1/21/25: Dems Humiliated On TikTok, Trump Pumps Meme Coin, Elon Salute Gesture Debate
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Hey guys, Sagar and Crystal here. Independent media just played a truly massive role in this election, and we are so excited about what that means for the future of this show. This is the only place where you can find honest perspectives from the left and the right that simply does not exist anywhere else. So if that is something that's important to you, please go to breakingpoints.com, become a member today, and you'll get access

to our full shows, unedited, ad-free, and all put together for you every morning in your inbox. - We need your help to build the future of independent news media, and we hope to see you at breakingpoints.com. Let's talk about TikTok. - Oh, this is- - It's big.

I mean, this is just too perfect. I mean, I'll say this. I was prepared for this. I knew it was going to happen. I've made my peace with it now long ago. Let's go ahead and put this up there on the screen. This is from Donald Trump two days ago before he took office. He says, I am asking companies not to let TikTok stay dark. I will issue an executive order

on Monday, which has been issued by the way, to extend the period of time, it's approximately 90 days, before the law's prohibition takes effect so that we can make a deal to protect our national security. This order will also confirm there will be no liability for any company that helped keep TikTok from going dark before any order.

Americans deserve to see our exciting inauguration on Monday, as well as other events and conversations. I would like the United States to have a 50% ownership position in a joint venture. By doing this, we save TikTok, keep it in good hands, and allow it to stay up. Without U.S. approval, there is no TikTok.

With our approval, it is worth hundreds of billions, maybe trillions. Therefore, my initial thought is a joint venture between the current owners and or new owners, whereby a U.S. gets a 50% ownership in a joint venture set up between the U.S. and whoever purchased we choose. So there's a lot going on. Is this like TikTok's like the new NPR?

Is that like? Yeah, I mean. I mean, I don't think, nobody really knows what is meant by this, including probably Donald Trump. But, you know, if we're going to have state ownership of media, there are models that can be successful that provide editorial independence. You know, we could buy up TikTok. We could buy Twitter. We could buy Facebook. You know, have them run by an independent consortium, have independent funding sources. Take the profit motive out of it, Sagar. This is the type of idea I can get on board with. Yeah, yeah.

Something tells me that's not what he has in mind. What could possibly go wrong with all of that? Here's the thing about the whole TikTok thing. Basically, Trump was pro-banning TikTok. It's like Bitcoin. Pro-banning Bitcoin, pro-banning TikTok.

Leaves for four years. Remember what I said about being gone for four years? Well, what happened in four years? TikTok became massively more popular. I think it doubled its users. An ex-engineer on the platform actually revealed 170 million people log on to the app, I think, once a month. And I think...

90 or 100 million are spending an average of 53 minutes per day on TikTok. Is this just in America? No, in the United States. Yeah, in the U.S. That's one third of the U.S. population and probably...

God, I'm terrible at math. Maybe like 40, 50% of the US adult population just for context. So you can see here what it means and how much time people are spending on TikTok. It's not just the kids anymore. No, it's everybody. I mean, I was on the Metro today and some guy's scrolling TikTok right next to me. And I was like, oh, how'd you download that? You know, I was asking him. I was like, how does it work now? I was like, oh, he's like, oh yeah, dude, it went off. He had no idea what it was. He was like, oh yeah, it went off. And then it came back. I was just so excited. It was interesting. So TikTok.

The TLDR of all of it is it's a mess because the law that banned TikTok was supposed to go into effect on January 19. That law would impose ruinous fines on Apple, Oracle, and all other U.S. providers of any services to TikTok. Now, the thing is, is that for the Apple and all these other companies to believe this executive order is lawful, which I don't believe it's lawful at all.

is to believe that they will not go through with the imposition of the fine. Now, what Tom Cotton, who is the, I think, chairman or one of the high-ranking members on the Intelligence Committee in the Senate has said is like, no, no executive order delaying action is legal and will face scrutiny and could impose back fines

on these companies. That's part of why I'm still not 100% sure the way that it's working with the App Store, with Oracle and all these other, I know Oracle has resumed service in terms of its ability to scroll. I think it was working if you have the app pre-installed, but I'm still not sure if it's on the App Store right now. Same with the Play Store, for Google, for these people. These companies are in complete legal limbo. And the real thing that actually kind of ties Trump's hands is

is you can do as many executive orders as you want, but this is an act of Congress at the end of the day. And so the ability for trade organizations, even Facebook, honestly, anybody, to be able to file suit against them and actually have the court system impose this block is very possible. I think what's clear to me is that Trump

only cares about being popular. And he knows TikTok is massively popular and that he himself is massively popular on TikTok. And so because of all of that, his sole goal is to try and save the program or save the company, but also use some geopolitics in terms of his negotiations with China to get it done. So that's something that I've seen happen

with him in the past. He's reportedly spoke with President Xi or Premier Xi in China. They talked about TikTok. I think he's going to be going to China probably in the next couple of months. That's apparently one of the first trips that he wants to make as president to discuss the issue so he could pursue a forced sale. And it could be like some sort of negotiation. It is just objectively crazy, though, for the U.S. government to own 50% of TikTok.

It's like, and by the way, I mean, you know, would it be a victory for the pro-Palestinian side? We're like, well, we saved TikTok, but now the government has control. Now the government, oh, great. Yeah, what do you guys, listen, Gaza people, what do you think is going to happen if the government owns 50% of that? You know, good luck with your BLM and trans and Gaza stuff under the Donald Trump administration, or if J.D. Vance wins the election.

the presidency next time. What's the first thing I would turn off if you didn't want something in your culture to be happening? That's the immediate thing. So I don't think it'd be the best solution, but you guys do what you want if you're spending 53 minutes a day on a map. Well, I mean, we already have the model of that, which is Elon Musk's ownership of Twitter. It would look very much like that, you know, where certain things are very much prioritized and certain things are very much deranked and actively censored, including, you know, a lot of pro-Palestinian phrases and content, et cetera. So, yeah, I mean, the whole thing is just

What do you even say about it? Like from looking at it from the Democratic perspective, like these people are total and complete, pathetic, embarrassing morons. Morons. Like you couldn't predict that this would be wildly unpopular. So Trump is the person who really, you know, in his first term, towards the end of his first term, he starts pushing this. He issued some other executive order that gets struck down. It doesn't happen. Blah, blah, blah. But he starts pushing it.

it. Democrats are such idiots that, you know, the polling starts to move on this where there was some nominal majority theoretically in favor of a TikTok ban. And oh, I guess we better get on board with this. I guess we better pass a law. So they pass it. Joe Biden signs it into law.

And then here, you know, in the waning days of the Biden administration, they're freaking out like, oh, my God, I can't believe we did this. Like, we don't want this to happen. No, this shouldn't go away. Blah, blah, blah. It's like, what is wrong with you? You couldn't predict the way this was going to play out. And also, by the way, do you have a single principle that you actually care about and are willing to stand by? Because polls can move around, you know.

you could actually just have a value. You could actually just have a principle that you care about and whether it's in favor of TikTok or against TikTok, you could just stand by that thing and argue for that thing. But no, no, they're just like blown around in the winds of wherever public opinion happens to be.

basically led around by the nose by Republicans. I mean, Trump leads them into this thing and then Trump leads them out of this thing. And they have no ability to set the messaging or the agenda themselves. It's so utterly pathetic that it is completely insane. - That's, you know, I also think it's a crisis of competence. So the law passed and the Biden administration basically didn't do anything about brokering for sale. I mean, if you were being real, the way to save it and for the Democrats to get credit, they could have gotten credit from the national security hawks and from the voters for saving TikTok.

You passed the bill. Biden should get to China, right? He didn't have anything else going on, right? He literally wasn't even running for president. He should have flown to China, sat down with Xi Jinping, brokered some sort of deal or sale or whatever. There are multiple willing buyers here. We have a shit ton of leverage on China if we want it to be. And then they could have saved it and they could have had it. And instead, they kind of just

bumbled their way in to a de facto ban. I mean, it was hilarious too, where, I mean, how long have we been covering this story? I actually, I know, in terms of my monologues, from 2019. But in recent months, we're like, hey, the deadline's on January 19th. Looks like nothing's gonna happen. And then you would see Chuck Schumer the day before be like, well, we're gonna try and delay it. It's like, dude, you're a lawmaker.

