0:05

Hello and welcome back to Drilled.

0:07

I'm Amy Westervelt. A little bit

0:10

earlier this season, we ran an

0:12

episode on a global network of

0:14

think tanks called the Atlas Network.

0:18

We did a print piece as well. A

0:22

version of that piece ran with the New

0:24

Republic and a couple of other outlets.

0:27

In that work, we looked at some of the ideas

0:30

and tactics that seemed to be

0:32

spreading across the Atlas

0:34

Network, aimed at laying the groundwork

0:37

to criminalize certain types of environmental

0:39

protests. I had actually reached

0:41

out to Atlas, wanting to interview someone

0:43

about the network and specifically

0:46

wanting to talk to a woman named

0:48

Magat Wade, who runs their Center

0:50

for African Prosperity. I didn't

0:53

hear anything back and to be honest,

0:55

I kind of assumed that they just didn't want to talk

0:58

to me because Atlas sort of has

1:00

that reputation. So that was me

1:02

maybe being a little bit lazy. Anyway,

1:05

after that story came out, Wade was

1:07

pretty upset about it and she took to

1:09

Twitter and challenged me,

1:12

our reporter Jeff Dambicke, and

1:15

New Republic editor Molly Taft to

1:17

a debate. I let her know

1:19

that actually I had really wanted to talk to her

1:21

for the story and I tried, so would

1:23

love to schedule a time to talk. And

1:26

talk we did. It

1:27

was definitely a little debatey sometimes, but

1:30

also an interesting window into

1:33

how certain ideas about the climate movement

1:35

are being shaped. We're gonna get

1:37

back to our anti-protest series

1:40

soon, but in the meantime, I'm gonna

1:42

be bringing you some bonus episodes

1:44

featuring what I've been calling messy

1:47

conversations. Sometimes

1:49

with people I don't necessarily agree

1:51

with, sometimes with people I very

1:54

much do. First up, Magat

1:56

Wade, who heads up

1:57

the Center for African Prosperity.

2:00

for the Atlas Network. This week

2:03

she's at a convening for a

2:05

new group that brings together quite

2:07

a few different Atlas member

2:09

think tank folks. It's

2:11

called the Alliance for Responsible

2:14

Citizenship. It's spearheaded

2:16

by Jordan Peterson, backed

2:18

by several of the entities

2:21

that funded the push for Brexit,

2:24

and includes not only folks like Magat

2:27

and Arthur Brooks, the former president

2:29

of the American Enterprise Institute,

2:32

and the folks leading

2:33

the state financial officers foundation,

2:36

a group that's funded by

2:38

a whole batch of Atlas

2:40

Network tanks like the Heartland Institute,

2:43

the Heritage Foundation,

2:46

but also a whole cast

2:48

of folks from the climate-septic

2:51

slash climate denial crowd.

2:53

You've got GOP

2:55

candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, who's

2:58

been sort of the king of the anti-ESG

3:01

or quote-unquote

3:01

woke capital conversations.

3:05

You've got Michael Schellenberger, author

3:07

of A-H-O-K-A-L-I-C-E-N-E-R.

3:09

You've got Bjorn Lumborg,

3:11

who

3:12

pushes a similar kind of approach to the Schellenberger,

3:14

this idea that sure climate change is happening

3:17

but it's not happening fast enough to

3:19

warrant extreme changes. You've

3:22

got Alex Epstein, the guy who authored

3:24

the quote-unquote moral case for fossil

3:27

fuels. This group, the

3:29

Alliance for Responsible Citizenship,

3:31

or ARC, was

3:32

put on my radar by a tip a few months

3:35

ago. I shared that with Deesmogg,

3:37

who's written some really great and helpful

3:39

profiles of both the organization and

3:41

some of the members in it, which

3:43

I'll link to in the show notes.

3:45

It's been interesting to see how they have evolved,

3:48

how they've added different people, and

3:50

what sorts of things are getting discussed. What's

3:54

particularly interesting to me about ARC

3:56

is that it's doing this thing that happens

3:58

a lot on the record.

3:59

and not

4:00

so much on the left, which

4:03

is bringing together lots of

4:05

sort of cause-a-leb under one

4:07

tent. So you've got the anti-climate

4:10

people, you've got the anti-feminist

4:13

people, anti-trans

4:15

people, they're all meeting together

4:18

to discuss the supposed

4:20

end

4:21

of Western civilization as we know

4:23

it. They're all meeting together this

4:25

week in London, so I thought it would

4:27

be a

4:28

good time to bring you this conversation.

4:30

I hope you enjoy it. Please

4:33

get in touch with all the things you would

4:35

have said in this conversation. Knowing

4:37

exactly what to say in the moment is

4:40

not always my strong suit, which

4:42

you'll see here because I definitely took the liberty

4:44

of cutting in to say some things I wish

4:47

I had thought of at the time. Anyhow,

4:50

all feedback and complaints welcome.

4:52

It might even turn into another messy

4:55

conversation. Enjoy.

5:10

Hello?

5:14

Hi, my God, can you hear me? Yes,

5:16

I can hear you. Awesome.

5:18

I'm gonna turn my video on to say hi,

5:20

but then I might turn it off just because I

5:23

live in a place with pretty spotty Wi-Fi.

5:26

No problem. So you can see I'm a person.

5:28

Hello.

5:29

Hi.

5:33

Oh yeah, so thanks first of all for

5:36

being here. I appreciate that.

5:38

Yeah. So Amy, I think first I'm gonna

5:40

start

5:40

just for the people who are going to be listening to

5:42

this and what might be how

5:45

we got here. Maybe I'm just gonna give everybody a

5:47

background. So I think it was not

5:49

Friday of last the Friday of the

5:51

previous week. I think it was. I

5:54

got a note from my team members over

5:56

at Atlas and they said, Hey, I got this article

5:59

that came out on the...

5:59

New Republic and see I'm reading here

6:02

the title,

6:03

it was called Meet the shadowy

6:06

global network villain-fying

6:08

climate protesters.

6:10

And so the whole thing was pretty

6:12

much what I call a headpiece.

6:14

And on me, you give me a paragraph

6:16

on there and I'm going to read it for people.

6:19

And it says, my gateway who

6:21

had an internal atlas

6:23

project called the Center for African prosperity,

6:25

right, completely cites the SODO

6:27

as an inspiration for her take on Africa

6:30

and climate change. In multiple op-eds

6:32

over the past few years and in an interview

6:35

this year with Canadian professor and

6:37

right-wing figurehead, Jordan Peterson, Wade,

6:40

who was born in Senegal but moved to Germany

6:42

when she was seven, describes

6:44

climate activists as a nuclear

6:46

illness, arguing that climate action

6:49

will keep Africans poor and deprive

6:51

them of access to energy. Wade

6:54

often depict those who would deny the continent

6:56

its current fossil fuel boom as out

6:59

of touch elitist and regularly

7:01

claims that climate action will kill a billion

7:03

Africans all while refusing

7:06

to engage with the fact that African climate

7:08

activists are being arrested at

7:10

an alarming rate.

7:11

So that's the piece that was written about

7:14

me.

7:15

Well, so

7:16

two things. One I would clarify

7:18

that the piece was about you. As you

7:20

said, there was one paragraph

7:23

in a 4,000-word piece, which was not meant

7:25

to give

7:25

you short shrift. It's just there's like

7:27

nearly 600 atlas

7:30

network think tanks to get to. And the

7:32

thing that we were looking at was how ideas

7:35

spread within and throughout

7:37

the atlas network, not

7:39

any particular think tanks work.

7:43

But in saying that, also worth

7:45

noting, actually the original piece

7:48

is more like 6,000 words and includes

7:50

a lot more on your

7:51

work and trying to look

7:53

at different economic

7:56

studies and things like that, which is on our

7:58

site at drill.media.

7:59

New Republic trimmed

8:02

out quite a bit of the story so I'm

8:04

happy to send you a link to that as

8:06

well. And yeah

8:08

I have actually a bunch of questions that I

8:11

would love to ask you about

8:13

your work and I submitted a contact

8:15

request through the Atlas Network

8:17

a couple of times and didn't get anything

8:19

back but I was looking through my inbox

8:21

this morning. Would you speak specifically

8:23

to me? To you and also

8:26

to

8:26

fact check various things with the

8:28

sort of Atlas Network. Headquarters as well

8:31

but I just saw in my inbox this morning

8:33

that I got bounced replies

8:36

to that. Yeah.

8:36

Because me when I'm trying to reach out to someone and they're

8:39

not getting back to me,

8:39

I forgot usually when I first made a

8:42

check. Do I even have to write email? But I'm like

8:44

okay. It was like in my

8:46

you know went to my Proposions folder. I agree

8:49

like I would have much preferred

8:52

to speak to you before the piece came

8:54

out and also like not just for that piece

8:56

but I find this

8:58

area

8:59

really interesting

9:00

looking at

9:01

the idea of how to

9:03

address energy poverty and climate

9:05

change at the same time, how to do

9:07

that in an equitable way.

9:10

All of those things are big questions that

9:12

I frankly agree with

9:14

a lot of your take on the

9:16

failures of the climate movement to do that.

9:19

So I actually think

9:20

you might be surprised at how much I agree

9:23

with some of the stuff you say.

