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1:43

Welcome back to pod. Save world. I'm Tommy Vietor. I'm Ben Rhodes.

1:45

Then I want to take people behind the music for a second here and just talk about how we almost couldn't do the podcast in person in the office today because it's raining and online Los Angeles.

1:55

Yeah. And that took out our internet in the office for That

1:59

apparently accounts for a major natural disaster from Los Angeles perspective, truly people cannot, they Cannot

2:06

handle it. I'm shocked. You made it here safely.

2:08

I mean, it was kind of mad max out on the, on the roads.

2:10

You know, there were people, you know, driving five miles per hour, like drifting across the street and it's like, it's raining.

2:17

It's just not, it's just raining and stuff.

2:20

Yeah. It's just running. Although I saw Tahoe might get like 70 inches of snow in the mountains.

2:24

No, that's cool. That's cool. That'll help our drought issues.

2:27

Yeah. We'll be using that for a while.

2:30

Hopefully not. Yeah. Hopefully not forever.

2:32

Then there's no drought when it comes to the content.

2:34

Oh today. No, there's not.

2:36

We got big problems for Boris Johnson.

2:39

Ready to dive In

2:40

deep waters of content.

2:41

Why the Trump Netanyahu bromance is officially dead.

2:45

One of my favorite stories in a long time, we're going to talk about why we all need to go hang out in Finland.

2:49

An update on the assassination of the president of Haiti, confusing choice from president Biden for a us ambassador nominee updates on Russia and Ukraine, the Iran deal, accountability problems at the Pentagon, a debate over whether progressives are getting rolled on defense policy, a court ruling on Julian Assange and WikiLeaks, founder, and his extradition, and then camel influencers.

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Don't

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a

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lot

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of

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them

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in

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LA

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Looking forward to that item that I didn't, I wasn't tracking, you know, the Campbell influencers.

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You w we'll catch you up from Ben.

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Also, if you're excited for the release of, Spider-Man no way home, then you have to check out x-ray vision.

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Multi-verse new episodes of extroversion drop every Friday, wherever you get your podcasts.

3:49

Okay then, so in recent weeks, we've talked about how our friends in the UK were concerned about prime minister, Boris Johnson's mental wellbeing and his affinity for Peppa pig.

4:00

I actually think the latter is understandable.

4:02

Yeah. Penta Seems cool. Cool. Yeah. So Finally,

4:05

pig. The challenge now is they're increasing concerns from conservatives about Boris's political future.

4:09

Here's why first it is now confirmed that last December as the UK was putting in place strict lockdown rules that Boris Johnson staff threw a Christmas party where they hung out, drank wine, ate snacks, and played party games, even worse Johnson and his team deny that this party happened until the video leaked of one of his staffers.

4:28

Like I guess kind of like the white house press secretary ish, role preparing for a white house style briefing at a podium.

4:35

And they were practicing questions about this alleged party and essentially practicing how to lie about it and laughing about it.

4:43

Yeah. So not smart. A note to future staffers, don't record yourself practicing how to lie.

4:47

So Johnson still maintains that he had no knowledge of the party and that he is quote, sickened and furious about the whole thing.

4:53

He's asked a cabinet secretary to investigate.

4:56

I'm sure an internal investigation will really get to the bottom of this whole thing.

5:00

The daily mirror claims that there was a second party, a second event that Boris Johnson actually attended and spoke at so far.

5:07

That's not part of this investigation. Great pics from that party, By

5:10

the way I saw. Oh Really? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

5:12

I got to check that out.

5:13

Why

5:13

are

5:13

they

5:13

sitting

5:13

on

5:13

the

5:17

ground? They're like, yeah, I don't know what's going on here.

5:19

I mean, nothing good is happening. It

5:21

looks like a scene from the office.

5:22

Boris Johnson is also facing major pushback from members of his own party about his plan to put in place, basically vaccine passports that require proof of vaccination or a negative PCR test to do certain activities through the UK.

5:34

So this is all swirling together at the worst possible time.

5:37

I guess my take on this was like, I'm not obviously not a big Boris Johnson fan in general, that it was just nice to see a hypocrisy matter again.

5:45

Remember that? Yeah. Remember that was the thing in our politics.

5:49

Yeah. Oh look, there's a Mela thing happening in the world, which is you'll remember what it was like to be an in 2009, 2010 during the financial crisis when people are just, people are just pissed, pissed, like things aren't getting better fast enough.

6:03

And so, you know, I think what we're going to see in a lot of places is like in comments, seven problems, cause people are pissed about COVID and they're pissed about hypocrisy.

6:13

And they're pissed that, you know, certain elites are seeming to, you know, be able to do things that they can't do.

6:18

But I think there's a bigger problem for Boris Johnson, right?

6:22

The bigger problem is he like clearly doesn't seem to give too much of a shit about like, you know, you know, how all of his constituents are doing relative to how he and his circle of friends and advisors are doing.

6:37

They appear to have been living under a different set of rules.

6:41

This is, there've been multiple scandals now throughout COVID of people around Boris Johnson or Boris Johnson himself, not doing the things that they're requiring other people to do.

6:51

So it's one thing to say like, okay, maybe these COVID restrictions, you know, you can make an argument they're necessary, but if they appear to be imposing draconian COVID restrictions while they're like partying and not wearing masks and not following the protocols, and there's a different set of rules that apply to them that apply to everybody else, it starts to feel like he doesn't respect the voters who elected him and thinks that he doesn't have to play by the same rules of the people around him do not play by the same kind of rules.

7:21

And that is like poison for politicians that that's like the, let me cake stuff, which didn't end very well from Marie Antoinette.

7:27

And usually it doesn't end very well for, for leaders.

7:30

This is surprising in this case, since Boris Johnson almost died from COVID.

7:34

Yeah, yeah. That Chris Christie kind of situation, you know, like he was, he was in the ICU for like a while.

7:39

It was Bad, real bad. And now it just doesn't seem to take it seriously Now.

7:43

And, and again, like they've been riding this wave where no matter what happens, like, you know, the Brexit thing took a while to get done.

7:51

And then, you know, certain consequences been pretty negative out of Brexit, but they just keep getting rewarded.

7:58

And I think they kind of internalize the dynamic where like, yeah, we can do whatever the fuck we want, you know?

8:04

And it feels like that's finally catching up to him, you know?

8:06

Yeah, Yeah, it does. And then she started combing his hair and I don't know that that's working.

8:11

I don't think people want That.

8:13

Why do I want The fuzzier a huge improvement?

8:14

No, No. He's not much he can do.

8:17

Yeah.

8:17

Our

8:17

next

8:20

topic. You're a little more vengeance for us maybe personally then, because the bromance between Donald Trump and former Israeli prime minister Bibi Netanyahu is officially dead.

8:28

You Hate to see it. Yeah. Here's

8:30

a quote from Donald Trump. Fuck him.

8:32

And then Yahoo, Donald buddy, like welcome to the Bibi Netanyahu, not a fan club.

8:39

Objection is like, it was one of those things where I was like, well, if it leaked out, the Barack Obama had said fucking voted in.

8:44

And now like the vended, the statements being issued by organizations, the pro clutching with Donald Trump, it's like, oh, that's interesting Axios.

8:51

You know? No, but I mean, the truth is like every American president, most officials who had to work with Bibi Netanyahu are sort of in the same place here.

8:58

But the, so the backstory is according to Brock devid of Axios reporter there, the Trump Netanyahu relationship fully ruptured when Netanyahu congratulated Biden on his victory.

9:07

You're not allowed to do that. Right? You're not allowed to talk about reality if Donald Trump doesn't like reality, but things were souring long before that Trump told Axios, initially it had a much better relationship with buck Moda, boss, the leader of the Palestinians, and ultimately determined that a boss wanted to make a peace deal more than Netanyahu ever did.

9:25

Trump said that quote, BB just tapped us along.

9:28

BB did not want to make peace. He never did again.

9:31

Thank you, Donald stating the obvious joining along lists of public officials who admit to this sort of cynical effort by BB to drag out talks and never actually do anything now, of course, Trump gave Netanyahu every political gift possible.

9:45

He moved the embassy to Jerusalem.

9:47

He recognized the Golan Heights as part of Israel's territory.

9:51

He cut off contact with a boss cut assistance to the Palestinians.

9:54

So I don't know, Ben it's, it's odd to just sort of agree with Donald here.

9:59

I don't know. Well, I mean, I think there are a few things that stand out here.

10:03

Like first of all, what's interesting is that his attitude towards the Netanyahu is kind of like his attitude towards like the Georgia secretary of state.

10:12

Like he sees Bibi Netanyahu as like a, as a local Republican elected officials.

10:18

You know what I mean? Like clearly that's his mentality, right?

10:21

Like, like, oh, you know, the, the, the, the word, the right wing party in Israel now, and that means that this guy is going to do everything I want, including backing up my stop, the steel like campaign.

10:30

And, and again like that speaks to how crass and transactional and full of shit.

10:37

They're whole like wrap themselves in these Railey flag thing is it's not about any genuine feeling for Israel or Israelis.

10:45

It's just this idea that we can cynically manipulate the politics of this issue for our own benefit at home.

10:51

And we expect these really prime minister to be a party to that, which by the way, Netanyahu by and large was totally cool.

11:00

Like, he's totally cool. They right. He, the, he is not the Georgia secretary of state who stood up to Trump.

11:05

He's just somebody who like called the incoming president of the United States, Joe Biden.

11:09

Right. Second thing is, I'm a little dubious on the like, oh, I actually had a great relationship with Abu Mazda.

11:15

And it was like a father figure to me.

11:18

Yeah. Like, I mean, let's be clear here.

11:20

Right? Like, I don't think that there was like some deep chemistry developing between Donald Trump and .

11:26

And then lastly, like a bit of like the tell that maybe the Abraham records wasn't the peace deal.

11:32

Right. Because it's suddenly like, well, he wasn't interested in peace.

11:34

Like, no, maybe that was not about peace either.

11:38

Right? So this kind of just exposes the obvious truth at the core of the whole Trump Netanyahu thing, which was entirely about each one and others like respective political views at home and not about trying to do anything and trumping, oh, well, fuck him is more about the fact that, you know, even though Netanyahu put up billboards to Trump and remember they were like naming shit after him in Israel that, you know, if you're not willing to like storm the Capitol in January six and participate in like hanging Mike Pence chants, you know, you're going to end up getting trashed and like a Barack revealed book, As

12:16

much as I love reading about Trump's slapping that around what it does reveal is that, okay, you're telling us that you knew from the early, from the very beginning, that net guy was never going to cut a peace deal.

12:27

And yet you gave him all those political gifts.

12:28

It was only to excite an evangelical base back in the United States.

12:34

It was as cynical as it gets. You basically, he's admitting that it's also like an enormous repudiation of Jared Kushner and all of his strategies and everything he stood for.

12:41

In fact, so Brock DVT is writing this book on the Abraham Accords.

12:44

He did a podcast, a couple of podcast episodes with Jonathan Swan of Axios, like about the negotiations.

12:49

And it is very, self-congratulatory a bit of a circle jerk vibe about, you know, the UAE ambassador, you know, coming to Jared with this idea for the Abraham Accords.

13:03

And, you know, ultimately they talk about how essentially the, the Abraham Accords or what became them was essentially a way to get Netanyahu to not annex the west bank.

13:16

Because I guess Trump didn't have the SWAT to like call up Nino and say, Hey, do not annex the west bank.

13:23

They had to give him this giant diplomatic gift.

13:25

It's all very, Let's

13:27

confuse it. What peace is a slight delay in the annexation of the west bank.

13:31

Right? I mean, it sounds like it piece was like the west bank becoming part of a Palestinian state.

13:35

It was like, oh, I'm not going to just publicly claim all this land as annex.

13:41

Isn't a part of Israel. I am going to continue to build settlements.

13:43

I'm going to do nothing to bring about a Palestinian state.

13:45

So no, this didn't accomplish anything.

13:48

Right? Like, let's be clear, like the idea that they forced stalled like an even worse outcome of an annexation of the west bank, like in exchange for massive arms deals to the UAE.

13:58

And the, the like Morocco is, is, you know, basically got support for like a war in the Western Sahara Sudan.

14:06

We've had a coup like if you look at the countries that are a part of this, it's not ended well for them.

14:10

The behavior in those countries has not improved on the backend of this deal.

14:14

You know, I do just think like Netanyahu himself, like looks like increasingly ridiculous figure.

14:21

You've got multiple Israeli officials now coming out and saying that his Iran policy was like the biggest disaster for Israel in recent history.

14:29

And, and you have Iran moving in the direction of a nuclear weapon because of Bibi, Netanyahu, peace is further away.

14:35

Nino is out of power.

14:37

Trump has best buddy is telling him to go fuck himself.

14:40

Like, I mean, in both of them, I

14:42

spend a lot of their time either in a courtroom defending themselves against corruption charges, that's on Yahoo or Trump preparing to defend himself potentially against corruption charges.

14:50

We're fighting back against subpoenas and you know, both in New York and at the, in Congress.

14:55

So this is not exactly like, you know, Anwar, Sadat, and yeah, they're not coming out.

15:00

Gloria here, Jimmy Carter here, I

15:03

don't know about those creeps. Then it is time for the world does out there to Mount up in defense of an unfairly maligned world leader.

15:11

So Santa's Marine is the prime minister of Finland.

15:15

She had to apologize because she went clubbing until 4:00 AM and she missed a text message informing her that she had been in close contact with someone who had COVID-19.

15:23

Now that's obviously a bummer, but that someone was the foreign minister of Finland.

15:28

It wasn't like some random, she handed a bar here's where this all gets a little confusing.

15:33

Marine was initially told that despite her close contact with the foreign minister who got COVID, that she didn't need to isolate because she was fully vaccinated.

15:40

So she did, I think what, what every one of us wished we could have done for all of 20, 20 on a Saturday night, she, she left her fucking work phone at home and she went out to the bars.

15:50

But then on Sunday, when she got home, she saw texts on her work phone that said, Hey, you're in close contact.

15:55

You should self isolate. You get tested.

15:56

So she went and got tested. The results came back negative.

15:59

All is well, that ends well, the Finland guidelines don't require you to isolate if you're fully vaccinated and come in contact with someone with COVID, but they suggest that you do.

16:07

I don't, I don't get how this is a scandal.

16:08

It seems like the problem here is some poorly written rules, but a Marine became the world's youngest prime minister when she was elected to lead Finland's center, left coalition back in 2019.

