12/5/24: Healthcare CEO Assassinated, Crypto Mania Takes Over DC, Obama Aid Gaslights On Mistakes
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Alright, we're all set for the party. I've trimmed the tree, hung the mistletoe, and paired all those weird-shaped knives and forks with the appropriate cheeses. And I plugged in the partition. Partition? It's a home cocktail maker that makes over 60 premium cocktails, plus a whole lot of seasonal favorites, too. I just got it for

So how about a Closmopolitan or a mistletoe margarita? I'm thirsty. Watch. I just pop in a capsule, choose my strength, and... Wow. It's beginning to feel more seasonal in here already. If your holiday party doesn't have a bartender, then you become the bartender. Unless you've got a Bartesian, because Bartesian crafts every cocktail perfectly in as little as 30 seconds. And I just got it for $50 off. Tis the season to be jollier. ♪

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Good morning, everybody. Happy Thursday. We have an amazing show for everybody today. What do we have, Crystal? Indeed we do. So as you probably know by now, the CEO of UnitedHealthcare was murdered in Midtown Manhattan. That manhunt continues, as does, of course, the online reaction. So we will get into all of that. Trump packing his cabinet with billionaires. We have new details about what that administration may look like and what they are planning.

Rahm Emanuel is being rehabbed over on the Democratic side, planning what his future in the Democratic Party may be, making some pretty wild comments given his own past history. So we'll dig into all of that. Also, Morning Joe, once again in meltdown mode after apparently David Frum now too spicy for them. They had to like apologize after some of his comments. This is the Iran-Iraq war.

war here. Joe Scarborough, just this morning, had some whole rant meltdown, whatever. So we're going to bring you that. I think you guys are going to enjoy and appreciate that. Also, some news from overseas. Emmanuel Macron's government has now collapsed, which is somewhat predicted, but leaves the French government a lot of uncertainty and chaos.

So we'll tell you all of the details there. And Biden is considering pardoning a slew of officials and Democratic politicians and Liz Cheney and all kinds of people who could be targets of Trump's retribution. And The View is reacting and arguing with Charlemagne about many of these things. Yes, that's right. That'll be fun. Dr. Fauci apparently needs a pardon. Interesting. He's told he's never did anything wrong.

Anyways, before we get to that, BreakingPoints.com. Please go ahead and subscribe, become a premium subscriber. Help out the show. We've had a couple of long-form interviews this week, which were awesome, which our premium subscribers got first access to. So if you want more like that, you can go ahead and sign up and become a premium subscriber today. Yeah, and thank you guys for the questions you sent in for Jon Favreau. They were really helpful, and you guys had some really great questions.

and so it was very much appreciated. Yeah, I thought that was a very interesting interview, so I hope you guys enjoyed it. Yes, and if you can't become a premium subscriber, please just go ahead and like, subscribe, share the podcast, the video that you are watching right now. It really helps us out. We just got our Spotify wrapped yesterday. It's amazing to see which episodes you guys share around and all that. We were in the top 1% video podcast in the world, so thank you all very much. And apparently people frickin' loved the Dave Smith podcast.

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So thank you. We love you. All right. Let's get to the UnitedHealthcare CEO murder. This is some shocking stuff. So we have some surveillance video that has emerged of the killing itself. We've gone ahead and edited it so you can't actually see it. But let's go and put this and play this for everybody up on the screen so you can watch here. The United CEO is walking there at about 645 a.m. outside of a midtown hotel.

in Manhattan. You could see the gunman there. He raised his gun and he shot several times into the CEO. He went forward, walked towards him, apparently to basically make sure that the man was dead and then begins to flee across the street where he got onto a city bike and went uptown.

To this day, now some 24 hours later, he is not currently in police custody, although we have some of the details. The NYPD itself broke down some of the details of the crime. Let's get to it. The suspect approached from behind and fired several rounds, striking the victim at least once in the back and at least once in the right calf.

Many people passed the suspect, but he appeared to wait for his intended target. The suspect fled first on foot, then on an e-bike, and was last seen in Central Park on Center Drive early this morning. The victim was removed to Roosevelt Hospital, where he was pronounced. We've been in touch with his family, his friends and his colleagues, and they are very much in our thoughts and prayers at this hour.

The full investigative efforts of the New York City Police Department are well underway, and we will not rest until we identify and apprehend the shooter in this case. The women and men of the NYPD take enormous pride in the work that they do each day and each night to drive down crime and violence in our city. Right now, we are asking the public for your help.

If you have any information about this case, call Crime Stoppers at 800-577-TIPS. We have increased the reward in this case to $10,000. I want to be clear. At this time, every indication is that this was a premeditated, preplanned, targeted attack.

That is really what all the details begin to describe. We've seen ballistic experts and other people who have come out just to look at all the circumstances, and they are genuinely shocking. I mean, this is one of the busiest areas in all of midtown Manhattan, 6.45 a.m., full-on pre-work traffic.

and all of that. It appears that he had either a suppressor or some sort of a pistol, which was using subsonic ammunition to try and to keep the sound as quiet as possible. From ballistics experts and others that I have read, they just show a couple of things that you can see in the details of the crime. Number one, the photo that's been released of the man so far shows him wearing a face mask and a hood pulled up all over. It appears he had a change of clothes in the backpack.

was able to immediately flee, get onto a bike, apparently was waiting outside of the hotel some full five minutes before he emerged. This UnitedHealthcare CEO knew he was staying there. He'd cased it out.

It was clearly a very planned assassination, and that's what a lot of the details around this and professionals as well. So just before we get your reaction, this is the Felipe Rodriguez, former NYPD detective, just talking about this thing. It's one of the most detailed assassinations that he's ever seen. Let's take a listen. Is it possible that police may have to close the bridges, or how are they surveilling those areas? It's a good question.

At this point, you know what's going to end up? The CCTV footage. But I'm telling you, the way he planned this out, I can see him having a change of clothes, everything hidden somewhere in Central Park because he's aware of the cameras. That's why, you know what? He did have that mask on. That's why he's trying to, you know, hide his identity, trying to make sure that we don't have any facial recognition in place. So once again, this is one of the

most detailed assassinations I've ever seen. Yeah, I mean, it's truly shocking. It literally took place downtown in the middle of New York City. It appears the wife says that Mr. Thompson had been receiving threats. Can we put that tear sheet, please, up on the screen over, quote, insurance woes in the details that she said? She said something about denied coverage in terms of

threats that he had been receiving. And we also have some stuff that broke just very late last night. NYPD detectives have discovered the words, quote, deny, defend, and depose, which were written on shell casings that were found at the scene. Deny, defend, and depose is the title of a book

which is specifically about how insurance companies deny coverage to patients. So it does appear to be an act of retribution, or it appears to be some sort of act of retribution against the UnitedHealthcare CEO. The book itself, here, I can pull up the cover in front of me. Yeah, it's Delay, Deny, Defend Why Insurance Companies Don't Pay Claims and What You Can Do About It.

