Iran War: Trump's Endgame, Economic Fallout and Polymarket Profiteering

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I should parent everybody.

1:52

I think you kind of do.

1:53

Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast network. I'm Kara Swisher.

1:58

And I'm Scott Galloway.

2:03

So I just flew in from San Francisco and boy, are my arms tired.

2:04

I've heard that joke before.

2:07

I know. I don't know why I keep doing the night flights things. I just keep. I think I'm getting too old for it. But I had. As you can hear, everybody, I have a cold. And I actually was there to interview Gavin Newsom for his book Young man in a Hurry, which is now, I guess, Old man in a Hurry. And so I went in to do that and it was actually a fantastic interview. We'll talk about it.

2:09

And it's gotten a lot of news.

2:33

Yeah, I did. I'm a newsmaker, my friend, and I

2:34

just to be clear, to give you insight into our relationship, there was someone put out a thing saying that he was in support of. He changed his tone or he's in support of regime change. And I wrote smart and you berated me. So why don't you give us.

2:38

Not publicly. We're going to talk about it. We'll get into it. I didn't berate you. It just was inaccurately depicting the interview I had just done.

2:52

Because I wrote the word smart?

3:00

No, because you were tweeting an inaccurate report. That's all.

3:03

Who wrote out the inaccurate.

3:07

I don't know. It just was weird. It was weird because it was so not what he said. And so it just annoys me. It just annoys me. I mean, I definitely, definitely made a lot of news in that interview, by the way. We talked a lot about his book, which was interesting, but he's definitely not

3:09

running for president because no president ever puts out a book before they run for president.

3:23

I know. Well, no, he kept saying that he wasn't sure. It was really funny. And then right afterwards. Actually, I like the book. It's gotten some bad reviews, but I think they've just decided who he is and are reviewing it based on sort of that unctuous, toady, slick image versus a lot of stuff that he's done. That's brave. He's a very complex person, like yourself, Scott Galloway.

3:26

I've heard it's actually pretty authentic.

3:47

Yeah. Let me just characterize this discussion. The book I really like, I have to say, and I think I found out a lot of things about him that I didn't know about his mother. I knew a little bit about his mother's assisted suicide, but it was really interesting to talk about a lot about his own struggles and not. It wasn't the dyslexia part. We didn't talk a lot about that, but a lot about. I didn't know his wife had had a miscarriage, for example. He has four kids. He almost had five. There's a lot in there. There was a lot in there. And one of the things that struck me, which brings me back to you, which I know how you like that. Thank you. He was the wife. He was the son of a single mom who was not wealthy. And he has a lot of resonances with your mom, you know what I mean? Like your story with your single mom who was struggling, father who was distant and who he desperately wanted to be with. It was really. It reminded me a lot of you, actually.

3:50

I think people underestimate Newsom, and I think they underestimate DeSantis and Rubio. But I think right now, I think Governor Newsom, hands down, is the leading candidate on the Democratic side. And not only that, I think I know a little bit about his personal story and I actually think it's quite compelling. And a lot of his personal failings, I think will come across as a bit authentic. People know about them. And also I think California is gonna begin not to peak, but to recover at just the right moment for him.

4:48

Yeah, I suspect. Anyway, it was really interesting. Cause I did feel like I was having the same discussion you and I have had about single moms.

5:20

No, look, we're the same person, except he's much more talented and handsome and higher character than me. Other than that, we're the same guy.

5:26

That's what he suffers from. That's what everybody is sensitive to you and not to him. He definitely played into it. We talked about that. It was a very personal thing. But we did get a lot of news in too.

5:32

Yeah, I'm reading about it everywhere.

5:40

I know.

5:42

I literally see Gavin Newsom and this 11 year old boy on stage with him. I'm like, oh, I know her.