16:17

At that time she was 34.

16:19

Now she's 36.

16:21

Here's a hot take for her critics.

16:23

Shut up. Yeah, you Guys

16:25

are losers. You're losers and you Wish

16:27

you could stay awake till 4:00 AM. That's the problem.

16:29

I wish I could stay awake until 4:00 AM.

16:31

Well, yeah, I mean, I wouldn't end well for me, you know, like about 2:00 AM, like things would start to go really south really fast, you know?

16:38

But look, it's, first of all, it's very different from the Boris Johnson scandals, where he was putting forward these guidelines that they were all breaking, Right.

16:47

This was pre vaccine to when Boris was Doing

16:49

this, you know, he's just partying back there.

16:51

Like we want our leaders, our political leaders to be recognizable.

16:55

We want them to, you know, essentially be authentic the themselves.

17:02

Right. And like, who wouldn't want a leader to feel like, you know what?

17:06

It's been a pretty fucking shitty year.

17:08

Yeah. So, you know what I want to do live your life.

17:10

Like, I want to go out till 4:00 AM.

17:13

I'm going to have the jello shot, like or whatever the thing is that you do at the club, you know?

17:17

And, and look, she's she's, she's the kind of leader we need.

17:21

Like it, it would, would you want like Donald Trump at the club till four in the morning?

17:25

Like no. No. You Think Biden wasn't in the clubs during the roaring twenties or whenever he Was,

17:30

I'm saying that like, this is a person who's at the Vanguard of this trend.

17:34

Yes. We've talked about of women leaders in their thirties getting elected, being very reasonable people, doing a great job in office.

17:41

And, and if you want to go out to the club at four, like, you know what, every now and then like, that's something that like you gotta do.

17:48

Right? And I think this is something where world does need to circle the wagons and defense here of all the haters and back the fuck up.

17:54

I will tell you also, Helsinki is a fun place to hang out And

17:57

the sun that Ever go down. So I went there, I went there a long time ago and I had like a really good time.

18:03

And I went out, I remember one night and I had a little too much to drink and I go back and it was the white nights.

18:08

It was literally the time when the sun never goes down.

18:11

And I will tell you, it is rough when you have had a little too much drink and I didn't have her stamina.

18:16

So I didn't make it till four. So I go back and I crash in my like, you know, crappy hotel at the time.

18:21

And I wake up at like three in the morning and you know, like, you don't feel that great.

18:25

And it's just bright light.

18:26

How are you supposed to sleep anyway, window?

18:28

What's the point of going home? This, I have a lot of respect for these people.

18:31

They can power through in the summer.

18:33

And right now, you know, and now it's like dark all the fucking time.

18:36

Like, I mean, yeah, you don't even know what time it is.

18:39

The Oslo in January. And it basically, the sun came up at like eight 30 and went down at four and it was there's the reverse.

18:45

It's not good. But I'm just saying like, if part of the problem that we have in the world today is that a bunch of autocratic, nationalist, creeps are getting elected because in many countries, too many countries, more old people vote than young people because young people are looking at politicians and not seeing people that they can relate to.

19:02

And not seeing people that can connect to the idea that you have like an effective social Democrat prime minister in her thirties, crushing it on the job and then crushing it at the clubs is like the kind of thing that would get more people involved in politics.

19:18

Yeah. This story is getting traction because she is a young, attractive woman.

19:20

But I just want to point out that some of the world's greatest leaders have been known to party as has been discussed before on this show queen Elizabeth, the second England was known to pregame her lunch.

19:32

Yeah. Pregame her lunch. She would have a Dubin, a cocktail just for the fine wine mixed with Jim Sounds

19:40

like I had to like crawl off the floor.

19:42

It was Former

19:44

Russian president. Boris Yeltsin, reportedly got so drunk during a visit to Washington DC, that he was found by secret service, standing alone, trying to hail a cab on Pennsylvania avenue in his underwear.

19:56

And when asked why he said he was going to go grab a slice of pizza, Who

20:00

among us, hasn't wanted to get that slice Of

20:02

pizza. Can you imagine if you ran into a half naked, Boris Yeltsin, the jumbo slices.

20:06

I say the good thing is, was going to say, you get the jumbo slice.

20:09

You know, like that was clearly what he was going after.

20:11

You know, FDR, Ben reportedly served dirty martinis to Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin at the Yalta conference, as they were figuring out, you know, a sort of post-war Europe.

20:22

It didn't end that well for Eastern Europe, but like, you know, they, they, they, they saved half the world, you know?

20:30

Yeah. You know, maybe they'd get the Merkel is reportedly a fan of a good German beer, Margaret Thatcher, the iron lady, she loved Quantro and scotch.

20:36

I don't like, I look, what I'm saying is a lot of great leaders knew how to have a great time.

20:42

You know, who didn't ever have a drink, did never seem to have fun Donald Donald.

20:46

I Mean, you know, sitting around and drinking diet Cokes and eating like fast food Look,

20:51

we're team Finland Here, we're team Finland we're team.

20:53

We're in, you know, we're invested in her success and the success of basically all political leaders under 40 who try to do the right thing in office and, you know, try to get after it on the week.

21:04

Yeah. Except for that douche douchebag then in El Salvador.

21:07

And we don't like him. Ben, the New York times published a report about the assassination in Haiti though.

21:13

I thought it was important update. So they said that president Jovan, a moist of Haiti who was assassinated back in July, had been keeping a list of government officials and business people linked to the drug trade and was about to hand it over to the U S government before he was assassinated.

21:28

This list, reportedly included, close associates.

21:31

People who had basically helped him gain power and moist, his wife who survived the assassination attempt, described how the killers had rifled through all his documents before declaring that's it grabbing something and leaving a it's a long story it's worth reading and full.

21:45

There was actually a great episode of the daily where they talked about it.

21:48

But I don't know, not an entirely surprising motive here.

21:51

I thought No. And I mean, it was, it was nice to feel like you were getting the beginning of some answers about this, right?

21:58

Because it was so opaque why this incredibly dramatic thing happened, you know, and you know, it is a sign that in Haiti and through Haiti, you have gangs and drug cartels that are far more powerful than the state so that if they become aware and start to feel like they might become the target of the state, it's like, okay, we'll just take out the president.

22:19

Right. So it's good that, you know, hopefully this is a thread that can be pulled to figure out what happened, but you know, a sign of just like how big a problem it is that you know, that the state is not the, the, the big actor here when it comes to violence and Haiti, you know?

22:36

Yeah. It makes you worried that the, the corruption is so endemic in the halls of power in Haiti, that there might not ever be accountability for what happened.

22:44

But hopefully it does seem like we are a little bit closer to knowing why he was assassinated.

22:49

Yeah.

22:49

Pod

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26:39

Another

26:39

interesting

26:39

story

26:39

that

26:39

has

26:39

to

26:39

do

26:39

with

26:39

president

26:39

Biden

26:39

and

26:39

his

26:39

ambassadorial

26:51

nominees. So president Biden nominated former Quimby, Hewlett Packard, and eBay CEO, Meg Whitman, to be the U S ambassador to Kenya, Whitman endorsed Biden in 2020 Hillary Clinton in 2016.

27:02

So she was sort of an anti-Trump Republican.

27:04

But before that was a senior member of Mitt Romney's campaigns in 2008, 2012.

27:08

And she ran for governor of California in 2010, as a Republican could be used to be in this building, used to be an elevators with our randomly.

27:15

Here's my question though.

27:17

Why w why, why make Whitman?

27:21

Why, why, what, what connection does she have with Kenya?

27:24

Yeah, she's an incredibly accomplished CEO, but Kenya is a big and really important country country.

27:31

We've lots of counter-terrorism interests there that like Ethiopia, their neighbor is, is in the middle of a year-long civil war.

27:39

I get rewarding supporters with ambassadorial posts.

27:44

I don't think it's the greatest practice that presidents do, but Obama did it.

27:48

Others had done it, but normally you're like sending people to like the Cayman islands.

27:51

The Bahamas is Kenya spot where you try out a novice political appointee rather than some like hardened career diplomat with experience in the region.

28:01

It seems like a bad idea. To me, It's

28:03

pretty random. I mean, first of all, Kenya is really important country, right?

28:07

So, and as a country have a lot of sensitive issues you have to manage.

28:10

You you've had situations in the past that we've had to get involved in the United States government kind of mediating between some tribal violence and Kenyan politics between the Tutsi and cuckoo tribes.

28:20

You know, that that you've had really bad election violence.

28:24

It's, it's a dynamic economy.

28:26

It's a place where China is seeking to get greater influence in Africa.

28:29

It's a key counter-terrorism partner.

28:31

It's a part of any diplomatic strategy related to Tigray or South Sudan or any number of the other issues.

28:36

There it's the biggest and most important country in that part of Africa.

28:39

And you would want someone who knows a lot about Kenya or knows a lot about the diplomacy that you're gonna have to pursue in that kind of country.

28:48

And the reality here is that like, yes, sometimes you reward people, but like you try to get the, the right person for the right posts to the right job.

28:59

I mean, Quimby didn't work out.

29:02

Let's face it. I mean, when I first started coming to this building where Cribby had offices, you know, it was cool for like about two months.

29:08

You'd see like some celebrity coming in for a meeting and stuff like that is not the prep work that you want though.

29:14

The, the, the cratered Cribby experiment to be the springboard to an ambassadorship to Kenya.

29:22

What's weird to me is like, I get, look I'm okay with non-traditional ambassadorial choices.

29:28

I'm okay with like plucking, if you Republicans and trying to show a bi-partisan, you know, image to the world.

29:34

But another one that was weird is Jeff flake, former Senator Jeff flake of Arizona to be ambassador to Turkey.

29:39

Again, it's a country where like a lot of shit is happening, big, important place.

29:45

Yeah. They're kind of falling out of NATO. We have a autocratic leader.

29:48

It's just an odd, odd choices to me.

29:51

I get it. Yeah. I mean, I think that you like the, the role of ambassadors too, is, you know, it's, it's actually getting kind of more important, right.

29:59

In the sense that when you're talking about a Kenya, or even to some extent at Turkey, these are really important countries that are at the center of a lot of stuff.

30:07

And yet a lot of the Washington bandwidth is going to be taken up by China by middle east issues, by, you know, these large trends that are being managed at a Washington COVID climate change.

30:21

And so you, you actually rely a lot on, on the ambassador to be the tip of the spear of your diplomacy and all these places.

30:28

And I think like this is not restricted to the byte administration.

30:32

You know, I think as a general matter, thinking through like the kind of profile that you want for people to be ambassadors is important.

30:40

And by the way, like also not having a confirmation process that is so fucked up that, you know, you can't really get your own people in there.

30:48

So maybe it's easier to get a Republican.

30:50

And, you know, when you're a democratic president, it just it's worth taking a step back and kind of thinking through this whole enterprise going forward, you know, Or

31:00

creativity, but it's gotta be like square peg square hole kind of fixed.

31:05

Yeah. And sometimes it can fit with a, with a political supporter or donor.

31:08

Sometimes someone who hasn't been in government has like a lot of unique and relevant expertise to a country doesn't have to, I, I'm not, I'm not one who thinks that always has to be a foreign service officers as good as foreign service officers are, but you do want to make sure it makes the most sense.

31:24

Yeah. And I just haven't seen it. Yeah. Ben, I w I made a little section that we call a various serious problems that seem to be getting worse, but there's no good answers for some quick updates here.

31:33

One Ukraine, again, G seven got together.

31:36

They warned Russia against invading Ukraine, just for listeners.

31:40

The G seven is the us UK, Canada, Germany, France, Italy, Japan.

31:43

This meeting came after.

31:46

Biden's talk with Latin repute. And last week state department sent the assistant secretary of state for Europe to Ukraine and to Russia for meetings.

31:53

I think those are happening right now under the Pod.

31:56

Yes. Yes. I also saw that former world heavyweight boxing champion and current mayor of keep Vitaly Klitschko said he was prepared to personally join the army, join the fight if Russia invades.

32:07

So watch out, wouldn't wanna fuck with that guy.

32:09

So the G seven is saying there's going to be political and economic consequences for Russia.

32:14

If innovation occurs, it's worth remembering that the G seven was the G eight until 2014 when Russia invaded Crimea, not sure that that deterred them.

32:23

We talked about this last week about how Russia is and seemed to be really all that scared about us sanctions.

32:28

Do you think the collective has more sway?

32:31

Do they have more tools or is this sort of status?

32:34

I think it's useful to send a message that it's not just the United States like raising these concerns.

32:39

It, it suggests to Russia that there'll be multilateral consequences for things that they do.

32:46

It, it provides a good backdrop to diplomacy that Karen Don freed is, is excellently qualified to, to carry out.

32:54

You know, the whole thing though, continues to be worrisome suppression, troop buildup just continues.

33:00

And, you know, part of, I was kind of trying to think of at a different angle of like w where this might be going.

33:06

I mean, obviously worst case scenarios, Russia just invades Ukraine.

33:09

But you know, sometimes what Putin can do is he can create a worst case scenario, right?

33:17

Like, oh my God, he's going to invade the whole country.

33:19

And then he can do something short of that.

33:22

Right? Like what if they move a whole bunch of these troops into the two provinces that are contested in Eastern Ukraine, right.

33:28

The Donbass area of Ukraine that's on the Russian border.

33:32

And so it's like, well, he didn't invade the whole country, but you know, maybe it's a play to kind of annex those pieces of Ukraine.

33:40

Right. Like he did Crimea. And so then he's done something that is not this worst case scenario necessarily, but it's still invading claim to have a country.

33:50

Yeah. Yeah. So that's the only, the other angle that occurred to me as I thought about this is just like, I think Putin in the past sometimes has created like, fears about something that is extreme so that when he then does something that is less extreme, it doesn't look as radical as if he had just rolled a bunch of troops into a couple of provinces in Ukraine, you know?

34:11

Yeah. Well, I guess we just keep watching this one because it's still building up.

34:15

Yeah. I mean, it is like Groundhog day, but also it's worth pointing out that like the Biden team has a full plate here and that when you look at the progress of Ron's nuclear program, you look at the risk of an invasion of Ukraine.

34:26

Like next year, you know, could be, it could have some serious foreign policy challenge.

34:32

Yeah. I mean, so you mentioned the Iran nuclear deal. So the international atomic energy agency says that restrictions that are being put on their inspectors by Iran are giving the world a very blurred image of the nuclear program.

