U.S.-China Trade Deal, Trump's Plane Grift, and the American Pope
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You can come over, we'll do edibles, watch Meet the Press on my computer. It's fun time. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. And I'm Scott Galloway. Scott, did you hear who my seatmate was? Your favorite person on my way to California to talk to Democrats. I can't say who. Oh, Gordon Gekker. I mean, Speaker Amaranta Pelosi. Yes.

She was delightful. She's a delightful seatmate, I must say. Let me just tell you one thing about her. First of all, I recognized it was her because it was a plane full of political people. Zoe Lofgren was on there. Eric Swalwell was on there. But someone yelled out white smoke really loudly, an older lady, and it turned out to be her, and spent much of the beginning of the flight having me figure out who the pope was for her. She's quite Catholic and

carrying lots of newspapers, constantly moving throughout the entire thing. I mean, she's in really good shape for...

someone of her age, of any age, actually. So it was fun. We had a good time. She says hi. I think she's very fashionable. She is. Well, she was wearing a very comfortable but fashionable outfit, I would say. I would say very, but comfortable. And one of the things that struck me was how many people came up to her. I know you have antipathy towards her, but most people don't. It was astonishing how many people gave her notes and handed her little things saying they loved her and this and that. It was interesting. Look, I don't... I think she's been a great representative. I think she's a

powerful, smart woman. I also think she engages in wild corruption. Yeah, not like a Qatari airplane. We'll get to that. But the slow creep has not helped. No, I agree. The stock thing has to be dealt with throughout Congress, by the way. There was a Republican...

who did it, who was saying he was against it and then he suddenly was doing a lot of trading, Marjorie Taylor Greene. They shouldn't be trading. And again, I think your idea of paying them more is a great idea in order to get them off of that. Because another part, you know, you're smart people. You want to make some money and

And you can't help yourself, but you do have insider information to a lot of things. Look, I've said this over and over. I'm trying to be better about coming up with solutions. I think there should be a bill, and I think there's a decent chance it would pass. $1 million a year for representatives, $3 million a year.

for senators, $10 million a year for the president in exchange for a zero-tolerance policy on corruption. Yeah, but then how do you—like, the Trump people have really taken it to the most— No, I agree, but that's a separate conversation. I'm trying to talk about solutions. The Singapore model works because what ends up happening is the money they get costs so much more in terms of loss of faith,

in the markets in terms of people's reticence to invest in certain companies. I'm going to agree with you. I'm going to agree with you. All I have to say is I love a lady who has a pile of newspapers all crumpled up. She pulled out stories, she knew where everything was. It was quite nice actually. It made me feel of a different era. I liked it. A bunch of newspapers crumpled up? She reads newspapers on paper.

Like instead of digitally. And at one point when I figured out for her who the Pope was by getting online and stuff like that, she said, ah, him. And then she fished out of this pile of newspapers an article the New York Times had done on this particular man who became the Pope. And she was like, hmm, I wonder if he's too conservative. Like she was like immediately just out of this pile.

She was almost like the Wikipedia herself. It was really interesting. Yeah, the guy who lived across the hall from me and the faculty housing also collected newspapers, also spoke to himself and was 108. I just haven't seen someone have a lot of newspapers. My mother. I mean, you know, anyway, it was fun. We had a good time. White smoke. Anyway, we've got, how was your weekend, by the way? I was in California very briefly to talk to Democrats. What? You're out of California again? I'm back. I'm back. I'm in D.C. Jesus Christ.

Going up to New York, I'm staying with you, just so you know. My son's graduating. When are you coming? Wait, when are you coming here? I'm not getting there till Wednesday. When are you checking into the hotel? Wednesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. The hotel cheap prostitutes and pastries from Balthazar? Yes, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday. Okay, okay. Memo to self, cleaning lady, get rid of the dildos and the condoms. Okay, okay, memo to self. Yeah, you're there with someone. If you want to have drinks tonight, I'm coming in tonight.

Pretend I'm coming up with a really valid excuse for no. I'm going to just show up. I'm nearby. I'm in a hotel nearby. My son's graduating. I had a great weekend. Congratulations to your son. I went to one of these new member clubs. I went to San Vicente Bungalows. Oh, how was it? I love that guy who runs it, Jeff. Oh, really? Yeah. You know, they're kind of all beginning to look, smell, and feel the same. The difference is

They're all in the same area and are a bunch of them. So you go to one and if you don't like the crowd, you go to another one. I mean, it's going to be, so the easiest prediction in the world is there's going to be a Harvard business case study on these private members clubs about how it's overinvestment, the shakeout, how that you try to find their own lane and their own identity. But I'm not exaggerating. I would bet 10 have opened in the last year. It's amazing. Yeah.

They're the one in LA, and it's lovely. The one in LA is lovely. Yeah, it's nice. A guy who's a Pivot fan, actually, Jeff. I'm lacking on his last name. But I love the one in LA. It's quite lovely. I've been there for lunch. I've been a guest to people. But did you like it, this one, comparatively? Yeah, I like all of them. I'm easily impressed. But I think they're nice. Also, I'm at the age where I don't want to...

I don't want to wait in line. I want to go somewhere that they don't allow in other people, that I shouldn't be there. I need to be the oldest and ugliest person in the room. Okay. And that happens at these places. Good, good. Would you care to say which one you like best or not? Oh, my favorite is Zero Mon because I like the owner and I think they do a nice job and

it's just sort of my cheers. I like it there. And it's sort of the original one that kind of took private members clubs to the next level. If I had to guess, I'm fascinated by markets. If I had to guess, I think the two that will survive sort of the HBO and the Netflix are Zero Bond and Casa Cipriani, which just has its own kind of Euro trash crowd and O as well. Oh, yeah, it's a nice crowd. And it's downtown and it's just got a very unique positioning. And the other ones are all like,

you know, Hulu and Peacock trying to battle it out. Oh, all right. Okay. It'll be very interesting to see what goes, what actually survives here. All right. So I'll meet you at Zero Bond tonight. That'll be great. ZB? We're going to meet at ZB? We should. I will. I have to speak in front of C-U-N-Y. Is it CUNY? Is that how you pronounce it? CUNY, yeah. CUNY. I'm speaking in front of a Newmark group. Craig Newmark has funded a journalism thing. But then I'm free. Oh, that's nice. So you can meet me at Zero Bond. Then I'm free. You don't drink. I don't. I'm not. I know. I'm not interested in that. I'm just going to show up.