5:43

And my voice is so for those listening to it, I apologize. This is a good version of my voice. It was so. I was absolutely dead hoarse three hours before and I thought I'd have to cancel. But I did all manner of things to my voice to allow it to work. And he got to. And I said, you're lucky today. I've never had a man over talk me. So you're gonna get some chance to do that today. Which funny. And he does talk a lot, let me just say. So let's get right into it. President Trump says the US military intends to continue its assault on Iran for four to five weeks if necessary. He keeps changing his tune. We'll get to that in a second. The US and Israel began strikes on Saturday, killing Iran's supreme leader, the Ayatollah, as well as several senior officials. Iran is retaliating all over the place with missiles and drones targeting Israel, the US bases in Gulf countries, Dubai, all manner of places. Four American service members have been killed, and Trump says there will likely be more. But, quote, that's the way it is. Kind of a callous way to put it. Three US jets were also shot down in a friendly fire incident over Kuwait. The crew members got out Safely. Thank goodness. These are $90 million jets. That's $270 million. Trump has justified the attack on Iran, which did not receive congressional approval, by citing, quote, imminent threats, though he had not provided evidence that it looks like he doesn't have any. That said, a lot of people are celebrating the death of the Ayatollah. Defense Secretary Hegsatz held a presser a little while ago. He said this is not so called regime change war, but a regime sure did change. Not clear if either of them is true because Trump has talked about regime change and it doesn't appear as the regime has changed. Hegseth was also asked about the timeline. Let's listen to what he says. If we can hear him directly to

5:49

the media outlets and political left screaming endless wars. Stop. This is not Iraq. This is not endless. I was there for both. Our generation knows better and so does this president. He called the last 20 years of nation building wars dumb. And he's right. This is the opposite.

7:36

Well, it's nice to hear from a Stoke Bose model who doesn't know what he's talking about. But I also want to note about this interview I did with California Governor Gavin Newsom of the weekend for the latest episode of on with Karis Fisher. It's really interesting because one of the issues was all the misinformation online. It was really quite. It wasn't just something you tweeted, but it was all over the place. Misreporting where he stands on all this. Let's listen to what he told me. And this was just a small piece of it because he went on for a while decrying Donald Trump's action. Let's go.

7:59

And that's Donald Trump, the chaos president, this wrecking ball president across the board. Destruction is not strength. And once again we've seen destroy not only our allies in relationship to the rest of the world, but we're seeing him destroy any capacity to explain fundamentally what the core American interest is at this moment to declare war, to go to war with the regime. And all of this is playing out in real time.

8:28

Newsom posted on X over the weekend. The corrupt, repressive Iranian regime must never have nuclear weapons. Leadership of Iran must go. But that doesn't justify the President of the United States engaging in a legal dangerous war. Very similar to what Senator Warner said. All the senators pretty much said this guy deserved to die. And at the same time, this seems like a chaotic mess. Let's talk a little bit about it. And especially the economic impact. Fighting has effectively shut down The Strait of Hormuz, which carries one fifth of the world's oil supply. As is recording, oil prices are up about 7%. Gas futures jumped as much as 9%. Spike in energy places supply chain strain broader ripple effects across the global economy, especially because of the uncertainty. And the last thing I would note is that, and it's interesting because Trump does respond to this is that there's much reporting, including in the Washington Post about how he was convinced to do it through Mohammed bin Salman and Benjamin NETANYAHU and even J.D. vance and General Kaine did not want to do this. But here we are. So talk a little bit about where it's going to go from here and your thoughts?

9:01

Well, the honest answer is I have no idea or I have a vision for where you hope it goes. But I'm sympathetic to Governors Newsom and Senator Warner. The notion that we're going to end up after Trump is gone, we have to be thoughtful about how we improve the tensile strength of our democracy by stopping the slow but steady leak of power from Congress, which is the people, to the president under the auspices or cold comfort that they will stick to certain norms because effectively a president should not be able military action you can maybe justify. But this is war.

10:10

He used the word war.

10:51

I know this is war. It is war. And I'm sympathetic to the notion that the reason we have 535 members of Congress representing, you know, two, two per state in the Senate and one for every 750,000 people is the American people are supposed to have a say. But Democrats, it's 7% are actually in favor of this. So there's going to need to be the best thing we could do coming out or one of the best things I think coming out of the Trump administration and this highlights that is to have structural reform around gerrymandering Citizens United and that Congress has to be involved or briefed or that we have to go back to this notion where only Congress can decide if in fact we go to war. Now, where could this go? As you know, now I'm in favor, loosely speaking around this action because I always like to ask myself what to go right. Iran is 90 million people, sits on the second largest natural gas reserves, the third largest oil reserves, incredible science, incredible universities, incredible entrepreneurial spirit. Actually quite a non secular.

10:52

It was that's for sure.