Apparently it's a well-known kind of moniker and a playbook that people have always talked about, these insurance companies. So it does appear to be an act of revenge, Crystal. And obviously that alludes also to kind of the reaction around this, which has certainly run the gamut, I guess we could say that. I don't think it has run the gamut. I think by and large...

Listen, let's all be adults here. Nobody here condones murder in broad daylight, targeted assassinations, etc. It's insane.

Yes, of course. But we also have at this show made it clear when a powerful person who did great evil in the world, we don't mince words when that person dies, is killed, etc. And this is a person who caused great harm, death, bankruptcy, debt and injury to probably millions of Americans.

And so, you know, there was a lot of like, oh, the left is like celebrating this viciously. Let me tell you, it wasn't just the left. We're going to show you later on. If you go on Facebook, Facebook, not exactly like the bastion of the socialist revolution. And you look at the reaction there. If you look at the reactions on TikTok, I mean, it was across the board. And so I think people should think like political class, executive class, billionaire class,

need to think really deeply about how people feel about this disgusting, evil system that this person was a part of. So we can put, you know, up on the screen, you know, you're talking about the motive. Obviously, yesterday it was all speculation because obviously there would be many people who would have a motive.

to do harm to this individual. And quite frankly, you know, again, and this is us being adults here, not condoning, but it's shocking that something like this hasn't happened before, given the amount of pain, death, and suffering that this industry overall causes. And this was a very, you know, powerful person in terms of that industry. Um,

You know, we've got we can put a five up on the screen in terms of claim denial rates. UnitedHealthcare was apparently the worst. Thirty two percent of claims denied by this company. We also know that, you know, they are being sued right now because they've been using this.

AI that reportedly, according to the lawsuit, has some 90% error rate to reject people's claims. And, you know, I mean, you're hard-pressed to find an American family that hasn't been negatively impacted by this disgusting, horrible system.

So, you know, if people are shocked by the reaction that has sort of flowed out of the entire nation in response to this killing, I don't think that you should be shocked because most people have some sort of story. I mean, in my own family, like,

Kyle's dad very possibly would still be alive and have been at our wedding if it wasn't for our fucked up health insurance system. So, you know, there's a lot of anger and horror at what this looks like in this country. Yeah, the deny, defend, depose gets to some patients in terms of denial of coverage in the way that the insurance companies operate.

are able to work that system. Yeah, I mean, as you just said, let's all be real and adults, like murdering people in vigilante, or not even vigilante, like murdering people in cold blood in the middle of New York City is bad, unironically. What we have seen, though, is honestly, I'm even surprised by it, and I've seen a lot of social analysts and others who have reacted to the killing itself

in terms of the outcry from a lot of the public, where there is some deep-seated rage here. And we can talk about that just analytically in terms of, look, we just had an election, right? Donald Trump won the White House. People are very angry with the system. A lot of rage there, too. Yeah, and I was thinking, I was actually thinking back to it. Alex Berenson made the analysis. He's like, I don't think anything like this has happened in the post-World War II era.

I think he's right in terms of a major targeted assassination of a CEO. But this really harkens back to some of the violence and anarchist violence in the period of like 1900 to 1937. Like the Gilded Age. Yeah, it's like post-Gilded Age.

more like the latter age of the Gilded Age, a lot of the violence around labor and the, you know, the relationship between the major company and the citizen, but also just like literal anarchists and others' theory of like, we have to strike back through genuine violence against people who are like this. You know, we saw some of that actually, like you said, on the, um,

reacting to this. We can go ahead and put A10, please, on the screen. And this was put out. For example, some of the top comments, people are like, I'm sorry, prior authorization is required for thoughts and prayers. Sending prior authorization, denied claims, collections, and prayers to the family. Was his trip to the ER really emergent? And it's crazy what my first thought was. And then I look at the comments and realize that I am not alone in my thoughts.

So clearly there's a lot of people who are out there who are very, very upset with the health care system. You know, even bringing it back to just the crime, I saw some analysis where they're like, this is an insane crime because there are 20 million people who could be potential suspects in carrying this out. And if you look at some of the if you look at currently, the fact is, is that when you murder someone in New York City, actually pretty much you murder someone anywhere.

It's not all that difficult to narrow down the range of suspects. And especially New York is one of the most surveilled countries in the world. I mean, in terms of not only police officers, this is Midtown Manhattan. Anybody who's been there, there are police everywhere across Midtown Manhattan.

You also have cameras blanketing the entire place. That surveillance footage is just like private one. In terms of what the NYPD has access to and the NYPD Counterterrorism Bureau and all of that, that entire city is like basically wired.

With cameras. So the fact is, is while they have released a photo of the suspect, they are probably able to track some of his movements and others. For now, he has not been apprehended. Well, not only that. By police, which is shocking. They don't even have a person of interest. They don't have a name, a person of interest that they have put out there. They haven't released anything other than- They've released nothing as of this morning. The photos they put out, I mean, you can't see anything of those guys. You basically can see- It could be anyone. I think you can see his eye color and his nose. Like, that's about it. Yeah. And it's like-

I mean, he's a white male. That's basically all. That's all you know. That's all we know. It's really crazy. There was actually an analyst who was able to determine which city bike was actually taken. Can we put A6, please, on the screen? This looks like there was an analysis, and it says, I'm fairly confident here that UnitedHealthcareAssassin was escaped.

on an electric city bike. It remains unclear right now because NYPD told Lyft, which operates City Bike, that their bikes don't appear to have been used in the shooting. So it's a little bit up in the air right now as to how exactly he was able to get away because there was some...

At least initially there appeared like he was using some sort of electric bicycle to get away from the scene. But it's a little bit confusing in terms of whether this was correct or not. Well, it's also like, I mean, if you're planning to do a targeted assassination, you probably have your bike already out of the dock.

You know, they brought it from another part of the city or whatever. So I don't know if this is really relevant or not. But it does illustrate the point that you were saying, Sagar, that like there's cameras on every corner. There's police everywhere, especially in midtown. Just so you guys understand if you aren't, you know, New York City people, like this is very close to Times Square. It is the tourist hub. Like I'm sure many people have stayed in that.