I'll text you. You can come over. We'll do edibles. Yeah. Watch Meet the Press on my computer. No. Fun time. That's what I do. That's literally what I do at night. I take edibles and I watch Meet the Press on the computer and I get really depressed. I'm going to find you tonight. Do you want to go to the theater tomorrow night? Oh, my God. I can't think of anything.

I'd rather less, too. I want to go to the theater. That was you trying to up it? Yeah. That was you trying to like go one more. Yeah. Yeah. I have a lot of new work. I'm interviewing Barry Diller. I'm going on Nicole Wallace's new podcast. I was on Nicole's thing. She's good. You were on her show show. She has a new podcast, too, now. Oh, really? Everybody's getting a podcast. Mm-hmm. Yeah. So I got... I'm going to speak out of school here. Yeah, sure. I got... This is literally why TV is dying. You've done a lot lately. Yeah. I'm a total fucking whore lately. So...

Anyways, so when I'm in New York, I just say yes to everything. Almost everything. Not me, I see, as you can see. Well, come on, I know you. Okay, go ahead. Anyways, at CBS Mornings, whatever it's called, with Gayle King, reached out and said, do you want to come on? And I said, yeah, I've never been on the show. My understanding is it gets a huge audience. It does. I actually like Gayle King for all the shit she's getting. I like her. Yeah, I do too, except for the flight thing, but go ahead. Okay, whatever. I've done worse. You've done worse. Exactly. That's how I feel.

And so they're big assignment. They do a pre-call, a fricking pre-call with like eight people. Oh, I declined those. You did them? No, my, okay. My team agreed to it. I don't do pre-calls for talks where I get paid six figures, but they decide I need to do a pre-call for CBS morning. Okay. Hard no. Anyway, so I'm on with like eight very attractive, intelligent 30 somethings.

who are literally a third of the age of their viewership as they figure out programming for people who are 140. And they're asking me all these questions about young men and the economy and tariffs. We talked for 45 minutes. And then I go, can you tell me a little bit about the segment? And they said, it's with Gayle King. And I said, how long is it? And they said, four and a half minutes. And I said, I'm not doing it.

And I'm like, what? You did it again. You've done this before. I'm not getting up at oh dark hundred hours, putting on a suit, coming to Midtown, getting in a makeup chair to speak to 800,000 seven-year-olds for four and a half minutes. And? And they were so shocked. Oh, good for you. And then, by the way, same night, and I'm bragging, I went on Nicole Wallace's show for 40 minutes. Yeah.

Yeah. But I'm supposed to go on fucking. And the thing is, they don't get it. And what did you do? Did you go on? I went, no, I said, I'm out. Oh, this is not. I said, the juice isn't worth the squeeze. I'm pissed off at my team for agreeing. Yeah. I'm like, and it's bad for my brand to show up with Gail came for four and a half fucking minutes. That makes me look important. Oh, so poor Gail. And they seem so shocked. And this is the thing, broadcast news or just cable news.

It's one thing that you're dying, but it's another thing you don't realize it yet. Yeah. They literally seem shocked.

that I wasn't going to haul my ass to Midtown to be on with Gayle King for four and a half minutes. Yep. I agree with you. The call before, see, I always returned down. I was like, no, you can read my threads. Four and a half minutes. Yay. We spent 40 minutes talking through these issues and they want me to answer like one question with Gayle King at 8.04 a.m. Now Gayle's mad at you. So I can sell more opioid-induced constipation medicine. You're never going to meet Oprah now. Oh, well.

Oh, that's right. They're good, good friends. Best friends. They're good friends. BFF. BFF's our best friend. It really, truly is. Well, that's a nice story. Anyway, I'm going to go on a podcast that's an hour long, so I am agreeing to do it because it's anything, as long as it's,

Substance. Love Nicole Wallace. She's great. Hello, moderate. We like her. We like her a lot. Hello, moderate. I love her. I think she's really great. And then I'm doing Barry Diller. I'm very excited in person. We're going to do it in person. Yeah, that guy's a gangster. I'm excited. The book is wonderful. Do you want some more inside baseball? What else? What other TV did you turn down?

No, this activist investor, smart young guys called me. They're thinking about taking a big position where they already have.

And I see and they wanted me to join their group. And I'm like, there's no fucking way I'm going up against. I'm like, one or more of us will end up in the river. I'm like, and they're like, what are you scared of him? I'm like, yeah, I'm really scared. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm like, good luck with that. And by the way, you don't know me.

And I said that I love Barry Diller and I want nothing to do with an activist play against IAC. Anyway, we've got a lot to get to today, including MAGA's meltdown over the Pope, woke Pope, and the return of Elizabeth Holmes, sort of, I guess.

But first, the U.S. and China have reached a deal to roll back the sky-high tariffs they've imposed on each other, at least for the next 90, another 90-day thing. Under the deal, the U.S. tariffs on China will drop from 145 percent to 30 percent, while China will cut its own tariffs on American goods from 125 percent to 10 percent. These tariffs reductions will go into effect Wednesday. China also said it will suspend or cancel tariff countermeasures, including restrictions

on rare earth metals that have been hitting automakers and chip makers. The markets are thrilled by this China deal, though Dow surged 1,000 points at the opening bell, no surprise. Treasury Secretary Scott Besant was just on CNBC calling this a pause and saying he expects to meet with China in the coming weeks to work out a larger agreement.

I mean, what? Like, why did we do this? I guess to get them to do this? Is this better, better, worse? I can't even tell because the specifics are not there. Besson also said, "Neatherside wants a decoupling," meaning we want to get along with the Chinese. That's probably, hello, we already knew that.

If you're an American company right now, I don't know what your next move is. And Scott, how many dolls are you buying me? That's what I really want to know. But talk about this deal. This is capitulation. You don't show up and say you're levying 145% and then a week later start negotiating against yourself and saying they're unsustainable. And it's like, well, why did you put that number out there to begin with? And then say there's a temporary pause slash interim tariff of 30%. And

This is a reality. China gets kind of gets what they want because China has made a strategic decision to divest from the U.S. They have taken the percentage of their exports from 24 percent to 17, which is huge. Yeah, they're doing pretty well. And as we pretend that our dick is much bigger than it is, we're their third largest trading partner. We're not even number one. So they're fine to slowly but surely go through a measured decoupling, actually, or reduction independence upon us.