11:56

Non secular. Well, I would argue anyways fairly non secular, a lot less anti west than people have been led to believe by what I think is one of the most oppressive brutal regimes in history. So what could go right, you could have one of the largest economies in the Middle east become more pro West. It's been punching below its weight class for 20 or 30 years now because of poor technology and sanctions. You could immediately see it come up and be an economic power that is pro west, pro trading, pro capitalist. What effectively might be one of the biggest tax cuts in history. If you saw more consistent flows of oil and technology and a great trading partner, I actually think Europe would be the biggest beneficiary and turn what has been the primary agent of chaos and terror in an unstable region into something resembling, I don't even call it pro west, but neutral West. So I think there's a lot that could go right here. And I think the risk assessment provided to the president, in my view, had a lot of asymmetric upside. Now, having said that, what they missed here was part of the PAL doctrine, and that is you have to have clearly articulated objectives or plans for next beyond. Well, they haven't. And to your point, they just haven't been able to articulate in the last 24 hours what is the off ramp and the objective here. Is it regime change? Is it a more friendly regime? Is it, I mean, what exactly? And not only that, you're not going to get this notion that all of a sudden we're going to provide air cover and the Iranian people are going to rise up and overtake 150,000 members of the IRGC who are deeply integrated into.

11:58

They have outside plans. There's some great reporting on this, by the way, by legitimate news organizations. They have contingency plans in place for what happens if the Ayatollah dies and they're carrying them out.

13:39

Okay, but in Syria, Libya, in Iraq, these were autocracies with a central figurehead. The IRGC is very deeply embedded into the economy. So when your mortgage and your salary is being paid by the irgc, it's not like, oh, okay, the top guy Assad is gone and boom, it's a new administration. So there's a lot about the ground game, there's a lot about intelligence assets. And if they had said we are going to, for example, a potential off ramp, we're going to neuter their Navy, we're going to diminish their air defense capabilities, we're going to make sure for sure there is absolutely no ability to create or enrich nuclear stockpiles, and then we're going to leave it up to the Iranian people, that's technically an off ramp. But I have seen in the last 24 hours them talk about regime change. No, this isn't regime change. So they haven't been able to articulate what is next.

13:53

Well, I don't believe they thought about it. I mean one of the things that a lot of people are pointing out is the involvement of Netanyahu and the head of Saudi Arabia who publicly had said he was against this but privately was quite for it and pressing for it. The linkage between the corruption with the Trump family and this coin operated presidency that I talk about all the time is really very clear because most I would say they're trying to come up with a story after the fact. Oh, it hasn't worked. It isn't an endless war. Although it feels kind of like an endless. It feels very Bushian. Right. You definitely had echoes of that. I think he thought it was going to be like Venezuela. Right. That it was like just take that guy out. And by the way, he's in business with the Maduro administration. He didn't regime change that place at all. Like speaking of regime change, this is much more complicated. I agree, but I think he thought it was like that.

14:47

No, I'm agreeing with you. This is not take out Maduro and this is much more.

15:37

He's just as has cowed the regime into it, but it's the same regime in this case. It's really fascinating how they have put themselves into this economy in a way that's very hard to get them out. Right. Of course, this is their point of these very corrupt and I would say evil mullahs in Iran. But one of the things that's fascinating to me is one, the continued corruption of Trump's family and Trump with in this region. And second of all that he keeps calling. Have you noticed? He's calling all. I'm waiting for a call from him myself. Like he called Jake Tapper, he called a bunch of John Carl, he's called all the regular old media people essentially or the people he decries all the time. And it seems like he's workshopping different reasons. That's so disturbing.

15:44

Yeah, he's trying to figure out what people want. But there is again what could go right here. The most powerful instinct is survival. And what we pulled off here and when I say we, I actually think it was more the Mossad than us. We effectively and I don't think people really register how profound this was. Within about two hours we took out the equivalent of the President, the Secretary of Defense and the head of the Joint Chiefs.

16:38

Right. They were all in the same place, but yes.

17:05

And Then. And what has got to be the strategic mistake of, I would say, the last five years, other than the decision by Hamas to go into Israel geopolitically, they started attacking civilian targets within the Gulf.

17:08

Fareed Zakaria noted that this was a big mistake.

17:24

I mean, that's just okay. You want to isolate yourself from who should naturally be sympathetic to you. Now, the going back to this notion of survival instinct. At some point, you got to think the next level down. And I don't know if it's 1000 or 10,000 or 100,000 or 150,000. IRGC say, okay, we too, really like our families in this thing called life. Maybe we need to come to some sort of accommodation with the US and the West.