9:25

I am very happy to hear that I agree with

9:27

my takes and it will be good to compare

9:29

notes and we're going to compare notes. So first

9:31

of all it's good that we basically settled

9:34

this incident about you

9:36

having rich cuts to me because when someone

9:37

was talking to me I talked to them. So

9:40

I'm glad we clarified that but I never

9:43

knew from you that you wanted to speak to me. So that's

9:45

number one and then I'm very

9:47

glad to hear that you share some of my views

9:50

and when you're talking about issues between

9:52

climate change and Africa

9:54

and all of that, the links, I really

9:56

wish that this article had gotten into

9:58

it. because I'm

10:00

going to tell you where I'm coming from. So when

10:03

I go back and I read this piece, Magatway

10:06

is going to head an international actress project. So that's

10:08

fine. Frequently cites the

10:10

SODO as an inspiration. The

10:12

inspiration I cite is always

10:15

for the most part, George

10:17

Iiti, again an economist

10:20

who really has put his finger as

10:22

to why the reason Africa, despite

10:24

its riches and the riches of Africa

10:27

are its people,

10:28

and despite all of that,

10:30

being rich in all of that, we still to

10:33

this day remain sadly in such a wrong

10:35

way,

10:38

still the most

10:40

poor continent in this world. And I'm supposed

10:42

to be with Alice in Africa and I'm not. So

10:44

when you say that I frequently cite you

10:47

or the other three people, because by the way,

10:49

I commend you for your courage to come here and

10:51

speak with me because I would have liked to have a

10:53

courtesy from the other three people who have been involved

10:55

in this piece. But anyways, so whoever

10:58

here did their investigation

11:00

and says that I frequently cite the SODO,

11:03

I would like for me to put in my face. When

11:05

I cite this, usually George Iiti or

11:07

who it is who I cite, and a few

11:09

times I cite the SODO who I also

11:12

have a lot of respect for, has

11:14

to do for, I have to do with his work related

11:16

to the main

11:19

cause as to why my continent is poor because

11:21

what Hernanu de Sodo did, for those who

11:23

don't know, Hernanu de Sodo is a Parisian

11:25

economist. And what he has done,

11:27

him too, like me, has been wondering

11:30

why are people poor because his

11:32

native Peru is a poorer nation as well. And

11:35

he said, I'm going to find out what's going on. And

11:37

him, along

11:39

people like Hayek, because I saw you citing Hayek,

11:41

you see this face is citing a lot of great people,

11:44

but really not

11:46

even understanding why the rest of the world respects these

11:48

people. I don't respect Hayek because

11:50

supposedly he claims that all the

11:52

ills of society are caused by socialism,

11:55

as you put in the piece. I really don't

11:57

like socialism, the philosophy.

12:00

of what socialism means, not what the young people today

12:02

think what socialism is. And that might be a different

12:04

conversation for a different time. But when you talk

12:07

about Hyatt, the reason why people like me really

12:09

appreciate Hyatt is because of how

12:11

Hyatt really is one

12:14

of the few, and I would say probably one of the first

12:16

economists who ever started

12:18

looking in the direction of the entrepreneurs

12:21

as the solution and as the main

12:24

creators of prosperity. All of the other

12:26

economists out there doing some math,

12:28

model calculations, all sorts

12:30

of things that are completely removed from the rest of the

12:33

world. And very important detail.

12:34

The reason why

12:37

some of us are really someone like me

12:39

enjoys Hyatt.

12:40

And I think he has contributed

12:42

a lot

12:42

to the field

12:44

of economics is because of that precise

12:47

insight that he had about the entrepreneur.

12:50

And so going back to DeSoto, Hyatt

12:52

has seen that the entrepreneurs

12:54

have a role to play

12:55

in fighting poverty,

12:57

not NGOs. And that's

12:59

another thing. So

13:02

what DeSoto did, he did an experiment.

13:05

He established himself in a little bit of

13:07

an art spirit of Lima, Peru, and

13:09

he tried to start a little

13:11

business, a little business where they were sewing,

13:14

feeling like really moment pop. He

13:16

was thinking, what happened

13:18

to people like Magat? Because I have

13:21

a small, medium sized enterprise in Africa.

13:24

How does it work for us when we're trying to build a business?

13:26

What's going on? What's happening to us? And

13:29

so he positioned himself as a new body

13:31

and then he went through the process to legally

13:34

register the business. He found that

13:36

it took forever. We're talking here almost

13:38

a two third of the year.

13:40

The amount of money it cost in fees.

13:42

It was pretty much close to

13:44

somebody's salary.

13:45

So he found that it was impossible

13:48

for people like that to start a business. Impossible.

13:50

And so he went on to write this book called The Mystery

13:53

of Capital and explaining all of that.

13:55

And so the times when you would hear someone like

13:57

me fighting DeSoto, it has.

13:59

to do with it, not

14:02

what you're saying here and what

14:04

you're

14:04

saying about the Soto. It was trying

14:06

to make the Soto look very bad here. I'm gonna

14:08

find him. Where

14:10

is the Soto?

14:11

When you're saying that the Soto basically

14:13

went and he told the people

14:16

in the Amazon forest, I'm just, you know,

14:19

summarizing. When

14:20

you say that he went there and he told

14:23

the indigenous people, you know, if

14:25

we give you a piece of the action, it's

14:28

a way to muzzle them up. And

14:30

I'm just like saying, Adini, have you spent

14:33

time in African nations and

14:35

which ones if you have?

14:37

I have not spent much time in Africa.

14:40

I've spent a lot of time in Latin America

14:42

and I live

14:42

in Latin America. Okay. So I'm very familiar

14:45

with how things work in the Soto

14:47

territory. And okay, can

14:49

I just say speak now because, you

14:51

know, you've had a lot of things, it'd be

14:53

good to respond to. So I

14:56

don't think there's anything in there that says, you

14:58

know, this terrible man to

15:00

Soto, it just says what he's argued

15:02

for, which

15:03

is not inaccurate. It is true

15:05

that what he has argued for is for

15:08

property rights and a profit share for

15:10

indigenous people. And what's wrong

15:11

with that? And what's wrong with that? I don't

15:13

say anything wrong with that. I

15:15

would appreciate,

15:18

yeah, being able to finish my sentence. Thank you.

15:21

So he says that, you know, he argues

15:23

that's the fix for

15:26

indigenous protest. And in terms of

15:28

it being a strategy to shut down protest,

15:30

that's very explicitly laid out

15:32

on the ILD website. They have a whole

15:35

site that's called the,

15:37

I think it's the Avatar Miss

15:39

Theory

15:39

or something along those lines.

15:42

And it very explicitly

15:44

says, you know,

15:46

for people that are concerned about the

15:48

impact that indigenous protest is having

15:50

on business and development,

15:53

we believe that this is the solve for

15:55

that

15:56

and kind of lays out how

15:59

to do it.

16:00

All we were trying to show in the piece was how

16:02

this idea kind of starts with DeSoto and

16:05

spreads to multiple other Atlas-Sync

16:07

tanks, which I don't think is inaccurate.

16:10

You know, it's fairly easy

16:11

to follow. And whether or not

16:13

that's a good or bad thing

16:15

is not something that I

16:18

or I think any of my colleagues ever say in the piece. It's

16:20

like, look, this is happening. It's not

16:23

very well-publicized

16:25

that it's happening, and it's a strategy.

16:28

And

16:28

in me, the title of your piece

16:31

says it all, that

16:32

the shadowy

16:35

global network vilifying climate

16:37

protesters. And this is

16:39

the long piece, so I will really recommend

16:42

to everybody to go back and read it. But

16:44

the way this paragraph,

16:46

anybody who would read this paragraph

16:49

in

16:50

the context also of the rest of the piece, and

16:52

also the way this paragraph was written, you're

16:54

making

16:54

a commentary here.

16:56

And with that, I'm going to move on because there's

16:58

a reason why I really wanted to have you on here. So

17:01

the website – so I will ask people to go

17:03

and read this piece, and then you let me know

17:05

your opinion. But this

17:07

whole idea that DeSoto is an anti-climate

17:10

person, I think that's totally misguided.

17:13

But I digress. So next, I –

17:15

Well, actually, that's interesting.

17:17

So how do you kind of frame DeSoto's

17:20

approach on climate action? So

17:22

the bigger talk I want to have is

17:25

bigger and better than DeSoto. So

17:28

if you hear me out, you'll hear exactly where it is that I'm

17:30

going with all of it. Go follow. Yeah.

17:41

Okay, so I'm just going to jump in here for a

17:43

minute to remind folks of why

17:46

we were touching on DeSoto in

17:48

both the written piece and the podcast

17:50

episode about Atlas.

17:59

called red washing.

18:01

And it's a strategy that we see

18:03

other Atlas-thing pinks, particularly the

18:05

American Enterprise Institute in the US

18:08

and the McDonald-Laurier Institute in Canada,

18:11

starting to deploy over the years, often

18:14

using the same rhetoric and arguments

18:16

as DeSoto. Here's a snippet

18:18

from our episode on Atlas, just

18:21

to jog your memory.

18:30

One of the very first think tanks

18:32

created by this newly

18:34

formed Atlas Network was

18:36

the Institute for Liberty and Democracy

18:39

in Peru.

18:40

It was started the same year the Atlas Network

18:42

started, 1981, and its founder

18:44

was a well-known economist, Hernando

18:47

De Soto. De Soto came up with

18:49

a theory that wound up reverberating

18:51

throughout the Atlas Network universe.

18:54

It's a really good example of just how

18:56

much these think tanks talk to each other and

18:59

how ideas spread.

19:04

Here he is giving a TED Talk in 2011,

19:07

explaining his strategy for dealing with

19:10

indigenous environmental activism.

19:12

He

19:21

says part of the problem is they don't have

19:24

titles to property.

19:30

If

19:34

you ask why, certain international

19:37

organizations and environmental groups will say, well,

19:39

you know, indigenous people don't want to be landowners.

19:41

They wander around the forest. But

19:44

when he went there with his colleagues,

19:47

he saw immense

19:48

poverty.