Hilton that, I mean, I know it very well. I used to live very close to there. That is really well known and completely centrally located. And there's all kinds of police and surveillance and whatever around. And so for him to have been able to do this, you know, it was, yeah, it was kind of early in the morning, but in basically broad daylight,

and have the skill and the wherewithal to get away and still the police appear to have very little to go on is quite astonishing. Are you ready to move easily and independently without pain or stiffness holding you back? Do you want to look in the mirror and see a hydrated glow instead of fine lines and wrinkles? Now you can with Native Paths Collagen.

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Alright, we're all set for the party. I've trimmed the tree, hung the mistletoe, and paired all those weird-shaped knives and forks with the appropriate cheeses. And I plugged in the Bartesian. Bartesian? It's a home cocktail maker that makes over 60 premium cocktails, plus a whole lot of seasonal favorites, too. I just got it for

So how about a Closmopolitan or a mistletoe margarita? I'm thirsty. Watch. I just pop in a capsule, choose my strength, and... Wow. It's beginning to feel more seasonal in here already. If your holiday party doesn't have a bartender, then you become the bartender. Unless you've got a Bartesian. Because Bartesian crafts every cocktail perfectly in as little as 30 seconds. And I just got it for $50 off. Tis the season to be jollier.

Add some holiday flavor to every celebration with the sleek, sophisticated home cocktail maker, Bartesian. Pick up your phone and shake it to get $50 off any cocktail maker. Yes, you heard me. Shake your phone and get $50 off. Don't delay. This is it.

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To get back to some of the conversation about the reaction, you had that TikTok reaction. I honestly was probably most shocked by if we put A12 up on the screen and of course, Ken Klippenstein going hard in the paint and stirring in the pot as he often does. But he tweeted out, "People loathe our healthcare system. The pearl-clutchers should ask themselves why." What you're looking at here is the post from UnitedHealth Group, the company that he was the CEO of, on Facebook. Again, not exactly bastion of the socialist revolution,

It's a lot of like MAGA grandmas on Facebook, frankly. And this was early on. The bulk of the reaction was the laughing emoji. And it had 5,500 people who had done that. The last I saw, which was from like eight hours ago, it was like 18,000 people.

people who had posted the laughing emoji. So, you know, I know there's like a lot of, especially mainstream liberal journalists and politicians. I saw Dean Phillips. I saw Richie Torres. I saw some others who were kind of like, you know, tut-tutting this reaction and okay, fair enough. But you all are the people in a position of power to change this truly vile, destructive, damaging, deadly system. And

Like, what have you done other than many of you being complicit in blocking and quashing the movement that was, you know, pushing to totally overturn the system and make sure everybody has health care access like every other developed nation in the entire world? I was just looking up the stats just to check my memory. Forty percent of all bankruptcies are because of medical debt.

40%. You know what bankruptcy does? I mean, that is so devastating, like putting the denial of care and the sickness and the avoidable death to the side. Just that kind of crushing debt destroys people's lives, pushes them to suicide. So, you know, this is a horrible, evil—and there's something, too, about—

There is something about like the sort of banality of evil or the fact that this is a system that we've sort of accepted and the harm of it is kind of depersonalized that makes politicians feel like, oh, this is, you know, it's unacceptable to pin that blame on this one person. But, you know, again, this is someone who was a powerful individual in the

in an industry that has caused unbelievable damage to American lives, health, well-being, et cetera.

And so Democrats have effectively, you know, I mean, but remember in 2016, Trump ran along, I'm going to give everybody health care. And then he tries to repeal the Affordable Care Act. That doesn't work. He has his own health care plan. It's like a 10 percent approval rating or whatever. He just gives up. Republicans gave up completely on health care. Now they're trying to like, you know, pretend like they care about legalizing raw milk or, you know, getting the toxins out of the food products, which seems unlikely that they're going to accomplish that. But they don't really have anything to say about health care.

The Democrats have collapsed from they don't even talk about like a public option anymore. I mean, Joe Biden ran on a public option. And as soon as the primary was over, that gets dropped. He doesn't talk about it at all anymore. Never gets brought up during his tenure.

And I think partly because of this whole like populist theory, they're like, well, if we lower the prescription drug prices on a few drugs for seniors only to, by the way, you can just run on that and that'll be enough. And I think very clearly from this reaction, that is not enough. And so, you know, not to turn everything into a freaking political point, but there is a political point to be made here, which is Democrats look at this energy that's out there.

to upend the system, to have something that approaches a more just and human-first versus profit-first healthcare system. That is all out there for the taking. So as you wander in the wilderness,

and wonder what you can do to get back into political power. Maybe try actually challenging powerful interests and trying to improve people's lives. Maybe try to right the injustices in a disgusting and vile healthcare system. Just a thought there for you as you move forward. It is...

I think it has now passed into the realm of just even interest in the, which by the way, the crime itself is insane, right? Is now into like a sociological, I've seen a lot of analysts and others just be like, hey, look, like, you know, nobody's condoning this, but you gotta go out and take a look at some of the response and just say like, wow, this is pretty crazy. It can tell you a little bit about something. Yeah, and this isn't just like the dirtbag left. This isn't just like the choppo guys. I will say there is a lot of like really annoying

Yeah, there's a lot of... Just let us cosplay about their... It's like, okay, guys, you know, like, let's keep it down a little bit. Let them shitposts on her. Okay, look, you shitpost what you want, but then people should rightfully just be like, oh, it's really interesting, right, in terms of what selective application of what good violence is or not. Whatever, we can get into that, like, a little bit later. And then, by the way, how did it all work out? Whenever you were all riot posting during BLM, the country was really with you, wasn't they? The point is, is that...

Clearly, sociologically, the response has been devastating, I would think, for the healthcare industry. For the public itself and even for trying to solve the crime, that will be one where it will – I mean just imagine if they are able to apprehend this person. You could imagine some sort of like trial of the century type stuff in terms of him – whoever this perpetrator is.

Let's say he had a relative or he himself was affected by the healthcare system trying to put them on trial. It could become like a real thing if that does happen. And if they don't catch him, that's even more insane that somebody was able to get away with this. So we're some 24 hours now post the shooting. NYPD basically has gotten nothing from...

As far as we know, yeah. The only clue they have right now is that, you know, the carvings that were put on the bullet casing. So we'll keep everybody updated. But certainly, you know, even when they do catch somebody as well, like, there's going to be a lot of discussion on this case. What's the story? What led this person to take this action? Yeah, I mean, this person put a ton of planning and time and

know-how into executing this, taking the time to literally etch things on a bullet. That's some stuff out of like peaky blinders for people who watch the show. He wanted to send a message. Exactly. It's like literal Joker stuff. That's what this is. That's exactly what this is. Are you ready to move easily and independently without pain or stiffness holding you back? Do you want to look in the mirror and see a hydrated glow instead of fine lines and wrinkles? Now you can with Native Paths Collagen.