17:27

That would require as boots on the ground. And Trump, Trump didn't even rule that out. Again, like this. Here's the. What really drives me crazy, this idea. They're like, it's not endless war. The other presidents were just dumb. It's the same thing. You know, they're just trying very hard to spin it. And by the way, you noted a poll that half Americans support it. It's actually not the case. Many of the polls are showing 25%. You should.

17:55

I didn't say that. 55% of Republicans, and it's about 30% now. Amongst Democrats, it's 7%. And I'm amongst the 7% of Democrats who support this. But it's a little bit, because, okay, what they're hoping for, and maybe it's a hallucination, that it's not boots on the ground, that it's sandals and sneakers and slippers, that the Iranian people based on the problem is the 30,000 people that have been mowed down were the front lines. They were the Marines, they were the shock troops who were willing to risk their lives. So the reality is kind of what the off ramp will be or how this plays out or how it plays out in the next week in terms of the Iranian populace's ability to foment change on the ground because the American public does not have any appetite site for boots on the ground. But what I talked to a senator this morning, I'm like, isn't a reasonable off ramp that you would say, okay, we're going to diminish their ability to wreak havoc to a point, you know, 0.1, we're going to control the skies, we're going to diminish their Navy, we're going to clear out their minesweepers from the Straits of Hormuz. We're Going to absolutely ensure there is zero capability nuclear. And then we're going to declare.

18:18

Which you said was obliterated in June. Just let's point that out.

19:23

Fair point. Again, more inconsistency. Why did we need to go back in to diminish their nuclear capacity when you said it was done seven months ago? So there is inconsistent messaging. But I think the lies, that's called lies, in my opinion, the opportunities here to diminish the capacity to continue to levy this depravity and oppression amongst its populace and potentially liberate one of the great cultures in civilization's history that sits on unbelievable economic potential, economic prosperity. There is a real potential upside here.

19:26

You know where else there's a potential of upside is Ukraine. Same thing.

19:59

Agreed.

20:03

So what's really interesting to hear is he yells at Europe for not pulling their fair share in defense. Fine. I can see that argument. Even though he makes it in the crude and repulsive way. Why isn't Saudi Arabia and Israel paying for this? We're doing their cop duty and we happen to have a corrupt cop on the beat.

20:03

Oh, Israel sacrifice.

20:22

I'm talking about. You don't hear the same language. Right. If Saudi Arabia wanted this to happen, they should pay for it. Like, if that's really the thing, why do I have to pay as an American taxpayer, $270 million for three planes? Like that kind of stuff. And so. And why are. Why isn't this money deployed elsewhere? That I think is in our. Not me. I'm not running this show. But, like, why isn't Ukraine the same thing? Like, that's what's really interesting. Because there's a country that is full of like, economic talk about economic opportunities. Same thing. Let me focus you on the toll on the US Economy because all these a free. Well, first of all, every attempt at regime change in the Middle east has failed almost miserably. For the United States or a version of regime change. Afghanistan, everywhere. Everywhere we go.

20:25

Well, I did, to be fair, I did work in the Balkans. We have had successful interventions in Kuwait. We successfully repelled. The difference there is we did it multilaterally. Which he's stupid to do here. Already Britain, our closest ally, is humming and hawing about letting us use the airfields. He wants to go it alone, which is stupid. Anyway, I interrupted you talking about the economics here.

21:11

So I want to know about the effect on the US Economy because one of the things. Because when people start a war, it tends to be in the 60s period. Right? Right. It's 25. And I get that the Democrats don't like it, but in a 25 is a bad place to start when you're doing a war, which if you remember, remember the stud scud and everyone being vaguely excited when they were doing those. I mean, even myself, which is grotesque because I now have children. I'm like, oh no, no, no. But talk about the toll on the economy because every. And the MAGA people GRE and even more heinous people are talking about this is not what we voted for, right? This is not. And they're trying very desperately to pretend it's not an endless war. It's whatever word they're gonna use is not gonna work with these people. He's already struck seven countries, seven events. He's done more war. It was interesting cause Hillary Clinton was so prescient about exactly what he would do here. He seems to like and have an appetite for military action because everything's going so badly for him. So talk about the effect on the US economy, oil prices, right? Inflation, more danger for the US in terms of attacks on our own soil from the Iranians. I mean, if you back these Iranians into a corner, they may do something really dire here in this country. What is the toll in the US economy? And let me add in that people were using this war to cash in on online betting markets, which was repulsive. Kalshi reportedly saw 36 in BET volume related to whether or not there'll be regime change in Iran. On polymarket, 529 million was traded on contracts tied to the timing of the strikes. And some of them seem rather suspect. Poly Market defended its decision to allow betting on the start of the war, saying it's invaluable source of news and answers. It feels like profiteering to me. But talk a little bit about the impact on the economy. What's next? Think of two scenarios. What's next for the economy?