Like, how did you not even know this was happening? We're doing nothing behind the scenes. So I think there's a major competence of governance in terms of actually trying to execute the ban or even the forced sale. And also, yeah, it's like this weird, like, what are you guys, what are you guys trying to do here? And that's kind of what I'm, I'm still confused about. Why did you guys all vote for this in the past? I don't even understand. And that's the thing. And it's,

such a core problem for the Democratic Party, which is that under neoliberalism, they outsourced any core values to basically market logic, right? And a corollary of that is this idea of popularism, which is just like, let's take a poll and see what thing polls the best, and that's what we'll run on, and that's where we'll be. And again, polls...

change people's opinions, guess what? Republicans really successfully changed their opinions on immigration as one example because they were willing to have something that they cared about and make the case for it over and over again. And Sagar, I know the reality also helped them make that case, but the point still stands.

They were willing to have a fight even on things that were unpopular and to move public opinion. If you have no values, nothing you're willing to fight for, everything is finger in the wind, everything is market logic and testing it, then like it's just – this is the sort of pathetic situation.

situation that you end up in. And you never are going to be the primary mover. You're always just going to be chasing your tail or chasing Trump's tail or reacting to what the Republicans are throwing at you and the way that they're shaping the culture. And so that's why this story is so important. I mean, it's important on its own right because TikTok is such a massive platform and it is an influential part of the culture, etc.,

But it's also important because it is indicative of one of the core failures of the Democratic Party and failures of like really meeting the moment. And so, you know, for example, Trump's we'll see how long Trump's like newfound relative popularity lasts, where he was flirting with a majority approval rating, something he has never had before. And I genuinely think a lot of that is just this sense of like he makes decisions and he takes actions.

And even if, you know, those are things that some of them I agree with or some of them I don't agree with, I'm talking about from like an average voter perspective, like at least he's taking action. He's making decisions and he's doing things.

The Democrats never can make a decision. They never know what they stand for. They never are willing to just say like, yeah, I'm going to make that thing happen. That thing is important. I'm going to make it happen right now. There's always got to be 12 committees or a parliamentarian that says I can't do it or whatever. And so, you know, I feel like all of that is sort of tangled up in this TikTok story and just illustrates they're

utter patheticness and why they are now in minority and just lost the popular vote to freaking Donald J. Trump. - Yeah, I think that's all well said. I see it a lot, not only with the TikTok issue, but in terms of how they're dealing with Trump,

I really think that they were just so unprepared for the collapse and lack of the resistance, and they just don't know what to do now for what it looks like. And all of the sensible things that they would want to do would be so detrimental to the Democratic Party establishment that they just don't know how to deal with it. That's right. I mean, the good billionaire thing is the best example where they're like, okay, so what are we doing here? Yeah, I don't know. Just for people who don't get that reference, Ken Mark.

who is the leading candidate for the DNC, new DNC chair, got asked about taking money from billionaires. He's like, well, of course we're gonna take money from good billionaires, and just not the bad billionaires. And of course, his definition of good billionaire is someone who gives money in the Democratic Party. And it's like, you know,

you know, maybe just having our country run by billionaires is bad, whether you think they're good or bad billionaires. Maybe that's just a bad thing that you should consistently stand against, but that would require having a principle and actually caring about things. And it would, like, to your point, would be incredibly detrimental to the existing democratic leadership whose primary skill is sucking up to rich people and raising a lot of money from them. What I have noticed most about many people

who are new Republicans in the last four years, specifically new vibey-based Trump supporters, is if you ask them about hypocrisy, whatever, they're going to be like, look, I don't even disagree with you. But, and what are they going to list?

I don't like George Soros or I don't like, you know, Mark Zuckerberg before his previous turn. They're like, I've lived under oligarchic, democratic, liberal, cultural, elite rule now, and I hate it. And so I'm just going to go with the other option. I don't even particularly like the other option that much. In a lot of ways, the Flight 93 election was 20-25.

It was not 2016. Maybe we should debate that at some point with a lot of other people. But in terms of the way people felt, they genuinely felt as if there was no escape from the crisis of competence, of chaos, insanity, pressure, culture, whatever. All came together in terms of Trump,

because of who he is at a showman level, his ability to convey the message of, I'm just going to do what I want. I'm willing to hit the red button and I'm going to vote for Trump. And I've been grappling with like, how did this happen over the last four years? And it's interesting because I think what it comes back to is an indictment of liberal cultural elite rule. And so much of it, when you're faced with, because we're about to talk about meme coins, that's why it's a good

transition is really, is really just comes down to, they're like, okay, but Bill Gates, you know, blah, blah, blah. And there's just not enough people who have been involved with the highest levels of democratic politics to call that out or establish any credibility on issue that they're like, screw you, eat shit. I'm not going to listen to somebody, you know, who took money from George or

posing with Alex Soros and posing with Mark Zuckerberg and all these other people, you know, four years ago, I don't want to hear it from you, right? And so then the issue becomes a non, and that's exactly how bipartisan, what is it, the bigotry of low expectations? That's what's effectively now happening to American politics is that people have so little faith that the other side is going to do anything, even remotely principled, that they say, screw it.

I'm just going to pick the person who I think will get a little bit of what I want done. And I totally under, I did that. I don't like this position. But a rational actor in a bad model. Now, how you fix that, I have no idea. Okay? You're talking to the wrong guy. But I do think that that feeling is so important for especially a lot of this new bro sphere in others is they just feel so beaten down by,

by a lot of the democratic institutions and others that they just feel like as if they have no choice but to have a total escape. And that's a very hard problem to solve. You know, my view is effectively that after the Iraq war and the financial collapse, like that sort of like twin blow, the neoliberal order was basically done. Now, this is not the way that any normal person would articulate it, but...

It's like the system as it exists. Like this is bankrupt. This has failed. This is not delivering for me in any sort of a meaningful way. We got to do something different. And so you have these twin rival movements that arise. You've got the Bernie movement and you've got the Trump movement. And Democrats really had kind of a choice. They could have either –

focus their primary efforts on defeating Trumpism and making that the priority and using models from history of how we defeated fascism in the past and right-wing reactionary movements in the past, which was through the New Deal coalition, etc., or

Democratic elites could primarily train their fire on that Bernie Sanders grassroots movement so that they could maintain their grip on power within the Democratic Party. And that was goal number one. I'm not going to say they didn't want to defeat Trump. Of course they did. But that was goal number one. There were even there were New York Times articles about how they were they were willing to risk, quote unquote, party damage to defeat Bernie Sanders movement. And with that as their primary goal, they were wildly successful.

wildly successful. That's what the, and Ryan was tweeting about this this morning, that was what the identity politics invention from Hillary Clinton, that's what that was all about. That was about saying like, you all aren't even really progressive because you're not talking about intersectionalism and breaking up the big banks isn't going to end racism, blah, blah, blah. Very effective.