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Alright, we're all set for the party. I've trimmed the tree, hung the mistletoe, and paired all those weird-shaped knives and forks with the appropriate cheeses. And I plugged in the partition. Partition? It's a home cocktail maker that makes over 60 premium cocktails. Plus a whole lot of seasonal favorites, too. I just got it for

So how about a Closmopolitan or a mistletoe margarita? I'm thirsty. Watch. I just pop in a capsule, choose my strength, and... Wow. It's beginning to feel more seasonal in here already. If your holiday party doesn't have a bartender, then you become the bartender. Unless you've got a Bartesian, because Bartesian crafts every cocktail perfectly in as little as 30 seconds. And I just got it for $50 off. Tis the season to be jollier. ♪

Add some holiday flavor to every celebration with the sleek, sophisticated home cocktail maker, Bartesian. Pick up your phone and shake it to get $50 off any cocktail maker. Yes, you heard me. Shake your phone and get $50 off. Don't delay. This is it.

Your moment. This is your time to make your comeback with Purdue Global. When you come back with a Purdue Global degree, you create opportunity for yourself, your family, and your future. It's a degree you can be proud of, a degree that employers will trust and respect. Purdue Global offers working adults like you over 175 flexible degree programs to meet your specific career goals.

goals. These include associate, bachelor's, master's, and doctoral degrees and certificates. Purdue Global degree programs range from nursing to business to communication and more. Whatever your interests, we have the degree that will move you forward.

You have the knowledge. You have the experience. Now it's time to get credit for the work you've done and earn the recognition you deserve with Purdue Global, Purdue's online university for working adults. You know you're worth it. We do too. So don't wait another second to get the degree that will take your career to the next level. Start your comeback today at purdueglobal.edu.

All right, let's move on to the latest from Trump. We had actually a pretty positive pick for his cabinet. I'm gonna get to some not so positive ones, but let's start with the good news here. Put this up on the screen. He's nominated Gail Slater

As assistant attorney general for the antitrust division at the Department of Justice, this is a position currently held by Jonathan Cantor, who's been a real warrior ally of Lena Kahn in terms of the new antitrust movement. He goes on to say big tech has run wild for years, stifling competition, our most innovative sector. And as we all know, using its market power to crack down on the rights of so many Americans, as well as those of little tech.

So this is like a J.D. Vance ally, it appears, in his Senate office. Gale's also worked in the private sector and media at Fox, in the tech sector

at Roku. In her new role, Gayle will help ensure our competition laws are enforced both vigorously and fairly with clear rules that facilitate rather than stifle the ingenuity of our greatest companies. Congrats, Gayle. Together, we'll make America competitive again. Is this someone that you had familiarity with previously, Sagar? I haven't met Gayle. I know a lot of people who do know her. They speak very, very highly of her. She's kind of been in the big conservative antitrust movement. Not a surprise, by the way, that

hated desperately by a lot of the Heritage Foundation types and others, but has been on the front lines. That's a good sign. Specifically on Google, Facebook, and others. You also should take a look at the text there, which is very important, of what Donald Trump actually said in his release. And he was specifically talking here about, quote, we will know big tech has run wild and using its power, market power, to crack down on the rights of, quote, many Americans and

as well of those of little tech. So little tech has become an acronym kind of pushed forward by Y Combinator and a few others, which is about the emergence of the startup ecosystem and its inability to compete fairly on grounds. The reason little tech is actually so important, I did a monologue about this previously with respect to AI, is that AI itself naturally lends itself to people with a shit ton of money. People like Amazon, Facebook, 'cause the server cost is so high.

The problem with that is that it means that whatever the next innovation is, is likely to be built in-house by these already massive giants. So what you want is actually to create an open source ecosystem which allows the emergence of new players and is not allowed to be totally captured. That is something that little tech has really become an important war in and actually gets to Marc Andreessen, who we talked about previously. He's been a big little tech quote unquote fighter, but there are a lot of other individuals out there. Gary Tan,

who I recommend people follow. He's the head of Y Combinator currently. Luther Lowe, who currently works for Y Combinator. He previously worked at Yelp. That guy is an absolute antitrust warrior. People should go and follow him on Twitter. There are a lot of people here in DC and others who've been involved in this movement. And I would say this is a major victory for them. And it is interesting. It's an ideological fight. It also will show you what the Titanic showdown of the century is because there's a reason that Mark Zuckerberg has his ass down in Mar-a-Lago.

And that Jeff Bezos yesterday at the New York Times deal book conference was like, Trump is great. He's really learned about how to quash regulation. Oh, I was wondering what he was going to say there. These people, they know that this is probably the single largest existential threat to their business. Like if you really believe that AI is the future, which all of them do, and all of them have poured millions,

billions of dollars of their profits into, they don't have to do that if they didn't think it would be commercially viable, then your inability to capture that future market would both kill your current investment and possibly could put you out of business in the future or at the very least,

have to compete. God forbid, uh, that they would have to do that. So you have a lot of stuff going on right now. There's a lot of ideas about splitting Google search away from Google ads and for, or from the rest of the alphabet company, a, uh, Amazon, which Bezos of course used to helm the ideas. He would split like AWS away from the retail business. There's a lot of unfair competition that happens in this sector. So anyway, I think it's, um, I think it will be, uh,

It could be one of the most positive developments, and the fact that he picked her is a very, very good sign. I actually think this is a more important development than while you were out, we covered the labor secretary who had voted for the PRO Act. But then if you look at the rest of her record, she only has a 10% record of voting with the AFL-CIO. So backing the PRO Act was an attempt to win in a swing district, and also the labor secretary is in a lot of ways less powerful than whoever you put in at the NLRB. So that one's still very like,

I'm not sure how much we're getting out of this one. This one to me is more significant. You know, I take my cues on antitrust from Matt Stoller because he just knows way more about it than I'll ever dream of knowing that. Well, he's probably worked with Gayle. And he clearly knows who she is, probably has worked directly with her. And it's funny because he had just tweeted, like, the Trump administration has studiously avoided putting any economic populists into their administration. And then within minutes, they made this pick.

