Secretary of Defense. Now none of that seems like these 377 00:17:36.200 --> 00:17:39.200 are people who are the gray and colorless leaders we expect. 378 00:17:39.319 --> 00:17:40.799 But on the other hand, the gray and colorless leaders 379 00:17:40.799 --> 00:17:44.160 took us into a rack. So we got to figure 380 00:17:44.160 --> 00:17:44.799 this out right. 381 00:17:46.319 --> 00:17:49.160 I think it's three things that work here, one of 382 00:17:49.160 --> 00:17:53.160 them which may be sound incoherent, but is actually probably 383 00:17:53.200 --> 00:17:56.799 basically it is just we are going to remove your 384 00:17:56.839 --> 00:17:59.279 capacity to bleep with us if you just don't get 385 00:17:59.279 --> 00:18:01.160 to bleep with us any We're not putting up, We're 386 00:18:01.200 --> 00:18:03.160 not buying, we're we're sending your palettes of money. 387 00:18:03.160 --> 00:18:06.559 We're we're not sitting down at tables. That's all there 388 00:18:06.599 --> 00:18:07.000 is to it. 389 00:18:07.319 --> 00:18:09.640 Before we went into Afghanistan and there were nice pictures 390 00:18:09.640 --> 00:18:12.039 of women holding up a blue finger outside of kabble, 391 00:18:12.079 --> 00:18:15.839 the culture was as barbaric and medieval. That's actually cruel 392 00:18:15.839 --> 00:18:18.799 to the medieval. It was irredeemable, and we waste a 393 00:18:18.839 --> 00:18:21.000 lot of time and money. We should have just got 394 00:18:21.000 --> 00:18:23.599 out and said, okay, well do what you're gonna do. 395 00:18:23.920 --> 00:18:26.160 We would like to make you like like you used 396 00:18:26.160 --> 00:18:27.759 to be in those pictures we see where women are 397 00:18:27.799 --> 00:18:29.559 walking run schools and going to university. 398 00:18:29.759 --> 00:18:32.640 That'd be great. But if you're not up to the challenge, okay, 399 00:18:32.759 --> 00:18:34.400 just so you know that it's a moab. 400 00:18:34.559 --> 00:18:36.720 Anytime anything happens and we trace it back to you, 401 00:18:36.920 --> 00:18:38.440