And also really annoying to the population and created a massive backlash to the Democratic Party. And number two, Russiagate was also part of making sure that after Hillary Clinton was defeated, the most logical takeaway for people to have come to at that point was this –

lady who was like the queen of the neoliberals. This way of doing politics, this doesn't work to defeat Trump. This isn't the thing. Like we need to do something different. But instead of having that takeaway, they have a takeaway of Russia and collusion and the P-tape and Comey and whatever. Total distraction tactics.

from their manifest failures at that time. And again, it worked. It worked for what their primary goal was. It works like a charm. And so, you know, to me, the real, you know, from my perspective, off ramp from this moment where Trumpism is ascendant, dominant, no brakes on the car, maximalist approach to governance, which we're already seeing with, you know, pardoning all the J6 people and launching his own shit coins and just like blatant,

brazen theft of tens of billions of dollars from his own supporters. That was back really in 2016 was where the road diverged. And then there was another bite at the apple in 2020 with Bernieism again. But, um, you know, that kind of, to me was when the, the course was ultimately set. So, you know, um, and the, the pieces you say are not, um, you know, that's, that's,

another way of looking at that story, right? I don't think that those two things are like at odds with each other, but my own view of our recent history and how we ended up with this really 2016 is kind of the pivot point where Democrats decide that rather than embracing their own left-wing response to Trumpism, they're gonna try to hold on to this bankrupt, discredited ideology that is being rejected, not just here, but rejected around the world.

not only that, but actively embracing, pushing the culture and really making that the cornerstone of a lot of your argument against the right and basically making- And against the left. I mean, look, I'm personally enjoying it, right? Like I've hated this shit from the beginning. It's literally the only reason that, that's what turned me to right-wing politics was a rejection of what I thought was like cultural, liberal overreach. And so to see so much of the population completely blackpilled

on any credibility of the media, on a lot of cultural left-wing shibboleths and things that we weren't even allowed to say over the last eight years. Or you could say it, but you're going to have problems and all that. I'm really, really enjoying that. I'm curious, too, to see how much of that is all Trump needs to do.

in some cases, is not even do anything. As long as the economy is fine, and as long as a lot of this bullshit is not in our culture, I think a lot of people might think that he's very successful. I just know so many people who are so disaffected and so repulsed by these like commanding heights of culture and other, that just the victory of Trump

himself was enough. I've been going back and doing some more reading about the Reagan era. Very similar, actually. If you go back and you look at one of the reasons why Ronald Reagan was popular, part of the reason why the 80s was looked as like a way to save yourself from the horrible consternation of the 1970s

And all of that was a very similar period of like inflation, chaos of foreign policy issues, but also just like crazy shit going on in terms of like movements on the street from the new left and the fall of the Vietnam activism. And I mean, even on the right, we don't talk about and look at.

Some of the big like right wing, the Goldwaterism and stuff like that, that Reagan was able to resurrect the John Birch Society. I mean, these were huge, huge debates in the country at the time. Reagan was able to use this like showman aspect of command in power where, look, he's an actor, right? Yeah, he was a governor, but he had some beliefs. But at the end of the day, he didn't do a lot.

But by doing that, just by kind of existing and being this showman, this cheerleader of the United States against Soviet communism, he really was able to achieve like a massive approval rating and real vibe shift in the country. I have huge criticisms of the Reagan presidency. But I like to study. I'm like, why are people popular in their time? And I think –

think Trump will be a huge beneficiary of a similar movement. Maybe. I don't know. I already see signs of like, you know, tremendous over, like pardoning the J6 people. That's not popular. No, I don't. Like it's really unpopular. I don't think people will care. The meme coin shit, really unpopular. So I think, I mean, it's possible, but I think you're likely to see a

A backlash against him. I mean, I think there's also going to be a backlash against the, you know, more like aggressive and like visibly cruel immigration crackdown. I think it's also, I don't think there's any guarantees about where the economy is going to be either. I think there's, you know, very possible that we have like an AI or crypto bubble that completely bursts. So, yeah.

A lot of question marks about how this is all going to go for him. I mean, look, again, possible. But I think it's more likely that you're going to get some level of backlash to – because they are reading a mandate that is much broader than –

than what voters actually handed them. And that leads to a lot of political... It only depends on which... I don't disagree. I made that point yesterday, right? In terms of overreach and what all of that stuff looked like. But I'll tell you why I disagree on the Jan 6th stuff. This is a settled question. And in terms of what I mean by that is that the January 6th...

Americans heard more about January 6th and Donald Trump for a four-year straight period than any other issue about Donald Trump. He still won the popular vote, and he won his own party. The idea that there would be some backlash to Donald Trump doing what he basically said he was going to do, at least, you know, maybe it's a little bit more than what people expected. I mean, he didn't say he was going to pardon people. He didn't like beating up police officers. He didn't really say anything. That's what a lot of people forget. J.D. Mayer said something.

Right. Republicans may have said something. That was not, I think, clear to people. But listen, and people vote on a range of issues. So the fact that Trump still gets elected by a point and a half doesn't mean that they were like, actually, January 6th was fine. Okay, but at this point, Trump doesn't need to run for re-election. No, I know. He's going to do it on day one and people will forget about it in one week. One of the reasons why... But these things build, right? What I'm saying is it's a sign of the overreach.

It's a sign of a maximalist approach to governance that vastly overreads the mandate that he actually received from voters. So, you know, I think these things build on each other, right? I think part of Trump's

Why he was able to succeed this time is that there was sort of rose-colored glasses because he had been out of power for four years, and people didn't really remember how chaotic it was and all of the worst things that they didn't like about him. But this was one of the things that they were the most upset about. And it is a big part of the reason why Republicans, in particular in 2022, did so poorly, all the Republicans that were associated with. So to your point, he doesn't have to run for re-election, but some Republicans are going to have to, and not all of them are as—

actually none of them, are as like uniquely charismatic and magically politically skilled as Donald Trump is. Yeah, look, I don't disagree, but I think it's day one. One of the things that they're doing is flood the zone strategy, is to embrace the vibe shift, is to do basically whatever they can at the height of their powers and try not to do anything too unpopular. So far, I think they've succeeded. I mean-

In terms of a lot of these executive orders, yeah, they're going to bitch and moan on CNN about January 6th. People just don't care. I really believe that people do not care about the pardon. Or if they do, they forget about it in a week, okay? The stuff that sticks with people is both a long-term vibe. So in terms of overreach, what would that look like? It would look like foreign chaos. It would look like major inflation. Remember,

Americans stuck with Biden for what, seven months, eight months? In the first eight months, there was high inflation at that time. They were like, hey, do something about this. Do something about this. And it was only after a while when he didn't do anything about it, they were like, okay, now we're gonna turn on you. It takes a while. So these things need to bleed. You're talking about immigration. I mean, first of all, as we said, there's a huge reality change

Also, if you look at the New York Times polling on this issue, shocking in terms of the mass majority support for deportation. There's actually a huge support for mass deportation. What I mean by that is mass deportation of all illegal immigrants, the plus 12 issue from the New York Times. Now, to your point, am I going to take that to the bank, right? I'm not stupid. I know how that

media and how people are going to receive the reality of it. I know exactly what it looks like. I don't think most people do. So we'll see. It probably could change. But the fact that it's almost a 70 plus percent issue on deporting at least all of the people who are here illegally under the Biden administration is crazy. And that shows you the change in the status quo. As long as it is executed, I think somewhat competently, I think he will be more popular for it. The only way it goes south

is, well, actually, this is an interesting question too. I'm not so sure if it can go south in the same way. The trust in media has now gone down so much in the last eight years, the same conditions for the outrage over the travel ban and for deportation or closing the border. I don't know if that mechanism still exists in the same way. I could be totally wrong.

But I do not see the same organic level of pushback. You know, if you scroll, my barometer is like normal friends' Instagram stories. I'm not seeing the same stuff about racism, sexism, coming to the Women's March, can't believe he did this. I mean, you know, you remember, people were showing up at Dulles Airport, lawyers, to try and help people to go through the travel ban. I don't see any of that happening.

I don't see, you know, Catholic charities and others organizing to try and help Guatemalans across the border. Like all this infrastructure, ACLU, right, raised a billion dollars over the Trump administration. They can file and fight. Show me your 1099. I don't think that they're raising the same amounts of money this time. So I just I think the country's changed.

It's been eight years. The level of trust in the media and all the stuff on this issue is way down. The reality situation has changed. And another thing that I guess Trump and J.D. and all these other people deserve credit for is they have stuck to this argument now for a long time. And they've won, in my opinion. Now, the Democrats might be able to, you know, if we have maybe I think the big overreach like what you're talking about would be like a mass deportation of DACA.

That's an issue which is definitely on the other side. But absent that, I don't really see it yet. But again, a lot of this is competence-based. It's worth remembering that at the height of the initial George Floyd protests in Minnesota, there was a significant majority in favor of protesters burning down a police station.