So, you know, we shouldn't overstate it because there's still very few people you would consider to be like J.D. Vance allies who've been put into the administration. And those tensions you're talking about, I mean, that's not just outside of the Trump world, the Zuckerbergs and the

Sundar Pichai and Tim Cook, or Tim Apple, as Trump likes to call him, who, you know, called Trump and are trying to get in good with him and trying to reassure him and make sure that their companies don't end up being targeted. But, you know, obviously he has, and we're about to get to, he has a lot of

billionaire, more libertarian minded people who are in his administration or who are influential with his administration who are not interested in going in this particular direction. So, you know, those typical like Chamber of Commerce business interests still have a lot of sway in the Republican Party in particular and in Washington in general. So this will be quite a battle to see how this all ultimately turns out.

And let's get to the next one. Speaking of, you know, some of the ideological indications of this administration, this is zero surprise, but still worth taking note of. So the current SEC commissioner is a guy named Gary Gensler, who, among other things, is

has believed that cryptocurrencies should be regulated by the SEC. And the SEC of the various financial regulatory agencies is the most aggressive in terms of enforcement. That created all kinds of, you know, conflicts and recriminations. There was a whole fight about, okay, which agency should really be regulating or not really regulating the crypto industry. And to be honest with you, probably whether it was Kamala or Trump, because the crypto industry has...

spent a lot of money in our electoral system on both sides of the aisle, you were going to get an SE chair who was going to be much more crypto friendly. And that is exactly what Trump has picked here. He picked Paul Atkins to run the SEC. They describe him as a pro-business conservative. He'd previously been an SEC commissioner under George W. Bush. And what he is known for is he's on the advisory board of Securitize digital asset firm that promotes the use of digital tokens.

He's considered to be very friendly to the crypto industry will probably you know push the regulation of this over to one of the other One of the other bodies that will do a lot less in terms of enforcement and then one of the other big things they'll have to decide right away that's pointed out in this article is the SEC had filed a

charges against Coinbase, which is obviously a massive crypto exchange. They charged the company with violating securities law. We had covered this here by failing to register as a broker, allowing unregistered crypto assets to be sold on its platform. So that will be one of the first questions, and it's one of the current SEC Commissioner Gary Gensler's signature cases. Are they going to continue that high-profile enforcement action? I would say it is very unlikely. Oh, no. I mean, listen, for anybody who is paying attention,

Tyler Winklevoss and Cameron Winklevoss and who else? All of the other, the entire crypto industry, the Bitcoin conference, they did not give $1 million to Trump for free. Donald Trump did not change his mind on crypto for free. I actually remember when he was president because I freaked out about it.

whenever he tweeted against Bitcoin. Bitcoin itself, hilariously, is actually a very counter to Donald Trump. Donald Trump is obsessed with the strong dollar. That's why he loves tariffs and that's why he wants to impose tariffs on the BRICS countries who are pursuing an alternative currency. But the truth is, is that the immense amount of wealth in Bitcoin is now basically undeniable.

As of this morning, Bitcoin officially crossed the 100,000 threshold, something I never dreamed in a million years that I would actually get to see this day. I was shitposting memes about Bitcoin going to the moon when it was at $9,000, just for context. I remember that.

I was talking to you about it. Should have listened. Should have listened. Bought my first Bitcoin, I think in 2015, just for context. And I thought I was late. I was like, there's no way. And it's all going to go to zero. So worked out. But the point is, is that with Bitcoin itself, it has now become, look, I mean, this is a multi-gajillion dollar industry because we're not even talking about Bitcoin. We're talking about platforms like Gemini, which are owned by the

by the Winklevii. Then you've got the Coinbase itself, a multi-billion dollar company. I mean, this is clearly here to stay. There's just no getting around it. You've got Bitcoin ETFs now that have happened. What the SEC did, just do it. This is nerdy, so stick with me.

is that they decided crypto should be regulated as a security and that every transaction on the blockchain would have to comply with securities laws. There's a specific test that the Supreme Court has determined, or maybe some other court, I forget. The financial guys can explain it to me. But effectively, there's like a type of regulation which goes into play legally that requires an immense amount of compliance.

if you want to be able to transact like that under the current SEC regime. It has been the basically of the crypto industry since that went into place in 2022 under Gary Gensler to have that guidance reversed. And it was one of the main reasons that a lot of these tech people decided to back Donald Trump. So again, they're gonna get what they paid for. - That's right. - And you know, yeah. And they're probably gonna get some of it under Comline too. - They were. I mean, you remember Mark Cuban was sweating himself

for SEC chair. Yeah, that's why. Yeah, exactly. And, you know, it was clear, like, there was a war on Gary Gensler, and that war had already been won before this election. And one of the seminal moments was, because it's crazy, because you have the whole Sam Bankman-Fried thing, right? This massive fraud is exposed, and this was just like a house of cards and a total Ponzi scheme, and he goes to prison, and, you know, he's giving all kinds of money publicly to Democrats and more secretly to Republicans. And so you would have thought

that that would have dealt a blow to their influence in DC, but not at all. On the contrary, they sort of got smart from there. They lobby and organize super PACs just like every other major interest. In fact, crypto was one of, if not the largest contributor to

the 2024 elections by industry in this entire election. But one of the seminal moments in this fight was Katie Porter, who had been adversarial to them. And it's not like they're like, oh, we have to get rid of Bitcoin. It's like, we're going to enforce securities regulations, as Sagar was explaining, using the SEC. And so they're more adversarial, Elizabeth Warren being part of that wing as well. So in any case, they dropped millions of dollars in Katie Porter's race.

And they were able to defeat her. And that really sent a chill across any legislator who had been more adversarial to crypto. And since then, they've all just been folding like a deck of cards on both sides of the aisle. So, yeah, even before, you know, Trump was able to win the

They had already basically locked in a more friendly regime, whether it was Kamala or whether it was Trump. And of course, we can't forget Trump himself has his own stupid cryptocurrency at this point as well. And, you know, there's a lot that's disturbing about that in terms of the possibility for corruption. Last time in the Trump administration, the way for people to get in good with Trump was to stay at his hotel.

and very demonstrably and performatively stay at his hotel and secure a large block of rooms and spend lots and lots of money. Now they can just buy a bunch of his crypto. Crypto coin? Crypto coin. Is it called Trump coin? Whatever it's called. Anyway, they can do that, and there's already a lot of indication that that's already happening, by the way. So yeah, he's all in with them. Crystal is a hawk to a coin. Oh my God. She apparently was pumping...

I don't know. Look, I am pro. Look, you kind of have to admire this lady for the way she's capitalized on her 10 minutes. I told you about this morning. I've been involved in the sports gambling fight. And by the way, I will do a very long magnum opus about why sports gambling online is very bad. But honestly, I am just resigned at this point. Americans are obsessed with pissing their money away. I just don't know what to do at this point.