21:30

Well, just, just to go in reverse order, I actually would argue that, that we have diminished. I mean you have what is. What was the superpower in the region with their proxies, Hezbollah, Hamas, the Houthis, wreaking havoc economically and in terms of oppression of different people in the region. And their organizing principle was death to Israel and death to America. And I would argue you that even if we don't have the regime change or a quote unquote liberated, capitalist west friendly Iran, that their ability to strike at us and our proxies overseas in our basis has actually been diminished, that they're not now we need to be more worried. I Think we need to actually be less worried. There are two scenarios here. One scenario is we end up in another forever war that explodes our deficits and we keep incrementally making excuses. Is for trying to impose democracy, which is an oxymoron. And oil prices, the Strait of Hormuz gets blocked off and oil prices skyrocket. Now, to a certain extent, if you wanted to be really Machiavellian, that doesn't hurt us that much because we are energy independent. Who this really is hurting, both Venezuela and Iran is China. 80% of Iran's oil was going to China. The same with Venezuela. So we can survive an oil shock, but you could have an increase in deficits of a forever war, disruption in supply chain, straining our relationships with the allies. I personally think there's more asymmetric upside where we unlock stronger oil flows, better technology, a potential trading partner for Europe and the US And I would argue, I would, would bet that I believe in six months that oil prices will be lower than they are today. Now, to your point about costs and economics, I am sympathetic to the left's view. Many people on the left, that these forever wars and foreign intervention and imperialists imposing our own values on other cultures and other nations is not only wrong, it is just really fucking expensive. I'm sympathetic to that. What I'm not sympathetic to.

23:34

Can I make a correction? Charlie Kirk talked about this, the right. This has been an animating.

25:43

Well, I was just about to get there. Kara. The right has a very strong isolationist bent. What is inconsistent? For me, it is consistent to say, let's focus on our problems domestically, let's spend money domestically, let's not run up deficits with tax cuts and forever wars in a macho military, and let's stay out of other people's knitting, recognizing that we respect the right, their right to do it, to govern themselves and shape their own future. What is totally inconsistent is the far right or the right's isolationist rhetoric while approving a $1.1 trillion military budget. Because my view is the only rationale for having a $1.1 trillion military budget is quite frankly, is if on regular basis you're going to go on your toes. Because if we don't want to get involved in this kind of foreign adventures or misadventures, whatever you want to characterize it, there's no risk of Canada invading us. Let's take our military budget down to 300 billion and pay off our deficit. So I've never understood the right's fascination with ridiculous military spending. And then this isolationist complexion. I personally think the upside over the medium and the long term here economically with a peaceful Middle east, once its primary sponsor of terror is neutered here, actually, I think this over the medium and the long term could be really good for Europe. And if we could figure out a way to end the war in Ukraine, figure out a way to have a, a neutral West Iran, I think you're going to see the largest tax cut in history because I think the flows of oil will cut oil probably in half. And you'll have an incredible trading partner with what is one of the most productive capitalist in many ways societies in history. And that's the Persian people.

25:49

Yeah, that is true. I understand. One of the things that troubles me is one is that he really doesn't seem to have a plan. And he's the President. Right. And that people within his administration, he'll

27:28

call you and ask you for your

27:40

plan in about half an hour. My plan is for you to step down. But then I would get J.D. vance. But that's my suggestion. And you should go off and spend all the money you've stolen from the American people. But one of the things that I think about a lot is that this is done in such a haphazard way without the involvement of Congress. Right. That really is troublesome. And that these Republicans who are against these things immediately get in line. Now look, Lindsey Graham, that southern belle, has always been wanting to do this, right? I mean, now he wants to go. He is southern belle and he's wanted to do this. He wants to do Cuba next. Let's do Cuba next, right? That's the whole thing. This is all he just in his mistaken.

27:41

Cuba isn't blinding its women. It's not hanging teenage girls and then sanctioning rape of them.

28:29

He said Cuba. He did, Yeah.

28:35

I agree. No, I'm saying that makes sense in my opinion. I mean, as much as a war hawk as I am, I see no logical reason to invade Cuba.