Yeah, but again, they didn't know what that meant. But yeah, you're right. Well, and that's my point is it's one thing to, in theory, support something when it sounds bloodless and painless and you've been told that this will bring down prices for you and help deal with housing costs and labor. You'll get better wages, blah, blah, blah. It's another thing to see the human reality of it and what that actually entails. And especially another thing when that human reality and cruelty ensues is

And guess what? Your life isn't actually better. It didn't actually make your wages go up. It didn't actually make it so that housing was more affordable or that other like core material problems you're struggling with in your life improve. And then you add to that the fact that the tariffs are very likely. I mean, if he institutes anything like what he's talking about, the tariffs will be inflationary. And that he doesn't believe that.

He said this yesterday. He doesn't really believe that inflation was important to people. He said he thought it was overrated. He said it was second. He said he thought it was overrated as a problem. He might be right, though. So he's not taking seriously that the cost of living, I think cost of living is a core, core concern for people. Core concern.

And so he, I think, is telling himself that because that gives him permission to pursue a terror strategy, which at least in the short term is almost certainly going to be inflationary. So, you know, you're right that, I mean, I don't think if he just did the J6 thing and, you know, pardon them and then everything else people liked, like, no, that's not going to sink him. What I'm saying is that's indicative of

of a maximalist strategy to over-interpret the mandate and indulge his worst instincts and worst excesses. And I think it's unlikely that over the long term it will ultimately be popular, but we're going to see.

Here at Life Kit, NPR's self-help podcast, we love the idea of helping you make meaningful lifestyle changes. Our policy is to never be too punishing on yourself or too grand in your goals, which is why we've got shows on how to make little nudges to your behavior and create habits that stick. Listen to the Life Kit podcast on iHeartRadio.

John Stewart is back in the host chair at The Daily Show, which means he's also back in our ears on The Daily Show Ears Edition podcast. The Daily Show podcast has everything you need to stay on top of today's news and pop culture. You get hilarious satirical takes on entertainment, politics, sports, and more from John and the team of correspondents and contributors. The podcast also has content you can't get anywhere else, like extended interviews and a roundup of the weekly headlines.

Listen to The Daily Show, ears edition on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. We, you know, he drops this shit coin, Trump coin. Then the next day he drops a Melania shit coin. Or maybe she dropped it. We don't know yet, right? Whatever. It doesn't matter. I mean, he already, like, just the Melania, dropping the Melania coin, um...

It totally undercut the Trump coin. So, all right, it dropped like, what, 40% instantly after the Melania thing drops. I saw this morning. I don't know. I have to double-check the numbers on this, but that the Melania coin was already down like 70% from its peak or something. You know, just for... So, people...

who aren't crypto people understand. These meme coins, they're literally, they don't exist. I mean, all it is is hype. It is a pure Ponzi scheme, at least with Bitcoin, which I'm also not a big fan of, but at least with Bitcoin, there's a story about a new technology and using it as actual currency for transactions, cross-national transactions and frictionless and not having to deal with government, blah, blah, blah. At least there's a story.

With these, there's no even pretense that this adds anything valuable or productive to the economy. It's just a total greater fool cash grab, meaning that you buy in with the hope and the assumption that there will be people dumber and more gullible than you

who are gonna come in after you and push the price up so that you can be one of the winners. But I mean, by and large, these are just massive upward transfers of wealth. The Trump coin, 80% is held by insiders. The Melania coin, I saw 89%, is held by a single wallet. So those people are guaranteed

to come out on the positive net winner side, and then all of the suckers who, not all, but many of the suckers who get pulled in after are the ones who will bear real cash losses from purchasing this entirely fake, invented bullshit thing. Yeah, and you know, I generally, as people know, I think it's bad. We have talked how many times on this show? Trump Hotel, Trump Super PAC saying he's gonna challenge Stop the Steal. Yeah. Trump Birch.

This is another level, though. Crystal, you're right, but guess what? At a certain point, this gets... Remember a conversation we had before the holiday, and I was talking about sports gambling, and how no matter how much information I or others put out there about people getting ripped off about sports gambling, that sports gambling becomes more popular in the United States, even though you're literally losing if you're placing gambles. At a certain point, people want to be ripped off. And I just... I'm stopping feeling bad anymore. They want the...

They want the fantasy of this. Then suffer the consequences at this point. You guys voted for this. You guys don't care about this. Then fine, like deal with it. I just don't, I don't feel bad anymore. It's just such naked, I don't know. Yeah, and they like it. It's like truly end stage capitalism where, like I said, look, there's tons of fakery in the stock market.

Right? Like, oftentimes stock prices are not really related to, like, the value of that company. And a lot of that is based on hype and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. At least there's a story about some product or service that is being offered that is some sort of a benefit to humanity. This is just...

pure theft cash grab. And I mean, to me, it's wild that it's legal. It's wild that this is allowed at all, that you can just like invent a fake thing and steal a bunch of people's money and it's perfectly fine. But this is, I mean, it's very similar to what the Hawk Tua chick, Haley. No, it's really exactly the same. It's the same shit that this lady did. And so now, you know, again,

Anybody who doesn't have an issue with this on the Republican side, like, I don't want to hear about your Hunter Biden corruption, James Biden corruption, Nancy Pelosi inside. It is that is pennies compared to what we're talking about here. Trump, what? I mean, he massively inflated his own network. He is now predominantly his wealth is from this freaking crypto. I mean, that's part of why it's absurd is that it's going to collapse. So everyone's like, oh, Trump is worth 25 billion. It's like, no, he's worth. I don't know.

whatever the post-crash price will be, which will be like 0.1 cents. So yes, I guess technically on paper he's worth $25 billion or whatever. Yeah, on paper, the bulk of his wealth is now in the stupid Trump coin. I will also say,

A lot of this is Don Jr. and Eric, too, who are actually the ones behind it. I think it's called like World Liberty Financial. I don't know what to say. Like I said to you, I think people are enjoying getting ripped off at a certain point. By the way, if you're invested in Trump coin, you're a fucking idiot. All right, let's just say it. Like, can we all be honest? If you're going online and you're buying this graph, like you're a moron.

And a lot of the people who do invest in this stuff do so specifically for speculative purposes to try and get in on the idiots who will buy it. I just no longer, I feel exhausted by the conversation now, frankly, just because it's so obvious to me now in the more socially libertarian, isolated America, this is unironically what people want.

And at a certain point, why try and protect people from what they want? Like they want to gamble. They want to play the lottery. They want to buy Trump coin because they think it's funny or, you know, or ticket to wealth. What are we supposed to do whenever? Look, the argument against Trump has been made.

The corruption argument has happened. It's been plastered all over the news. People don't give a shit. So it's like what I was telling you previously. They think that the Democratic Party is so equally corrupt that their guy is corrupt when he does this stuff that they like. I don't think it's a good thing, but that's what they think.