19:49

De Soto started to think about this whole situation

19:52

a lot more because of a bloody standoff

19:55

between indigenous land defenders and police

19:58

in Peru.

19:59

Dozens of people are estimated

20:02

to have been killed in clashes between police and

20:04

indigenous activists protesting oil

20:06

and mining projects in the northern Peruvian

20:08

Amazonian province of Bagua. Indigenous

20:11

leaders were protesting the encroachment

20:13

on their land by various

20:15

interests, including timber, mining

20:19

and oil and gas.

20:21

Eyewitness accounts indicate the

20:23

police fired live ammunition and tear

20:25

gas into the crowd. Alberto

20:27

Pizango, the leader of the National Indigenous

20:30

Organization, the Peruvian Jungle Inter-Ethnic

20:33

Development Association, or EDICEP,

20:35

accused the government of President Alan Garcia

20:38

of ordering the quote genocide of the indigenous

20:40

communities.

20:42

Our

20:48

brothers are cornered. I

20:51

want to put the responsibility on the government.

20:54

We are going to put the responsibility on

20:56

Alan Garcia's government

20:58

for ordering this genocide.

21:00

De

21:05

Soto argues that the solution to all

21:07

of this is just

21:08

to cut indigenous groups in on

21:10

the

21:10

profits.

21:24

To give them property rights and

21:26

a share of resource and mineral rights

21:29

so that they will stop protesting for

21:32

control over their land. This

21:35

idea shows up again in Canada

21:37

a couple years later when

21:39

the McDonald-Laurier Institute, another

21:42

Atlas network think tank and a partner

21:44

of the Fraser Institute, starts

21:47

to put out a bunch of papers in the wake

21:50

of indigenous led protests there.

21:53

Go back and listen to the rest of that episode

21:55

if you haven't

21:55

heard it yet. We're going to

21:57

take a quick break here and get back to my question.

21:59

conversation with LaGatwe in

22:02

a minute. Stay

22:03

with us.

22:20

If you ever get the sense that there's

22:23

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24:07

Environmental justice is a talking

24:09

point in every politician's toolkit,

24:11

but do you ever wonder where it all began?

24:14

On this week's through line, we're taking you

24:16

back to 1978, where a fight against a toxic

24:20

dump in North Carolina started

24:22

the environmental justice movement. It's

24:25

in NPR's Climate Week, and listen

24:27

to Through Line, wherever you get your podcasts.

24:33

If you are banking with most banks,

24:36

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24:38

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24:41

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24:44

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24:47

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24:49

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24:52

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25:54

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25:57

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25:58

with a company that is supportive.

25:59

a carbon-free future, head

26:02

to Atmos.com.

26:26

So, earlier when we started,

26:28

you said that you don't actually disagree

26:31

with a lot of things that I say about the climate. Where

26:33

anybody that knows a little bit of my work on all

26:36

of this, my whole thing,

26:38

my full purpose in this

26:40

world,

26:41

the field I will die on

26:44

is prosperity for Africans. And

26:48

I want that

26:48

in my next. And

26:52

for prosperity to be built, there's

26:54

only one way only prosperity

26:56

can be built.

26:58

Prosperity is built by entrepreneurs.

26:59

Entrepreneurs need

27:02

what we call the toolkit of the entrepreneurs.

27:05

In there, primarily the way you sum

27:07

up everything that they need, this concept of

27:09

rule of law, clear and transferable

27:12

property rights, all of it is

27:14

very important for the entrepreneur to be able

27:16

to enterprise.

27:17

Economists also call it economic freedom. The

27:20

best way to call it is just, is an

27:22

individual, especially if you are a nobody

27:24

individual, somewhere can you

27:27

or not

27:28

start and run a business easily.

27:31

And when it comes to that, you have multiple

27:34

economic indexes that measure that

27:36

very simple situations.

27:39

And one of them was the doing business index

27:42

of a World

27:43

Bank. And then you have another one of the

27:45

economic freedom index of the Fraser Institute.

27:47

Another guy that you guys make

27:49

out to sound like this conspiracy

27:52

out there, trying to destroy the

27:54

world with their right wing ideas. So

27:57

there again, these people that should demonize,

28:00

to demonize people like me actually happen

28:02

to love. I love the Fraser Institute

28:04

insofar as they focus on economic

28:07

freedom and really pointing there too. Because

28:10

when it comes to economic freedom, how easy or hard

28:12

it is for anyone anywhere in the world

28:14

to start and run a business, it turns

28:16

out that the index is showing exactly

28:19

what I

28:20

as a business entrepreneur doing business both

28:22

in Africa and in the US. I have

28:24

seen at first, I thought it was just an anecdote. At

28:26

first, I thought, oh, you know, it's normal. You're

28:29

poor, so it's hard to do business back home. Here,

28:31

they're rich, it's easy to do business. Instead,

28:34

I came to realize we are

28:36

foreign nations are poor because they make it hard for

28:39

the wealth creatives to create and

28:41

rich nations are prosperous because they

28:43

make it easy for wealth creatives

28:46

to create.

28:47

The minute I understood that, my whole

28:49

life changed. So many things started to make sense

28:52

and I started just to follow that path.

28:54

When you look there, you realize that it is harder

28:57

for almost anyone in sub-Saharan Africa

28:59

to do business than it is for anyone

29:01

in Scandinavia. That fact

29:04

is very important because if we want

29:06

to fix the problem and I would want, so

29:08

this is actually the question I'm

29:10

going to have for you. If we're serious about building

29:12

prosperity in Africa, then we

29:14

have to be serious about this issue around the

29:17

lack of economic freedom. So for Azure Institute

29:19

measures, things like that, but doing business measures, things

29:21

like that, Atlas Network has been working

29:23

with people to improve the situation.

29:26

So we need economic

29:27

freedom to build prosperity. Our entrepreneurs

29:29

need that and you know what else entrepreneurs need? Access

29:32

to reliable and affordable energy

29:35

source. This is actually when I got into

29:37

the fight.

29:38

This is when I got into the fight, into

29:40

the climate action fight because when

29:42

you have these anti-phosphatryl zeolites who are

29:45

sitting halfway across the world in very comfortable

29:47

places telling me and Africans,

29:50

what is it that I get to do or not do in my continent

29:52

when we happen to still be the poorest region in the world

29:54

and people are still dying, I said I have

29:56

a problem. So Amy, do you believe?

30:00

But

30:01

do you support prosperity

30:03

for Africa,

30:04

even if it means the goods?

30:07

This is a very... I do. So actually,

30:09

yes, I do. This is a... Pause.

30:12

Pause. I just want to share that again. Do you... I do. Yes.

30:15

Please, prosperity

30:16

for Africa, even if it means

30:18

the use of fossil fuels. Yes, I

30:20

do.

30:21

So this is why I was happy

30:23

to talk to you because I was like, I feel like this

30:26

whole thing is getting...

30:28

It's getting really polarized in a way that's

30:30

just not helpful. I was just in a room

30:33

full of people this past week, Global

30:35

North people saying, look, the solution

30:37

is to turn off fossil fuels. That's it. And

30:40

then someone from India and another

30:42

person from Africa saying, well, you guys don't understand

30:44

that. We're still dealing

30:46

with XYZ. And how do we deal with

30:48

that

30:49

without fossil fuels? Right. And

30:52

to be honest, I think that the solution is that

30:54

the Global North

30:56

transitions quickly off of fossil fuels

30:58

while the Global South

31:00

continues to develop. When I hear people

31:02

say, we need to solve energy

31:04

property first, I'm like, well, yeah,

31:07

I agree. I think we should solve energy

31:09

property. I don't think it's an either or. I

31:11

think they can happen at the same time.

31:14

And I think that rich countries in the Global

31:16

North have a much bigger obligation

31:18

to do what they can to

31:20

reduce emissions and

31:22

decarbonize as quickly as possible.

31:25

Unfortunately, that's not happening.

31:28

And neither are the Global

31:30

North companies that are developing

31:32

oil and gas

31:33

resources in Africa doing

31:36

anything at all about energy property.

31:38

So that's the piece where I'm like, okay, yes,

31:40

I agree. But the oil

31:42

and gas that's being developed in Africa right

31:44

now, more than half of it

31:46

is exported to Europe and Asia.

31:49

The African countries that have those resources

31:51

have terrible

31:52

contracts that lock them into

31:55

not getting anywhere near what

31:57

they should be getting for those resources.

31:59

contracts require distribution

32:02

locally. So like

32:03

the best example is Nigeria.

32:06

That's the oldest and largest fossil

32:08

fuel industry on the continent of Africa,

32:10

right? Last

32:13

in the world on energy access. So

32:15

when I see people say, oh, fossil

32:17

fuel development equals a solve

32:19

to energy poverty,

32:21

where's the proof of that? It hasn't happened

32:24

on the continent of Africa. It hasn't even happened in

32:26

the United States, which is like the birthplace

32:28

of the industry. So

32:29

that's where I'm like, okay, if we're going to talk

32:32

about energy poverty, let's talk about actually

32:34

solving it. And also the fact that doing

32:37

so and solving for climate, which will

32:39

also impact people in Africa

32:41

and Latin America

32:43

first and worst,

32:45

why can't we do both together in a way

32:47

that actually like solves both

32:49

problems?

32:51

So can I respond now because I'm trying to be

32:53

sure about... Please,

32:55

so this is great. This is great.

32:58

And I really wish that pieces like this...

33:00

So when you say I'm so, I found

33:02

it so sad and so bad that the things have

33:04

become so polarized, I'm sorry, but the

33:06

piece like this does not help with the polarization.

33:09

It just doesn't. This piece would have

33:11

been

33:11

so much more interesting, Amy. If

33:14

first of all, I

33:15

put in a lot of these caveats that

33:17

you're sharing with me right now. It would have made

33:19

for such a much more interesting piece.