Trump has created so much ill will. I mean, do you realize, and this is the thing people don't realize in terms of brand. For the first time in history, when you do, there was a national, a global poll done of global consumers. And for the first time in history, more people see China as a positive force in the world than the US. I cannot believe that. I saw that. So when opting for where should my kid go to graduate school,

Who should I do business with? Who am I inclined? What kind of business am I inclined to meet with? What widget or aircraft should I buy, Chinese or American? More people around the globe for the first time now pick China. Yes, an authoritarian communist country that follows its people. It is...

It's so ridiculous what we've done here. So, and then just on a more economic level, in terms of capital outflows, in the wake of this nonsense, investors have rushed to the exits on all dollar-denominated investments, and the U.S. dollar index is down 6% year-to-date. More than $10 billion has been wiped off of the stock market. The Magnificent Seven alone lost $2 trillion on April 3rd and 4th. So there's just

This is just a massive attempt to claim some sort of Pyrrhic victory in exchange for massively trading off the equity that we have developed over the last 80 years. This is just...

Just stupid. Again, these guys don't understand business. They don't understand negotiation. They don't understand even our dollar dominance. People estimate that we get interest rates on mortgages, student loans, and credit cards of between a half a percent and a percent lower because so many people buy our dollars to invest here. The real damage is incremental. It's like a virus that's eating away that you can't even identify.

It's all these little, it's death by a thousand cuts and America has taken for granted just how powerful having the dollar as the reserve currency, having these inflows of capital, having people feel decent goodwill about us.

And he's torn those up such that we can go to 30% temporary tariffs. 90 days. All this 90-day nonsense. I mean, what if you're a business? Tell me, if you're creating a business, how do you know? I guess you're relieved that now we're not being insane and ruining, but it's already wrecked a bunch of people's businesses. It's thrown planning out the window. And what do you do? Because you don't know what this lunatic's going to do next. And I don't mean China. America is meant to be a platform for rights, to protect our shores. Yeah.

and for stuff. Americans love their stuff. A 30 percent tariff is enough to get trade unclogged again, but it'll be essentially the percent of exports the US will go probably from 17 down to 15 or 12. Then the next time we try to do it, our products are going to get more expensive. If you were to give someone a Christmas tree, every business and all the shit they order from China, it'll make the cost of doing business more expensive.

and it's done huge damage to our reputation. It's just we're no longer seen as a reliable trading partner. I think actually, interestingly enough, a big winner is Europe who's going to find a lot of, they're going to be able to negotiate, get a lot of products on sale as China tries to keep these factories humming. I heard that they were doing that, they were keeping up sales across the globe. Then the soccer will probably rally because of this because we're getting out of idiocy. It looks like Scott Besson is just a cleanup lady.

Like on aisle five, essentially, correct? Yeah, that's a good way to put it. Yeah. Anyway, President Trump is heading out on the first major overseas trip of his second term this week with stops in Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates, presumably to collect new bags of money.

The trip comes as Trump administration plans to accept a $400 million luxury Boeing 747-800 from Qatar, possibly the largest foreign gift in U.S. history. The plane will be retrofitted to be used as Air Force One, which I don't even want to think about the security implications, and donate it to Trump's presidential library when he leaves office, allowing him to still use it. Despite all the ethical questions being raised, Trump called it a very public and transparent transaction on truth social. And Press Secretary Carolyn Leavitt, Tracy Flick, who was just

so bad, said in a statement, any gift given by a foreign government is always accepted in full compliance with all applicable laws. It's the griftiest grift yet. I mean, this is just, I'll note the Trump family struck a deal to build a luxury golf resort in Qatar a few weeks ago. I mean, it's all in plain sight, I guess, is the only good thing we could say about it, all the billions they're making and taking from these Arab countries. And he wants to call the Gulf, the Persian Gulf, the Gulf of Arabia now, another one. I mean,

Why does he just go there in his plane and live there for the rest of his life? I don't know what else to say. Was he looking for a place to go if he ever gets convicted of anything? I don't honestly know what's happening here. Well, again, I go to the brand. Do you know how stupid this makes us look that we have to have rich Qataris buy the president a plane that's manufactured here? We're the most prosperous nation in the world, but we need a government that

an authoritarian government that sponsors the Houthis in Hamas to give us a plan. Yeah, that's right. Oh yeah, Hamas. So I have a group of friends from college, mostly Jews, who are pro-Trump. They kind of hold their nose around the man and his policies, but they found that Biden and Harris' wavering around Israel was really disappointing. And so they're, quite frankly, they're pro-Trump or they voted for Trump because they see him as more resolute on Israel.

Qatar basically is the diplomatic mouthpiece and funds Hamas. The notion that the Trump administration gave a flying fuck about anti-Semitism as they try and implement thought control across our universities, and is meanwhile saying that Middle East policy is now pay for play, that he's now the ultimate frequent, there's now a new frequent flyer category for Qatar Airlines.

and the president is the only person on it. In exchange, they're going to have leverage over a guy who claims to be focused on anti-Semitism. I find that Jews in America that support Trump are like, okay, yeah, there's the white Christian nationals, the evangelicals are really fond of Jews in Israel. But if you actually do a little bit of digging, the reason they're fond of Jews,

is a little bit unsettling. They think we're part of their master plan when Jesus comes back. It's like, okay, just dig a little deep on what their plan is for us and why they're like us. End times. It's all about the end times, just so you know. I have relatives. I hear a lot about the... Do you know what I did? The bumper sticker my brother made for my relatives who are very, very charismatic Christians, I guess I would call them.

He made them, they're lovely people, but they have varying degrees of religiosity. But he made my aunt, Bombersick, who said, when the rapture comes, can I have your stuff? Huh. I thought that was going to be funnier. How is Dr. Swisher? He's good. He's good. He's in Portland visiting his son right now. He's good. His son's in Oregon? Yeah, one of his sons. Yeah, the other lives in Australia, and his daughter is in the Dominican Republic right now teaching. Okay.

I can totally see that. What does his son do in Portland? He's working on electrical engineering, I think. Oh, good for him. At the University of Oregon? One of them, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay.

I can't say what Alex would be doing because he signed an NDA, but Alex is doing an energy-related internship this summer. I'm not exaggerating. When your son took me and my son to work or to lunch when we were touring the University of Michigan, we asked him what he was doing over the summer, and he looked around as if there were spies about to take notes. And I'm like, Alex, you're not that important.

Yes, he is. You're not that important. He is. Don't tell him. He loves you. Do not say that. He's listening right now. Okay. What is he? He's going to a sophomore. He's literally like, okay. He's like, you can't tell anyone about this. You know what? He's a very, I love that kid. We had a great weekend. Well, yeah. You love him like a son. No, I just think he's going to be a billionaire. And we should, speaking of being scared of people, you should. No, I'm glad he's on our side. He's going to take care of us, you and I, when we're older.