34:43

And Ron, Ron refuses to let the IAA replaced cameras.

34:47

They have in some parts of their sort of nuclear infrastructure, because the Iranian say, well, those cameras were probably used in sabotage efforts where the Israelis blew up this facility at some point.

34:59

So no, you can't put them back in us.

35:02

And European diplomats are warning. The time is running out Tony Blinken the secretary of state to the U S is preparing quote alternatives in case the talks, collapse, anything out there giving you hope, do you think is alternatives code for dusting off Pentagon plans to blow up shit?

35:16

Like, I wasn't sure how to read that.

35:19

I'm, you know, usually that means like you even more sanctions, which I don't think are going to accomplish much other than, you know, just squeezing Iran more.

35:29

We left the sanctuary. Yeah. I mean, like they've clearly priced in sanctions with the course that they're on and no, I mean, it, every, every signal that seems to be coming out of these steps by Iran and these, these negotiations points to an Iran that is at, at best engaged, in pretty extreme brinksmanship as a part of a negotiating tool or at worst is just decided like they're moving ahead with their nuclear program.

35:56

And they're, you know, doing some smoke screen talks to just, you know, play the clock.

36:02

Yeah. Not good.

36:04

Yeah. Last sort of a problem we've been sort of observing for awhile, which is the Pentagon says that no us troops are going to be punished for the drone strike in Kabul in August that killed 10 civilians talked about this a lot at the time John Kirby, the Pentagon spokesman said, quote, what we saw here was a breakdown in process and execution in procedural events, not the result of negligence, nor the result of misconduct, not the result of poor leadership end quote.

36:26

I remember that, you know, at the time the defense department did not acknowledge that civilians were killed until the New York times challenged their assertion, that this was a quote righteous strike that killed a nicest bomber.

36:37

Some of the reporting on this decision by the Pentagon not to punish anyone noted that the military almost never hold anyone accountable, never punched anyone with the one notable exception being when it doesn't military personnel were disciplined for an airstrike on a doctors without borders hospital in Afghanistan in 2015, they killed 42 people.

36:55

The decision from the Pentagon not to punch someone comes as the times released another major report detailing how the military routinely circumvented rules put in place to protect civilians in Syria, by saying, look, all our districts are defensive in nature.

37:11

So we don't have to, you know, make sure that civilians will be killed.

37:14

I just want to highlight all of this Ben, because I'm just having a growing sense that these are systemic failures that not enough is being done to protect civilians and that the message that's getting sent to the world when there's no accountability is really damaging.

37:32

And it worries me and I'm not sure what to do about it.

37:35

Yeah. And I think part of what is, is kind of troubling here is we learned a lot about this drone strike and, you know, nothing that we learned suggested really anything that would point to this being like a legitimate target, right.

37:54

I mean, as the guy's like driving around town, running some errands, putting some water in his car family, you know, and I'm thinking to NGO.

38:00

And so, you know, part of the issue here is when the Pentagon comes out and says, nobody did anything wrong, there was no failure of this nuclear that you almost want to ask the question and they need to answer the question.

38:15

What would, what would qualify as a failure of, of execution or leadership?

38:20

You know, like, like, like what, what is this cause it's so opaque, you know, like who like, you know, and, and, and there's different kinds of processes.

38:28

If they were clear about what the standards are that would merit, then there could be an easier way to measure what happened against what those standards are.

38:41

And there's a lot of just kind of like, trust us, we looked into this and nothing wrong happened when, you know, in fact that that doesn't answer any questions.

38:50

If nothing, if nobody did anything wrong, then how did this happen?

38:53

You know? And, and so I think bottom line is you want more accountability and more circumstances.

38:58

I think you would also want there to be a kind of clear public explanation of what does constitute a failure so that you can measure these incidents against that.

39:10

You know, We were like mistakes were made vibe.

39:14

Yeah. At some point like someone made a mistake, made a mistake.

39:16

Like if killing someone, isn't a mistake.

39:18

What is I, yeah, I dunno, Ben political had a piece that I want to get your gut check from you on because the headline felt frustratingly accurate and we're talking about, so this headline was Progressive's get rolled on Pentagon policy.

39:33

A few examples cited in the article.

39:36

We still haven't been able to get rid of the authorization for the use of military force that was passed to go to warn rock.

39:44

A bipartisan group of senators were unable to block a $650 million arm sale to Saudi Arabia efforts to fundamentally reform the military justice system were pared back.

39:54

And the price tag on this big defense spending bill was massive.

39:59

It was $768 billion, which was 25 billion more than the white house even asked for it's worth noting just before we talk about it, that progressives have made a ton of progress towards building support to end the U S support for the Saudi war in Yemen.

40:14

Senator Kirsten Gillibrand has done incredible work to push the Pentagon, to reform the way it handles sexual assault allegations and deserves credit for it.

40:21

And she was furious of the way it was watered down, but I don't know.

40:24

What did you make of that article? Do you think that take is fair?

40:26

And then more importantly, I guess, like, do you have thoughts on how Democrats can actually do a better job in when some of these fights cut the Pentagon budget reform, the military, et cetera?

40:37

I, I think it's fair, you know, in those, those Trump years when you know, progresses were, and frankly, just even Senator left folks were kind of thinking through, like, what are the types of changes you would want to make in this space?

40:49

You know, you would be looking at cuts to the Pentagon budget.

40:53

You'd be looking at cuts, for instance, to the massive trillion dollar nuclear infrastructure modernization plan.

41:00

Do we really need to spend a trillion dollars modernizing our nuclear weapons industry?

41:05

Didn't Bob Corker force us to do that during the Obama Kyle, Bob

41:08

Corker, these guys, but it just grew it mushrooms, right?

41:10

So there was an original sin there in like 2010, but it's just got, it's like a snowball rolling down a hill.

41:17

It's just more and more money.

41:18

And so there's the overall cut to the budget.

41:21

And particularly this nuclear weapons piece and, and Biden has like a nuclear posture review.

41:26

That's how you look at nuclear weapons and all the mood music out of that is it's not going to be particularly progressive.

41:31

We used to about, you know, no, no, no first use of nuclear weapons as being a part of it.

41:36

You don't hear anything about that anymore. Right?

41:38

Then the Yemen war, you know, Biden came in his first major speech and said, you know, we're going to end support for offensive military operations.

41:44

But you know, here we are in Saudi arms sales is something that obviously Progressive's, and I think Democrats generally thought we need to hit a pause button on a Chris.

41:54

Murphy's had great leadership on that. So, you know, then you see this arm sale going through progressive, Very

41:59

pissed at Murphy for not fighting to cut off this latest one.

42:03

Yeah, Yeah, yeah, exactly. Right. And then, well, that's the point?

42:06

This is, it's kind of like downgrading of expectations on a bunch of stuff.

42:09

The AUMF was an area where people had a lot of enthusiasm when you're a Democrat president coming in, you're going on Afghanistan, it's a hundred plus a year and a half.

42:16

So if you look at that kind of wishlist or agenda of repealing the AUMF ending the war in Yemen suspending, arm sales to Saudi Arabia, making meaningful cuts the defense budget, like none of that is happening, you know, and it feels like the autopilot right.

42:33

Of the machinery of Congress and the military industrial complex, you know, plussing up defense spending, which we should point out like Joe Manchin and, you know, the deficit Hawks there and the no labels caucus, like we're talking about an annual expenditure of something that is almost half of the overall tenure price tag of bill back bed, right?

42:57

I mean, massive, massive amounts of money.

42:59

And I don't think that that changes absent, like real concerted presidential and white house focus on this because Congress, you know, the lobbyists and the defense contractors can always get to just enough members to kill something like the effort to cut off this Saudi arms sale, right.

43:18

Or to, to add some more pork to the defense budget.

43:21

And so, you know, this is something that they would have to decide to, to, to, to meaningfully take on, Again,

43:28

look, it's frustrating that, you know, the, I think the U S is still providing some support for airstrikes in Yemen.

43:34

The blockade hasn't been ended, millions of people are at risk of starvation.

43:38

So like there is there there's some good pressure from the left on these issues.

43:44

It's just kind of, I don't know, it's not penetrating the, the Biden team's decision-making on this set of topics in part, because just in, in fairness, the, the white house folks are probably thinking, all right, we're going to need the Saudi's help with the Iran nuclear deal.

43:58

If we can get back into that, we're gonna need their help on energy prices.

44:01

We need their help on a QAP, all these other things.

44:03

And so, you know, you can see how really critical priorities like ending the war in Yemen can get squeezed out a little bit.

44:10

But I do think like there is more urgency there than on almost any other issue to end that blockade and prevent people from starving.

44:18

And I would expect what they would tell you. And this is just me saying this, not based on, on, on the conversations, you know, that we're trying to do this, we're trying to end the war in Yemen.

44:28

And actually it could harm our diplomacy and trying to in the Warren yet, man, if we picked a fight with the Saudis over this saying, and you know, kind of the strategy of like you, you kind of hug the person to try to get them to do something.

44:39

I don't know. I don't like, I just feel like the war in Yemen is so beyond the pale that you have to set some markers, the nature of the Saudi regime is so compromised that you have to do something more concerted armed sales.

44:54

But then also this question of the Pentagon budget is within your purview.

44:57

And, you know, we don't need this big of a Pentagon budget.

45:01

If you look under the hood of that budget, this is not all stuff that is going for future threats.

45:07

You know, whether it's China or cyber or whatever, it's a lot of bloated stuff, you know, like a trillion dollar nuclear weapons, modernization plan, right?

45:16

And so I think it's just time to, you know, to, to, to, to have government reflect the priorities that I think Democrats have.

45:25

And this is feels like it's not there Pod

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50:18

Here's another example of a priority.

50:21

That's continued from Trump to Biden.

50:23

That sort of surprise me, which is the extradition Julian Assange.

50:27

So last week, a British court rule that WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange can be extradited to the us to face charges, which reversed a lower court ruling.

50:35

So in 2019, the Trump administration chart on 17 counts of violating the espionage act.

50:41

The Biden ministration continued that prosecution effort, the Obama team, the Obama administration, back in the day, debated charging Assange, but decided not to because of concerns that could harm press freedom.

50:51

This British court ruling wasn't about under any of these bigger issues.

50:56

We're talking about their concern is that the Sonja's physical and mental health had deteriorated so much in British custody that his extradition to the U S could put him in a prison where the conditions are so inhumane, that they could create an extreme risk of suicide.

51:10

I would just say pausing for a second, like no matter how you feel about us as ONJ.

51:15

I think the fact that the British court system is debating how horrific the us prison system is, should probably all make us pause, be ashamed for a minute of just how fucked up our penal system is.

51:28

So, you know, the, the charges that assigned just facing, none of them have to do with 2016 or, you know, the election, it's all about documents.

51:36

He was given by Chelsea Manning in 2010, DOJ says the Saanich solicited the documents that he participated in a conspiracy to, with Manning to cover his tracks after Chelsea Manning got the documents.

51:48

So Ben, I, you know, I, I'm not a fan of .

51:51

I find this whole thing deeply uncomfortable.

51:53

I worry about the precedent, but I guess the question I have for you is, are you surprised that the Biden administration is continuing with this prosecution and extradition is, is like, are these, you know, prosecution efforts at DOJ?

52:08

Just sort of like a source of enormous inertia.

52:11

Like I just don't get it. This works, They

52:14

are kind of a source. I mean, they, they kind of, the wheels start spinning and then they just continue spinning you.

52:20

And I went through a version of this in the Obama years on I think even more questionable cases.

52:27

Interesting, which are those leak cases. Right.

52:29

And remember we, a lot of those originated in the Bush administration, national security leaks.

52:36

And, and then it just like w like was hard to explain to people that Barack Obama didn't come in and say, like, I want you to prioritize this.

52:45

They're just ongoing prosecutions, you know, some which began Bush and some just, and, and so you have to kind of make a decision to deprioritize something at at times, which, you know, I think you could make a pretty credible argument, like the Obama administration should have done on some of those, some of those leak investigations.

53:01

And,

53:01

and,

53:01

and

53:01

so

53:01

in

53:01

this

53:01

case,

53:01

I'm

53:01

not

53:01

surprised

53:01

cause

53:01

it

53:01

kind

53:01

of

53:01

runs

53:01

on

53:01

autopilot,

53:01

but

53:01

at

53:01

a

53:01

certain

53:01

point,

53:01

like

53:01

what

53:01

is

53:01

the

53:01

relative

53:01

value

53:01

of

53:01

pursuing

53:01

kind

53:01

of

53:01

futilely

53:01

this

53:01

extradition

53:01

over

53:01

something

53:01

that

53:01

happened

53:01

over

53:01

a

53:01

decade

53:01

ago

53:01

that

53:01

has

53:01

really

53:01

been,

53:01

you

53:01

know,

53:01

we

53:01

are

53:01

like

53:01

so

53:01

many

53:01

universes

53:01

past

53:01

that

53:01

time,

53:01

you

53:01

know,

53:01

like,

53:01

like

53:01

we've

53:01

sent

53:01

the

53:01

message

53:01

that

53:01

like

53:01

there

53:01

will

53:01

be

53:01

efforts

53:01

to

53:01

bring

53:01

to

53:01

justice

53:01

people

53:01

that

53:01

leak

53:01

or

53:01

the

53:01

people

53:01

that

53:01

are

53:01

involved

53:01

in

53:36

this. Like, I, I just don't see that with all the things that the justice department can and should be doing, why this should be like prioritized in the U S UK relationship or, or in the kind of universe of stuff that, that, that we had to worry about us.

53:51

And look, I don't like Julian Assange.

53:53

I find to be a pretty odious character in a lot of ways.

53:56

But like, I just don't know that like what, And

54:00

also, I think the global reaction to this extradition effort is horror.

54:04

Yeah. I concerned about the precedent and press freedom And

54:06

concerned about and dragging back up the, the, all the debates about everything wiki-leaks was like, what is the best case scenario here, right?

54:14

Like from the U S government standpoint, like, what is it really worth?

54:18

Like having Julian Assange in, in, in a prison and then a trial and bring back all the Chelsea Manning stuff I had just, it just feels like we're past the expiration date on this one, you know, And

54:30

look, I mean, some of the docs, some of the materials Manning released were whistleblowing, or there was that horrific video of a us helicopter shooting journalists murdering them, huge mistake that that should have been disclosed by the government before shouldn't have been leaked.