Like they love weed, they are addicted to weed, they wanna send it all to OnlyFans addicts whenever they eventually win, OnlyFans models when they win. They just want to gamble and to buy meme shit coins. It's like, I don't know what to do at a certain point. It's like, you know, should we stop people from doing what they want at a certain point? Like, I just don't know. - Well, he wants you with gambling, right? - No, but that's what I'm saying. I'm like, what's the point of the fight at this? You know, the token for Hak'tu hit $500 million.

That's how much people pumped into this thing. I'm not for- She didn't force anybody to buy it. No, I'm not for like bad, but there have been a lot of like out and out scam. I agree, but they want, people want to be scammed. And that should be enforced. It's clear. I don't think people want to be scammed. I think they do. I'm serious. The promise of crypto was always like, you know, that, what is it? Fortune favors the brave. Oh, that's crypto.com. That's not to be confused with. I know, but I'm just saying that's like the ethos.

You have a bunch of people who, you know, we have this society where it's impossible to buy a fucking house. It's impossible to afford health care, not like, you know, die for one of coverage, et cetera. It's impossible to afford an education. All these things take so many more years. Wages don't keep up with inflation. And so this is like sold as a chance to be one of the players, like to have a shot. It's almost like a lotto ticket.

Right? It's like, that's what it feels. It is, I mean, it's gambling. It's not any different really than the sports betting thing. It taps into that same sense of like, this at least gives me a chance of being able to make it and have the life that I envision for myself and my family. And,

I think any time you're tapping into that, you know, it's – I'm not saying I'm, you know, probably more libertarian on these things than you are, Sagar. I'm not saying it should be banned, but it should be regulated. It should definitely be regulated. And obviously we've seen in our lifetimes how when a massive speculatory bubble emerges, how it can be absolutely devastating not only for the people who are directly implicated but for the economy. That's my point and that's why I get annoyed.

Everyone's like, let me gamble on my phone. And it's like, okay, fine. But then don't come crying to me whenever we have to send police officers to your house because you're pissed drunk and you're beating up your wife. And by the way, that's been happening tremendously all across the entire nation. Or whenever you drink yourself near to death and we have to send EMTs and we have to pay for your health care bills. Or it can go on forever in terms of the social services that all of this stuff involves.

is going to cost. But people are addicted to it. I just, I honestly, I feel very blackpilled today just with the response on online gambling with, you know, this Hawk Tua thing. And it's like, how many rug pulls do we go through? I know. Through 2020. How many? And people are still doing it. I don't know. Should we save people from themselves at this point? Like, what's the point? They're addicted to it. It's like, whatever. Whatever.

I'm sure someone will clip this out. I think we should protect people from scam artists. I agree with you, but they don't want to. They don't want it. Of course they do. No, but they don't. Nobody wants to be scammed. Yeah. No one wants to be scammed. Scammed. I mean,

Every time you bet a parlay bet on sports gambling, you're getting scammed. Guess what the number one most profitable and most bet thing on sports gambling? Parlay bet. What are we supposed to do at a certain point? You know, they like it. They think it's fun. It probably is whenever you put a little money into Hawk Tour or whatever. Also, to be fair, when I bought Bitcoin, it was specifically because of the stateless promise. I never thought it would become some ETF like gold thing.

speculative asset. I bought into the OG vision around the idea of like getting around the state, people in Argentina using it to buy houses. And at this point, I mean, that's just that, I mean, that is a small percentage. Yeah. I mean, look, if we're being honest, it's just speculative, like, you know, yeah, it's just, it's just gambling. I think the promise of it is that now, actually now it is so much money that you actually could start to use it and

I mean, at this point, a sizable portion of the world's billionaires are now Bitcoin billionaires. None of us will ever know who they are. But I mean, once Bitcoin crossed 100,000, which it did in the last several hours, that's genuinely like a shocking moment for the world economy. If it ever passes 500,000 or a million, that's when you're, I think the majority of the world's billionaires would be Bitcoin billionaires. So I don't know. Maybe it will change something. I still believe in some of that vision from the old days. To be honest with you, I actually do too.

Maybe from a somewhat different, not that different though perspective from you of like, you know, using Bitcoin to evade US sanctions regime and things like that. Not even that, but like banks. Like that part I support, you know. Oh yeah, but remember the Canadian truckers thing and like that was a real wake up call whenever they were still able to go down on the exchanges and be able to seize Bitcoin.

their crypto, there's still a long way to go. The point is, is that guys, now we actually, there's a ton of money out there. If you bought Bitcoin, you know, early, there's, you're sitting on some sizable profits. You could actually invest in some of this alternative ecosystem, like you were talking about with sanctions. But I mean, there's a million use cases, which ironically could be good. And I would like to see some of that. But

unfortunately a lot of it has evolved into FTX, Hawk to a meme. What was the other one? Safe Moon? I think that was another favorite one that people were talking about. So anyways, look, I don't know. This is a long, this is a more psychological thing, but I'm just, I am stunned and amazed at people's want and addiction to want to

To piss their money away. I don't get it. I do. I don't get it. It's because, I mean, it does come out of this like. At a certain point. Well, there's a few, I mean, there's a few things. There's, like I was saying, this sense like I have no other shot. Like this is my shot. You know, it's the people that you see lined up at the gas station buying the lotto tickets. Like, you know. Yeah, well, there's another one. This is my shot. It's that same energy. Yeah.

And then, you know, there's a lot of sophisticated scammers out of there is definitely, definitely part of it. And yeah, I think that we have a responsibility as society to, at the very least, try to regulate and protect people from the most overt scams and try to make them whole when they are scammed rather than just being like, oh, well, you're an idiot and you shouldn't have gotten scammed. You know, because sometimes these things can be very sophisticated. They can be targeted at any number of vulnerable groups

who can be manipulated into thinking that this is their big shot. But even when it's regulated, like Lotto, they have to tell you the odds, right? How many people, when I go to 7-Eleven to go buy a Big Gulp, Diet Coke, by the way, how many people are right next to me buying these scratch-off Lotto tickets? They know the odds, and they still play it. I just don't. If you ever come into Union Station here in D.C., they have a D.C. Lotto store. The line is out the door for people who are purchasing these things. I don't know, man.

At least those usually go to fund like education in the state or whatever. This is just going to make rich people richer. But think about how disgusting that is then. Like here in the city of Washington, if you line out the door, half the guys are homeless. And they're the ones who are paying for it so people can go to school? What's your... No, I agree with that. I mean, it is a tax on the poor. And that's why I think there should be a lot of protections in place. But I mean, do you have the same... Like, do you think sports gambling should be banned?