No, he's going to be my bodyguard and also figure out what technology keeps me alive to 200. I feel like he's going to build something really significant. I feel this. Yeah, he's got that kind of crazy smart gene. Yeah, he really does. Anyway, we can't say what he's doing. He's under NDA. I know. It's total, like, top secret. I love that about him. Anyway, Trump, you're a grifty grifter. That's all. I don't know what to say. I don't know if we can stop him, but he's, like, piling up the grift like you can't believe. All right, when we get back,

how the new pope is riling up the MAGA world. And we'll also discuss some of our favorite pope memes, because I love a pope meme.

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In most ways, Google and Apple are ruthless competitors. But then a high-powered Apple executive gets up on the stand at the trial that might break up Google and argues that actually Google's fine and the best thing you can do is leave it alone. Why? Because Google being left alone means $20 billion a year for Apple.

On the Verge cast this week, we talk all about what's going on at the Google trial, plus the latest from the efforts to break up Meta, what's going on with Netflix and lots more. All that on the Verge cast, wherever you get podcasts. Scott, we're back. The Pope Leo XIV, the first American pope, laid out a vision of his papacy over the weekend, identifying AI as one of the most critical issues facing humanity. It was interesting. He was also sporting an Apple watch, his first official mass. He also seems to be a very techie pope.

Let's invite him on the show. That would be great. And while many have cheered the election of American Pope, the MAGA folks are not happy. Activist Laura Loomer branded him "woke Marxist Pope." Steve Bannon predicted friction with Trump. As for Pope Leo's political leanings, voting records show the Chicago native has participated in Republican and Democratic primaries in various elections.

An ex-account under his name has criticized Trump's policies in the past and also rebuked J.D. Vance back in February. He's got a crazy Trumpy brother who, what was he saying? He's saying a bunch of things that are really nutty. One brother's calmer. He has two brothers. The older one seems insane. He's, as you said, from Chicago. He has a background, interestingly, of Creole and from Haiti, right?

You know, they're calling him also the Black Pope, but he's definitely got, they did some really interesting reporting on that, which is cool. He's been all over the world. He's very international. Seems fascinating. So we'll get to the memes in a bit. What do you think of this Pope Leo? And so far, he seems very vibrant and exciting and interesting. I think he's the Pope because of Donald Trump. I think that if you look at the newsreel

new leaders of Australia and or the existing leaders of Australia and Canada, basically Trump got them elected and he got them elected because the other, their opponents were more closely associated with Trump. So Trump is basically anyone who's not Trump or represents a pushback on his policies is ascending to the most powerful positions in the world. I think that's what happened here. I think the papacy or the papacy takes very seriously how they can have the most impact. And

If you look at when the Eastern Bloc was really going through a difficult time, they decided to pick someone from the Eastern Bloc. They picked Pope John Paul II from Poland. I think they see there's a relevance and a means of adding value by saying when a place is struggling, we pick someone from there in hopes that they serve as a moral standard bearer. My father-in-law absolutely adores Pope John Paul II. He's born and raised in Poland.

I think that it's no accident that they've decided that America needs a pope, that they need somebody. The best line that identifies or marks

this very dark moment in American history is what Bill Gates said, and that is that the richest man in the world is killing the world's poorest children. That was something as we said. I thought, Jesus Christ, that's puncturing and sad. I'm glad he said it. That identifies our mega politics right now. I think they decided that America is in desperate need of a moral standard bearer and the world needs someone that America will take seriously

I was thinking so much about, like, how did my generation fuck up so bad? And I was thinking, and for me, it all comes back to a personal parable. Oh, you're doing a parable? Well, my youngest is always built. He's got the most wonderful grandparents. And his grandkids,

Granddad. And wife's parents, correct? Yeah. My grandparents went on. Average age expectancy. You know how everyone says I'm going to live forever? None of my grandparents made it past 50. Wow. Anyways, so he's just the most wonderful man. Took over the family room to build a train set for the boys. And he's always with my youngest built these Legos. And

And this time he came over, my youngest is 14, and into girls and snap and fashion and football. And they built about half of it. And then he said, you know, Zsa Zsa, I don't want to do this. I don't feel like it. You know, he wasn't enjoying it that much. And I could tell it was very upsetting. It's like one of those moments when you feel like that's probably the last time I'll pick up my kid or the last time I'll build a Lego with my grandson.

And I was trying to figure out a way to say to him, look, that's not cool. Even if you didn't want to build this or finish it, you should have realized this was important to your grandfather and finished it. And what I've been thinking about is that, you know, I'm writing a lot about becoming a man. I think that my generation and our politics have become more about our feelings as opposed to our values.

And that is, we don't do a good enough job of identifying values and then basing those actions and those political views off those values as opposed to just what makes us feel good or feel like we're part of a tribe or feels some sort of thrill because the other side looks stupid or feels confirmation because we're signed up for whatever narrative with the party we've chosen believes. But I do think there's a degradation or a move away from values.

and as a guiding light, as opposed to just- - And this guy feels like that. - This guy's really got very, I mean, he's not afraid. He's called Russia's invasion, you know, he said Russia's loving wickedness. He's not afraid to tweet about shit. And I like to think that the church,

has said, all right, there needs to be some sort of rejuvenation or a move back towards values in the West, as opposed to what everyone thinks is gonna make them feel good. - It depends on what your values are though, 'cause there's a very conservative shift in many people in the US. The most devout, I'm using that term loosely, are the conservative groups that are sort of machinate and behind the scenes in the Catholic church. There's a whole groups of,

of very conservative Catholics. And J.D. Vance is a convert, obviously, and is among those. And the concepts are much more old Latin Pope, like Benedict. Let's go back to before Vatican II and everything else. And I agree. I think this guy is a choice that they make. I happen to be Catholic. I don't know what your religion, I don't even know what your religion is.