54:43

No one is arguing that disclosing 250,000 state department cables was whistleblowing or necessary or appropriate, but, Or

54:52

like taking from the GRU cutout, the 2016 documents releasing them.

54:57

But that's not what the is. Right,

54:59

right. And that's how it is you. But like my point was just on the state department cables, like Chelsea Manning was punished for that crime extensively to the point where Obama commuted The

55:07

sentence. So it was Julian Assange. I Mean, he's been living in a fucking embassy.

55:11

It's not like, you know, he's been high on the hog here the last few years.

55:14

Right. So there's been punishment.

55:15

You have sent the message that there are consequences for people who do this kind of stuff.

55:21

Like I don't.

55:23

Yeah. It just doesn't seem like, why are we still doing it today?

55:27

It's surprising to me. Last thing, very, very serious topic here.

55:31

According to the Saudi press agency over 40 camels were disqualified from an annual camel beauty contest because they were administered Botox, hormones, or other appearance enhancing techniques participants in the king of duel, Aziz, camel festival compete for weight for it.

55:47

$66 million.

55:51

Yes. Judges pick the camel winners based on the shape of their heads.

55:55

Next humps dress and postures.

55:57

That's a quote. These poor Campbell's are treated As

56:01

like a attractive hump. I don't Know. We've gotta fight.

56:03

We gotta go. No, we probably shouldn't go. Bone saw these poor camels.

56:07

They're they're they're, they're treating them like Instagram influencers or bodybuilders.

56:10

They're poked in their product and injected with like fillers and steroids and shit.

56:14

They should all move to LA. The goal of the festival is to keep Saudi Arabia is better than traditional live it's to highlight the role the camels have played in it.

56:21

So I guess, you know, good, I guess that they're cracking down on cheaters, but like, so the idea of giving a camel Botox is obviously crazy and hilarious, but I guess also PED is, are pervasive at horse races, dock tracks other competitions.

56:35

But Ben, while I was researching this, I came across the following headline that I just thought you would love.

56:41

Quote, Barry bonds is unrecognizable at Westminster dog show, very bonds.

56:46

Former baseball player had a miniature schnauzer named Brockie competing in the Westminster dog show in 2021.

56:52

And the headline was about how he doesn't look rooted up anymore.

56:56

So full circle. So Like

56:58

the head isn't swollen up And

57:00

oh, no, not dude. I used to go to the gym in San Francisco and Barry bonds would work out there and he looks like a different person.

57:05

Huh? Well, I was thinking like, remember the movie best in show.

57:08

Pretty good. Right? Fantastic. Like you could make a Rainmaker, a SQL it's like the camel show, write it up.

57:14

That's like every society is a little peculiar about their animals and we have dog shows here.

57:19

So like we're, we're in a bit of a glass house.

57:22

I don't know that the dogs are getting Botox and PDs.

57:24

Like maybe you could probably find that they are.

57:28

Yeah, I bet they, yeah, you're probably right.

57:31

I just think my dog's haircuts costs four times as much as mine do.

57:36

So I shouldn't really talk. I do just think it's a little, like wouldn't the camel contest be like, you know, which camel can like walk the farthest across the desert or something like that.

57:45

Beauty is not the word I associate with a camel.

57:47

No, They're kind of mean too.

57:50

I hear they're there. They can be kind of real bastards.

57:53

You know what I mean?

57:55

But I don't, I'm not a better one. I assume that they know how to kind of tame.

57:59

They build a really, yeah. Did you go on the Obama trip to Egypt?

58:01

I did. Didn't you guys go on like a camel thing?

58:04

I didn't, I

58:05

I, well, no, I wasn't that enthusiastic to, to ride on camel.

58:10

And I remember seeing like rom manual riding around in camels.

58:13

It's something I'll never on unsee, you know, but it's, I mean like the health of the Campbell's need to be first of course, on center here on this thing, the camel influencer thing is kind of dystopian.

58:27

Yeah. I they're probably using like Instagram filters and like those beautification apps on, on, on Face

58:33

tune and stuff. Yeah. Hump tune.

58:35

Yeah. $66 million.

58:37

That's the thing that really Mistakes.

58:39

That number is we've got this topic and this show 66 mil When

58:44

he was over there for the, the big MBS, a bone saw, you know, party at the formula, one racing thing was, was doing a little side show with the camels.

58:52

I mean, I wonder that's quite a ride on a camel.

58:55

I bet. I bet. Do you think if you get, I bet that the Bieber concert appearance price tag comes with like a three day, like you have to Do

59:05

it tour, ride a camel through the desk, Kind

59:08

of participate in their weird yeah.

59:10

You know, like propaganda, you know, events they want you to do.

59:14

It's probably some, some, some camel beautification picks out there that Bieber could get ripped into.

59:20

Yeah. Well, good for him. Anyway.

59:22

If any of you out there are camel aficionados, if you've been to this competition, if you know more about this, I

59:30

would love to know, is there a Lama version of this?

59:32

Cause that was like, that's kind of our version of the camel over here in this hemisphere Had

59:36

a Lama for Obama in Iowa in 2008.

59:38

No, I Went

59:40

to like, oh Yeah. I went to all kinds of events that Lama was in dozens of parades for Obama.

59:44

It was like that Lama would, would always show up to stuff.

59:47

There's I think there might've been llamas for Obama in 2004, to which we love a good, you know, alliteration Ryan scheme.

59:54

But yeah, it was that the llamas and my shitty ass truck would always be in these events.

1:00:01

W who would drive the Lama around? Did you have a gun?

1:00:03

Someone on staff who was at a Lama caretaker, Oren

1:00:08

who lived up in the sort of Lamur region, who I think was sort of the designated Point

1:00:12

of contact there, llamas. And I was at a thing there's just Lots

1:00:15

of weird people. Yeah.

1:00:17

Yeah. I've always like a good alpaca.

1:00:18

Oh yeah. Those are cool. Yeah. Those are cool.

1:00:20

But those are why don't people find them.

1:00:23

Is that further for, Is it like a hanger?

1:00:25

I think so. I think they have like the, yeah.

1:00:27

The can make a sweater. Do they die when you do that?

1:00:29

Or is it, I think it's like a shutter Plus

1:00:32

dark. You feel good about it? I'm learning. You can feel okay about it.

1:00:35

I guess you can feel okay. About the, as long as the, Campbell's see a little piece of that 66 miles.

1:00:40

Yeah. Right. I mean, I wonder how you sell it.

1:00:42

If you go to Finland, you have the club.

1:00:45

Yeah. Yeah. Just bring all these threads together.

1:00:48

Yeah. Well, I'd rather go to Finland and go to hit the clubs and hang out at the Tory party Christmas party.

1:00:52

Oh yeah. I can eat the Tory.

1:00:56

I saw the video of the, of the Tory, Jen Saki, like making fun of the track.

1:01:01

Spinet like we did not have a party or something.

1:01:03

And it's just, it wasn't that funny. It was bad. It wasn't funny.

1:01:05

Is that at least be funny? Don't you think that Boris Johnson was absolutely aware of these parties and was probably at one Of

1:01:12

them? No question about it. Like This

1:01:13

shoe is going to drop so hard on him.

1:01:15

He's so Full of shit.

1:01:17

He's down in the polls. So the first time in a while there was a poll that showed labor has like an eight point edge on it.

1:01:23

Let's go Lammy. Yeah. I mean, there's been a Lammy bounce.

1:01:26

Maybe it was quoted knifing Stories.

1:01:30

Yeah. It's, it's, he's been well, you know, it sort of feeds him pretty good.

1:01:32

If you want to know where I saw like the picture from the mirror.

1:01:35

Got it.

1:01:36

But yeah, he's been, he's been wielding the knife, but like th the problem is that the election is not supposed to be for a couple of years, you know, where you wish that the election was like in a few months, how's Cure,

1:01:48

Starmer doing over there. He's I mean, they're up now for the first time in a while.

1:01:51

I mean, like, they've got, you know, they've got a, they've got a lead and I mean, what cure Schermer needs to just close the deal on like making labor or credible alternative.

1:02:00

Totally. That actually like, you know, respects the voters and has a program for them.

1:02:04

And doesn't, you know, spend their money or donor money, you know, redesigning number 10 and, you know, partying and contravention of your COVID protocols, Idiots.

1:02:13

I'm waiting for the Skeksis shoe to drop and for them to just peace out Scotland.

1:02:19

That is, Yeah. Yeah.

1:02:21

I mean, one of the problems labor has to get a little wonky on British politics is that, like, there were two referendums, right?

1:02:29

There was a Scottish referendum and labor used to get a lot of Scottish voters, but some of the voters you just get in Scotland now moved to the Scottish nationalists.

1:02:37

So they lost those people.

1:02:39

Then there's a Brexit referendum, and a bunch of labor zone people were, were really for Brexit.

1:02:43

So then they lost some voters in that referendum, you know, so they got to kind of build back better.

1:02:49

There you go, Ben, I almost forgot Donald Trump did an interview with Hugh Hewitt.

1:02:55

Oh, Dan and John talked about this, just a historic suck up, suck up epic proportions of a man who, who traces his political lineage back to Richard Nixon's administration.

1:03:07

And I believe is the head of the Nixon, The

1:03:10

library, and presents himself as this like intellectual, you know, who's like deeply versed in foreign affairs.

1:03:17

And if you know anybody who presents himself as like an incredibly serious and deeply red person on foreign affairs simultaneously completely sucking up to Donald Trump is, should be taken with a grain of salt.

1:03:31

Yes. So here's a clip of Hugh Hewitt, his interview with Trump, where they go on this sort of odd tangent about China and hypersonic missiles that raised a lot eyebrows.

1:03:43

So Russia started it after they got our information.

1:03:46

You know, somebody gave them during the Obama administration, everything we had on hypersonic and Russia did it.

1:03:55

And what I did is they catch up program and we've caught up largely caught up.

1:04:01

But what happened is Russia.

1:04:03

Got it. And then China got it.

1:04:06

Perhaps from Russia. I doubt they did it themselves.

1:04:08

They got it, perhaps from Russia, maybe from some bad spy in the United States.

1:04:14

So he's talking about hypersonic missiles, but like clearly detailing what sounds like some pretty closely held intelligence about how the Chinese got a hold of really advanced technology.

1:04:27

It's a very, very weird, weird quote part of this interview.

1:04:31

I mean Like a lot of the times with Trump, first of all, like the idea that like the Obama administration gave Russia hypersonic missiles is like one of the dumbest fucking Zimmern and not at all true.

1:04:45

And I think we would have known, I think, I think that the Trump let's put it this way.

1:04:48

I think if the Trump administration had uncovered some massive, you know, program by Barack Obama to deliver a brand new missile to Russia and China, like put that out, might to Put

1:04:59

that out there, Prosecuted that one, everything about Donald Trump in these cups, when he has a foreign affairs question like this, there's like some shred of information.

1:05:08

Like he was once like briefed on like Russia's hypersonic weapons program or something.

1:05:12

And he remembers like one shred of something about that.

1:05:16

And then he just like wraps it up in some insane conspiracy theory that he's just like Making

1:05:22

up on the Spot, aggrandized his ham and runs down Obama.

1:05:25

And then the Chinese at China, as he says, has to be brought in as like a villain.

1:05:30

But that is like completely insane commentary on very sensitive nuclear missile related technology, Esoteric,

1:05:39

Deep dive. There there's things I can't even say about this.

1:05:42

Not that, not that the Obama administration, but like th this is, This

1:05:47

is not something you should be talking about on the radio for the former president also in the interview, Trump mocks his former secretary defense Asper.

1:05:55

He called him Yesper. Hugh Hewitt said something about him being scuba diving when they needed him.

1:06:00

At some point, I don't know what the fuck they were talking. I have to say, I'm occasionally on, you know, I'm on MSNBC or something.

1:06:06

And like mark Esper, like I want to reference him by name and I forgot his first name.

1:06:10

I love that. I can often not remember his full name.

1:06:14

Like, I, I, I'm glad that I can't, it's such a sign of what caliber of secretary defense.

1:06:20

I literally forgot it until you said it just there, he also asked Trump whether they thought the Chinese like, knew about COVID let it spread without doing anything.

1:06:28

And Trump basically said, you know, the question that you're really asking is did they do it on purpose?

1:06:32

And I don't think so. Then he went on to sort of detail what other say, all the other conspiracy theories.

1:06:39

We sort of had it both ways in his answer, but it's interesting because the sort of Steve Ben, Peter Navarro wing of the par Josh Rogan, Jason Will

1:06:47

have the lab Lead people to I'll, you know, sort of either overtly say or suggest that the Chinese communist party, like, you know, essentially treated COVID like a weapon.

1:06:59

Yeah. It's interesting that he hasn't, cause it's not like this guy has boundaries.

1:07:04

Like it's not like truth is a binding factor with.

1:07:08

Right. And so it's interesting that he like, so why does he just say that, given that he'd say anything like it suggests that he's like afraid of something about the Chinese.

1:07:20

I mean, I think, you know, It's very weird.

1:07:22

He also talked about the, this was right after the Biden Putin phone call about Ukraine.

1:07:27

And you know, you can tell Trump just like wants Putin to invade Ukraine because he thinks it'll make Biden look bad, but he called Biden a high school football team versus Putin, who is the Steelers in their prime, which is only funny to me because Hugh Hewitt is a huge Cleveland Browns fan.

1:07:42

And it's kind of a bit of a tacit, fuck you to them.

1:07:45

Yeah. Yeah. Well, like you hear it, like all the Trump's sycophants is going to figure out that like, you know, he doesn't really love you.

1:07:51

You I'm sorry, all your sucking up and reputation destruction and, and revealing yourself to be a deeply unserious person posing as a serious person is not gonna, when you that affection.

1:08:03

Yeah. It's weird to me that that Nixon staffer, you know, wouldn't be on the up and up, you know?

1:08:10

Yeah, yeah. I'm when God, you know, who knows like why a Nixon staffer would be on board a man who's willing to break democratic norms and subvert our democracy.

1:08:19

Yeah. Corruption. Yeah. All that stuff.

1:08:21

Okay. So that's it for us today. We are off next week because of the holidays.

1:08:25

But the episode after that is going to be a deep dive into all things, China, because you know, I've been in some ways, yes.