No, I don't think sports gambling online should be legal, period. You don't think it should be legal? No, sports gambling online. So the difference is that, look, for Vice, I have come to the terms, people are going to do it. There's nothing you can get around. You should have to go to a casino. A lot of the, in the UK and elsewhere, they have physical shops in people's neighborhoods where you have to go to place your bet.

And one of the reasons why is that online, first of all, the actual products that are sold to people online are the most degenerate, like horrible financial products that exist. But so you are in favor of some level of protection for people's skin.

Crystal, I am, but they don't want it. If you put that on the ballot, it would go down by 80%. People love gambling on their phone. I mean, so, I mean, I'm just trying to see if the position is consistent here. So when it comes to sports gambling, you want to have some level of protection. People can't do it on their phones. When it comes to like crypto gambling,

which I think is the same. I'm pro-regulation on a lot of this stuff. My point is just that I feel at a complete resignation of the fact is, is that every single time this comes to a test of the Vox Populi, people don't want more regulation. They want to be able to do, you know, whatever they want. I don't know

about that, Sagar. I really do. I don't know about that because I don't think people want to just be like fed to the wolves. You know, I think they want their shot. I think, yes, they want to be able to have that dream. And then it also gets a deeper like, you know, social conversation similar to the one we were having before about how much of our social contract here is centered around like consumption and what that means and also how difficult it is here to be able to just like achieve a

basic stability and things like healthcare. And that contributes to the sense of desperation that leads you to take what would seemingly be irrational risks. Maybe. Yeah. You certainly are. This is a much deeper thing. I will do my magnum opus. I'm going to write it. It's going to be like 30, 40 minutes long at this point. I've been thinking about it a lot. But just to give you an example, sorry to monopolize this. I went on the Matt and Shane podcast, right? And this is the ultimate bro podcast.

And I used it intentionally as a platform to speak against the dangers of weed and of gambling. I have never received more hate in my life than talking. Yeah, but that's partly the audience you're talking to. But that's why I did it. I did it with that purpose, is I wanted to go into the lion's den and just be like, look, you're never gonna hear this from anybody else, at least in the circles that you people are...

oh, this is the fun police, Buzz Killington, and all of that. It's like, okay, it's like if your version of fun is coming home from work from an underpaid job, pissing your money away on alcohol, and then getting on your phone to watch the game, and then throwing even more of your money away on parlay bets, like what can I do for you at a certain, and then getting mad

By telling you, you are losing money. You are wasting it away. You are taking away your chances to build a better life. I don't know. At a certain point, I don't know what to do. The response I got to that, it was shocking. It was hilarious. I mean, it is funny. I'll be fine. You keep doing what you want to do. But it's one of those where, like, I don't know what... At a certain point, how can you help people who actively want to participate in their own destruction? It's so, like, I mean...

These companies, they spend so much money researching like how to tap into these deep human inclinations. I know. And manipulate you. I mean, it's very similar with like, you know, the way that everything's gamified and algorithmically generated on the phone and how impossible it feels as a parent to be able to like pull your kids away from the constant. It's the same like systems of dopamine that are just being manipulated by these companies. So I don't know. I have, um, I,

like I don't really get it myself. Gambling isn't something that like has a pull for me, but I know enough people who, for whom it really does have that pull. And I have a lot of empathy for that. I'm open about it. I like gambling. I like to go to a casino and gamble. I have set limits and all these other things around, but you know what's so important about it? You have to go physically. You have to be around, by the way, other real degenerates. When you see people who haven't showered in three days, seeing that is really important because you're like, oh my God, I don't want to end up like this.

person. But when you're on your phone, you're the sucker. That's the thing they don't tell you. You have no idea how many other suckers that are out there. On top of, you just talked about the algorithm. It's very true. They use it specifically. Imagine Facebook adification applied to gambling. I mean, the things that the DraftKings and FanDuel get away with, they dream in Las Vegas of being able to get away with the quote unquote hold of what they do. Except

It happens every day on the couch. I mean, I've talked about this before. New Jersey bettors lost $200 million in a single month betting online casino games on their phone. Total, they lost about $500 million in the month of September just gambling. New Jersey is not a big state. That is, it's like a giant suck hole. Like, like...

predominantly from the least, you know, what is it, from the least affluent part of society. Like, I don't know. You know, at a certain point, it just, we could talk about this more in a little bit. Well, I just, I would just say, I actually think the idea of you have to go to the casino, I don't think that's a bad idea. I'm kind of open. I'm like a little ambivalent because I got to think about it a little bit more, but I'm kind of open to that. I just, you know, I also, I feel a similar way about,

Like, I don't feel any different about crypto betting and gambling than I do about online sports betting. I think it taps into the exact same thing, which is why I think it was important what Gary Gensler was doing just to bring it back to where we started this conversation. We'll see. Yeah, indeed. We're going to save the Trump billionaire cabinet conversation for – we'll hold that one for next – maybe I'll do a monologue about it.

But in any case, there's a lot of billionaires in Trump's cabinet, and that's something that we should be thinking about and what their influence is going to be. Elon Musk being the most important example there since he's literally the richest man on Earth. Are you ready to move easily and independently without pain or stiffness holding you back? Do you want to look in the mirror and see a hydrated glow instead of fine lines and wrinkles? Now you can with Native Paths Collagen.

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Let's go ahead and move over to the Democratic side of the equation though here with Rahm Emanuel, who, you know, extremely important in the Obama era, but really with this guy.

You can go back to any number of Democratic crimes that were committed against this country, including NAVDA. It was an important advisor under Bill Clinton as well. And you can find Rahm Emanuel there. There's all kinds of stories about him during the Obama administration. Apparently, he did not want Obama to try to reform health care at all.

He pushed against that. He famously, you know, he went out and recruited all these quote unquote like moderates, neoliberals who were very pro-corporate. That was his whole orientation when he was, you know, running, effectively running the party. And so now he is, he's actually ambassador to Japan is where the Biden administration stuck him after being mayor of Chicago, very controversial tenure as mayor of Chicago. And now he has come back out of the wilderness, so to speak,