They have no problem. And so it's a hypocrisy race to the bottom. And when they hear people who are Democrats, Chris Murphy I saw and others are criticizing this. It's like, dude, they're just going to point to your photo with Alex Soros and they're going to say you're equally corrupt. You're not even wrong, absolutely, on absolute terms. What's Pelosi worth on paper? $100 million, something like that? I mean, $100 million getting some board seat or whatever. $600 grand. It's nothing. Right. Nothing compared to this. In absolute terms. So I just –

The thing I'm saying, Sagar, is first of all, number one, I don't think that, like, I can't just throw my hands up because I think these things are, I think corruption is actually really important. But they don't. They control the country. You obviously do, too. You did a whole long monologue about your problems with online gambling, and you may acknowledge, like, okay, politically, like, I'm in the minority here, but that didn't stop you from feeling like it was important. No, of course. You make the argument, which is my position here as well. But it's also like, you know,

Again, if you don't have any smoke for Trump on, don't tell me about Pelosi's, you don't care. You actually don't care. And you are just a total partisan hack if you have no smoke for Trump on this, but the only corruption you see is on the Democratic side because in that hypocrisy race to the bottom, let me tell you, buddy, he just won because no one, show me another instance where a politician has managed to grift tens of billions of dollars

off their own, primarily, their own supporters through something that is just completely fake. Completely fake. Assuming he actually is able to realize any of these gains. He's going to be able to realize some of them. I would bet at best he can realize like,

maybe 50 million. Look, I'm not putting it down, but 50 million. That's an insane amount of money. Yeah, sure, but it's not 25 billion. Look, I'm not defending it. What I'm just saying is it's very clear that the way that this has all played out, like Dave Portnoy buying Trump coin, pumping Trump coin,

right? People getting in on this. I saw a lot of this during the whole Robin Hood, you know, GME thing. And now you really see it. And really what you see in today is just gambling. People, single game parlays and their willingness and want, they want more gambling products. They love to be ripped off. It's the most remarkable thing in the world. And I just feel- They love the promise of

The possibility of what it could, they want to buy into like, you know, fortune favors the brave. And there are enough examples of random people who place the crypto bet at the right time that they're like, that could be me. That could be me. And lacking better, in some instances, lacking better prospects or any other real pathway to that sort of like,

lifestyle or even being able to just like make it and have a normal middle class lifestyle, yeah, they're going to chase, they're going to be susceptible to chasing fans like this. I just...

I don't know how a society survives. Truly, I don't know how a society survives where it is illegal to just make up money with the explicit purpose of robbing people. I mean, that's what this is. Like, it is a pure Ponzi scheme. At least the Amway people, like, sell some shit, right? This doesn't even have that. Like, it doesn't even have the pretense of that. It's just invented. And...

This is like, this is a core part of the economy. Like, I just... No, it's not a core part of the economy. Increasingly... Like, no, no. It's less than 1% of overall... This is, but this is like a central also promise of the Trump administration is like moving more in the direction. Let's have the Bitcoin crypto reserve. I don't know. I just, to me, it's such a sign. I mean, first of all, just the brazenness of Trump, right? Yeah, and he is getting away with it. I know. He gets

with everything. That's my point. He's gotten away with everything. People don't care. I don't know what to say. The brainless of Trump and also just like pure societal decline and the end stage capitalism that it's hard for me to wrap my head around that it's like actually a real thing. Oh, I mean, look, historically, this is actually pretty par for the course. You know, we talked a lot about yesterday, the 1900s and the way that you had

like robber barons and other people who would be in power, both politically and then also similarly either involved in big business or price discrimination, et cetera. It's just a natural extension of an extremely low trust society. That's what we're in. You know, if people are trying to parse the differences of like, oh, but Pelosi and all that is bad. Oh, but Trump is bad. And when neither have any credibility on the issue, they, again, they just choose like the lesser of two evils. I,

I really do. I saw someone tweet this and I think this is right. I think Citizens United really was like the beginning of the end of any semblance of democracy. Because I do think like, you know, effectively, capitalism and democracy, very difficult for the two to coexist. Very difficult. If it's going to work, you're going to have to have some strict controls on money and politics. And not only do we not have strict control, we basically have no controls on money and politics. Effectively. Effectively. And, um,

Yeah. So, I mean, that's what you're going to end up with is a bunch of oligarchs who run the government, get what they want and, you know, get taxpayer goodies and get the decisions on AI and crypto and whatever that's going to further enrich them and screw over working people because they won't have the ability to join labor unions or organize or fight back against the AI that's going to come and take their jobs. Like,

That is the natural endpoint of the system that we set up. And that, to your point, Sagar, that both parties have at this point like wholly embraced. But what I can't move away from is that's what people want. Majority of people, not majority, a huge portion of households who are union voted for Trump. It's just like, OK, well, you know, don't complain. I don't know what to say. Like they like him. They don't care about the NLRB or whatever. They think it's like bureaucratic bullshit. And then Trump will just, you know, it'll change everything.

everything up. Okay, up. - But it's not like their other option was really great. - No, sure, but that's my point. - I mean, Kamala Harris was a terrible candidate, stood for nothing, and barely lost.

I wouldn't say barely. A point and a half. Yes, a point and a half, but he lost all seven swing states. And importantly, even within that point and a half, the demographic movement is deeply important for what the future of that looks like. No doubt about it. And who's left in the Democratic Party. If it continues in that direction. Yeah. Nothing in politics is permanent, etc., etc. But-

Really what we are looking at is the new birth of like socially libertarian America. This is what it looks like. Like this is the snake oil salesman era of the early 1900s. And I think the Trump, again, if you want to change that, you have to think about why is it so popular? I will never understand it. Why people put their money on FanDuel or, and look, $5, $10 is not what we're all worried about here.

We're talking about people who are gambling away their life savings. Or if, yeah, if you put your life savings in Trump, this is where the bootstrap part of me comes in. I don't know. You deserve it. I don't know what, like, that's an IQ test. That's social Darwinianism at a certain point. And what we have gotten to

is a society that venerates and wants this get rich quick and all of this. Now, there's a lot of reasons for that. A lot of people in power are responsible. Yeah. But let's also not let people off the hook. Sure. They like it. And I don't know what to say in a country which loves weed and porn and gambling and...

And, you know, is constantly searching for get-rich-quick stuff, and they make fun of people like Dave Ramsey and others who tell them to save their money and put it in the freaking S&P 500. And they're like, oh, that's boomer shit, even though that's like the greatest return that you probably could have ever asked for compared to the idiot stuff that you're doing. I mean, like, people have a choice. Their individual responsibility and wishes are a thing. And this is what they want. Sure. Yeah.

I don't want to deny people individual agency for their decisions, but when you have a mass societal trend,

then you have to ask, what are the underlying economic, social, political conditions that are leading to that trend? Because they don't just come out of nowhere. And my contention would be that in an era of mass inequality, the likes of which we have never seen in human history, where the price of goods increases,

that are required in order to obtain just a basic middle class life have been going up and up and up for decades.

And, you know, also there's a lot of cultural trends. I mean, you do see like the valorization of the businessman who breaks the rules but gets away with it and gets rich and gets the girl and whatever. Like there's those social cultural trends as well. But yeah, that leads a lot of people to be very susceptible to mythology about, you know, whether it's how Trump is going to save them and they put all their trust in him. And that's part of, you know, that parlays right into this crypto theft trend.

heist scheme or if it's trust in like this is my shot this is my lotto ticket to be able to make it to the good life I don't disagree necessarily I just sometimes have to like truly I mean I think about this with weed I think about this with porn I think about this with gambling these are massively popular services

I could show people all the social research in the world that will show this is so bad for you. If you live your life the opposite to this, you will be better off. They don't want to do it. They like it. It's like, look, we're not a dictatorship. You can't control people. And yes, there's a lot of people who, what, there's a lot of economic reasons, et cetera, and all that, but a lot of it is cultural. A lot of it is familial. And I think we're gone. I mean, I think we've long passed.

move what that even looks like in terms of what that everything will look like for a fix. I don't think Donald Trump is going to fix it. I don't even think it's literally possible. I think maybe he could usher in an age where we ask bigger questions and

in a society, maybe more of you will be able to grapple with bigger questions and other stuff and with media and the new environment. But, you know, in the interim, there's just a, there's, this is the, you know, the, this is the celebration. And, you know, it's just funny. Every time I talk about gambling or whatever, oh, you're a narc, you're a nerd, weed, same thing, porn, you know, they start laughing when you talk about all these things.

And they will fight to the death for their right to consume the things that are bad for them. And, you know, look at prohibition. Prohibition was a good idea. Sorry, it's true. People were drunk and they were beating their wives. And the women are the ones who wanted it. And then they got it overturned because they just want to be drunk all the time.

It's like, okay, you know, at a certain point, you just got to give people what they want. It also, we don't have to fight about prohibition today, but, you know, I mean, it led to a massive increase in crime and organized gang. Well, there's also the Great Depression. People conveniently leave that out of the story. True, true. Yeah, like in terms of where a lot of the crime and all that came from. One of the main reasons they brought it back is because they needed tax revenue, ironically.