28:36

Well, I think that's next. It seems like they're just gonna get bored over here and come over here. But this is something Lindsey Graham has wanted forever in his endless and sad attempt to be more masculine in some fashion. So fine, fine, Lindsay, that's fine. But one of the things that really drives me crazy is these people are so they shift. These people say one thing one week and then shift it the next week. Like, look, I know you like to attack them, but they're sticking to their guns on these kind of things.

28:43

They're sticking attack Right.

29:09

Oh, the left a lot. But the right just shifts it. Like, it's like we're against it, we're against it, we're against it. Charlie Kirk said, let's not be dragged into this by so and so. Let's focus here.

29:11

Okay, then let's cut our military budget to 300 billion.

29:22

I get it, I get it, but I just don't see why they don't. They shift this way. It's really. It's sad because I like when there's argument over what we should do here in a way that everybody gets to.

29:24

And it's meant to be a discourse in the Congress. I agree with that. Barry Goldwater called this in the 70s. He said that we have become dangerously used to a slow leak of power from the co. Equal branches of government and Congress to the President. And what kept that mostly in check was a series of norms where the President would go and inform the Senate Intelligence Committee or the Defense. The people on the Defense Committee that he would give them a heads up. He'd invite them to the White House and say, this is what we're thinking. What do you think? Think those norms are gone. And so there's gotta be. Unless there is structural reform around what it means to have co equal brow. Republicans are resigning from Congress because they're like, why the fuck am I here? Yeah, yeah, well, I'm not even gonna. The speaker of the House is not Mike Johnson. He's the speaker of the White House. He's there to run roughshod over. People in the minority party are used to getting fucked over. They're used to having no power. But Republicans are like, let me get this. I stuck around to be in the majority such that I could represent my people and get policies through. And I'm not even being consult melted on this shit.

29:37

No. And on the Democratic, I'd say centrist conservative. I have never seen Senator Warner, who I consider pretty. Like he's a moderate. Moderate more than. I mean, I think he's often. We often disagree on a lot of stuff. He was incandescent because he sees these things. He knows he has so much experience in Senate intelligence, et cetera, et cetera. And to watch people who had said the very opposite shift was really something because at the very bottom of this, it puts people's lives at risk unnecessarily. And not just American troops, which is terrible. It's people on the ground there, Iranian citizens, which American troops. And I worry about American people attacking here. And it just creates a situation that when you there's just a. This guy's gotta have a better reason than to call someone and have a different reason every minute. And we'll see its effect on. The stock market's not loving this at all. But we'll see. We'll see where it goes.

30:38

But you brought up Kalshee. And what's fascinating about these things is they tend to be right, that there's a wisdom of the crowds. And when you have Senator Warner, who has just had a lot, this is not his first rodeo, has had a ton of presidents and joint chiefs come before him and explain their plans. And when you have Senator Mark Kelly, who's actually flown these missions, if you don't take advantage of the benefit of their insight, even if they don't agree with you, you're not taking advantage of the greatest depth, the greatest IP depth of knowledge and experience in military history. And that's amongst, quite frankly, many of our members of Congress. If you're not bringing Representative Seth Moulton in and saying, hey, when you were on the ground in Iraq, I mean, instead we're consulting with a senator from Florida, a former Fox TV host and a reality game show host. They're making these decisions.

31:42

And the FBI is being run by a guy who likes to party in the middle of a possible terrorist action in this country.

32:42

So they're just going to make. And this is. I always like to try and reverse engineer to a personal learning here. One of my biggest flaws, biggest flaws as a man is I thought that masculinity and leadership was making a quick survey of the situation and then making a decision. And then it was my job to talk everyone into my decision. No, it's not. Leadership is listening and occasionally going, oh, fuck, I got it wrong. We need to switch course. I don't make. Now, I didn't learn this until I was little, literally 50. I don't make a big decision personally, financially, professionally, without talking to three or four really fucking smart people, because you can't read the label from inside of the bottle. And the U.S. congress is full of some of the most impressive, experienced, smartest people in the world.

32:49

And beyond that, there's people all over the world.

33:39

And also they have this incredible task of representing their constituency to not check in with them. I think Senator Warner is apoplectic because he's like, for God's sakes, we can save you from yourself.

33:40

That's right. That's right. He wasn't out of ego. I just. I've never seen him do that. It was really interesting. Anyway, we have to move on. This is a developing story. We'll see what happens. This seems like a very, as Gavin Newsom said, chaotic White House. It might be trying to get us away from the Epstein files or other issues at home. We didn't even talk about the distraction, but we'll go on a quick break. We come back Trump targets Anthropic, another incredible tech company in what former Trump official calls attempted corporate murder.