1:08:34

The biggest story in the world. In many ways, We

1:08:36

don't get to talk about it quite as much as we should given that it's not always like pressing in the news, but I think the ability to step back and really go deep into all the dimensions of what's going on, but the U S and China kind of tee up the next cold war, you know, it's worth an episode where, So

1:08:52

we'll get you guys that next week and until then, happy holidays, Merry Christmas, Merry Warren Christmas.

1:08:59

Yeah. Be careful in that rain Angelina's yes.

1:09:03

Dr. Hunker down Patsy.

1:09:18

If the world is a crooked media production, the executive producer is Michael Martinez.

1:09:22

Our producer is hailing news. It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick.

1:09:26

Kyle segment is our sound engineer, thanks to our digital team, Elijah cone, you'll freed and Phoebe Bradford and film and share our episodes as videos each week.

1:09:34

Business casual for Morning Brew is back for a new season with new hosts. Nora Ali and Scott Rygowski give you a front row seat to candid conversations with some of biggest names in business asking them the questions you wish you could ask yourself. They're going to look at how business shapes culture and how it transforms our lives because let's face it, almost everything has something to do with business. New episodes will be arriving in your ears every Monday and Thursday wherever you get your podcasts. Pod pod save the world is brought to you by simply World has brought to you by safe. If you've ever wanted to make your home feel safer, there's no better time than you've ever wanted to make your home feel safer, there's no better time than now. This week, our friends at Simply Safe are giving Pod Save World listeners early access to all their holiday deals. 40% off their award-winning home Forty percent off their award winning home security. We love Simply Safe because it is everything you need to make your home safe. Indoor and outdoor cameras, comprehensive sensors, all monitored around the clock by trained professionals who can send help the instant you need it. A moat with alligators about love it as simply A mode with alligators? A vote. Love it as a safe. He loved it. it. John's neighbor just got assembly thrilled with neighbor just got a simply safe. That's really it. Safe, happy everybody's Yeah. You're safe and very happy. safe. Everybody's safe, safe, simply safe was even named best home security system of Everybody's safe. Get safe. know? Simply save was even named the best home security system in twenty twenty one by US and World Report. You can easily customize a system for your home online in minutes. And even get a free custom recommendation from SimplySafe. These are SimplySafe's biggest discounts of the year. You can get a complete home security system starting at just over You can get a complete home security system starting at just over one hundred dollars. There's no long term contracts or commitments. It's a really easy way to start feeling a bit more peace of a really easy way to start feeling a bit more peace of mind. Take advantage of SimplySafe's holiday deals and get forty percent off your new home security system by visiting simply safe dot com slash crooked world. Again, that's simply safe.com/crooked world for 40% off your entire Again, that's simply safe dot com slash crooked world for forty percent off your entire system. Welcome back to Pod Save World. I'm Tommy Vitor. I'm Ben Rhodes. Then I wanna take people behind the music for second here. And just talk about how we almost couldn't do the podcast in person in the office today because it's raining in Los Angeles. Yeah. And that took out our Internet in the office for a couple hours. That apparently accounts for a major natural disaster. Angeles perspective, truly. People cannot they cannot handle it. I'm shocked you made it here safely. I mean, it was kinda mad max out on the on the roads. You know, there were people, you know, driving five miles per hour like drifting across the street. And it's like, it's raining. It's just it's just raining. snowing. It's just raining. Although, I saw Tahoe might get, like, seventy inches of snow in the mountains. Oh, that's cool. That's cool. That'll help our drought have our drought issues. Yeah. We'll be using that for a We'll be using that for a while. Hopefully not. Yeah. Hopefully not forever. Ben, there's no drought when it comes to the content. Oh, today. No. There's not. We got. Big problems for Boris Johnson. Ready to dive in, deep waters of content. Why the Trump Netanyahu Bromance officially dead? One of my favorite stories in a long time, we're gonna talk about why we all need to go hang out in Finland. An update on the assassination of the president of Haiti, a confusing choice from president Biden for a US ambassador, nominee, updates on Russia and Ukraine, the Iran deal, accountability problems at the Pentagon, a debate over whether progressives are getting rolled on defense policy, a court ruling on Julian Assange and WikiLeaks founder in his extradition, and then camel influencers. Don't see a lot of them. I'm looking forward to that item that I wasn't tracking. You know, the camel influencers. We'll we'll catch you up real quick. Yeah. Ben, also, if you're cited for the release of Spider Man No Way Home, then you have to check out X-ray Vision, the fantastic podcast with Jason Kcepsepsi owned. He is breaking it down with Marvel superfan rosy knight. They're looking at all the previous Spider Man films. They're breaking down all the returning villains. Sharing their wildest theories about the future of the MCU multiverse, not universe, multiverse. New episodes of x-ray division drop every Friday wherever you get your podcasts. Okay, Ben. So in recent weeks, we've talked about how our friends in the UK were concerned about prime minister Boris Johnson's mental well-being. In his affinity for Peppa Pig. I actually think the latter is understandable. Yeah. Peppa seems cool. Yeah. It's just cool. Yeah. So friendly pig. The challenge now is there increasing concerns from conservatives about Boris's political future? Here's why. First, it has now confirmed that last December, as the UK was putting in place, strict lockdown rules that Boris Johnson's staff through a Christmas party where they hung out, drank wine, ate snacks, and played party games. Even worse, Johnson and his team denied that this party happened until a video leaked of one of his staffers. Like, I guess, it's kinda like the White House press secretary ish role. Preparing for a White House style briefing at podium, and they were practicing questions about this alleged party. And essentially practicing how to lie about it and laughing about Yeah. So not smart. Notes of future staffers don't record yourself. Practicing how to lie. So Johnson still maintains that he had no knowledge of the party and that he is, quote, sickened and furious about the whole thing. He's asked a cabinet secretary to investigate. I'm sure an internal investigation will really get to the bottom of this whole thing. The Daily Mirror claims that there was a second party, a second event that Boris Johnson actually attended and spoke at so far. That's not part of this investigation. Great picks from that party, by the way. I saw. Oh, really? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Gotta check that out. Oh, boy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They are So why are they sitting on the ground? They're like, yeah. I I don't know what's going on here. I mean, nothing good has happened. That looks like a scene from the office. Yeah. Boris Johnson is also facing major pushback for members of his own party about his plan to put in place. Basically, vaccine passports require proof of vaccination or a negative PCR test to do certain activities through the UK. So this is all swirling together at the worst possible time. I guess my take on this was like, I'm not obviously not a big Boris Johnson fan. In general though, it was just nice to see a hypocrisy matter again. You remember that? Yeah. Remember that was the thing in our politics? Yeah. Well, look, there's a a meta thing happening in the world, which is you'll remember what it was like to be an incumbent in two thousand nine, twenty ten during the event crisis when people are just people are just pissed. Like, things aren't getting better fast enough. And and so, you know, I think what we're gonna see in a lot of places is like in comments or seven problems because people are pissed about COVID, and they're pissed, you know, about hypocrisy, and they're pissed that, you know, certain elites are seeming to, you know, be able to do things that they can't do. But I think there's a bigger problem for Boris Johnson. Right? The bigger problem is he, like, clearly doesn't seem to give too much of a shit about, like, you know you know how all of his constituents are doing relative to how he and his circle of friends and advisors are doing, they appear to have been living under a different set of rules. This is there have been multiple scandals now throughout COVID of people around Boris Johnson or Boris Johnson himself. Not doing the things that they're requiring other people to do. So it's one thing to say, like, okay, maybe these COVID restrictions, you know, you can make an argument they're necessary. But if they appear to be imposing draconian code restrictions while they're like partying and not wearing masks and not thawing the protocols, there's a different set rules that apply to them, that apply to everybody else, it starts to feel like he doesn't respect the voters who elected him and thinks that he doesn't have to play by the same rules or the people around to not play by the same kind of rules. And that is, like, poison for politicians. That that's, like, the Let Me Cake stuff, which didn't end very well from Murray Antoinette and usually doesn't end very well for for leaders. It's also surprising in this case since Boris Johnson almost died from COVID. Yeah. He was, like yeah. Like, Chris Christie kinda sedation. You know, like, he was he was in the ICU for, like, a lot. It was bad. Yeah. Yeah. Real bad. And now it just doesn't seem to take it seriously now it just doesn't seem to take it seriously. No. And and again, like, they they've been riding this wave where no matter what happens, like, you know, the Brexit thing took a while to get done, and then you know, certain consequences have been pretty negative out of Brexit, but they just keep getting rewarded. And I think they kind of internalized a dynamic where, like, we can do over the fuck we want. You know? And it feels like that's finally catching up to him, you know? Yeah. Yeah, it It does. Manage, he started combing his hair. I don't know that that's working. I don't think people want that. You know? Why do I want the fuzzier. It's not like a huge improvement. No. Yeah. No. He's not much he can do. Yeah. Yeah. Our next topic here, a little more vengeance for us maybe personally then because the bromance between Donald Trump and former Israeli Prime Minister, BB Netanyahu, is officially dead. You Hate to see to see it. Yeah. Here's a quote from Donald Trump. Fuck him. Yeah. You said it's Netanyahu. Yeah. Donald Buddy, like, welcome to the BB Netanyahu, not a fan club. Beef rejection is, like, it it was one of the things where I was like, well, if we leaked out the Barack Obama that said fucking president now, like -- Oh. -- that we've defended the statements being issued by politicians, the pro clutching, with Donald Trump, it's like, oh, that's interesting, Axios. Yeah. No. No. But but, I mean, the truth is, like, every American president, most officials who had to work with VPN and Yahoo who are sort of in the same place here. But the so the backstory is according to Brock David of Axios reported there. The Trump Netanyahu relationship fully ruptured when net Yahoo! Congratulated Biden on his victory. You know, I'd love to do that. Right? You know, I'd love to talk about reality if Donald Trump doesn't like reality. But things were souring long before that. Trump told Axios that he initially had a much better relationship with Bakmuda BOSS, the leader of the Palestinians, and ultimately determined that a boss wanted to make a peace deal more than Netanyahu ever did. Trump said that, quote, Vivi just tapped us along. Vivi did not wanna make peace. He never did. Again, think that you donned, saving me obvious, joining long list of public officials who admit to this sort of cynical effort by BB to to drag out talks and never actually do anything. Now of course TrumpBibi gave Netanyahu every political gift possible. He moved the embassy to Jerusalem. He recognized the goal on Heights as part of Israel's territory. He cut off contact with the boss, cut assistance to the Palestinians. So I don't know, Ben, it's it's odd to just sort of agree with Donald here? I I don't know. Well, I mean, I think there are a few things to send out here. Like, first of all, what's interesting is that his attitude towards Netanyahu is kind of like his attitude towards, like, the Georgia Secretary of State. Mhmm. Like he sees BBC Netanyahu as, like, as a local Republican elected official. You know, we like, clearly, that's his mentality. Right? Like like, oh, you know, the the the word of the right wing party in Israel now and That means that this guy is gonna do everything I want, including backing up my stop the steal. We'd like campaign. Yeah. Right? And and again, like, that speaks to how crass and transactional and full of shit, their whole like wrap themselves in the Israeli flag thing is. It's not about any genuine feeling for is real or is real is it's this this idea that we can cynically manipulate the politics of this issue for own benefit at home, and we expect the Israeli Prime Minister to be a party to that. Which by the way Netanyahu by and large was? Totally cool. Like, he's totally cool there. Right? So he the the he is not Georgia secretary said who stood up to Trump. He's just somebody who, like, called the incoming president in the United States Joe Biden. Right? Second thing is I'm a little dubious on the, like, oh, I actually had a great relationship with Abu Masai. No. I totally feel like it's like it's like father figure to him. Yeah. Like, I mean, let's That's unclear here. Right? Like, I don't think that there was, like, some deep chemistry developing between Donald Trump and Amazin. And then lastly, like, a bit of, like, the tell that maybe the Abrams records wasn't the piece deal. Right? Because it's suddenly, like, well, he wasn't interested in piece. Like, No. No. Maybe that was not about peace either. Right? So this kind of just exposes the obvious truth of the core of the whole Trump Netanyahu thing. Which is entirely about each one another's, like, respective political views at home -- Yes. -- and not about trying to do anything. And Oh, well, fuck him is more about the fact that, you know, even though Netanyahu put up billboards to TrumpBibi remember they're, like, naming shit after him in Israel that, you know, if if you're not willing to, like, storm the capital on January sixth and participate in, like, hang Mike Penn's chance. You know -- Yeah. -- you're gonna end up getting trashed in like a barack review book. Right. I mean, as much as I love reading about Trump slapping at Yahoo around, what it does reveal is that okay, you're telling us that you knew from the early from the very beginning that net guy was never gonna cut a piece deal and yet you gave them all those political gifts it was only to excite an evangelical base back in the United States. Yeah. It was as cynical as a get to basically admitting that. It's also like an enormous repudiation of Jared Kushner. In all of his strategies and everything he stood for. In fact, so Brock DeVries is writing this book on the Abraham Accord. He did a a podcast a couple podcast episodes with Jonathan Swan and Axios, like, about the negotiations. And it is very self congratulatory, a bit of AAA circle jerk vibe -- Yeah. Yeah. -- about, you know, the UAE ambassador, you know, coming to Jared with this idea for the abraham accords and, you know, ultimately, they talk about how essentially the the Abraham accords or or what became them was essentially a way to get Netanyahu to not annex the West Bank. Because I guess Trump didn't have the SWAT like, call up Netanyahu and say, hey, do not annex the West Bank. They had to give him this giant diplomatic gift. It's all very Well, annoyed and confused. Like, what peace is a slight delay in the annexation of the West Bank. Right. I mean, it's not like a peace was like the West Bank becoming part of Palestinian state. It was like, oh oh, I'm not gonna just publicly claim all this land Assanges isn't the part of Israel. I am gonna continue to build settlements. I'm going to do nothing to bring about a Palestinian gonna do nothing to bring about a Palestinian state. So no, this didn't accomplish anything. Right? Like, let's be clear. Like, the idea that they forestalled, like, an even worse outcome of an annexation of West Bank. Like, in exchange for massive arms deals to the UAE and the the like, look, Morocco is is, you know, basically got support for, like, a war in the Western Sahara. Sudan, we've had a coup. Like, if you look at the countries that are part of this, it's not ended well for that. The behavior in those countries has not improved on the back end of this deal. You know? III do just think like Netanyahu himself, like, looks like an increasingly ridiculous figure. You've got multiple Israeli officials now coming out and saying, that his Iran policy was like the biggest disaster for Israel in recent history. And and you have Iran moving the direction of a nuclear weapon because of giving India peace is further away. Netanyahu is out of power. TrumpBibi best buddy is telling me to go fuck himself. Like, I mean, Both of them spent a lot