33:22

And what you said about

33:24

America and leading to do this, leading to do that, I

33:26

will leave it to Americans to talk about

33:28

those things. When I wear my American hat,

33:31

I can also talk about that. But today, the reason

33:33

why I'm talking to you is

33:35

the African magat, because that's

33:37

my roots and I'm African first and foremost.

33:40

So when you go back and say,

33:42

well, you know, if

33:44

the oil industry and if also

33:46

fuels were so important to Africa, we could have known

33:48

by now because clearly that Africa is not

33:50

where it should be right now. So it tells me that we

33:52

don't necessarily, you know, that's

33:55

not what I said. What I said was if developing

33:57

oil and gas resources in Africa was.

33:59

going to solve energy poverty. We

34:02

would have seen that happen in Nigeria.

34:04

I think there's a huge problem with the companies

34:07

that are doing the work in those countries

34:09

not being required to actually

34:12

address energy poverty, especially because a lot

34:14

of those companies are now saying

34:16

that that's the entire reason that they're in

34:18

Africa. So I would say, okay,

34:21

make them do that then. There's

34:23

enough resources on the continent to

34:25

address this issue. Now,

34:27

I feel like there's a huge amount of

34:29

work that

34:32

needs to be done to look at how

34:34

fossil fuel contracts are made,

34:36

how developing financing works,

34:39

all of that stuff. How the whole investor state

34:41

dispute system is set up that robs

34:43

countries of their sovereignty, all of that

34:46

stuff. So in order for

34:48

this entrepreneurship

34:49

to work that you're talking about and

34:50

for businesses to succeed, you also

34:53

can't have a giant industry

34:56

kind of corrupting that process. Well,

34:58

let me jump in there. Yeah, please. So

35:01

first of all, thanks for clarifying what people

35:03

are hearing you and I still have a problem with what you just said.

35:05

My country San Diego just discovered

35:07

oil when I say just a few

35:09

years ago, discovered oil, discovered

35:11

gas. Huge reserves of oil

35:13

and gas. Next.

35:15

And it is estimated that we probably

35:17

will only get to keep 10% of

35:19

the proceed of that, right? And that would be

35:21

high, that would be high. Wait, wait, wait. No,

35:23

that's not. And meanwhile, well,

35:27

clean as Germany is over

35:29

there saying, oh no, more

35:52

and more than anything. I think that's why I say

35:54

that it's just like me, when I thought it's hard to do business in Africa

35:56

because we're poor and I discovered

35:57

it with the other way around. I will tell you...

35:59

today, the same exact thing that I say to some of my friends

36:02

who might be saying the same thing you say. So

36:05

the reason why we're being literally

36:07

this exploited, and it's

36:09

not just oil, it's not just oil, I have a

36:11

bigger problem with the NGOs, the aid industry

36:13

as we know. The reason why it's so easy for

36:16

everybody to come to our nations and be

36:18

the kings and queens on our own

36:20

land is because we are poor.

36:22

And I will say it again, why are we

36:24

poor? I am not poor because

36:27

the oil and gas company people

36:29

are taking my fossil fuels away.

36:32

It's not a good thing, but definitely not a good thing. And

36:34

we intend to do better. But the only time we're

36:36

going to be able to do better with them, not

36:38

benefiting more from us is

36:41

going to be when our people are not so long

36:43

a poor, where we don't have time to really

36:45

look at what our leaders are doing. And

36:48

even when we see there's nothing we can do in my country,

36:50

some reports came up, but there was some corruption

36:53

that happened there, basically oil that threw

36:55

that on the cheap and there's that. Most

36:57

of our people didn't even have time to complain about

37:00

it. After a few months, little noise, everybody

37:02

went back to trying and find food because when

37:04

the majority of people are poor, most

37:06

people don't have time to go and see, look

37:08

at what the president is doing and what the type

37:10

of nasty deals that they're doing. We don't have a strong

37:13

society. We don't have organizations that are

37:15

looking into all of this, bringing them to the forefront

37:17

and

37:17

all of that good stuff, as you may not

37:20

know. So my point is, this is not

37:22

us going and trying to force

37:25

these people to do this and to do that.

37:27

At the end of the day, as long as we remain

37:29

poor, we will be the carpet

37:32

on which everyone else and their mothers walks on.

37:34

And it is just the way it is. And so for me,

37:36

my plan is not tell the oil

37:39

company to, one oil

37:40

company or that oil company do

37:43

this, do that. As long as the situation

37:45

is the way it is, we will remain where we

37:47

are. Now, if we manage

37:49

to free our entrepreneurs, build

37:51

the type of prosperity and they

37:53

will also have access to the

37:55

type of oil because if our entrepreneurs

37:58

are enterprising and they have the money

38:00

to pay for the fossil fuels

38:03

to be handled, you know, direct on the ground.

38:05

This is the force that's going to make oil companies

38:08

to say, you know, to be like, Oh, maybe

38:10

we should leave more in here. Because guess what? At that

38:12

point, it's not about

38:13

somebody

38:15

telling them, you want to do the right thing,

38:17

you need to give this to other

38:18

what's worth, you know, their fossil fuels worth

38:20

in money. No, what happens is, Oh, gee,

38:23

there's a market here. There is the market here.

38:25

These people can pay for it. These companies can pay

38:27

for it. But my point is, you

38:29

see that the force, I

38:32

kill myself trying to tell people economic

38:35

freedom is what we need in order to

38:37

unleash all the other dominoes. But instead,

38:39

everybody is busy. I see almost

38:41

operating in a worldview in which

38:44

us Africans are going to remain poor for

38:46

the rest of our lives. When you're poor,

38:48

you have no voice. When you're poor, you're not the market.

38:50

When you're not at the market, nobody caters to you. But

38:53

I go back to my piece being that when

38:55

I see a piece like this and

38:58

you're here, this piece is all about

39:00

defending last generation. It's

39:02

all about defending the rights of

39:05

these climate activist people

39:07

to basically do whatever it is that they're

39:10

doing. That's what this piece

39:12

was all about. I would have loved. So

39:14

when I see a piece like this, defending the rights

39:17

of rich kids, excuse me, people calling them

39:19

this way, because seriously, when I look around,

39:21

that's what I see rich kids who

39:23

are looking for a way for an existential for

39:25

a way maybe to exist in this world. And I tell them, if

39:28

you want to exist in this world, if you want

39:30

to feel like you're doing something really useful,

39:34

why not to come with me on the battle

39:36

of making sure that Africans have

39:38

access to economic freedom as

39:40

well as that we do not stop

39:43

pipelines that are being built, by the way, trying

39:45

to be built in places like Tanzania, in places

39:47

like Uganda. Why is it that you

39:50

are right now protesting those

39:52

type of developments? So you

39:54

are not, here you are, you say that you're fighting

39:56

for the climate

39:58

and nature. Are we?

39:59

not part of climate and nature. You

40:02

are, but in the name of climate and

40:04

nature,

40:05

we can just die. Thank you very much. And

40:07

I think you have,

40:08

going to say that here. So I am just...

40:10

I'm not trying to say that here at all. That's

40:13

a total mischaracterization of climate. No, I'm

40:15

not saying you. I'm saying, yeah, actually I'd be saying that.

40:17

But my point is, Amy,

40:20

with all of the things to fight for in the

40:22

world,

40:23

with all the critical problems to fight for

40:26

in the world, that

40:27

you said it was a 4,000 word piece.

40:31

4,000 word piece. I see complaints

40:34

about pretty much everybody

40:36

and their mothers as long as we're related

40:38

to Atlas Network.

40:40

But I see, and I see, and

40:42

all of that in defense

40:43

of rich kids

40:45

deciding to glue themselves

40:47

to the asphalt or to some paintings

40:50

and

40:50

then crying out loud, why is it

40:52

that they're being arrested?

40:53

Why should I live in if you're messing up with somebody's

40:56

property? That's

40:58

a problem.

41:29

Okay, so cutting it again here, because

41:32

this thing that Nagat

41:33

keeps saying at this point

41:35

in our conversation, just kind of

41:37

keeps repeating

41:38

it, that these climate activists are rich

41:40

kids. And the tone is

41:42

kind of like

41:43

they're annoying rich kids who

41:45

are destroying property for no reason.

41:48

This is actually like a pretty key message

41:50

that we saw Atlas Network folks hammering

41:53

on again and again in the media

41:55

all over the world. In fact, we talked about it a lot

41:58

in our episode. It's a big part.

41:59

of the strategy to demonize

42:02

and minimize what climate activists

42:04

are fighting for. Which is not

42:06

at all to say that activists don't

42:09

sometimes get it wrong. We've

42:11

talked about that before. In our last episode,

42:13

in fact, we got into the details about

42:15

why applying class and race filters

42:18

are so extremely critical to

42:20

successful activism.

42:22

But it's just not true that all

42:25

climate activists are rich

42:27

white kids. The activists fighting

42:29

the pipeline

42:29

Magat mentions in Tanzania

42:31

and Uganda, for example. Those

42:34

are mostly young people who are from

42:36

those countries. In fact, we've

42:38

got an episode on that fight coming soon where

42:40

you'll hear from some of those folks.

42:43

There

42:43

are definitely activists in other countries

42:46

who are supporting them. Usually

42:48

those folks are protesting the banks in

42:50

their countries that are financing the pipeline.

42:54

But the resistance is home grown.