But my grandmother went to Mass every day. I got confirmed. I never went inside a Catholic church since, really. I did that for her. But there's a real movement. Either it goes quite left or quite right. And it's responding to growth in Latin America and Africa and different places, I think, where there's more conservative. But there is a real conservative movement.

shift in this country. And I think Pope Francis was smart to pick all those cardinals, shifting them a different way. And there's one cardinal that's Cardinal Dolan in New York, who's his favorite one, who's quite conservative. And I have to say, Nancy Pelosi gave me a walkthrough all the conservative cardinals in the country. She's obviously, she's not allowed to be, to get communion in San Francisco, but I think other priests give her communion in some fashion. But

There's a real struggle going on. So this should be a really interesting Pope. But more importantly, there's Pope jokes, which were really good. You know, whatever. If Laura Loomer and Steve Bannon don't like something, sign me up, I think. But you shared a Chicago Pope one, which looks like a new TV show coming to NBC. Very funny. The Wiener Circle, which I love in Chicago. It's a famous Chicago hot dog stand where they insult you. Puts a Latin translation, he has eaten our dogs on their sign. Someone posted on X.

Smart play for the Vatican to go with an American pope to avoid tariffs. That was cute. And Stephen Colbert put it, holy father, you had me at J.D. Vance's wrong. Did you have any other pope memes you liked or did you have a joke yourself? I feel like you might have a pope joke. Maybe you don't. Oh, Carrie, you know, the churches, they're just religious institutions. There just are some limits to even what I will say about the church and El Papa. And

You know, I mean, I will say what struck me as kind of unusual when the Pope said pets should not replace children in Italy. I guess he doesn't like priests practicing bestiality. Oh, I knew that was coming. Sorry, folks. Won't stop, can't stop. You know, Michael Che did a good one, you know, that Trump's Pope picture was juvenile. You'd think the Catholics would like it. Get it? The religions actually aren't that different. Jews don't recognize Christ. Anglicans don't recognize the Pope. And

Baptists don't recognize each other at the liquor store. Ah, here you go. Do you want me to keep going? One more, one more, one more Pope joke.

The staff says no, but I say yes because I've been chosen. Staff says no. We'll stop. One more. Well, no. The only Catholic in my Jewish fraternity was my roommate, Mike Vogt. And he wasn't circumcised. We used to get high and make him show us his penis and we'd make anteater jokes. That's not really a Pope joke. Oh, okay. Is that strange? That is. A bunch of guys. I'm going to move on now. We've gone from that.

Anyway, and chaos at Newark Airport continues. As of Monday, the airport has been hit with three outages in under two weeks. U.S. airlines are meeting with the FAA this week to discuss cutting Newark flights. Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy was on Meet the Press this week. And let's listen to what this dingbat has to say.

I'm concerned about the whole airspace, right? The equipment that we use, much of it we can't buy parts for new. We have to go on eBay and buy parts if one part goes down. You're dealing with really old equipment. We're dealing with copper wires, not fiber, not high-speed fiber. And so this is concerning. Is it safe? Yes, we have redundancies, multiple redundancies in place to keep you safe when you fly.

But we should also recognize we're seeing stress on an old network and it's time to fix it. - Bottom line, is it safe to fly in the United States right now? - Listen, we are the safest airspace for sure and traveling by air is way safer than any other mode of transportation, which is why I take it, my family takes it. But again, that doesn't mean you don't look over the horizon and say, hey, if there is a major outage, could that be a risk to life? Of course it could be, which is why we fix it.

Yes. So Doge, of course, they asked him about Doge and he sort of kind of squirreled around on the cuts that Elon was trying to make there. One of them was so weird that I was reading about this weekend that Doge made it so you couldn't charge anything more than a dollar to your credit card, your government credit card, because they can't buy paper and pens right now because of that stupidity.

So Newark, I don't fly out of Newark. I tend not to. I try not to. I go out of JFK or LaGuardia. But when I'm in New York, any thoughts about concerns about air travel and what do you have to say? Well, Newark is a great airport. And this doesn't, in my opinion, this doesn't reflect on them. What it reflects on is that, or look, it's pretty basic fucking logic. When Lloyd Austin was the Secretary of Defense, jets weren't falling off of aircraft carriers.

And when Pete Buttigieg was the Secretary of Transportation, we didn't have near misses and shutdowns at airports because air traffic controllers are so demoralized and there's not enough of them. And this guy figures out a way to do his interpretive dance and blame, I actually saw him blame Schumer for this. And all these tropes around, yeah, it's the safest form of transit. Do your fucking job. This is totally unacceptable. People

What do you want? People want prosperity. Money is the transfer of time and work. And when you're delaying people for hours and sometimes days at a time because of your incompetence and decision to bring in someone who knows absolutely nothing about government and start making reckless cuts that results in...

not only a reduction in safety, but a massive expansion in the amount of time people that's taken away from their families and their work and economic productivity. Again, it's another one of these slow burning, slow burn of our prosperity. And yeah, everything he's saying is right, but they're all, this is his, he's responsible for

What is he doing right now to solve the problem at Newark? I agree. It's like, when did this suddenly happen? Oh, now it's because now we're here and we figured it out. No, now you're here and you're an incompetent administrator of a very critical part of our infrastructure. Just this guy seems as dumb as a box of hammers. Again, this is another thing that I just don't think Americans, and unfortunately, they're about to learn the hard way how incredible

our FAA and our government employees and the regulations and the certification and the sea check. As someone who's loved aviation the whole life, has been molesting the earth for 30 years and has flown probably tens of millions of miles. And I'm fascinated with planes and aviation. People don't appreciate what they realized very early on is we're not going to make it like cars where there's an acceptable number of deaths, 10,000

what is it, 20,000 traffic deaths a year because it's worth it? They said, no, this is so uncomfortable to begin with. To put people in a cylindrical tube with recirculated air and then convince them it's safe to travel at eight-tenths the speed of sound across the surface of the atmosphere, quite frankly, it's just unsettling. It does not feel natural.

But if we can connect the world, if we can give people the opportunity to fly around the world safely, we're going to have the most unbelievable unlock in terms of

of human capital being willing to go to its greatest return. Okay, I did this for 10 years. I commuted to New York. I wanted to live in Florida because it was better for my kids, but I still needed to work in New York. So I commuted. Why? Because you can get on a plane and travel a thousand miles and then commute a thousand miles because it's that safe and it's that

And it's that inexpensive. These things are so overengineered. They are so safe. If we had anything resembling the fatality rates of automobiles, no one would get in a fucking plane. And also other countries. If you've ever flown in other countries. Because when planes go down, it's horrific. And it strikes a very difficult part of our society.

of our instinctual fear because we're land mammals. So the idea of dying in the air seems especially upsetting to us. And so they have totally over-engineered these things. I mean, I've owned planes. The amount of safety, it would be, imagine a car,

And every six weeks, someone had to show up, check the spark plugs, replace them. If your tires showed anywhere, they have to replace the tires. They test the thing over and over. They detonate the airbags to make sure they're working and then put them back to make sure this thing will not. Almost all airline disasters are pilot error.