33:53

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34:25

Hey, Kara Swisher here. I want to let you know that Vox Media is returning to south by Southwest in Austin for live tapings of your favorite podcast. Join us from March 13th through the 15th for live tapings of Today explained Teffy Talks, Prof. G Markets and of course your two favorite podcasts, Pivot and On with Kara Swish. The stage will also feature sessions from Brene Brown and Adam Grant, Marques Brownlee, Keith Lee, Vivian Tew and Robin Arzon. It's all part of the Vox Media Podcast stage at south by Southwest, presented by Odoo. Visit voxmedia.comsxsw to pre register and get your special discount on your innovation badge. That's voxmedia.comsxxsw to register. Really you should register. We sell out and we hope to see you there. Scott, we're back. President Trump ordered federal agencies to stop using Anthropic after it did not come to a deal with the Pentagon on safety. The Defense Department will phase out the use of Anthropic products over the next six months, which will, I will tell you, hurt national security. Anthropic plans to challenge the supply chain designation in court. Good for them. When it comes to the App Store. Anthropic winning Claude is the number one spot in the Apple's free apps. As we tape, Anthropic also faced a major outage on Monday with the company saying it's been dealing with quote, unprecedented demand. Meanwhile, OpenAI, of course, Sam, ever the opportunist. OpenAI, Sam Altman reached an agreement with the Pentagon. The company claims it found a way to ensure its technologies would adhere to its safety principles by installing technical guardrails. However, when Sam Altman was asked on ask whether he worried about there'd be future disputes with the Pentagon of what's legal, he responded, yes, I am. Oh my God, Sam, I gotta tell you, you need to stop talking. A former Trump official called Anthropic order attempted corporate murder. It's the backdrop of OpenAI raising 110 billion in its latest funding round, including $50 billion from Amazon and $30 billion from both Nvidia and SoftBank. And these continue round tripping kind of deals. I Read a lot this weekend about this and one of the people involved was a guy named Emil Michael who used to be an executive at Uber, who, who was possibly one of the most bullying and awful executives and full of all manner of bad behaviors. When there he left the company and we wrote some stories of a thing he was involved in that was just so not a good behavior. I would say. I have spent time with him. He was the one that was negotiating this. Not a surprise. He kept calling Dario Amodi from Anthropic. Godlike God. He thinks he's God or whatever. I've never met anyone who thinks he's got more than Emile Michael. And he's usually a toady to more powerful people. In this case, Pete Hegseth. Anyway, it seems a ridiculous overreach on the behalf of government. Probably Anthropic will win. I think it probably will benefit from this, as you've noted many times. Any more thoughts on this? I don't think we're any safer as a people for having done this.

36:39

I think what people miss is that over the last 12 months, out of 23 markets, we're the 21st best performing or the third worst.

39:50

Yep.

39:59

And what has changed? We've had incredible innovation.

40:00

Yeah, we're up 50,000. Sorry.

40:03

We've had. We still have incredible innovation. We dominate the most tectonic shift in technology. The thing that's changing is I believe we're experiencing a rotation out of US stocks and a compression of multiples. And the reason why is the following. The underpinnings of why so much capital flows into the US from every other market in the world world is our incredible ip developed mostly through funding of research at universities, an incredibly risk aggressive culture based on immigrants who take huge risks to get here. And also I think more than anything, probably or chicken and egg, it attracts the deepest pools of capital in history. There's $5 million in venture capital for every startup in the US. There's only 1 million for every startup startup in Europe. Anthropic started six years ago. If it was in Europe, it'd be one of the 10 most valuable companies. But when governments start selectively punishing and rewarding companies based on political favoritism, that capital gets scared and starts withdrawing. Because why do you invest in OpenAI or anthropic if you don't know who you're waking up next to in terms of its ability to raise capital based on the blood sugar level of whoever's president? So this is not only the wrong thing to do and Makes us feel less safe and is probably illegal. It's Gonna hit your 401k, folks. And even in places like the Gulf that are run by autocracies, they have a real respect for systemic laws in the market. Cause they recognize the moment they start fucking with companies based on their own who's in or out of political favor, which has no stock market because nobody wants to invest, and then find out the CEO got a call from the wrong person or got on the wrong list and is all of a sudden out of business. So even in China, people, I think they learned their lesson a little bit with Didi, where they got angry at Didi and basically crushed Didi. They're now, you know, they have a lot of respect for essentially regulatory bodies, consistent application of rule of law, trying not to play favorites. So this was people, the immediate reaction will be, okay, they're wrong, this is illegal, fine. And also from a commercial standpoint, I've been saying for the last year that someone has an incredible commercial opportunity to say, enough, we're the good guys. We do not buy into this. If this costs us money in the short term, fine. But the very American values that gave us so much opportunity are under attack. And we're just not down with. And I don't know if you remember me saying this, I said six months ago, the biggest opportunity for Nike, which is trading at a 10 year low, was to run a bunch of ads saying we're about American values. And what's going on here is wrong. What's interesting is corporate America needed a hero and it looks like it's Dario.