42:57

Which brings me to another thing I think is important

43:00

to note here. Africans are

43:02

not a monolith. People in the global

43:04

south are not a monolith. There

43:07

are people who are for and against

43:09

fossil fuels in every

43:12

country. Long time listeners of

43:14

this show might remember Guyanese attorney

43:16

Melinda Jenkis' absolute disdain

43:19

for the idea that global north

43:22

countries should transition away from fossil

43:24

fuels quickly while the global

43:26

south continues to use fossil fuels

43:28

for a while longer. The developing

43:30

countries should

43:31

have until 2050

43:32

to come away from oil. Why

43:35

would you say that? When in every

43:38

single form of

43:40

colony people are saying stop

43:43

the oil if you don't want it yet.

43:46

In places like Uganda and Mozambique,

43:48

they're putting their lives on

43:51

the line to stop oil. And

43:53

you sit in a comfortable

43:56

university room and

43:58

say oh well I've been through this.

43:59

that Indian Christian justice is, because

44:02

they shouldn't have to get rid of the social bills until they're

44:04

completely different. And in order

44:06

to make this really fair, the first world

44:09

should now immediately convert

44:10

to renewable energy. In

44:13

other words, all the white people

44:17

go straight for renewable energy, and

44:19

earn their economy, and move on to a cost-free,

44:23

a free future, and then you

44:25

step

44:26

on the third world. I'm

44:28

doing this under the guise of a just transition.

44:31

That season also included a great interview

44:34

with Yale economist Narasimha Rao, who

44:37

talked about the role that global development

44:39

funding plays in all of this, and

44:41

the real structural blockers to

44:44

energy transition for a lot

44:46

of global

44:46

south countries. So the need

44:48

for international cooperation for technology

44:50

transfer, and some sort of consideration of

44:53

fair effort is essential for

44:56

deeper transformations in these poor economies.

44:59

Having said that, there is some potential for them

45:01

to scale up renewables beyond what

45:03

they're currently doing potentially,

45:06

but still there's an upfront capital requirement.

45:09

So let me speak about finance for a second.

45:13

If you look at private finance today, the

45:15

cost of capitals

45:17

are exactly inversely related to the average income of countries.

45:20

That is,

45:23

the poorest countries in sub-southern Africa have

45:26

the highest cost of capital seen

45:28

by private finance because

45:31

they see high risk

45:32

in investing in these economies. But

45:35

this is a problem also of how risk

45:37

is assessed and measured. So

45:39

for example,

45:41

we think about credit risk. People

45:43

need to have debt to get new

45:45

debt, and that's circular

45:47

and maybe inappropriate for people who have never been part

45:49

of the formal economy. But they

45:51

may yet have a record, a perfect record,

45:54

of paying bills to the extent they receive

45:56

existing services.

45:58

So the existing

45:59

model of the market

45:59

markets for finance on its own is

46:02

going to be even more challenging because

46:04

of the fact that the poorest countries have the highest demanding

46:07

cost of capital. So there's going to

46:10

have to be some kind of government

46:12

intervention to underwrite private finance,

46:14

if at all, or some sort of broader

46:17

scheme for government cooperation. And

46:19

so that's with regards to the transformation.

46:22

Now, are developing countries thinking

46:25

only short term, not thinking long term.

46:28

For the most part, we have to understand that

46:31

poor countries have development priorities that

46:33

are longstanding.

46:35

And over the last few decades,

46:37

generally, countries started out by saying

46:40

that the climate is a northern

46:42

problem. It's a problem created by the West

46:44

and has to be dealt with by them. But

46:46

over time, for various reasons, it's been understood

46:49

that all countries have to be part of the

46:51

energy transition and also

46:53

that there are several opportunities for

46:55

efficiently growing

46:57

in ways that will be beneficial to even

46:59

low income countries. For

47:02

example, by reducing air pollution and

47:05

other health benefits of transitioning to clean

47:07

energy. So there has been a push

47:10

towards trying to integrate

47:12

and mainstream climate conditions

47:14

and climate priorities into development priorities.

47:17

But it's really important to understand that we

47:20

have to embed climate considerations

47:23

within the existing set

47:25

of priorities developing countries have rather

47:27

than to think about it as let's

47:31

see how we can introduce climate

47:33

policy and think about other benefits for development.

47:36

So that mainstreaming of climate

47:38

into development policy, I think,

47:40

is happening increasingly. And

47:42

so, yes, poor

47:45

countries are mostly thinking about near term priorities,

47:47

but there has been significant progress

47:50

and at least formally thinking about

47:52

climate, including them in plans

47:55

for the future, but very often conditional

47:58

on support from. the international

48:00

community.

48:02

I'll stick links to those episodes in the show

48:04

notes as well in case you missed them. Time

48:07

for another quick break.

48:20

Plastic is one of the number

48:22

one ways that the fossil fuel industry

48:25

is trying to keep itself in business.

48:28

That's especially true when it comes to single-use

48:31

disposable plastic. And

48:34

one of the ways that the industry has worked

48:36

for decades to convince people that

48:38

this is not a problem is

48:40

to make it seem like a lot more plastic

48:43

is being recycled than actually is.

48:46

I know those little resin identification

48:48

numbers with the three arrows and a triangle

48:51

make it look like every piece of

48:53

plastic is being recycled. But

48:55

in fact,

48:56

it's never broken double digits.

48:59

That's right. No more

49:02

than 9% of plastic

49:04

has ever been recycled.

49:06

That's why I try to just reduce my

49:09

single-use plastic consumption as much as

49:11

possible. And an easy place to

49:13

start is in the laundry room where

49:16

I use EarthBreeze EcoSheets

49:18

instead of those giant plastic

49:20

bottles. Laundry detergent.

49:23

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49:26

laundry detergent. Looks just like

49:28

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49:30

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49:32

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49:36

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49:37

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49:39

and they're delivered to your door via

49:41

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49:44

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49:47

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49:49

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49:51

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49:53

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49:55

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49:58

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49:59

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50:01

Over 2 million Americans have made

50:03

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50:06

and now you can become one of them. Right

50:08

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50:11

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50:16

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50:24

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50:27

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50:40

Hey, it's Amy.

50:41

If you're curious to hear what businesses

50:44

and organizations are doing and

50:46

what more they should do to confront

50:49

climate change, I recommend the award-winning

50:52

podcast Climate Rising,

50:54

produced by Harvard Business School. Named

50:57

one of the best environmental podcasts by

50:59

Earth.org, Climate Rising gives you

51:01

a behind-the-scenes

51:02

view into how some of the world's business

51:05

leaders

51:05

are confronting climate change, including

51:07

go-to brands like Microsoft

51:10

and Google. If you need a place to start, definitely

51:13

check

51:13

out a recent episode featuring Ashley

51:15

Orgain, chief impact officer from

51:17

Seventh Generation. They're the folks that make

51:19

everything from recycled napkins and

51:22

paper towels to dish soap, all sorts

51:24

of home service products. In that

51:26

episode, Ashley discusses ambitious

51:29

plans to achieve a real zero,

51:31

not net zero, climate goal. Each

51:34

episode explores the many challenges

51:36

and opportunities that climate change presents

51:38

to innovators and entrepreneurs, and

51:41

how businesses across the world are striving

51:43

to make a more positive impact on

51:46

the planet. Go listen to Climate Rising

51:48

on Apple, Spotify, or wherever

51:50

you get your podcasts, and tell them

51:52

we sent you.

52:03

Okay, back to my conversation with Magat

52:05

Wade, who runs the Center for African

52:08

Prosperity. It's part of the Atlas

52:10

network of think tanks.

52:15

So you know, Amy, I saw this piece.

52:17

At first,

52:18

I was angry, and then I was

52:20

so sad. Do

52:21

you know why I was sad? Because I told myself,

52:23

I said, at first I was angry, of course, because I'm like,

52:26

oh, my God,

52:27

do they even get it?

52:28

And then I was very sad because I

52:30

said, and there again,

52:33

my life

52:35

as a black person,

52:37

and how

52:44

all the issues I talk

52:46

about for, you know, poor

52:48

people,

52:49

oh, that's real pain.

52:51

Birth disasters. Do you know today? Listen,

52:54

Amy, I'm going to share this with you because I have to.

52:57

And

52:59

I'm angry. Here. Here. You

53:01

go on this thing.

53:02

This is, you see,

53:05

this is a website that I go to, and I'll share with you

53:07

here.

53:08

I'll share it to you.

53:12

You see this photo? You see a boat, right? Boat

53:14

with people in it. Yeah. Yeah.

53:17

This is the news of today. Every day, Amy, I have

53:19

this news every day.

53:21

And it says, Baron, the police intercepts,

53:23

told me, go on, send way, conveyor, deferral.

53:25

The police intercepted a boat with 30

53:28

migrants in it, and they arrested

53:30

five of the people who were helping

53:32

them cross. Today, it was literally,

53:35

but every single day, Amy, I get this news.

53:38

And you know that people will not make it. So

53:40

when I see suffering, when I see

53:42

this suffering of people who are so poor

53:44

in their nations, the jobs don't exist

53:47

because the entrepreneurs cannot

53:49

create businesses, and it becomes so

53:52

dire. But these kids,

53:54

for so many of them, they're half my age.

53:56

And they say, and you know what? We are leaving. We

53:59

have to go make a living. And you tell them, you

54:01

know how many nights I spend sometimes on the phone

54:03

trying to talk to a woman who is about to

54:05

take off with her baby on these boats? I

54:08

spend all night trying to talk her out

54:10

of it. Because I know that more

54:12

chances of dying than not. And

54:14

then

54:15

I see a piece like this. That's

54:17

where.

54:21

What these people are promoting is part of a

54:23

problem.

54:24

For me, they're not solving my problem. They're making it

54:26

worse.

54:27

And then I see a piece like this.

54:29

Where you give them four thousand

54:30

words, four thousand words. And there's

54:32

none for me. None.

54:34

I don't exist. And that made me

54:35

so sad. First I was mad.