of their time either in a courtroom defending themselves against corruption charges. That's -- Yeah. -- Netanyahu or Trump preparing to defend himself, potentially against caption charges. We're fighting back against subpoenas in, you know, both in New York and at the in congress. Yeah. So this is not exactly, like, you know, on Marsha dot and Yeah. They're not covered right here. Jimmy Carter here. No. We're not, though. I don't know if about those creeps. Ben, it is time for the world does out there to mount up in defense of an unfairly maligned world leader. So Santa Marine is the prime minister of Finland. She had to apologize because she went clubbing until four AM, and she missed a text message informing her that she had been in close contact with someone Quad COVID-19. Now that's obviously a bummer, but that someone was the foreign minister of that's obviously a bummer. But that someone was the foreign minister of Finland. It wasn't like some random COVID actually headed a bar. Yeah. Yeah. Here's where this all gets a little confusing. Marine was initially told that despite her close contact with foreign minister who got COVID that she didn't need to isolate because she was fully vaccinated. So she did, I think, what what everyone of us wished we could have done for all of twenty twenty on a Saturday night. She she left her fucking work phone at home, and she went out to the bars. But then on Sunday, when she got home, she saw a text on her work phone that said, hey, you're in close contact. You should self isolate. She get tested. So she one got tested. The results came back negative. Oswell that ends well. The Finland guideline don't require you to isolate. If you're fully vaccinated and come in contact with someone with COVID, but they suggest that you do. I don't, I don't get how this is a I don't I don't get how this is a scandal. Seems like the problem here is some poorly written rules. But Marine became the world's youngest prime minister when she was elected to lead Finland's center left coalition back in twenty nineteen. At that time she was thirty four. Now she's thirty six. Here's a hot take for her critics. Shut up. Yeah. You guys are losers. Your losers. And okay. You wish you could stay awake till four AM. That's the problem. wish I could stay awake till four AM. Well, yeah. I mean, it wouldn't end well for me. You know? Like, about two AM, like, things would start to go really south, really, really south, you know. But I look, it's first of all, it's very different from the Boris Johnson scandals where he was putting forward these guidelines that they were all breaking. Right. And this was pre vaccine too when Boris was doing it. You know, he's just parting back there. Like, we want our leaders, our political leaders to be recognizable. We want them to, you know, essentially be authentic, be themselves. Mhmm. Right? And, like, who wouldn't want a leader to feel like, you know what? It's been a pretty fucking shitty year. Yeah. So, you know what I want to do live your you know what I wanna do? Live your life. Like, I wanna go out till four AM, I'm gonna have the Jello shot whatever the thing is that you do at the club, you know? And, and look, she's she's, she's the kind of leader we And and look, she's a she's she's the kind of leader we need. Like, it it would would you want, like, Donald Trump at the club till four in the morning? Like No. No. You think Biden wasn't hitting the clubs during the roaring twenties or whatever he was. Yeah. I'm saying that, like, This is a person who's at the vanguard of this trend -- Yes. -- we've talked about of women leaders in their thirties getting elected, being very reasonable people, doing a great job in office. And and if you wanna go out to the club at four, like, you know what, every now and then? Like, that's something that, like, you gotta do. Right? And I think this is something where world has seen to circle the wagons and defense here of all the haters and back the fuck up. I will tell you also Helsinki is a fun place to hang out. And the sun that the sun that Ever go go down. So I went there. I went there a long time ago and I had like a really good time and I went out and remember one night and I had a little too much to drink and I go back and it was the white nights. It was literally the time when the sun, like, never goes down. Mhmm. And I will tell you, it is rough when you have had a little too much trick and I didn't have her stamina. So didn't make it four. So I go back and I crash at my, like, you know, crappy hotel at the time. And I wake up at, like, three in the morning and, you know, like, you don't feel that great. Mhmm. And it's just bright light. Yeah. How are you supposed to sleep any white window? What's the point of going home? This I have a lot of respect for these people. They can power through in the summer. And right now, it's like dark all the fucking time. Like, I mean, yeah, you don't even know what time it is. I went to Oslo in January and based the sun came up at, like, eight thirty and went down at four, and it was it was the reverse. It was not good. But I'm just saying, like, if part of the problem that we have in the world today is that a bunch of autocratic nationalist creeps are getting elected because in many countries, too many countries, more old people vote than young people -- Mhmm. -- because young people are looking at politicians and not seeing people that they can relate to -- Yeah. -- and not seeing people they can connect to. The idea that you have like an effective social democrat prime minister in her thirties, crushing it on the job, and then and rushing it at the clubs -- Yeah. -- is, like, the kind of thing that would get more people involved in politics. Totally. You know, the story is getting traction because she is a young attractive woman. But I just wanna point out that some of the world's greatest leaders have been known to party. As has been discussed before on this show, Queen Elizabeth II, England was known to pregame her lunch. Yeah. Pre game her lunch. She would have a Duvernay cocktail. Good for her. Just fortified wine mixed with gin. Jesus. That's his cheese cocktail. Sounds like I had to, like, crawl off the floor actually. It was. Former Russian president Boris Yeltsin reportedly got so drunk during a visit to Washington DC. That he was found by secret service standing alone trying to hail a cab on Pennsylvania Avenue in his Yeah. And when asked why he said he was gonna go grab slice of pizza. Who among us, hasn't wanted to get that slice us hasn't wanted to get that size of pizza. Can you imagine if you ran into a half naked Boris Johnson, a jumbo slice? I was gonna say the good thing is if you could get the jumbo slice. You know, like, that was clearly what he was going after, you know? FDR Ben reportedly served Turkey martinis to Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin at the Yalta conference. As they were figuring out, you know, sort of post war Europe? It didn't end that well for Eastern Europe, but No. Like it. Yep. You know, they say it's half the world, you know. Yeah. You know, maybe they'd get them. Merkel is reportedly a fan of a good German beer Margaret Thatcher, the Iron Lady shift, Quantro, and Scotch. don't let look. What I'm saying is a lot of great leaders knew how to have great time. You know who did never have a drink? Did never seem to have fun? Donald Trump. Donald TrumpBibi you know, sitting around drinking diet coke and eating, like, fast food? Look, we're team Finland here. We're team Finland. We're team Marin. You know, we're invested in her success and the success of basically all political leaders under forty who try to do the right thing in office and, you know, try to get after it on weekends. Yeah. Except for that douche bag then in El Salvador. We don't like him. Ben. The New York Times published a report about the assassination in Haiti, though. I thought it was important update. So they said that president driven a moist of Haiti who was assassinated back in July, had been keeping a list of government officials and business people linked to the drug trade. It was about to hand it over to the US government before he was assassinated. This list reportedly included close associates, people who had basically helped him gain power, and Moises's wife who survived the assassination attempt described how the killers had rifle through all his documents before declaring that's it. Grabbing something and leaving. It's a long story. It's worth reading in full. There was actually great episode of Daily where they talked about it. But I don't know, not an entirely surprising motive But don't know. Not an entirely surprising motive here, I thought. No. And I mean, it it was it was nice to feel like you were getting the beginning of some answers about this. Right? Because it was so opaque why this incredibly dramatic thing happened. You know? And, you know, it is a sign that in Haiti and through Haiti, you have gangs and drug cartels that are far more powerful than the state so that if they become aware and start to feel like they might become the target of the state. It's like, okay, we'll just take out the president. Right? So good that, you know, hopefully, this is a threat that can be pulled to figure out what happened. But, you know, a sign of just, like, how big a problem it is that, you know, the the the state is not the the the big actor here when it comes to violence and eighty, know? Yeah. It makes you worry that the the corruption is so endemic in you know, the halls of power in Haiti that might not ever be accountability for what happened. But I mean, hopefully, it does seem like we are a little bit closer to knowing why he was assassinated. Yeah. Pod Save save. The world is brought to you by Tommy, John stuck on what to give your friends and family this year stuck at is brought to you by Tommy John. 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Could be used to be in this building. It used to be in elevators with her randomly. Here's my question, though. Why? Why why make Wittman? Why Why What what connection does she have with Kenya? Yeah. She's an incredibly accomplished CEO. But Kenya is a big -- Really important country. -- country. We've lots of counterterrorism interest there. The like, Ethiopia -- Exactly. -- Napier is is in the middle of a year long civil war. I I get rewarding supporters with ambassadorial posts. I I don't think it's the greatest practice that president too, but Obama did it others have done it. But normally, you're like, sending people to, like, the Cayman Islands. Yeah. The Bahamas, is Kenya a spot where you try out a novice political appointee rather than some, like, hardened career diplomat with experience in the region. It seems like a bad idea to me. It it's pretty random. I mean, first of all, Kenya's really important country. Right? So in in this country, a lot of sensitive issues you have to manage. You you've had situations in the past that we've had to get involved in the United States government kind of mediating between some tribal violence in Kenyan politics between the Tutsi and Kikiu tribes, you know, that that you've had really bad election violence. It's it's a dynamic economy. It's a place where China's seeking to get greater influence in Africa. It's a key counter terrorism partner. It's a part of any diplomatic strategy related tea Gray or South Sudan or any number of the other issues there. It's the biggest and most important country in that part of Africa. And you would want someone who knows a lot about Kenya or or knows a lot about the diplomacy that you're gonna have to pursue in that kind of country. And the reality here is that, like, yes, sometimes you reward people. But, like, you you try to get the the the right person for the the right post to the right job. I mean, Quibi didn't work out. Let's face it. I mean, when I first started coming to this building where Quibi had offices, you know, it's cool for like about two months. You'd see like, some celebrity coming in for a meeting and stuff. Like, that is not the prep work that you want though. The the the cratered quibi experiment to be the springboard to an ambassadorship to Kenya. Yeah. It's just what's weird to me is, like, I get Look, I'm okay with non traditional and passive or real choices. I'm okay with, like, plucking a few Republicans and trying to show bipartisan, you know, image to the world. But another one that was weird is Jeff Flake, former senator Jeff Flake of Arizona, to be ambassador to Turkey. Again, it's a country where like a lot of shit is happening. Yeah. It's a big important place. Yeah. They're kind of falling in a needle. We have been a, you know, autocratic leader. It's just an odd odd choices to me. I don't get it. Yeah. I mean, I I think that you like, the the role of ambassadors too is you know, it's it's actually getting kind of more important. Right? In the sense that when you're talking about a Kenya or even to some extent Turkey, These are really important countries that are at the center of a lot of stuff, and yet a lot of the Washington bandwidth is gonna be taken up by China -- Mhmm. -- by Middle East issues, by, you know, these large trends that are being managed out of Washington, COVID, climate change. And so you you actually rely a lot on on the ambassador to to be the the tip of the spear of your diplomacy in all these places. And I think, like, this is not restricted to the by administration. You know, I think as a general matter, thinking through, like, the kind of profile that you want for people to be ambassadors is important. And by the way, like also not having a confirmation process that is so fucked up -- Mhmm. -- that, you know, you can't really get your own people in there, so maybe it's easier to get a Republican and, you know, when you're Democratic president. It just it's worth taking a step back and kind of thinking through this whole enterprise going forward, you know. Yeah. It's all for creativity, but it's gotta be, like, square peg, square hole kind of thing. Exactly. I'm just not sure that we And sometimes it can fit with it with it political supporter or donor. Sometimes someone who hasn't been in government has, like, a lot of unique and relevant expertise to a country doesn't have to I'm not I'm not one who thinks it always has to be a foreign service officer as as good as foreign service officers are. But you you do wanna make sure it makes the most sense. Yeah. If you'll explain it. Yeah. And I just haven't seen it. Yeah. Ben, I I made a little section that we call very serious problems that seem to be getting worse, but there's no good answers for some quick updates here. One, Ukraine Assanges. G seven got together. They warned Russia against invading Ukraine just for listeners, the g seven is the US, UK, Canada, Germany, France, Italy, Japan. This meeting came after Biden's talk with Vladimir Putin last week. State Department sent the assistant secretary of state for Europe to Ukraine. And to Russia for meetings, I think those are happening right now. Turn to the pod. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. I also saw that former world heavyweight boxing champion and current mayor of Keep The tally Klitschko said he was prepared to personally join the army, join the fight if Russia and bids. So watch out. We wouldn't wanna fuck with that. Yeah. Yeah. would Then the so the g seven is saying there's gonna political and economic consequences for Russia if an invasion occurs towards remembering that the g seven was the g eight until twenty fourteen when Russia invaded Crimea, not sure that that deterred them. We talked about this last week about how Russia doesn't seem to be really all that scared about US sanctions. Do you think the g seven collected, has more sway, do they have more tools, or is this sort of status quo? I think it's useful to send a message that it's not just the United States, like, raising these concerns It suggests to Russia that there'll be multilateral consequences for things that do. It provides a good backdrop to diplomacy that Karen Donfried is is excellently qualified to to carry out. know, the whole thing, though, continues to be worrisome because the Russian troop build up just continues. And, you know, part of I was kinda trying to think of at a different angle of, like, where where this might be going. I mean, obviously, worst case scenarios, Russia just in Bades, Ukraine. But, you know, sometimes what Putin can do is he can create a worst case scenario. Right? Like, oh my god, he's gonna invade the whole country. And then he can do something short of that. Right? Like what if they move a whole bunch of these troops into the two provinces that are contested in Eastern Ukraine, Like, what if they move a whole bunch of these troops into the two provinces that are contested in Eastern Ukraine. Right? The Don Bos area of Ukraine, that's on the Russian border. And so it's like, well, he didn't invade the whole country, but, you know, maybe it's a play to kind of annex those pieces of Ukraine -- Right. -- like he did, Crimea. And so then he's done something that is not this worst case scenario necessarily, but it's still abating in claims often throughout the country. Yeah. Yeah. So that's that's the the only the other angle that occurred to me as I thought about this is just like, I think Putin in the past sometimes has created, like, fears about something that is extreme so that when he then does something that is less extreme it it doesn't look as radical as if he had just rolled a bunch of troops into couple of bromance. You know? Yeah. Well, I guess just keep watching this one because So those nuts Yep. I mean, it is like groundhog day, but also it's worth pointing out that, like, the Biden team has a full plate here and that When you look at the progress of Iran's nuclear program, you look at the risk of invasion of Ukraine, like next year, you know, could be could have some serious foreign