David Axelrod floated him for DNC chair. He's already sort of ruled out. He doesn't want that particular position. But he's clearly trying to position himself as an important voice in the party going forward and probably for some new elected position. So he went on CNN and he made some of the most extraordinary comments given his own complicity

in the rage that this country justifiably feels about both the lack of accountability on the Iraq war and the lack of accountability with regard to the financial collapse. Let's take a listen to what he had to say. - The Iraq war, which the American people were deceived, spent trillions of dollars, thousands of soldiers lost their lives, people maimed for life. People were deceived and lied into a war and not one person responsible for that deception

ever was held accountable. Six years later, the financial industry lies to the American people. People lose their homes, their livelihood, and the bankers are screaming for their bonuses. Nobody held accountable. He's right. But Rahm was going to hold them accountable. You were chief of staff to Barack Obama when the decision to not hold these people accountable, when those all

occurred, whether it was the Iraq war or whether it was the the scamming, the mass scamming. We're just talking about this on Wall Street of ordinary people that led to 10 million homeowners being kicked out of their homes in a near global economic collapse and catastrophe, which we are still recovering from, by the way, and which has created the entire political era that we live in right now. So for him to go on CNN soccer and just like, oh, you know, be able to

correctly identify the problem and absolve himself of any blame or complicity in this is really quite extraordinary. And it's also very clear what he's doing. Because you have to say some of these things at this point. It's just undeniable. You have to say some of these things at this point. Yeah, but it's 15, 20 years too late. Well, yes, that. But also, it's an attempt to rehab himself and his political project, the very people who made these disastrous and evil, ultimately, decisions,

Yeah, and David Sirota makes a good point. Let's put that one up on the screen from C2 about Rahm Emanuel saying, quote,

Weighing, quote, third term, Emanuel relies on campaign donors who get city hall benefits. Emanuel was the quintessential Wall Street Democrat. I actually really recommend people go and read some early histories of the Obama era because Rahm is probably one of the most important.

- Oh yeah. - In that. And he embodied the Clintonian machine. He worked for Bill Clinton and for Hillary Clinton. He was a bundler. He comes from a very powerful family. His brother, Ari Emanuel, is like the biggest super agent in Hollywood. - Yeah, runs WME. - I think he's like a billionaire, head of WME.

et cetera, but the point is that-- - And his other brother was very involved in healthcare. - Yeah, I was gonna say, so his other brother, what's his name, Zeke, I think? - Yes, that's right. - Zeke Emanuel is, I think he was the head of CMS or something like that, one of the most powerful people in American healthcare. These people, in particular Rahm, embodied the Terry McAuliffe ideal of wheeling and dealing and raising big money. I once saw Big Terry in action at the Palm, and I've never seen anybody more at home.

Oh. In Washington. Let me tell you. Just glad-handing, sitting around with some rich people. I've been in many rooms with Terry McAuliffe. He's a fundraising machine. Loves to work a room, let me tell you. He's a fundraising machine. He lived there. They're like, oh yeah, this is his regular table here at the Palm here in Washington, which is like a, I don't even know. It's not even that great of a restaurant. It's fine.

But anyway, that's the tradition that he comes from. And the background in the '92 campaign, and he was built up by the Clintons. So Obama really picked him because he wanted a Wheeler dealer, kind of Chicago connection as well, to be there. And lo and behold, look at the decisions

that were made, both in advisory over healthcare, but actually even more importantly is about bailouts and about the general political direction of the Obama administration. On Iraq as well, I mean, he was the chief of staff to Barack Obama when Obama decided the half-assed maneuvers in Afghanistan, the surge and then the non-surge. I mean, just everything that happened.

under that administration. If you wanted to pinpoint, if you wanted to blame on one person why Obama goes from running on change and being a different sort of politician to just being a continuation of the Clinton era, like Rahm Emanuel would be a good person to situate that way. I would just blame Barack

I mean, yes, of course. Obviously, ultimately. But, you know, this is the guy who was the chief of staff. So he's involved in all of the staffing decisions, the direction of the administration. Like, he is at the scene of the crime on all of the bad decisions that were made in the Obama administration. So for him to come out and be like, you know what? People should have been held accountable. It's like,

Oh, yeah. You think? Where were you when people during the Obama administration were not being held accountable? Oh, that's right. You were in one of the most powerful and influential positions in the entire United States government. I do want to say in fairness to Ezra Klein, I read the transcript of the entire podcast that he did with Rahm Emanuel, and he actually raises a good number of these points with Rahm. And Rahm totally tries to reinvent history for himself.

And positioned himself as like, well, I was there behind the scenes saying that we need some, quote, Old Testament justice, that that's what we need in this moment. But he goes on to say, not even in the form of, it's kind of a sleight of hand here.

Because he says, we need some Old Testament justice when it comes to reform. But this was not someone who was for breaking up the big banks. And even in this rehab, he doesn't say that any of these bankers should have gone to prison. He's just saying like, oh, we should have been more aggressive about how we messaged about reform, basically, is his take here. So I don't know what he has planned. We can put this up on the screen. The Chicago Sun-Times say he's ruled out being DNC chair, but his

far from done with politics. Do you think this man, I think he might have the arrogance to think he could run for president. Oh, definitely. Because the other logical thing would be governor of Illinois. J.B. Pritzker is already in there and I think he can run for re-election again and I think is planning to and Rahm has already said he'll be 100% behind J.B.

J.B. Pritzker, were he to run for governor again? But maybe that's what he has in mind is that Governor Steve, maybe J.B. is thinking he's going to run for president. I don't know. But you definitely have not heard the last of Rahm Emanuel. He never gave up. By the way, it's funny. I just came from Japan. He pissed a lot of people off in Japan.

Oh, really? As our ambassador. Yeah, he did some social meddling over there where it's complicated. But basically they were debating gay marriage in Japan and Rahm Emanuel tried to insert himself and he actually tried to pursue a big media profile and actually caused a major diplomatic incident in the country. In general, from what I heard when I was in Tokyo, he's not one of the most well-liked ambassadors to ever be interviewed.

It was actually weird that he decided to go over there at all, especially because maybe it was a decision by Biden to get him out of the country. Very, very possible. Yeah, well, we were all, remember, we were tracking closely at the beginning of the Biden administration. Like, oh my God, are they going to bring Rahm Emanuel back? Because he was floated for a lot of like actually influential positions. I mean, not to like downplay Ambassador in Japan. I'm sure that's important.

blah, blah, blah. But it's not that influential in terms of actual policy settings. So we were all kind of relieved. We were like, all right, fine. Send Rahm to Japan. Let them deal with him, I guess. It's a side thing, but it's really sad, actually. Have you seen that show, The Diplomat? I've only watched it once. It's terrible. Realistically, it's awful. I don't know about the actual plot. I just couldn't get over the differences. But the biggest conceit of the show is the idea that the ambassador matters. And it's like...

Guys, ambassadors have not mattered since people can pick up the phone and talk to each other. Like ever since that red line, or was it the red phone between John F. Kennedy and Khrushchev, that killed great ambassadorships. That's why billionaires love it, because they get to go over there and just live in the official residence and gallivant around the country for like four years. But that's an aside. So anyway, The Diplomat, fake show, completely fake news. ♪

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