That tracks. Yeah, when we think about it, with all of the stuff that's super popular today, and look at male culture. Look at what young people, dudes, and all of that are looking at. I think there's a lot of economic reasons for it, but I also think there's a huge cultural component to all of this. And the more I see of how it has not only dominated, but has become overwhelmingly popular, the less optimistic I am that anything is ever going to change.

Do you need anything, Rachel? Oh, yeah. If you guys could bring me some water whenever. Control room. Can we get water in here, please? But we can go ahead and fight about Elon now if you'd like. Oh, okay. All right, sure. Let me finish this coffee then.

Here at Life Kit, NPR's self-help podcast, we love the idea of helping you make meaningful lifestyle changes. Our policy is to never be too punishing on yourself or too grand in your goals, which is why we've got shows on how to make little nudges to your behavior and create habits that stick. Listen to the Life Kit podcast on iHeartRadio.

John Stewart is back in the host chair at The Daily Show, which means he's also back in our ears on The Daily Show Ears Edition podcast. The Daily Show podcast has everything you need to stay on top of today's news and pop culture. You get hilarious satirical takes on entertainment, politics, sports, and more from John and the team of correspondents and contributors. The podcast also has content you can't get anywhere else, like extended interviews and a roundup of the weekly headlines.

Listen to The Daily Show, ears edition on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

So a huge controversy broke out yesterday over whether or not Elon Musk did a Nazi salute, like a whole Heil Hitler situation during one of his speeches. The explanations, we'll show you the video. Before I give you the explanations and Sagar will give you his explanation, I want you guys to be able to see the video for yourselves. Yeah, let's play it. And then we can discuss. And I just want to say thank you.

for making it happen. Thank you. So that's it. So immediately people were like, that looks like a Nazi salute. You don't think so? Okay, if every time someone raises their hand like that, is it a Nazi salute? It comes down to intention. Yes. Do we believe that Elon Musk is a literal Nazi who is intentionally Sieg Heilig?

Or do we have a high functioning autistic weirdo who, if you watch the full video, is spastically dancing like this on stage and unable to control all of his movements and also did some weird like my heart is with you type gesture? Which of those two things do you think is more accurate?

I don't think it takes a genius to figure this out. So that's why the controversy over this is so, it's so 2017 to me. It's like whenever this was supposed to be racist. Do you remember that? And people were like, oh, this is racist. Okay, go ahead and screen grab it. Call me a racist. I don't fucking care. This stuff is stupid. It's 2025. We've been through...

All of this, I find this whole thing exhausting. - I would be-- - Are we saying Elon is a Nazi? - Yeah, but I mean, I would be more inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt if he didn't, my Twitter timeline after he took over is like, and I think you would agree, filled with literal Nazis who he occasionally, not that infrequently, makes a point of agreeing with and elevating.

who backs the AFD in Germany. Okay, AFD is not Nazi. It's a legitimate political. So are you saying that all the people who voted for AFD are Nazis in Germany? Like, no, I don't think so. I'm just saying, Sager, in terms of like plausible deniability, that is the most reactionary party in Germany. Part of it, a wing of it is actually banned because of their extremism tied to like neo-Nazi movement. That's also because they have insane laws on the books in Germany. So when you talk about like, you said, okay, it comes down to intent.

True. What I'm offering is that there is enough evidence of this white South African who is very comfortable and very comfortable, obviously,

elevating Nazis on Twitter, very comfortable using a lot of the rhetoric about like birth rates and population decline and invasion, et cetera, et cetera. And that, you know, is a backer of the furthest right, most reactionary parties in Germany itself that, you know, look, the people who think that this was a Nazi salute are pretty much everybody left of center and actual Nazis also were like,

That's our guy. Okay, go for it. I just can't believe that, you know, I'm supposed to believe that the smartest man on the planet, this brilliant genius, doesn't know what he's doing in this situation? Like, come on. Yeah, but don't we also know he's a fucking idiot at times? And just like anybody moving around does weird, socially awkward stuff, like maybe a guy named Elon who's acted like this for his entire life. If he hadn't dabbled in Nazi ideology, I would be more likely to give him the benefit of the doubt. You can't say talking about birth rates is Nazi ideology. And then the other thing.

thing is. And why is a guy who's a Nazi advocating for more unrestricted H-1B Indian visas at his company? That's like pretty, right? So that kind of conflicts a little bit with racialist ideology. This just gets to the whole election. Everybody's tried this shit before. Nazism, birth rates, if you care about immigration, it's been totally rejected at the ballot box. People who are predominantly black and Hispanic are the majority. New entrance to the Trump coalition specifically on behalf of this. Terms have

Meaning, Elon is not, look, and people here know, I'm not some Elon fanboy. I hate community notes. Twitter has gotten way more annoying ever since we used it. The reason why I think Nazis get elevated on your Twitter feed is because the algorithm is designed to piss you off. To elevate Nazis. Yeah, and you know what I get too on mine? I get a bunch of shithead leftists who are constantly bitching about race or whatever because they're,

That's what makes me mad or trans bullshit. That's my, that's what I'm trying to say. So,

Saying the right wing reactionary party, AFD believes in less immigration for Germany. That's not Nazi. Talking about birth rates, that's not Nazi. Saying that people who care about those issues are Nazi adjacent is the same thing as tagging people like you who have your beliefs and saying it's communist. Ludicrous. That's not communism to believe in a fire department. Oh, that's collectivism, which is part of Karl Marx. Again, these terms are clear words.

People naturally understand that when we say Nazi has a very specific connotation, meaning, intent, belief, policy, do we really believe that Elon has that? There is no evidence for it unless you seek that interpretation I just made about

drawing any sort of like socialist or any sort of democratic socialist belief and saying you're a full-blown Marxist. I mean, you know, we don't talk like that here. Why does it apply to Nazism? Well, I mean...

It sure looks like a Nazi salute. And he's dabbled in Nazi ideology. But what does that mean? What does Nazi ideology mean? I would be very much more willing to give him the benefit of the doubt if not for that and the fact that he did it twice and the fact that a bunch of Nazis think that it was a Nazi salute. What does Nazi ideology has Elon propose? Saying that we have to care about birth rates and we want less immigration? That's not a Nazi policy. That's actually an overwhelming policy. Look, all this

All this conversation about, yeah, birthright and civilization decline and invasions and, you know, racializing crime. All of these things are adjacent. But that's like saying democratic socialism is Marxism. Is that adjacent to communism? Obviously, yeah, kind of. I think this man knows what he's doing. No, I don't. I absolutely think this man knows what he's doing. And so, you know, I...

look, do I think that people are going to care? Do I think it is, does feel sort of like, you know, 2017-ish and like kind of cringe or whatever. Yeah. But guess what? Sometimes things that are popular are bad.

Sometimes things that are popular are like actually genuinely evil. And that is not going to stop me from speaking out against things that I think are wrong and extremism that I think has been welcomed back into political discourse. And yeah, I do think AFD is an extremist party.

I think his backing of that, I mean, his dabbling in the UK political situation, like he's going further than Nigel Farage even is willing to go in terms of, you know, backing Tommy Robinson, who was an explicit racist Islamophobe who was in prison for like, you know, like horrifically smearing this image.

teenage kid and lying about him. And so, yeah, I don't think it's crazy to think that like this is a signal that he's throwing out there and giving himself enough plausible deniability. I think that is what's going on. I just think it's I honestly think that's ridiculous. Like to say that is an intentional Zeke Heil salute. I mean, by the way, has it been beneficial to the Trump movement or Elon Musk or Tesla or even his other companies? I mean, I think the guy is just spastic and weird.

Anybody I know who's ever met Elon tells me the same. You're not buying the Roman salute coat? No, no, no. I was going to say Roman salute. If we all want to talk, right? As an Indian, actually, you know, this is something that's always pissed me off, is that Hitler appropriated various different symbols that have now become conflated with Nazism. So, for example, many Hindus, a lot of white tourists when they go to India, they're like, what?

why are there so many Nazi swastikas over here? It's like, oh, turns out it's an ancient Hindu symbol. It's the other way. And the swastika is something that has nothing to do with that in India. And in India, they're very able to say, yeah, actually it's an ancient Hindu symbol. And yes, the Nazis used it, so we're not just gonna let people tar it and we'll actually continue to paint it on temple floors, put it all over, and we're just gonna continue.