policy challenges, you know? Yeah. I mean, so you mentioned the Iran nuclear deal. So the International Atomic Energy Agency says that restrictions that are being put on their inspectors by Iran are giving the world quote a very blurred image of the nuclear program in Iran. Iran refuses to let the IAEA replace cameras they have in some parts of their sort of nuclear infrastructure because the Iranian say, well, those cameras were probably used in sabotage efforts where the Israelis blew up this facility at some point. I know you can't put them back in. The US and European diplomats are warning that time is running out. Tony Blake in the Secretary of State said the US is preparing, quote, alternatives in case the talks collapse. Anything out there giving you hope do you think these alternatives code for dusting off Pentagon plans to blow up shit? Like, I I wouldn't try to read that. I'm, you know, usually that means like you even more sanctions, which I don't think are going to accomplish much other than, you know, just squeezing Iran You know, usually, that means, like, even more sanctions -- Okay. -- which I don't think are gonna accomplished much other than, you know, just squeezing Iran more or left a sanction? Yeah. I mean, like, they've clearly priced in sanctions with the course that they're on. And and no. I mean, every every signal that seems to be coming out of these steps by Iran and these these negotiations points to an Iran that is at at best engaged in pretty extreme brinkmanship as a part of negotiating tool or worse has just decided like they're they're moving ahead with their nuclear program and they're, you know, doing some smoke screen talks to just you know, play the clock. Yeah. Not good. Not a good one. Yeah. Last sort of, you know, problem we've been sort of observing for a while, which is the Pentagon says that No US troops are gonna be punished for the drone strike in Kabul in August that killed ten civilians. We talked about this a lot of time. John Kirby, the Pentagon spokesman said, quote, What we saw here was a breakdown in process and execution in procedural events, not the result of negligence, nor the result of misconduct, not the result of poor leadership, end quote, Remember that, you know, at the time, the defense department did not acknowledge that civilians were killed until the New York Times challenged their assertion that this was a quote, righteous strike. That killed nicest bomber. Some of the reporting on this decision by the Pentagon not to punish anyone noted that military almost never holds anyone accountable, never punches anyone with the one noble exception being when a dozen military personnel were disciplined for an airstrike on doctors without borders hospital. In Afghanistan in twenty fifteen that killed forty two people. The decision from the Pentagon not to punish someone comes as the Times released another major report. Detailing how the military routinely circumvented rules put in place to protect civilians in Syria by saying, look, all our strikes are defensive in nature, so we don't have to, you know, make sure that civilians will be killed. I just want to highlight all this, Ben, because I'm just having a growing sense that these are systemic failures, that not enough is being done to protect civilians, and that the message that's getting sent to the world when there's no accountability is really damaging, and it worries me. And I'm not sure what to do about it. Howard Bauchner: Yeah, and I think part of what is is kind of troubling here is we learned a lot about this drone strike. And you know, nothing that we learned suggested, really anything that would point to this being like a legitimate target. Right? I mean, is the guy's like driving around town, running some errands, putting some water in his car -- Yes. -- his family, you know. And driving to like an NGO. And and so you know, part of the issue here is when the Pentagon comes out and says, nobody did anything wrong, there's no failure of this, no failure of that. You almost want to ask the question and they need to answer the question. What what would what would qualify as a failure of of execution or leadership. You know, like like like like what is this because it's so opaque, you know, like -- Yeah. -- who like, you know, and and and and there's different kinds processes if they were clear about what the standards are that would merit accountability, then there could be an easier way to measure what happened against what those standards are. And there's a lot of just kind of like, trust us we looked into this and nothing wrong happened. When, you know, in fact, that that doesn't answer any questions. If nothing if nobody did anything wrong, then how did this happen? You know? And and so I I think bottom line is you want more accountability in more circumstances. I think you would also want there to be a kind of clear public explanation of what does constitute a failure so that you can measure these incidents against that, you know. Yeah. It's real, like, mistakes were made vibe. Yeah. At some point like someone made a mistake, made a Yeah. At some point, like, someone made a mistake. Someone made a mistake. Like, if if killing someone isn't a mistake, what is? I Yeah. I don't know. Ben, political had a piece that I wanna get your got a gut check from you on because the headline felt frustratingly accurate and worth talking about. So this headline was progressives get rolled on Pentagon policy. Yeah. A few examples cited in the article. We still haven't been able to get rid of the authorization for the use of military force that was passed to go to warn still have been able to get rid of the authorization for the use of military force that was passed to go to Warrnrock. Bipartisan group of senators were unable to block a six fifty million dollars arm sale to Saudi Arabia. Efforts have fundamentally reformed the military justice system were paired back. And the price tag on this big defense spending bill was massive. It was seven hundred and sixty eight billion dollars, which was twenty five billion more and the White House even asked for. It's worth noting just before we talk about it that progressives have made a ton of progress towards, you know, building support to end the US support for the Saudi war. And Yemen, center Kirsten Gillibrand has done incredible work to push Pennagon to reform the way it handles sexual assault allegations in his arrest report. She was furious at the way it was watered down. But I don't know, what did you make of that article? Do you think that take is fair? And then more importantly, I guess, like, do you have thoughts on how Democrats can actually do a better job and win some of these fights, cut the Pentagon budget, reform the military, etcetera? III think it's fair, you know, in those those Trump years when, you know, progressives were and, frankly, just even center left folks, we're kind of thinking through, like, what are the types of changes you would want to make in this space? You would be looking at cuts to the Pentagon budget. You'd be looking at cuts, for instance, to the massive trillion dollar nuclear infrastructure modernization which we really need to spend trillion dollars modernizing our nuclear weapons infrastructure. Right? Didn't didn't Bob Corker force us to do that during the environment. John Kyle, Bob Corker, these guys, but it just grew it mushroom. Yeah. Right? So there was an original sitting there in, like, twenty ten, but it it's just got it's like a snowball rolling down a hill. It's just more and more money. And so this overall cut to the budget. And particularly this nuclear weapons piece and, and Biden has like a nuclear posture particularly this nuclear weapons piece. And Biden has like a nuclear posture review. That's how you look at nuclear weapons. And all the mood music out of that is it's not gonna be particularly progressive. We used to talk about, you know, no no no first use of nuclear weapons as being part of that. You don't hear anything about that anymore. Right? Then the Yemen war, Biden came out as first major speech and said, you know, we're gonna end support for offensive military operations. But, you know, here we are and Saudi Armed Sales is something that obviously progressives. And I think Democrats generally thought we need to hit a pause button on. Chris Murphy's had great leadership on that. So, you know, then you see this arm still going forward. Progressives very pissed at Murphy for not voting to cut off this latest. Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. Right? And and then Well, at that point, there's this kind of like downgrading of expectations on a bunch of stuff. The AUMF was an area where people had a lot of enthusiasm when you're a democratic president coming you're going out of Afghanistan, it's Assanges a place here in math. So if you look at that kind of wish list or agenda of repealing the AUMF, ending the war in Yemen, suspending arms sales to Saudi Arabia, making meaningful cuts to the defense budget, like none of that is happening, you know. And it feels like the autopilot, right, of the machinery of congress and the military industrial complex you know, plussing up defense spending, which we should point out, like Joe Manchin and, you know, the deficit there and the the no labels caucus. Like we're talking about an annual expenditure of something that is almost half of the overall ten year price tag -- Mhmm. -- of build back better. Right? I mean massive massive amounts of money. And I don't think that that Absent, like, real concerted presidential in White House focus on this. Mhmm. Because Congress, you know, the lobbyists and the defense contractors can always get to just enough members to kill something like the effort to cut off this Saudi arms sale. Right? Or to to add some more pork to the defense budget. And and so, you know, this is something that they would have to decide to to to to to meaningfully take on. Yeah. You didn't look at frustrating that you know, I think the US is still providing some support for airstrikes in Yemen. The blockade hasn't been ended. Millions of people are at risk of starvation. So, like, there is there there's some good pressure from the left on these issues. It's just kind of I don't know. It's not penetrating the the Biden team's decision making on this set of topics in part because just in in fairness, the the White House folks are probably thinking, alright, we're gonna need the Saudi's help with the Iran nuclear deal if we can get back into that. We're gonna need their help on energy prices. We need their help on AQAPLs, other things. And so, you know, you can see how really critical priorities like ending the warring them and can get squeezed out a little bit. But I do think like there is more urgency there than on almost any other issue. In that blockade and prevent people from starving. And and I would expect what they would tell you that this is just, you know, me saying this not based on on the conversations. You know, that we're trying to do this. We're trying to end the war in Yemen. And actually, it could harm our diplomacy in China and the war. Yeah. And if we picked a fight with the Saudis over the saying and, you know, kind of the strategy like, you you kind of hug the person to try to get them to do something, I don't know. I don't like, I I just feel like the war in Yemen to so be on the pale that you have to set some markers -- Mhmm. -- the nature of the Saudi regime is so compromised that you have to do something more concerted arm sales. But then also this question of the Pentagon budget is within your purview. And you know, we don't need this big of a Pentagon budget. If you look under the hood of that budget, this is not all stuff that is going for future threats, you know, whether it's China or cyber or whatever, it's a lot of bloated stuff, you know, like a trillion dollar nuclear weapons modernization plan. Right? And so think it's just time to, you know, to to to to have government reflect the priorities that I think Democrats have. And and this is feels like it's not there. 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I literally texted Hannah this ad copy and said, let's watch I literally texted Hannah this ad copy and said, let's watch this. And she said, yes, yes, we will welcome to this and she said, Yes. Yes. We will. Saving flu. Welcome to Earth. I know. All episodes now streaming only on Disney plus. pod save the world is brought to you by Canva making content is an essential part of what I do to keep this show World is brought to you by Canvas. Making content is an essential part of what I do to keep this show going. Tommy Vitor is a content factory. That's that's that's the creative media is. It's a content switch up, but it hasn't always been a seamless creative process. We do make weed do make we videos. We make social media We make social media posts. We've had we used to be basically a a holding company for terrible versions of crooked media named websites. Remember get crooked media that Remember, get crooked media dot com? Yeah. Yeah. With the crooked With the crooked media. Yeah. 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Right now you can get a free 45 day extended trial when you use my promo code, just go to canva.me/crooked world to get your free 45 day extended trial that C a N V a dot M E slash crooked world, canva.me/crooked Right now, you can get a free forty five day extended trial when you use my promo Just go to canvas dot me slash crooked world. To get your free forty five day extended trial, that's CANVA dot m e slash crooked world, canvas dot me slash crooked world. Here's another example of you know, a priority that's continued from Trump to Biden that sort of surprised me, which is the extradition of Julian Assanges. So last week, a British court ruled that WikiLeaks founder, Julian Assange, can be extradited to the US to face charges, which reversed to lower court ruling. In twenty nineteen, Trump administration charged Assange on seventeen counts of violating the espionage act. The bid demonstrations continued that prosecution effort. The Obama team, the Obama administration back in the day debated charging Assange but decided not to because of concerns that could harm press freedom. This British court ruling wasn't about any any of these bigger issues we're talking about. Their concern is that Assanges physical and mental health had deteriorated so much in British custody that his extradition to the US could put him in a prison where the conditions are so inhumane that they could create an extreme risk of suicide. I would just say, pausing for a second, like, no matter how you feel about Assanges, I think the fact that the British court system is debating how horrific the US prison system is should probably all make us pause and be ashamed for a minute -- Yeah. -- of just how fucked up our penal system is. So, you know, the the charges that Assanges is facing, none of them has to do with twenty sixteen or or, you know, the the election. It's all about documents. He was given by Chelsea Manning in 2010, DOJ says the Saanich solicited the documents that he participated in a conspiracy to, with Manning to cover his tracks after Chelsea Manning got the was given by Chelsea Manning in twenty ten. DOJ says Assange solicited the documents that he participated in conspiracy to with Manning to cover his tracks after Chelsea Manning got the documents. So Ben, you know, I I'm not a fan of Assange. I find this whole thing deeply uncomfortable. I worry about the precedent. But I guess the question I have for you is, are you surprised that the Biden administration is continuing with this prosecution and extradition? Is is like are are these, you know, prosecution efforts at DOJ just sort of, like, source of enormous and or surely? I I just don't get get it as works. They are kind of a are kind of a source I mean, they they they kind of the wheels start spinning and then they just continue spinning. you. And I went through a version of this in the Obama years on I think even more questionable You and I went through a version of this. In the Obama years on, I think, even more questionable cases. Interesting. Which are those lead cases? Right? Yes. And remember Yes. Yes. Yes. -- we a lot of those originated in the Bush administration Previous national security weeks. Yeah. -- and And then it just like like, it was hard to explain to people that Barack Obama didn't come in and say, like, I want you to to prioritize this. It just ongoing prosecutions, you know, some which began bush and some just and and so you have to kind of make a decision to deprioritize something. At at times, which, you know, I think you can make a pretty credible argument like the Obama administration touched on on some of those some of those leak investigations. And and so in this case, I'm not surprised it's because it kinda runs on autopilot, but at a certain point, like, what is the relative value of pursuing kind of futilely this extradition over something that happened over a decade ago -- Mhmm. -- that has really been you know, we are like so many universes past -- I know. -- at that time, you know, like -- Right. -- like, we sent the message that like, there will be efforts to bring to justice people that leak or the people that are involved in this. Like, III just don't see that with all the things that the justice department can and should be doing, why this should be, like, prioritized in the US, UK relationship or or in the kind of universe of stuff that that that we had to worry about. Yeah. And look, I don't like Julian Assange. I find it to be a pretty odious character in a lot of ways. But, like, I just don't know that, like, what are what are we achieving here? And also, I think the global reaction to this extradition effort is horror. Yeah. I'm concerned about the president and press freedom. And concerned about and and dragging back up the the all the debates about everything WikiLeaks was Like, what is the best case scenario here? Right? Like -- Yeah. -- from the US government standpoint, like, what that is it really worth, like, having Julien Assanges in in in a prison and then a trial and bring back all the Chelsea Manning stuff. It just it just feels like we're past the expiration date on this one, you know? Yeah. And look, I mean, some of the some of the materials manning released were whistleblower. mean, there was that horrific video of a US helicopter shooting journalists, murdering them. He's a mistake. That that should have been disclosed by the government before, shouldn't have been leaked. No one is arguing that disclosing two hundred and fifty thousand say department cables was whistle blowing or necessary or appropriate. But or like taking from the GRU cutout the twenty sixteen documents releasing them, but that's not what the is it issuing? Right. Right. right. And that's how it is that's how it's digital. But, like, my point was just on the State Farm and Cable. It was, like, Chelsea Manning was punished for that crime -- Yeah. -- extensively. And so was the way we're about I mean, you did the sentence. So was Julian Assange? Yeah. I mean, he's been living in fucking embassy. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's not like, you know, he's been high on the hog here the last few years. Right? So there there's been punishment. You have sent the message that there are consequences for people who do this kind of stuff. Like, I don't yeah. It just doesn't seem, like, why are we still doing? It's just surprising to me. Last thing, very, very serious topic here. According to the Sally Press Agency, over forty camels were disqualified from an annual camel beauty contest. Because they were administered Botox, hormones, or other appearance enhancing techniques. Participants in the king of du Lacie's Campbell Festival compete for wait for it. Sixty six million dollars in votes for me. Yes. Judges pick the camel winners based on the shape of their heads next humps, dress, and posture. That's a quote. These pork candles are true. What qualifies As like a attractive like a attractive hump. I don't I don't know. We gotta find we gotta go. No. We probably shouldn't go bone side. Yeah. These pork camels, they're they're they're they're they're bringing them, like, Instagram influencers or body builders or poked in their product and inject it with, like, fillers and steroids and shit. They should all move to LA. The goal of the festival is to keep Saudi Arabia's better when traditional live. It's to highlight the role the camels have played in it. So I guess, you know, good, I guess that they're cracking down on cheaters, but like, so the idea of giving a camel Botox is obviously crazy and hilarious, but I guess also PED is, are pervasive at horse races, dock tracks other So I guess good, I guess, if they're cracking down on cheaters. But, like, so the idea of giving a camel boat talks is obviously crazy and hilarious. But I guess also PEDs are pervasive at horse races, dog tracks, other competitions. But then, while I was researching this, I came across the following headline that I just I thought you would love. Quote, Berry bonds is unrecognizable at Westminster Dog Show. Berry bonds for baseball player. Yeah. Had a miniature schnauzer named Rocky competing in the Westminster documentary in twenty one, and the headline was about how he doesn't look roided up anymore. Over a circle. Oh, so, like, the head isn't swollen up And oh, no, not Oh, no. Not dude. I used to go to the gym in San Francisco and Barry Bonds would work out there and he looks like a different person. Yeah. Well, I was thinking, like, remember movie best in show, pretty good movie. Right? Fantastic show. Like, you could make a remake or sequel. It's like the camel show. Write it up that's insurance. I think it was like, look, every society is a little peculiar about their animals and -- Yeah. -- we have dog shows here. So, like, we're we're in a bit of a glasshouse. I don't know that the dogs are getting BOTOX and PDs. Like, maybe you could probably find that they are. Yeah. I I bet they, yeah, you're probably bet they yeah. You're probably right. I I just think, I mean, my my dogs haircuts cost four times as much as mine do. So I shouldn't really so I shouldn't really talk. I do just think it's a little, like, wouldn't the camel contest be like, you know, which camel can, like, walk the farthest across the desert or something like that? Beauty is the word I associate with camel. No. They're kind of mean too. III hear they're they're they can be kind of real bastards, you know. Did you? Like like mean, but I'm not a better one. Yeah. I I that they know how to kind of tamed Yeah. You build a relationship. Did you go on the obama trip Egypt? I did. Didn't you guys go on like a camel thing? I didn't. Are we celebrating? Well, no, I wasn't that enthusiastic to to write on Campbell. And I remember seeing, like, Ram Manuel, writing on a it's something I'll never unsee, you know. But it's I mean, like, the health of the candles need to be first for of course. Fun center here on this thing. The Camel Influencer thing is kind of dystopian. Yeah. They're probably using, like, Instagram filters and, like, those beautification apps on on on Right. Face toon and stuff. Yeah. Humped toon. Yeah. Sixty six million dollars. That's the thing that really Some guy stakes That number's what got this topic in the show. Sixty six mille. Do you think Bieber when he was over there for the the big MBS bone you know, party at the Formula one racing thing was was doing a little side show with the camels. I mean I wonder. It's a crazy ride on camel. I bet I bet Do you think if you get, I bet that the Bieber concert appearance price tag comes with like a three day, like you have to you think if you get I bet that the Bieber concert appearance price tag comes with like a three day Yeah. Like, you have to do it tour. Rada Campbell through the deck. Hang out, kind of participate in their weird -- Yeah. -- you know, like propaganda -- Yeah. -- events they want you to do. Yeah. There's probably some some some some camel beautification picks out there that people could get, you know, ripped into. Yeah. Well, good for him. Anyway, if any of you out there are camel aficionados, if you've been to this competition, If you know I wanna know more about this. Yeah. I would love to know. Is there a llama version of this? Because that was like, that's kinda our version of a camel over here in this hemisphere. You know that we Had a Lama for Obama in Iowa in llama for Obama in Iowa. In two thousand eight. No. didn't actually It went to like yeah. It went to all kinds of events. That llama was in dozens of parades for Obama. It was like that llama would would always show up to stuff. There's I think there might be llamas for Obama in two thousand four too. We we we love a good, you know, moderation ride scheme. But he was that the llamas in my shitty ass truck would always be in these events. W who would drive the Lama Who would drive the llama around? Did you have a government Just someone someone on staff who was like a llama caretaker? Yeah. There's guy Orin who lived up in the sort of Llama region, who I think, was sort of the designated point of time. Are there Llamas in Iowa? Is that a thing? There's just lots of weird people. Yeah. Yeah. I've always like a good alpaca. Oh, yeah. Those are cool. Yeah. Those are Those are cool. But those are why don't people farm them? Is that for their for for, Is it like a a hanger? I think think so. I think they have, like, the, you know, like, mega sweater. Did they die when you do that? Or is it just shave? No. I think the shave moths took a shirt. Right? Yeah. Plus dark. Feel good about it. I'm wondering learning. You can feel okay about can feel okay about it. I I guess we can feel okay about the as long as the Campbell's see a old piece of that sixty six mil. Yeah. Right. I mean, I wonder how you sound right? If you go to Finland, you hit the club, you know. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Just, like, bring all these threads together. Yeah. Well, I'd rather go to Finland and go to hit the clubs and hang out at the Tory party, Christmas party. Oh, yeah. I can you And it's like the the Tory I saw the video of the of the Tory Gensaki, like, making fun of the transparent. Like, we did not have a party or something and it's just it wasn't that funny. It was bad. It wasn't funny. Is that at least be funny. Don't you think that Boris Johnson was absolutely aware of these parties and was probably one Of them. No question about it. Yeah. Like, the this shoe is gonna drop so hard. Yeah. He's so full of shit. He's down in the polls for first time in a while. There was a poll that showed labor that has, like, an eight point edge on it. Let's go whammy. Yeah. I mean, there's been a whammy Man who was quoted knighting for so I thought I had stories. Yeah. Yeah. It's it's he's been well yeah. His twitter feed's been pretty good. If you wanna know where I saw, like, the picture from the mirror, like Oh, that's how you got it. Yeah. Yeah. Right. But, yeah, he's been he's been wielding the knife. But, like, the the and the problem is that there lot is not supposed to be for a couple years, you know. Uh-huh. You know, you wish that the election was, like, in a few months. How's Cure Starmer doing over there? He's I mean, they're up now for first time in while. I mean, like, they've got, you know, they've got a, they've got a lead and I mean, what cure Schermer needs to just close the deal on like making labor or credible a while. I mean, like, they've got, you know, they've got a they've got a lead and I mean, but Keur Schimmer needs to just close the deal on, like, making labor credible alternative -- Totally. That actually like, you know, respects the voters and has a program for actually, like, you know, respects the voters and has program for them and doesn't, you know, spend their money or donor money, you know, redesigning number ten and, you know, partying and contravention of your COVID protocols, idiots. I'm waiting for the the Skexit shoe to drop. And for them to just peace out. Scotland. That is, that is Yeah. Yeah. I mean, one of the problems labor has to get a little wonky on British politics? Is it like there were two referendum. Right? There was a Scottish referendum. And labor used to get a lot of Scottish voters. But some of the voters used to get in Scotland now moved to the Scottish nationalists, so they lost those people. Then there's a Brexit referendum, and a bunch of Labour's own people were were really for Brexit. So then they lost some voters in that referendum, you know. So they gotta kinda build back better? Better. There you go. Ben, I almost forgot. Donald Trump did an interview with Hugh Hewitt Oh, Dan and John talked about this. He forgot this. Yeah. Just a historic suck up. And I see suck up of epic proportions. A man who who traces his political lineage back to Richard Nixon's administration. And I believe is the head of the and library. And presents himself as this, like, intellectual, you know -- Yes. -- who's, like, deeply versed in foreign affairs and -- Yeah. -- if, you know, anybody who presents himself as like an incredibly serious and deeply red person on foreign affairs simultaneously, completely sucking up to to Donald TrumpBibi should be taken with grain of salt? Yes. So here's a clip of Hugh Hewitt, his interview with Trump, where they go in this sort of odd tangent about China and hypersonic missiles that raise a lot eyebrows. So Russia started it after they got our information. You know, somebody gave them during the Obama administration everything we had on hypersonic. And Russia did it. And what I did is a catch up program, and we've caught up, largely caught up. But what happened is Russia got it. And then China got it. Perhaps from it perhaps from Russia. I doubt they did it themselves. They got it perhaps from Russia, maybe from some bad spy in the United States. So he's talking about hypersonic missiles. Yeah. Yeah. But, like, clearly detailing what sounds like some pretty closely held intelligence about how the Chinese got a hold of really advanced technology. It's a very very weird weird quote, part of this interview. I mean, like a lot of the times that TrumpBibi of all, like, the idea that, like, the Obama administration gave Russia hypersonic missiles is, like, one of the dumbest fucking nerd. And not at all true. And I think we would have known. I think I think if the Trump put it this way, think if the Trump administration had uncovered some massive you know, program by Barack Obama to deliver a brand new missile to Russia in China, like, you know, you might put that out there to prosecute that one. Everything about Donald Trump and these types when he has, like, a foreign affairs question like this, there's, like, some shred of information. Like he was once like briefed on like Russia's hypersonic weapons program or like he was once like, briefed on, like, Russia's hypersonic weapons program or something. And he remembers, like, one shred of something about that And then he just, like, wraps it up in some insane conspiracy theory. Yeah. He's just, like He's all the grandmas and stuff. The grandmas is him and runs down Obama. And then the Chinese at the China, as he says, has to be brought in as like a villain. But that is like completely insane commentary on very sensitive nuclear missile related technology kind of esoteric -- Yeah. -- deep dive there. There's things I can't even say about this. Not that not that the Obama administrator, but, like, this is insane. This is not something you should be talking about on the radio. Yes. Foreign president. Also in the interview, Trump mocks his former Secretary of Defense, Esper, he called him Jesper. Hugh Hewitt said something about him being cuba diving when they needed him at some point. I don't know what the fuck they're talking about. I have to say I'm occasionally on, you know, on MSNBC something and and like Mark Esper Like, I wanna reference him by name and I forgot his first name. love that I can often not remember his full name. Like, I I I'm glad that I can't. It's such a sign of what caliber of secretary defense -- Yes, guy was. -- I literally forgot it. So you said it just there. He also asked Trump whether they thought the Chinese like knew about COVID, let it spread without doing anything. And Trump basically said, you know, the question that you're really asking is, did they do it on purpose? And I don't think so. Then he went on to sort of detail what others say, all the other conspiracy theories. We sort of had it both ways in his answer, but it's interesting because the sort of Steve Ben, Peter Navarro, wing of the part -- Josh Hogan, Jason. -- who of the lab league people too. I'll, you know, sort of either overtly say or suggest that the Chinese communist party, like, essentially treated COVID like a weapon. Yeah. It it's interesting that he hasn't because it's it's not like this guy has boundaries of, like it's not like truth is a binding factor whenever and by forever. And so it's interesting that he like so why doesn't he just say that? Given that he'd say anything. Like, it suggests that he's, like, afraid of something about the Chinese. I mean, I think, you know, it's very weird. He also talked about the the this is right after the Biden, Putin, phone call about Ukraine. And, you know, you can tell Trump just like wants Putin to invade Ukraine. Because he thinks it'll make Biden look bad, but he called Biden a high school football team versus Putin who is the Steelers in their prime, which is only funny to me because Hugh Hugh is huge Cleveland Browns fan. Yeah. Yeah. And it's kind of a bit of a tasset fuck you then. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Well, it was like, you hear it, like, all the Trump's secret fans is gonna figure out that, like, you know, he doesn't really love you. Hugh, I'm sorry. No. He just doesn't. All you're sucking up in reputation destruction and and reviewing yourself to be a deeply unserious person posing as a serious person is not gonna win you that affection. Yeah. You're gonna weird to me that that Nixon staffer, you know, wouldn't be on the up and up, you know? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we've got, you know, who knows, like, why? And Nixon staffer would be on board with Amandu's willing to break Democratic norms and subvert our democracy, corruption, all that stuff. Okay. So that's it for us today. We are off next week. Because of the holidays. But the episode after that is going to be a deep dive into all things China because, you know, Ben, in some ways -- Yes. -- the biggest story in the world in many ways. Yeah. We We don't get to talk about it quite as much as we should given that it's not always like pressing in the news, but I think the ability to step back and really go deep into all the dimensions of what's going on, but the U S and China kind of tee up the next cold war, you know, it's worth an episode where, get to talk about it quite as much as we should, given that it's not always like pressing in the news, but I think the ability to step back and really go deep into all the dimensions of what's going on with the US and China kind of tee up the next cold war, you know. It's with Worth an episode. Worth an episode. So we'll get you guys that next week. And until then, happy holidays. Merry Christmas. Merry war on Christmas. Yeah. Just Be careful in that rain Angelina's careful in that rain and doing this. Yes. Yeah. slower down. Hunker down. Pod Save World is a crooked media production. The executive producer is Michael Martinez. Our producer is Hailie News. It's mixed and edited by Andrew Chadwick. Kyle Segment is our sound engineer. Thanks to our digital team, Elijah Cohn, Y'all Freeb, and Phoebe Bradford to film and share our episodes as videos each week.