54:38

Then I was sad. Because I was like,

54:40

and there we go. We don't even matter.

54:43

But some kid wanting to just go

54:45

and do whatever it is that they're doing is more important

54:47

to defend

54:49

than trying to work so right. These

54:51

people don't go. These

54:54

people don't go. Megan.

55:03

You know, the beauty

55:03

of a podcast is that when you're listening to a conversation

55:06

later and you

55:07

realize that you should have said something, you just

55:10

go ahead and say it. Feels

55:12

important here to point out that

55:14

a lot of poor migrants

55:15

are being pushed out of their homes

55:17

by extreme weather events as well.

55:21

Or famine caused by drought.

55:24

And again, not all climate activists

55:26

are rich white people. What we're talking

55:28

about protecting is the basic

55:30

right to protest. Not some

55:33

spoiled brat's right to do whatever they want.

55:36

Okay, back to my God.

55:41

Okay,

55:44

I don't miss Amy. It's just, I'm just like,

55:47

you see, this is why when I was talking to Jordan Peterson

55:49

and even there you criticized me. That's all

55:51

I was talking to him about. And I will say this to

55:54

anyone that's willing to hear me out. I don't

55:56

care who you are because I think this is important.

55:59

And I refuse to be. like, oh, you on the side,

56:01

you on the side, I talk to you, I don't talk to you. No, at

56:03

least he was willing to show me out. And

56:05

when I'm saying my people are

56:07

dying, this is important. The

56:10

policies that this guy right here,

56:12

this face you talk, what he's defending,

56:14

goes straight against my people. And I will never

56:17

ever say that much what happened. And so when

56:19

you say black lives matter,

56:21

maybe we have to be clear about which black lives matter. Maybe

56:23

it's only American black lives that matter. And maybe

56:26

us African black lives. And by the way,

56:28

we're 90% of representatives of a black race,

56:30

maybe our assets matter. And that's what I

56:32

was trying to explain to Jordan Peterson. And

56:34

it's like this, 4,000 words, you're

56:37

going to be friend this guy. What sugar was

56:39

promoting

56:40

stuff that's going to kill my people or

56:43

stand in our way?

56:44

I just don't know anymore. But when I

56:46

said, I

56:47

don't know,

56:48

I don't know any. I'm so glad you're shipping

56:50

because maybe I can share from you. Do I?

56:52

Let me and that Africa matter.

56:55

You definitely matter. Africa definitely

56:57

matters. I'm really genuinely

56:59

sorry that this piece made

57:02

you feel this way. It was definitely not the intention.

57:05

Let me just kind of explain a little bit about

57:07

what it was that we were looking

57:09

at here, which was not defending any

57:12

one climate activist group necessarily.

57:14

I would say like

57:15

the guy that you're pointing to, he's with last

57:17

generation, their asks are pretty, pretty

57:20

small. It's like institute 100 kilometer

57:23

an hour speed

57:24

limit on the Autobahn and give everyone

57:26

access to free public transit. So

57:29

they're not advocating for anything that

57:31

would

57:32

negatively impact people

57:34

in Africa. One of the things

57:36

that we were looking at was

57:38

not the protection of climate

57:40

protests necessarily, but really the

57:43

crackdown on free speech in general. So,

57:45

which is something that like from

57:48

what I've read and seen most

57:50

Atlas network think tanks are very supportive

57:52

of free speech. So it's surprising to see,

57:55

you know, intense amount

57:57

of support for some kinds

57:58

of free speech.

57:59

sort of

58:01

extreme approach and not from you, by

58:03

the way, I should, I feel like that should be made clear

58:05

here.

58:06

I have not ever seen you vilify

58:08

climate protesters in any way. You

58:10

have a difference of opinion with some of them, but

58:13

I don't think that you have said or done

58:15

anything that would contribute

58:17

to what's happening right now, which is the

58:20

criminalization of protest.

58:21

So really, it's the criminalization of

58:23

protest peace, which will affect

58:26

all people

58:27

everywhere. That is a big

58:29

problem for me, just as someone

58:31

who thinks that, you know, hey, if you believe in

58:33

free speech, that

58:34

has to include speech you don't like to,

58:37

you know, it can't just be the

58:39

speech that you agree with. So that was the

58:41

focus of that piece. On the subject

58:43

of

58:44

climate politics and how

58:47

it does or doesn't support

58:49

prosperity in Africa, I think, again,

58:51

like I said before, I feel like the climate

58:53

movement has absolutely failed

58:56

Africa.

58:57

I see people all the time that just do not

58:59

want to engage with

59:01

anything around the need for

59:03

cheap, reliable energy. And to your

59:05

point before about Germany going back to coal.

59:07

Yeah, I think it's ridiculous to push

59:09

the

59:09

idea of everyone transitioning to renewables

59:13

before that's technologically feasible,

59:15

which it is not at the moment

59:18

technologically feasible to have

59:20

the sort of scale of renewables

59:22

that you would need to power all of Africa.

59:25

And also, by the way, if that technology

59:27

was available,

59:29

it's going the usual route of

59:31

heading to Europe first and then

59:33

the rest of the world. So like ignoring

59:36

that fact and that history is

59:38

disingenuous and not helpful.

59:41

That said, I also think if

59:43

we're going to say, okay, look,

59:45

we need more entrepreneurship in Africa, we

59:47

need support for entrepreneurs and business,

59:49

and a part of that support is access

59:51

to cheap, free energy. Totally agree.

59:54

I think that should be, you know,

59:56

energy source agnostic. So like

59:58

if there's a situation...

1:00:00

where nuclear or hydro or

1:00:02

renewables is the cheaper,

1:00:05

more available option, then that should be allowed

1:00:07

to happen. Right now what's happening

1:00:09

is kind of the reverse, where there's a real

1:00:12

push.

1:00:13

And again I'm going to mention the fossil fuel industry

1:00:15

because they're not just like any old mom-and-pop

1:00:17

setup, you know, they've got quite a lot of

1:00:19

power all over the world. There

1:00:22

is quite a big push right now to

1:00:25

lock in these contracts that

1:00:27

require countries to be on

1:00:29

fossil fuels for 30 plus years.

1:00:32

So that to me is again

1:00:34

actually like really not a free market

1:00:36

approach. That is one industry saying

1:00:39

you're gonna sign this contract with us

1:00:40

and you're gonna be not allowed

1:00:43

to change for 30 years. That's

1:00:44

not an improvement, you know.

1:00:46

Yeah

1:00:47

and I'm gonna, so there

1:00:49

are two things. So you're saying

1:00:52

there's two things. And first of all I

1:00:55

am appreciative of

1:00:56

the fact that you at least support

1:00:58

Prosperity for Africa

1:00:59

and you don't seem

1:01:01

to be an anti-falsal fuel. I call

1:01:03

them the anti-falsal fuel zealots. So it doesn't seem to

1:01:05

me like you're bad because you're saying, look, I'm hearing

1:01:08

that you know reality is reality. You

1:01:10

never realize.

1:01:10

Yeah.

1:01:13

That's very hard to

1:01:14

hear that. So going back to two

1:01:16

other things that you said because I think it

1:01:18

might help for me to clarify

1:01:19

that for you a little bit because I

1:01:21

happen

1:01:21

to be within the address network

1:01:23

and I know what they're doing and how

1:01:25

they're doing things. So

1:01:26

this is where I wish

1:01:28

that some of the bits that you talked about

1:01:31

here, actually not some, almost

1:01:33

each single one of them would

1:01:34

have been great that you know you had a call

1:01:36

with them maybe like you're having with me right now. Hopefully.

1:01:38

I think there's a misunderstanding on why

1:01:42

the stand that some of these groups are

1:01:44

taking and because for you when you're

1:01:46

seeing the activists you

1:01:48

know doing what they're doing you're saying yeah

1:01:50

they're voicing their disagreement with

1:01:52

whatever it is that they're voicing the disagreement. They're voicing them. Yeah.

1:01:55

They're doing free speech.

1:01:57

So you're saying they're doing free speech and way

1:02:00

are people like the folks, most of

1:02:02

the folks in the Atlas network, you

1:02:04

know, network would say, is we

1:02:06

are, we have never been against

1:02:09

people, you know, doing

1:02:11

free speech. As a matter of fact, free speech is definitely

1:02:13

one of the pillars of, one of the pillars

1:02:15

that we defend. So in this piece, I

1:02:17

think the discrepancy in understanding

1:02:20

is

1:02:20

in your things, free speech being

1:02:23

squelched, and they would say to you,

1:02:26

we hear them complaining about something,

1:02:28

but we also are property

1:02:31

rights type of people. You

1:02:32

don't get to go and throw tomato

1:02:35

soup at a painting,

1:02:37

which is

1:02:38

appropriately somewhere. That's not okay.

1:02:41

And it's not because maybe at some

1:02:43

time it was okay, maybe for culture

1:02:45

or whatever. Us, we have always been the people

1:02:47

who say regardless of what culture

1:02:49

thinks is acceptable, property

1:02:52

rights means property rights. So

1:02:54

gain, complain all you want, walk

1:02:56

in the streets with big signs everywhere you

1:02:59

want, scream as loud as you want, do

1:03:01

whatever you want, but do not touch

1:03:04

or desist or destroy property.

1:03:06

So that's, and this is in

1:03:09

line, a very clear line

1:03:11

of our principle. Property rights is

1:03:13

important and anyone who

1:03:15

is serious about entrepreneurship also

1:03:18

will tell you that property rights is important.