And then they'd have very talented people coordinate all of this while it's sometimes there's 12,000 planes in the air at the same time. Yeah, the fact that it's messing up now is really the testament to the Trump administration and the demonization of our government workers, which has really gone far too far. There's one thing to be critical and want improvements in the money we're spending.

But anyway, we have to move on. But this guy seems like an imbecile. And the Trump administration is just presiding over like really low quality executives everywhere, which is not a surprise. All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, you'll never guess what kind of company Elizabeth Holmes' partner is starting.

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Scott, we're back. We're going to make quick work of this, I think. While Elizabeth Holmes is in prison for defrauding investors, her partner and father of her children is raising money for a company that, wait for it, claims to be the future of diagnostics. Billy Evans is distributing marketing materials, claiming the company, Haymanthus, I think that's what it's called, is a radically new approach to health testing and will test blood, saliva, and urine. The company is probably aiming to raise over $50 million. We'll start testing pets with a goal of developing a stamp-sized wearable product for humans that

Marketing materials reviewed by the New York Times say there is no regulatory oversight. Investor presentations probably did not mention Evan's relationship to Elizabeth Holmes. Will there be free trials at the Fyre Fest, too? I just, you know, I believe in pivoting, but this seems a little bit too much on the nose. I don't know. What do you think? Well, I got a lot of shit for it, but I thought Elizabeth Holmes' sentence was overdone. Agree. I have to. I agree with you with this. I agree with you, given what other people have done.

I found it unsettling. Only 2 percent of founders of unicorns are female. I didn't think there was a lot different between what Adam Neumann did and Elizabeth Holmes did. They both lied to their board, they both exaggerated.

Yeah. Look, a difference out of circumstances, I think things could have been much different. And people say, well, it's health. It's different. She lied about its capabilities. She basically lied to the board and exaggerated the results, which quite frankly, unicorn executives everywhere do. And I agree she was guilty. I agree she should have gone to jail.

And I said publicly, I thought 10 years was overdone for a first offense for a nonviolent criminal. And her husband reached out to me and asked me if I would get involved in a campaign to get her out of jail. And I said, look, this isn't something I'm emotionally invested in. I can't help. I think he's doing him and her a disservice doing this because all he's doing is bringing attention to the fact that she did commit a crime and commit fraud.

Because that'll be the story here. The story won't be the startup, whether it's a good idea or a bad idea. The story will be reminding everybody that his wife who's in prison and should be in prison committed fraud. So I just don't think he's being smart about this. I think this is strategically. You know what I always wonder? Young people,

It's so hard to read the label from inside of the bottle. Young people, everybody needs to establish a kitchen cabinet of people and people are willing to do it because people love to give advice because it makes them feel important. Or you can just call them and say, "Hey, I'm thinking about starting a diagnostics company." Somebody would say, "Okay, you realize you're going to bring attention to your wife who is in prison for fraud for lying about the financial results and the capabilities of a similar company. Have you thought this through?"

Anyone he reached out to who cared about him and was honest would have given him that advice. So I hear this. I just think about this across all of these people when they make these decisions. It's like, don't they have friends? I have a friend who's literally a master of the universe now.

And he was talking to me about his baby mamas and what's going on within his personal life and relationships. And I said to him, I said, don't you have friends? Like, who do you talk to about this stuff? Did you drop some real? Well, I said to him, I said, don't you have friends? Because this guy is literally one of the most impressive people I've ever met. On any issue, he can give you the most reasoned, thoughtful. And then you hear about his personal life and it's like,

So you just took every piece of bad judgment across your entire life and stuffed it into your relationship with women. And I mean, just a couple of phone calls to people saying, hey, I'm checking in. I could use your advice. What do you think?

What do you think about this? Yeah. Just for clarification, she's not Evans' wife, Scott. She's his partner and mother of the kids. They're together. Oh, excuse me. But they aren't actually married. That's all right. It's married-ish. Married adjacent. Married-ish. Married-ish, like us, you and I. Anyway, Billy.

Come on, Billy. Anyway, bad idea. And finally, OpenAI and Microsoft are negotiating the terms of their partnership to allow OpenAI to launch a future IPO, according to the Financial Times. Microsoft has invested $13 billion in the company to date and is reportedly willing to give up some of its equity in exchange for access to new technology developed beyond the 2030 cutoff.

there's going to be an IPO here. This is interesting. It's the one with the most revenues, the most users, et cetera, et cetera. And I think they've got to run ahead of everybody else. Correct? I mean, this is a race. This is like, and they're in the lead at this moment. It doesn't mean they're going to stay in the lead. A lot of the open systems

Like Lama, a lot of people feel that that's going to really dominate, that meta will. So any thoughts on this? Because you're Mr. Equity. This will happen. It makes sense. So what's happened is there's been a total, the number of companies that are publicly traded has been cut in half in the last couple of decades because there's been mergers and acquisitions. And the private markets have

have captured a lot of the innovation and attributes that used to be sequestered to the public market. Specifically, you can now raise billions or even tens of billions in the private market. You can get liquidity for your employees because there's an active secondary market. And also you can avoid all regulation and scrutiny and make kind of harder, tougher, deeper decisions without the scrutiny of public earnings calls.

What you have with OpenAI and the reason they will go public is that OpenAI is taking, and Sam is brilliant, he'll go down as I think one of the iconic business leaders of this generation. He realizes that this is an Amazon/Netflix play and that is,

It is very difficult for any AI to establish technological differentiation because AI just crawls it. When you ask DeepSeek what LLM it was, for the first 10 days it said, "I'm open AI." So these things reverse engineer each other. So this is a capital war around getting the best talent, striking the best deals, making acquisitions and tuck-ins. And now he's in an altitude where he doesn't need to spend billions, he needs to spend tens of billions.

And the way he'll be able to do that is by going public and getting, you know, a $400, $500 billion valuation. So it does make sense for him. It's got huge sex appeal, global appeal. It's the fastest, I think, $0 to $10 billion run rate. What is it? I think it's a $5 billion run rate right now. Five or six, something like that, yeah. But it'll get... It's so useful. It'll have a $10 billion run rate pretty soon. It'll go...