With the Roman salute, the quote unquote Sieg Heil was literally appropriated from the ancient Roman salute, which is famous in many of these statues. Now, am I going to go around Sieg Heil-ing or Roman saluting? No. Well, also the Roman salute apparently was not a real thing. It was like made up movies and then adopted by fascists. That's right.

It was appropriated by fascist ideology in the early 1900s, specifically Mussolini, Oswald Mosley, and others, because they were trying, specifically Mussolini as well, to try and bring back this idea of Romanism and greatness to the Italian Empire, which also Hitler was greatly influenced by in the 1920s.

But again, with Elon, with all of this, Nazism and calling someone a Nazi or even implying all this stuff around people is, in my opinion, a huge reason why the cultural left has so much less credibility and the media today. Like, you have to ask people very basic questions like I just did. Do you think this person is a Nazi?

Like, I just, look, maybe you do. I don't think that that's the case at all. And to get there, you have to do what, you know, all this mental gymnastics about adjacency, which I find just as annoying when right-wingers say this about any social democratic thing and say, that's a literal Stalin-esque communism. I would say- It's the same thing. I think I-

I think he and I think Trump are – like I think this administration is a fascist administration. I mean we've had this debate before. But if you look at the definition and especially with the merging of the richest man in the world and the business with the government and – I mean we have a raft of executive orders that are enlisting the military in draconian border policies like –

you know, not to be whatever, but like you said, words do have meaning. And if you look through the definition, yeah, I think it fits. I think that... I do think that this is a fascist administration at its core that is in power. I think Elon is obviously a key part of that. So that's what I would say. I mean...

I just think this will go on forever. But, I mean, again, it's like it's deeply within the American context, which I don't think has always been, quote, fascist. I mean, the American context has flirted with fascism in the past. So I'm not saying it's not American. As long as that's being qualified, like, that's fine. Yeah. But it's like, again, like...

Terms, I think, are important. And I also think they should be reserved for extraordinary things. So if we have Reichstag fires, false flags, militarization, end of government, and then the fusing of the economy and the state, then sure, I'll talk about fascism. Until that, as long as there's a court system and what, a Congress, which can frequently and often does change, and a democratic populace that frequently changes its mind,

and has the ability to have pushback, et cetera, like to say they're living in fascist countries is frankly insane. I mean, you can say that there's fascist tendencies or would want to be, you know, fine. I mean, I think all of those are okay. I think it would want to be, and, you know, this is what I've expressed for a while, that I think this administration, because there are no real checks left, because there are no real guardrails left,

will be able to more fully exercise those tendencies this time around. And, you know, I think there's already some significant signs of that.

Yeah, I mean, like, again, if we're using the idea of executive power or use of the military or whatever, if that's always fascist, then that erases the meaning. No, I didn't say it's all that. No, but if that's the tendency, then it erases the meaning of that. And then that means then that FDR, who often did many of the same things that Trump is currently doing, actually far more in terms of his executive power. Ew.

- So you mean fascism is explicitly right wing? - No, not necessarily. - Yeah. - No, well Mussolini started out as a socialist. - Any definition of fascism, any basic definition that you would look up online, one of the descriptors would be far right. - Well, it's difficult and that's more because of a connotative with the Hitlerism. If we actually look and study the history of fascism in Italy, a lot of it started out as left wing that got fused with nationalism, kind of beside the point.

issue is not about right wing per se. It's we're talking about tendencies. Like the reason why you're using the term is because of actions like military or executive order. Those are standard executive powers under the American imperial presidency. Like again, FDR would have been a- Ending birthright citizenship, which is part of the constitution is not a standard executive order. Okay. But if it gets struck down by the- Right. Invoking the Foreign Enemies Act. Is that what it's called? Alien Enemies Act. Yeah. The Alien Enemies Act.

which is what was used to justify Japanese internment and has never been used in this context. Like that's not an ordinary executive order. So, you know, I mean, these and again, partly this will play on in terms of how far does Trump want to go? Because if some of these things do get struck down by the Supreme Court and which is no guarantee because the Supreme Court is more or less on his side at this point. And he's like, I don't care. I'm doing it anyway.

- I have no evidence of that. - Don't you think that that's a possibility? - If he does that, then that would be a, do I think it's a possibility? Honestly, no, especially on birthrights. - 'Cause when we talked about it earlier, you said you thought it was possible. - No, the birthright sentence. I said, yeah, anything is possible, but do I think that that's the most likely outcome? Absolutely not, no. I mean, there's no evidence of that previously. Now, I mean, even the whole Andrew Jackson thing, we really think that's gonna fly today? So look, we're gonna base it back in this.

I have no idea also the political utility of this because Nazism itself, I think, is commonly understood to mean what I think it means. And so when the term is misappropriated and applied, as it was to Donald Trump, and then rejected at the ballot box, it causes a loss of credibility in media and also really makes it more difficult if you want to criticize Nazism.

actual Nazis about a lot of this stuff. So conflation makes it more difficult to have nuance or even interesting conversation around any of these issues. And I really think the democratic socialist communist argument is the perfect one. Do you know how many people called FDR a communist back in his time? Do I think he's a communist? No. But the reason why was because they're like, oh, any sort of social government or any of that, even if it's supported by the people, is communist. Let me ask you this. So Trump calls

people like Kamala Harris and whatever communists all the time. Yeah. All the time. How many times have I said it's dumb? But do you think...

Do you think that has caused him a loss of credibility? Do you think that that's diminished his standing? Blah, blah, blah. That's a good question. Actually, I mean, honestly, don't you think kind of has with a lot of people? Because we've talked a lot about this in the past. I think she'll work for him pretty well, to be honest with you. No, but we've talked in the past how they used to say that about Joe Biden. And most people didn't believe Joe Biden. I'm pretty sure he called Kamala a fascist.

And a communist. I don't know. But he called Biden. Republicans always call Democrats communists. And that's why I think the term doesn't have much meaning. There's so much smoke for people being like, Trump's a fascist and here's why. And here's the reasons. But when he does it and when Republicans constantly do it all the time, it's like, yeah, that's fine.

That doesn't cause a loss of credibility. Right, but that doesn't mean you should play the same game, though. I'm not playing the same game because when I – like it's – like the idea that Kamala Harris is a communist is so preposterous. The – like if you look at the definition of fascism, far right, ultra-nationalist, militaristic, often aligned, directly like co-opting large parts of big business.

I think there's a pretty reasonable case to be made. One may disagree and you are fair, it's perfectly fine for you to disagree and we've had this disagreement before, et cetera, et cetera. But I do feel the way you do of like, well, words have meaning and this seems to fit the, you know, fit to a T pretty close. But- I made an awkward movement. I mean, that's where I'm just, look- An awkward movement? Part of the reason why I feel and hate this whole conversation is it's so fucking stupid. It's so fucking stupid.

Like, look, at the end of the day, I don't think most people think Elon is a Nazi. So, you know, like, what are we doing here? We're analyzing the movement of Elon because he's like an autistic spastic weirdo. Like, if an autistic kid did that at a celebration for a school, what do you think we would all think? We're like, oh, you know, whatever. So it's like, it's ableist. I'm being ableist right now. I guess. Yeah, good question. That's perfect. We should, no, Elon is neurodivergent. That's what all of you people are not. Yeah, I'm not.

His neurodivergence is not being appropriately applied to the context within all of this. Well, the ADL agrees with you. See why it's so important. That's because the ADL is currying favor with power. That's a different story. Exactly.

The ADL, yeah, go ahead and put the ADL thing up because at least then we can end by both shitting on the ADL. They, you know, this is the group that if you do a rally chant that they don't like, it's a hate crime. If you wear a keffiyeh, it's an anti-Semitic attack. I mean, we showed you, showed you the move.