1:03:20

When I told you

1:03:20

earlier that part of the entrepreneur's toolkit

1:03:23

is clear and transferable property

1:03:25

rights. So the concept of property rights is key to

1:03:28

us and

1:03:29

you can have free speech. So if all

1:03:31

of these people were doing what they're

1:03:33

doing without touching somebody's property,

1:03:36

you would never hear us

1:03:38

have an issue with that. But the moment we accept

1:03:41

doing something to somebody's property

1:03:43

because we don't like what they stand for or we

1:03:46

don't like what they do, then

1:03:48

you can imagine the can of worms that gets

1:03:50

opened. And I think many people don't think

1:03:52

about that really, about the can of worms with

1:03:55

allowance. If you have a right to

1:03:57

mess with somebody's property, whether public or private,

1:03:59

just because you don't happen to like,

1:04:02

you know, what this place or the

1:04:04

people behind it stand for, then it's open

1:04:06

door.

1:04:06

It's open door and you're not going to be able to close

1:04:09

this thing. So for us, and I think if you had

1:04:11

talked to this organization, probably

1:04:13

you guys would have talked and you would have understood

1:04:15

that we are still

1:04:17

very much, very much as one of our pillars,

1:04:20

defenders of free speech.

1:04:22

And I think we have been in free speech even

1:04:24

when it was not the cool thing to do. But

1:04:26

we separate free speech from property.

1:04:29

So please go ahead and complain all you want. Go

1:04:31

ahead and protest all you want. But

1:04:33

please, property rights exist and we need

1:04:35

to defend it

1:04:35

at all costs. It's not because you don't like

1:04:37

what Amy stands for, but you have a right to

1:04:39

go and tag Amy's home. Or you have a right

1:04:42

to throw something at Amy's window or

1:04:44

throw tomato soup at her child's

1:04:47

drawer or something like that. And we start to

1:04:49

accept that because supposedly what they're

1:04:51

defending seems to be what

1:04:53

I agree with, and I think it's the right

1:04:55

moral thing to do, then who

1:04:58

then gets to decide what's moral, what's not moral, right?

1:05:01

So everything, it's just right to go

1:05:03

and destroy everything everywhere. So I think if

1:05:05

you take a little bit of time with us,

1:05:07

that's kind of what you would find. So that's one of the

1:05:09

free speech that's on these protesters and

1:05:11

the reason why we're having an issue and we're telling

1:05:13

the world, we're saying to people, what we're saying, oh,

1:05:16

today, maybe because we're defending what you think is possible. We're

1:05:18

defending what you think is cool to defend, you

1:05:20

then close your eyes on all the things they're

1:05:22

doing that is technically not okay. So

1:05:25

we're saying there, and we're basically the visual arms

1:05:27

saying, be careful, you guys. If we're

1:05:29

going to accept this in the name of all the

1:05:31

ideas we defend is something we agree with,

1:05:33

then watch out for when

1:05:36

people come to defend things

1:05:37

that you don't really agree with. So

1:05:39

anyway, so we're kind of keeping an eye

1:05:41

on things like that and remind everybody, I don't

1:05:43

care if you like what we're doing or not like what

1:05:45

we're doing, be careful of

1:05:47

what people are doing because tomorrow it could be

1:05:50

against you. And I'm very proud that

1:05:52

people like Atlas and the people in our

1:05:54

network are out there watching and not

1:05:56

being dragged

1:05:56

into these political battles or

1:05:59

into these.

1:05:59

Control battles that actually

1:06:02

fluctuate and go all over the place. So we have a

1:06:04

possible stand no matter what.

1:06:06

So that's what they would probably say to you. And

1:06:08

I'm sure that given what I've heard from you,

1:06:10

Amy, and how the conversation we're

1:06:12

able to have, even though I

1:06:14

really, I have a feeling that you guys

1:06:16

mentally understand each other.

1:06:18

And when you talk about, you know, these

1:06:21

oil companies, the deal that they're making, it's

1:06:23

not free market. Look, that's another

1:06:25

thing. If you know anything about Atlas, you

1:06:28

will learn that one of our big enemies is

1:06:30

what we call crony cap,

1:06:32

crony business.

1:06:34

And so what cronyism

1:06:36

is

1:06:36

happens when

1:06:38

really

1:06:39

when you have monopolies or you

1:06:41

mainly, almost everyone else has been kept out

1:06:44

or the people that you're negotiating with really don't

1:06:46

have the same, you know, what do you call

1:06:48

it? The same weight. And then you just get

1:06:50

to them, whatever you want. That's so

1:06:52

some of it is due to crony capitalism. And

1:06:55

again, it is

1:06:56

part of our principles. We are

1:06:58

anti crony. We will fight

1:07:00

monopolies anytime we see them. We

1:07:03

don't agree with things like that. Now I

1:07:05

go back to,

1:07:06

you know, someone like me, I used to be this

1:07:08

way too. I used to be like, only we forced

1:07:11

people that they have to do the contract this

1:07:13

way or do it that way, otherwise they can't be green. You

1:07:15

know what would happen

1:07:17

if a business does not see

1:07:19

if something does not work for a business somewhere,

1:07:21

it's simply just not going to do it. And it's

1:07:24

not because we're going to force an oil company

1:07:26

or a great company or anybody

1:07:29

do the right thing. If the

1:07:32

situation allows them to get away with it as

1:07:34

much as they might get away with, you

1:07:36

know, people are greedy. And this is not, when I

1:07:38

say this, not a problem of capitalism

1:07:40

because people are going to be like, yes, capitalism is a greedy

1:07:43

system.

1:07:43

No, humans are greedy.

1:07:46

We will end as with everything. You

1:07:48

will have people who are honest,

1:07:49

people who are dishonest. You're going to

1:07:51

have people

1:07:51

who are fair, people who are fair,

1:07:54

people who are just like, I'm going to take as much as I

1:07:56

can. And I don't care what people say. If I can do it,

1:07:58

I will do it. And all birds are. going to be like, even

1:08:01

if no one is watching, I don't want

1:08:02

to take more than what I have and I believe

1:08:04

in fairness no matter what.

1:08:06

And

1:08:07

with business people, you have the same thing going

1:08:09

on. Same thing. So

1:08:11

here my argument goes back

1:08:14

until unless African

1:08:16

nations are no longer poor, it

1:08:19

will have these type of

1:08:21

deals because I'm lucky

1:08:23

too, I will say deals

1:08:25

happening right now. And

1:08:28

there's absolutely nothing I can do with it. So

1:08:30

am I going to go and start picketing and saying,

1:08:33

yeah, force the oil companies to do this

1:08:35

and to do that? That's not where I'm going to spend my time.

1:08:37

That's not going to change anything. But what

1:08:40

I think is going to change something is if we unleash

1:08:42

our entrepreneurs and they build a prosperity, with

1:08:44

that prosperity, people

1:08:45

are going to start to notice us, respect us

1:08:48

and we're going to start to have a say in

1:08:50

how our

1:08:50

staff is sold,

1:08:52

sold course, who it sold to, all

1:08:55

of our staff is going to start to happen. So for me, I

1:08:57

made a calculation a long time ago and that's where

1:08:59

I fell. So when you say,

1:09:01

oh, Atlas is being hypocritical or the

1:09:03

network is being hypocritical because they're supporting

1:09:07

companies that are doing

1:09:09

everything but the free market, every time you

1:09:11

say something like that to yourself about Atlas, go

1:09:14

in and dig in because you'll find exactly that

1:09:16

we have not renounced our principles.

1:09:18

Free market is key to us. And again, like I

1:09:20

said, we stand for free markets when

1:09:22

it is popular and we stand for free markets

1:09:25

when it is not popular.

1:09:27

And another thing about Atlas Network

1:09:29

and the reason why I'm involved with them

1:09:32

is that I think that you would say

1:09:34

it's a good thing

1:09:36

to work on putting

1:09:38

women property rights in

1:09:40

the constitution of Burundi

1:09:41

when it was not before, meaning women

1:09:44

did not have a right

1:09:46

to property or to even

1:09:48

property that was in their family

1:09:50

before our partners, Atlas

1:09:52

partners. And you said

1:09:54

almost 600 partners, one of those 600 partners,

1:09:57

that's what they have been working on. And they

1:09:59

may.

1:09:59

to get that to happen.

1:10:01

I would say it's a good thing, right? It

1:10:04

is. Another thing, one

1:10:06

of the all 600 Atlas partners, but usually

1:10:09

it's more than one it's multiple people working

1:10:11

on different things where in South Sudan,

1:10:13

yet the access to property rights,

1:10:16

the access to property rights, the

1:10:18

rights of women is in the constitution,

1:10:21

yet it was not being upheld in real life.

1:10:24

What our partners came to us

1:10:26

for, what

1:10:27

the funding went to them for, was

1:10:29

to actually work with all the stakeholders

1:10:32

in this part of South Sudan. We're talking

1:10:34

about the judges, we're talking about the police people,

1:10:36

we're talking about the husbands, we're talking about

1:10:39

all the stakeholders, women themselves, telling

1:10:41

them, ladies, these are your rights. So all

1:10:43

of a sudden now your happy right that was in

1:10:46

the law, but the culture did

1:10:48

not follow the law. It was not one part,

1:10:50

the culture law. And so here, they

1:10:52

chose both of them matched, and now

1:10:55

women know their rights, and they also

1:10:57

are having their rights upheld in

1:10:59

the Court of Law and also in their

1:11:02

communities. That's a good thing.

1:11:04

That's where we spend the money. Also

1:11:06

in, what do you call it, Sri Lanka.

1:11:08

Our partners there, what they

1:11:10

have been working on is some of the many

1:11:13

things that they work on. One of them had to do

1:11:15

with access to personal hygiene products

1:11:17

for women. We're talking about tech funds and

1:11:19

things like that. As it turned out, there

1:11:21

was an outrageously

1:11:22

high tax put on those

1:11:24

products. So much that the final cost

1:11:26

was almost out of reach for the

1:11:28

everyday Sri Lankan women.