He needs to basically, this is a capital war. He's going to outspend everybody. And there are few companies that can't find enough capital in the private markets. This is probably one of them. He's going to go out and raise a shit ton of money. They have hired a very adept executive, the former CEO, former, I think, Meta person or Googler, who is the former CEO of Instacart, who's going to really run. It's the Sheryl Sandberg moment here in that regard. Yeah.

to run the companies, a lot of the business parts of it. So they really need to run fast and run hard. And they, I think that most people feel meta is their biggest, the open source meta is their biggest competitor. And Mark has, is,

has no guardrails of anything. So we'll see what happens. Anyway, it has to happen. It has to happen. It's going to head that way. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for wins and fails. Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile with a message for everyone paying big wireless way too much. Please, for the love of everything good in this world, stop. With Mint, you can get premium wireless for just $15 a month. Of course, if you enjoy overpaying, no judgments, but that's weird.

Okay, one judgment. Anyway, give it a try at mintmobile.com slash switch. Upfront payment of $45 for three-month plan equivalent to $15 per month required. Intro rate first three months only. Then full price plan options available. Taxes and fees extra. See full terms at mintmobile.com. Okay, Scott, we're going to do some wins and fails. I think I shall go first. All right. I recommend, there's so many different, there's so many great,

You know, TV's gotten great. There's a lot of great journalism going on. I have to say, there's several stories I've read recently that are just so good, interesting and fascinating to read. The one that really struck me this week was Nick Kristof's latest column in the New York Times. It's a long one. It sheds light on internal emails from Pornhub that were made public because of a filing error. Going back to 2020, they show employees laughing about what's on their site and reveal how the company handles child pornography. The

the inability of sites like Pornhub to get rid of CSAM, SAM it's called, child pornography, is unbelievable.

It's horrifying. And the fact that they're so casual about it and you see these emails laughing about it is with the pain it happens to these people is just astonishing. These people should be sued back into the dark ages for what they're doing here. It's gross and it's bad for young men, as you write about a lot. And I agree with you.

But the fact that they think it's funny about child pornography and the extent of it is so enormous. And we can talk about the audience for this, and that's another issue. But the fact that these companies facilitate it makes them—I mean, there's a sickness at the deep heart of humanity on this issue. But this company deserves to be sued out of existence from just this. And again—

I don't like porn. I think it's bad for us. I think the digitization of it has made it even worse. But the fact that they can't control this and they think it's a joke is repulsive. So that's a huge fail. For a win, there's a lot to choose from, including New York will now require schools statewide to ban smartphones during school hours. That's great. But

I was thrilled to see Cecily Strong return to SNL this weekend to reprise her role as Judge Jeanine Pirro after Trump named Pirro the interim U.S. attorney in D.C. That's another incompetent hire, by the way. But she did the whole—Colin Jost also came back. He came back as Pete Hegseth. And she spits—

drinks at him and it was so funny. And I love Cecily Strong and was just delighted to see her there and I'm glad they got her to do that. She does the best Jeanine Pirro, but from a fail point of view, Jeanine Pirro is an incompetent person to do this job. Never...

just incompetent, beyond incompetent for this job. Although the guy she replaced was venal and evil kind of type personality where he was defending J6 people and had all these crazy schemes and everything. So I guess she's better than him, but that doesn't mean she's any good. And it's such an irresponsible appointment. Your thoughts? Here, go for it. Okay, so my...

My fail I referenced before, this Qatar luxury suite, basically the privatization of the White House at 40,000 feet, that's not a kickback, it's government capture. And meanwhile, Qatar has funneled over 1.8 billion to Hamas since 2012. They host Hamas's political leadership in luxury Doha compounds and serves as the terrorist group's primary diplomatic shield.

The president positions himself as Israel's greatest offender. At the same time, he's accepting lavish gifts from a country that bankrolls the organization that murdered 1,200 Jews. It's like you're fucking twins and then trying to convince each of them that you're monogamous with them. The cognitive dissonance here is stifling. Qatar's influence doesn't stop at the White House. They've poured, get this,

$4.7 billion into American universities since 2001. That's more than any other foreign government. You know, this is such a weird relationship. While they host our largest military base in the region, they also maintain cozy relationships with Iran and Hamas. And meanwhile, America's leverage in the Middle East deteriorates as our president becomes essentially an employee of Qatar Airways.

with nuclear codes and our elite universities become intellectual laundromats for authoritarian anti-Semitic propaganda. This is not just corruption, it's the purchase of American influence from the Oval Office to our universities training our next generation of presidents. When you think about what's the point here? Our government, the founding fathers wanted checks and balances.

not deposits and withdrawals from foreign powers. So this is a yet again, and I'm at a point where it's pretty easy. And I think the other side loves it how outraged we are. I think a Democrat needs to sponsor and make very public legislation that says the government of Qatar is engaging in grift or corruption or foreign bribery. You're not supposed to accept gifts over $400.

as a public official and say that again, in three years and nine months, we're going to reevaluate our relationship with you based on, we're going to do X, Y, and Z in exactly three years and nine months. We need to stop. There's no stopping the Trump administration. He's weaponized the DOJ. He has neutered

He has neutered basically all checks and balances here. My attitude is go after the foreign governments and some of the lower level people who are enabling this. I told you Qatar tried to buy our all things D, like they wanted to give us $10 million each, all this stuff.

I was sort of astounded. This was more than 15 years ago where they wanted us to bring our conference there to Qatar. And Walt was like, you know I'm a Jew and you back come us. He was like, no. It was just an astonishing offer. And it was so massive. We were sort of shocked. Largely, they wanted the technology. They're sort of trying to buy an influencer to look good, right? We were sort of...

clean washing them in some way by going there. And there's a lot of, by the way, there's a lot of events that go there now and do that. But I remember Walt was like, no fucking way. Like, and it was an enormous sum of money, you know, at the time, $10 million sticks in my head. But,

But we were sort of shocked by it and astonished and, of course, said no immediately. But I agree with you. This is just beyond. I mean, the Nazis did this during right ahead of World War II, like tried to like buy influence through their various agents. The same thing, you know, very much trying to influence U.S. policy. But this is I don't even know what this is. This is even what's the goal here? Right.

Precisely. That's the thing is what's their actual goal? I'm still focused on the fact you don't know what religion I am. I don't. What are you? You're Jewish. You're Jewish.

You're partially Jewish. You're half Jewish. No, I'm whole Jewish. My mother was Jewish. And I'm an atheist, but I'm a raging Zionist. I just think it's hilarious when people in the comments section call me a Zionist as if it's an insult. I'm a proud Zionist. So wait, your mother is Jewish. What is your father? Yeah, my father's Presbyterian. My mother was a Jew, a maiden named Levine. So I identify with Judaism. I just don't believe I have an invisible friend. Oh, okay.