Sager disagrees. It does look, many people are saying though, it does look like a Sig Heil. It does look like it. But the ADL, no smoke for Elon, of course. This is a delicate moment. It's a new day. So many are on edge. Our politics are inflamed and social media only adds to the anxiety. It seems that Elon Musk made an awkward gesture in a moment of enthusiasm.

Not a Nazi salute, but again, we appreciate that people are on edge. In this moment, all sides should give one another a bit of grace, perhaps even the benefit of the doubt, and take a breath. This is a new beginning. Let's hope for healing and work toward unity in the months and years ahead. I mean, currying favor with power, number one. Number two, I mean, Elon supports the Israeli genocide in Gaza, and that's their primary goal.

So if you're good on that, then you can do whatever else, you know, you want and you're pretty much going to be good to go with regard to the ADL. No one can accuse me of hypocrisy on the ADL issue. Ironically, if you recall, Elon was heavily against the ADL back in the day. But the ADL wants to keep and curry themselves up with power, with the Trump administration, with Elon. I think they correctly see this as like this, you know,

Twitter-type controversy media thing that doesn't have any actual influence or whatever, and they want to stay cozied up, like Miriam Adelson is one of their biggest donors, right? And they want access and continued ability to influence U.S. censorship and power. And so within all of this context, it makes political

And yes, I agree, they're total hypocrites because in the past, this is exactly the type of thing that they would have latched onto and they have frequently derided incorrectly. - Well, if it was a college kid doing the same thing,

You know, at a college kid with Asperger's, doing the same thing. I agree with you. At a pro-Palestine protest. That's why I think both are bad. I mean, there's plenty of screen grabs, Crystal, of people in Keffiyehs doing Z-Hiles. Like, should we take them seriously? Or do I correctly see, like, okay, yeah, there's some real anti-Semites who are probably doing this. The vast majority of people who I know who are pro-Palestine are not anti-Semitic. They're just horrified by the action. I think the same thing with Elon. That's what I'm trying to say. I'm giving people the benefit of the doubt here. Like,

And not even benefit of the doubt, but just like parsing the overall thing and then trying to cast it correctly for what the core motivation is. Like, is the core motivation for Donald Trump every day when he gets up to be a fascist Hitlerian dictator? Like, no. Is this core motivation for the people who support Elon or even Elon himself? Elon, all he cares about is making more money. That's not...

fascist? You know, if anything, it's as American tale as old as time is to try and to curry favor with the incoming administration. So anyway, I just, I really don't think that this does any service to good discourse, to politics. And I think most people who see this stuff rightfully

think it's just so stupid bullshit. And I think it loses a lot of credibility, honestly. Like the media, I saw CNN and others like pushing, trying to turn this into a thing. Like it just feels exactly like so many of those Trump controversies, which pushed, actively pushed a lot of people away from the mainstream. You know, I would have agreed,

Obviously, I do think he knew what he was doing here. But we'll put that to the side. I actually would have maybe agreed with that point previously. But then I'm like, well, the Republicans and Trump, they do that shit all the time. Call everybody fascist. Send me the people like communists, blah, blah, blah. And it doesn't seem to have hurt them too much. He's...

said way more extreme, insane things about Kamala Harris than she ever said about him. And her, when she made the case he was a fascist, which by the way is not just something I said, it's something that people like Mark Milley who served with him also said. - Oh yes, the esteemed General Milley. - The reason, yeah, well at least he was there to be like, let's not shoot protesters in the legs, which is also a behavior I believe of a fascist.

fascist inclined individual. But in any case, that was the context of which that came up. And Trump has called her every name in the book.

So the idea that like, oh, you were too mean to him and that's why you didn't have, I just don't buy it. I just don't buy it. I just don't think that that's the lesson of this election when the guy who was the most obnoxious and the meanest and the most divisive and the most playing to this like tribal in-group out-group mentality, that's the guy.

that's the guy that won. So I'm just not, you know, I'm not as persuaded by that point as I perhaps would have once been. I don't think that's a bad point. I think the reason why it is hypocritical fundamentally is that right-wing culture kind of itself is basically right-wing culture and criticism of the mainstream is still seen as insurgent and thus is one where

paying the price and the checking action, like what you're talking about, is not one which is going to land similarly with that audience, as opposed to when Trump says so-and-so is a communist. I mean, look, how many times have I said here before? I think calling people communists is stupid. I think calling Bernie a communist and all that is foolish.

is he should actually debate these things on their merits and actually dive into them. And that, you know, if we stoop to the, oh, this is Marxist, oh, this is socialist stuff, you actually lose any ability to win over somebody who was a Bernie Sanders voter. But you know what? Maybe you're right because Trump called Kamala and all of them communists and he won a ton of people over. And he won a lot of people over. And he called her a fascist. I don't know. Yeah. I mean, all of these things were said. So I think it matters a lot about, listen, I mean-

Trump is also able to get away with things that people, other people aren't. Yes, true. But the thing Derek Thompson, when we had him on, said about how, and wrote in his piece about how Trump really capitalized on the socialization

social media, all tribe, no village dynamic where everything is about just like tribal in-group, out-group signaling. And so it wasn't that he won in spite of calling Kamala a communist and a fascist and an enemy of the people or whatever. It's in part because of that.

I think that that is – I think that's an important insight. It's a bad insight. Like it's bad for politics and it's bad for the future, et cetera. But I don't think that he's necessarily wrong about that, that he knows how – politics is inherently divisive. And this is something Democrats are stupid and run away from, right?

They are so afraid of conflict and whatever, like can't make a decision, blah, blah, blah. Trump sees this as a divisive conflict, and he is going to draw the lines of that divide, and aggressively so, and unrelentingly so.

And so that's why because he is the person who shaped that divide and drew the line and enforced it in the most aggressive, vigorous way you possibly could. He's the victor.

And so, yeah, I think, you know, that doesn't mean that, like, it was the best argument for Kamala to make about, like, fascism or whatever. But I think that central insight of, like, you have to have a divisive politics. You have to draw the divide in a way that is politically beneficial to you. I think Trump understands that in a way Democrats don't. Let's end on that because I totally agree with that. I think you're right. I just—

I think evidence has shown us the Nazi one doesn't really work. You've got to find something else. You've got to find something that hits with people. Maybe it will hit with people. I don't know. People could start actually turning against it. But I'm somewhat doubtful personally at this point, especially in this shitcoin illegal or pro-gambling era. Anyways, that's a way longer conversation. Crystal, I enjoyed doing this stream. How long have we been going for? Two hours and 20 minutes? Yeah. I think that's pretty good.

If you guys like it, thank you very much. You can sign up, Breaking Points premium subscriber at breakingpoints.com. Maybe we'll do something like this again in the wild. We could do it. I'm excited.

I mean, it's freewheeling. You got to ask about the Aussie open thing. I was like, you know, this is fun. And then here, you know, we're not worried about time and putting the show out or whatever. True. I'm really actually enjoying it. We can just talk as much as we want. And honestly, you know, I was watching some of the live numbers. It didn't really go down that much. We've been talking for 20 or 30 minutes. So I was like, hey, maybe it works. Yeah. Maybe we do it like once a week. Yeah. Well, that's a lot.

Okay. Maybe. Maybe. We'll talk about it. We have to figure out. It's a totally different business model, too. I have to think about all those things. But anyway, it was fun. Thank you, guys. Interesting week. And CounterPoints will be here for you tomorrow. We'll be back for you Thursday. So we'll see you then.

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What's up, everybody? Adnan Virk here to tell you about a new podcast. It's NHL Unscripted with Virk and Demers. Jason Demers here, and after playing 700 NHL games, I got a lot of dirty laundry to air out. Hey, I got a lot to say here, too, okay? Each week, we'll get together and chat about the sport that we love. Tons of guests are going to join in, too, but we're not just going to be talking hockey, folks. We're talking movies. We're talking TV, food, and Adnan's favorite, wrestling.

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