1:11:30

And so they worked on those reforms to take

1:11:32

down those taxes so

1:11:34

that the end product would become affordable

1:11:37

for everybody. So here, my NGO

1:11:40

would say, let's ship

1:11:42

in three tampons. And someone

1:11:44

like me was saying, we don't want to have to rely on new free

1:11:46

stuff for the rest of our lives. So what are we going to do?

1:11:48

What's the sustainable way here? The sustainable

1:11:51

way is find out what the problem is and something

1:11:53

about it. And that's what our partners did.

1:11:55

This is Atlas. This is the organization

1:11:58

and the members and the partners I love.

1:11:59

so much. Everybody that I have talked

1:12:01

to there, I haven't talked to all the six of us. But I know

1:12:04

they're not been working with

1:12:07

such amazing decent people who truly

1:12:09

put themselves in the line

1:12:11

in the most honorable way. And

1:12:14

putting themselves in the line for these people

1:12:16

is not about going and destroying somebody's

1:12:18

property or throwing tomato up

1:12:20

to some painting and stuff like that.

1:12:22

They're not doing that. They're doing the real hard

1:12:24

work. So when I see a piece like

1:12:26

this, I'm like, don't you guys talk

1:12:28

to us? And Amy, I will end this by

1:12:30

saying, please, if you would want to, come and

1:12:33

be my guest. We have our annual gala

1:12:35

every November. It's happening in mid-November.

1:12:38

It's

1:12:38

in New York City. And you will

1:12:40

get to see these people

1:12:43

talk to them. You will hear because

1:12:45

that year, during that time, we celebrate

1:12:48

our best freedom fighters. We are

1:12:50

supporting the people who are fighting for the freedom,

1:12:52

for their freedoms, for the freedom to speak,

1:12:55

for the freedom to build the business. Can

1:12:57

I just say one more thing? I know we're getting

1:12:59

really close to time, but I just want

1:13:01

to just say a couple of things. One, look,

1:13:04

criticizing

1:13:05

something a couple of, or three or

1:13:07

six or whatever entities within a

1:13:10

large network

1:13:10

are doing is not by any

1:13:13

stretch saying that

1:13:14

it's all bad and they're not doing any

1:13:16

good. I know that there are good things being done

1:13:19

as well. And on the systemic change

1:13:21

thing, I mean, I would love to see

1:13:23

something like the Atlas network

1:13:25

getting involved in looking at

1:13:28

the way that bilateral

1:13:31

trade agreements, for example, lock

1:13:33

countries into bad contracts.

1:13:35

That's like a big systemic thing. You

1:13:38

are? Yes, you are. You

1:13:40

have people who are doing working on all of that stuff.

1:13:42

We are again. I'm

1:14:01

jumping in here again to say that I did look

1:14:04

for examples of Atlas getting involved

1:14:06

in reforming the investor state dispute

1:14:08

system. This is the mechanism that

1:14:11

most bilateral trade agreements and bilateral

1:14:13

investment agreements provide for

1:14:15

companies to effectively sue

1:14:18

governments for any changes that

1:14:20

impact their business. It's

1:14:22

been used a lot to push back on human rights

1:14:25

and environmental

1:14:25

legislation.

1:14:27

I couldn't find any examples of Atlas

1:14:29

folks working on this issue. So I asked

1:14:32

Magana to send me stuff or recommend someone

1:14:34

that's working on it. I haven't heard back

1:14:36

yet, but she's super busy, so I'm still hoping

1:14:39

to hear, very much hoping

1:14:41

that it's true that they are working to reform

1:14:43

this.

1:14:47

So

1:14:47

that's my point.

1:14:48

You

1:14:50

know,

1:14:50

Mr. Big Oil Company could come and say, oh, we're

1:14:52

giving you money to do, we're giving you money because we're

1:14:55

at a split. What we're going to

1:14:56

do, the work we do is work we do and

1:14:59

it's all what people are told you about. That's

1:15:01

where the money goes to. We're supporting these initiatives.

1:15:04

So for me, it's just we are addressing

1:15:06

all of that. If there's something that you're interested

1:15:09

in, I can find some of my friends working on

1:15:11

this. And also even on the climate. You know,

1:15:13

right now we have this coalition of people

1:15:16

who are trying to think about some

1:15:19

of the best ways to address, you know, because

1:15:22

yeah, people are going to say, look,

1:15:24

is it always a better idea to be

1:15:26

climate friendly? Absolutely.

1:15:29

And I think you will see people like that among

1:15:32

us who say that. If we can do

1:15:34

better, let's do better. We always have

1:15:36

a responsibility to do better. So is

1:15:39

there a better way for the environment? Is there better

1:15:41

ways for human rights? Is there a better way for this for that? Yes,

1:15:44

there is. Let's find out. So

1:15:46

that's our commitment.

1:15:54

Thank you.

1:16:03

But Amy,

1:16:04

it seems to me like, you know,

1:16:06

the fact that A, you're the only one who decided

1:16:09

to speak with me when they ask me, or the pre,

1:16:11

you're the only one, and then you come here and

1:16:14

I'm not seeing you trying to score

1:16:16

a point or anything like that, I really appreciate

1:16:18

that. It tells me that, you know, you

1:16:20

also could agree with me that if you went back and re-read

1:16:23

this piece, Amy, you can't

1:16:25

with a straight face tell me that this was not a headpiece,

1:16:28

meaning that this was not about you

1:16:30

not

1:16:30

just focusing on or saying, it's

1:16:32

not even focusing, it was stuff I was reading in

1:16:34

here, me who is inside the organization,

1:16:37

I could see that, I would be just

1:16:39

like you two, I would say, Amy, look,

1:16:41

not everybody's perfect,

1:16:42

trade us, blah, blah, blah,

1:16:45

I would have, trust me, I would have, and the day I said something

1:16:47

too, but the point is, this

1:16:49

piece right here, I

1:16:52

think is not representative

1:16:55

of the reality, I think it was written in

1:16:57

a very one-sided way, but

1:16:59

based on the conversation we had, it

1:17:02

seems to me like you would be the type of person

1:17:04

who says, you know what my God,

1:17:05

I heard it, and fine,

1:17:08

but I've heard you. So by

1:17:11

the way, I'm just gonna- No, I appreciate,

1:17:13

actually like,

1:17:15

totally, I super appreciate

1:17:17

you taking the time to talk to me. Actually,

1:17:21

I do, one thing that,

1:17:24

you know, makes people use words like shadowy,

1:17:27

sorry,

1:17:28

is the lack of transparency around funding.

1:17:30

So you know, I would like encourage

1:17:33

think tanks in general, and

1:17:35

I say that about the left leaning think

1:17:37

tanks as well, I don't understand why these

1:17:40

entities exist. The whole point

1:17:42

is to shape public conversation,

1:17:44

and ultimately shape public policy,

1:17:47

international negotiations, all that kind

1:17:49

of stuff. I think it's good for people

1:17:51

to know who's behind those things. And

1:17:54

then like I said, across the political spectrum, I

1:17:56

don't have any love for the lefty

1:17:58

NGOs either.

1:17:59

I appreciate that. I appreciate that.

1:18:02

I appreciate what you just said. I appreciate it.

1:18:04

And I would tell you that as anybody who

1:18:06

is willing to get

1:18:06

the record, we will put them on the record, you know,

1:18:08

donors. But you know how sometimes they are in

1:18:11

your side.

1:18:11

And I think the reason why that is, is

1:18:13

because people are sick and tired of being attacked,

1:18:16

quite frankly. I'm sure they get tired of being attacked.

1:18:19

So maybe if we had more of the

1:18:21

commitment to focus on the type of work

1:18:23

that's being done, you know, rather than

1:18:26

all who gave what, maybe donors

1:18:28

would

1:18:28

be a little bit more, you know, feeling

1:18:30

free to put something out there. And also some people

1:18:33

just

1:18:34

even without even being worried about, you

1:18:36

know, being attacked or whatever, some people

1:18:38

are just

1:18:40

discreet. So but I think some people are

1:18:42

discreet, but I think many people who are not

1:18:44

putting their names out there

1:18:45

might have to do with this polarization where

1:18:48

you do and you do if you don't.

1:18:49

I sense in you somebody who wants

1:18:52

to see a better world, and I want to

1:18:54

see a better world. I think if we can

1:18:56

agree on that and work from there, it

1:18:58

might mean something different. So I would love

1:19:01

to keep these conversations going. And

1:19:03

if you want to talk to anybody on our side

1:19:05

and find out more

1:19:07

all of that, please let me know. I would love

1:19:09

to keep talking. I have a lot I have like a lot

1:19:11

more questions. And it's great that you're

1:19:13

open to I'm very, I'm very

1:19:16

open. I thank you. Thank

1:19:18

you. Have a good rest of your day.

1:19:20

Bye bye.

1:19:28

For this time,

1:19:29

again, kind of a messy conversation.

1:19:33

Very curious to hear your thoughts. Next

1:19:35

week, I'm going to bring you another one of these this

1:19:37

time with someone who has a very different

1:19:40

viewpoint on things. Rihanna Gunn

1:19:42

Wright.

1:19:45

She's a policy analyst with the Roosevelt

1:19:47

Institute. She was one of

1:19:49

the original creators of the Green

1:19:51

New Deal

1:19:52

way back when. And she's been

1:19:55

thinking a lot about how

1:19:57

permitting reform

1:19:58

and energy transition.

1:19:59

in the US is

1:20:02

leaving out people of color.

1:20:05

Come back for that conversation. Thanks

1:20:08

for listening and we'll see you next time.