It was a nice picture of her you put up for Mother's Day, by the way. Wasn't that nice? That was sweet. I got so many comments back. That was lovely, I have to say. I was touched by that. Well, I meant to ask you, happy Mother's Day. What did you do? Oh, it was Amanda's birthday also. We did a picnic. I took my mom out with the kids for breakfast. Does anyone get more flowers? How does this whole lesbian thing happen? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, my kids call me. I have a lot of calls. Who gets breakfast in bed first?

How does this all work? It's like, there's so many, I have so many questions about lesbian relationships when there's a really difficult parking spot, who parks the car? I do. Okay. Yeah. Okay.

- Yeah. - Okay, got it. - I'm a really good Parker, I would say. - All right. What'd you do for Mother's Day? That's what I was asking. - Thank you, happy Mother's Day to you too, and to your wife, not to you at all in any way. Anyway. - What did you do for Mother's Day? - I used to have breakfast with my mom. I took the kids and Amanda rested at home. And then we had a lovely picnic for her birthday and I bought her a lemon tree.

a Meyer lemon tree as a gift for Mother's Day and her birthday. Because she loves the Meyer lemons in my house in San Francisco, so we're going to try to grow one here in our house. This is so clearly a new relationship. Yeah.

This is so clearly the thoughtful, well-planned out gift. I got her a plate that had lemons on it and then lemon things and then a beautiful lemon colored pitcher that's beautiful. It was a lemon situation as in when life gives you. That's a new relationship. This is where you're headed. My wife sends me a picture of a watch she wants and I'm like, here's the Centurion card number. That's where we are.

No, I got her a lemon tree to grow for our life. I love lemons. I love lemons anyway. Oh, God. When life gives you lemons, eat mushroom chocolates. That's my saying. All right. What's your win? My win is I am really excited. I make a lot of jokes about the church, but I am excited about an American pope. I think that...

The Pope is a standard bearer for morality. I think this guy is up to the task, unlike our elected leaders. He seems to actually understand technology in a strange way. I'm happy for Villanova. I can't tell you how many messages- Oh, I hate the Villanova people from being a Georgetown person. I can't like them.

I have a guy I've become friendly with who's pretty involved in Villanova, and he can't stop sending out messages, like memes showing, all the universities in America, how many popes? Zero. Villanova, one. He's just so- They're so aggressive, the Villanovans. He's so excited. Yeah. Yeah, we played them in basketball. We were supposed to hate Villanova, as I recall. But I think America needs-

Kind of a, I don't know, a rejuvenation, an epipen, you know, a narcon of values. And I think we're more inclined to take an American pope or listen to an American pope. Do you want to hear the weirdest thing? I thought about going back to church after I had him crucified.

I thought about it. I'm still not going probably because so much corruption and the man thing. As a raging atheist, I also believe we need more religious institutions. I've come to believe when I was younger, I was one of those snobs who considered myself a scientist and really was disparaging about religion. As I've gotten older, other than the extreme batshit crazy part of every religion, I generally find that 90 plus percent of it gives people a lot of comfort. That's what I'm thinking.

I think young people also need more place to be in the agency of something bigger than themselves and meet potential friends, mentors, and mates. I actually have come full circle. I think religious institutions are really important in America. Interesting. I'm an agnostic, not an atheist. I don't know. That just means you're a closeted atheist. No, I'm not. I'm not either. That's like when dudes say they're bi. Ooh, I'm going to hear it on that one. I'm going to hear it on that one. Lately, I've been walking by a lot of churches.

I've been walking by and I want to go in and I don't know what that is. I honestly, apparently it's religion. You just want to get away from your kids. It's called having little kids at home. Peace. I almost went to church when we had little kids. I was like, I was thinking I want some peace. I know it sounds crazy, but I was, I don't know. Let's go to church tonight. That's you and I. Okay.

No, I find peace at San Vicente Bungalows talking to some 25-year-old ad executive whose parents are putting her through New York. All right. We want to hear from you. Send us your questions about business tech or whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. Elsewhere in the Karen Scott universe, this week on On with Kara Swisher, I spoke with CNN's chief international anchor, Christiane Amanpour. Let's listen to a clip.

I've covered almost all America's major wars since 1990. And I probably got a lot more war experience than JD Vance and Pete Hexeth, despite their military deployments. And I'm much older than them. The way I see it is we Europeans are not pathetic freeloaders. We have come to America's aid time and time again in the last 35 years.

So it was a good interview. She's terrific. Well, I'm curious, though. I asked this to learn not to make a statement. How has Europe come to America's aid? Oh, it goes on. She talks about the various, you know, when we moved into Afghanistan and about different things that they have done to be supportive of us. She wasn't saying America hasn't helped Europe. That was not what she was also saying. She thinks that Vance and putting out the idea that they don't do anything is ridiculous. Like,

That it's that she was saying that the alliance is so important and that the narrative they're putting about freeloaders was not true. And I think and she made a larger case, but she was in no way saying America's aid to to Europe wasn't critical.

too. So just she was being more complex. I've been on Christiana's show. I think she's... I also like her because she's one of those journalists that tries to set you up for success and she lets you speak. I find so many journalists are there to... Substantive is the word you're looking for. Well, actually it's not, but thank you, lemon tree weirdo. Catholic lemon tree. What I was thinking was actually generous and that is

I find there's some times when I go on a show, they're there to try and corner you or get you to say something provocative because they want a TikTok moment. And I'm guilty of this too. A lot of times I ask questions trying to show how smart I am as opposed to get to an answer. And then there's journalists who will let you just speak and want you to get

your views out there, whether they personally agree with them or not. They're generous. They want to set you up for success. And I find that she's one of those people. She is. I really, really adore her. We've become good friends and I really like her. It was a great talk. Anyway, please listen to it. Okay, that's the show. Thanks for listening to Pivot and be sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'll be back on Friday. Scott, read us out. Today's show is produced by Larry Naiman, Zoe Marcus, Taylor Griffin, and Kevin Oliver.

Ernie and her Todd Entrenier this episode. Thanks also to Drew Burrows, Mia Severo, and Dan Chalon. Nishat Kharouaz, Vox Media's executive producer of Vodcast. Make sure to follow Pivot on your favorite podcast platform. Thank you for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. You can subscribe to the magazine at nymag.com slash pod. We'll be back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Cara, we have a new pope.

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