40:05

I know, it's interesting.

43:01

What's really interesting here is, I think. And it's finally happening. They're shaping up to be Joe Frazier and Muhammad Ali here, here. And I think that Dario is being very smart and I think it's up to us. And the media are progressives. And I'm obviously stitching this into the risk. This is an unsubscribe thinking. I think it's time to start figuring out if there's a way to be more commercially supportive of Anthropic and less supportive of OpenAI. Basically, OpenAI has decided to enable and be complicit in the Trump administration's efforts. And Dario and Anthropic have said, no, we're not going along here. We're not going to be intimidated. This is. Quite frankly, Kara, I have been waiting for this matchup for a year.

43:02

I know. Yeah, I know you have. Let me say, I don't know, Dara. Emodi. I don't actually. And he might be arrogant, which is in line with most people in tech. That may be true. But I do know Emile Michael, who has been. Who did negotiate this, and I do know David Sachs. And both of them are Aryan operators, ceaseless bullies and unctuous toadies to the powerful. In my experience of covering them. Sam Altman is much a little more complex. But he's a gifted opportunist, which doesn't make him that different from anybody in Silicon Valley and has made his choice here. Right. He wants the business. And so it's a really knowing the characters involved here. And then on the top of it, you have an idiot like a moron like Pete Hegseth, who doesn't know what's happening, communicating to someone who's even more moronic on these issues, which is Donald Trump, who I think just, I suspect Sachs is whispering in his ear. Emile Michaels whispering in Hegseth's ear. And this is all a Silicon Valley beef, right between and among these people. Emil had to leave Uber under very not great circumstances. Was pushed out. I think all these people is payback for other people. It's just there's a lot of Silicon Valley drama happening here. And I don't know Dara Emodi. I don't. I don't. I really don't. It's unusual that I don't. And I've asked for interviews with him. He has not agreed to do an interview with me. Thanks, Chris Nolte. But I. I do. And he did a very good interview with CBS News, actually, which I thought was interesting.

43:41

He handled himself really well.

45:22

Handled himself really well.

45:23

He starched his hat white in that interview.

45:24

Yeah, it was a good interview. But one of the things that I know is the people on the other side of him are very people I covered for years who are just not good. How can I say this nicely? They're the worst of the people I had to cover over the many years. I have to say. They're literally the worst. And to see them in these positions of power is making these decisions and hurting a company that just doesn't want to do business with them. And actually Michael tweeted out against Emoti weeks ago. You know, it's so unprofessional as a government. Like, it's so. It's such based in beefs that were happening elsewhere. And Emil, I'm really. I had ended up having drinks with him after he was sort of drummed out of Uber and he said something to me, it was so strange. He goes, well, I'm so glad we can be friends. And I remember saying to him, we're not friends. I think what you did there is terrible. I don't know where you operate, but let him just do what he wants and don't, don't bring your stupid, stupid insecure beefs out on the thing. And it will benefit anthropic. It will. I think he's handling himself and he may be arrogant, he may have a God comes. I don't know. I don't know. But he's certainly not like these people. And in that case, the bar is low. I've had my say.

45:26

I think it's a big opportunity. I think Americans and consumers are so ready to vote with their pocketbooks. And Sam, I don't think Sam has acquitted himself well. I'm not going to have advertising. We would never do porn. Well, I need to raise money. Nevermind. And the largest customer in the world, which is the US Government, needs to have a series of systemic laws that don't that these are the rules you get to play by in full stop. Everyone is entitled to and obligated to the same set of rules, not who, who you like or who you don't like. And which kind of leads into our next story, which is Netflix and Paramount, right?

46:44

Netflix. Speaking of that, Scott, let's take a quick break. When we come back, Netflix emerges as a winner after losing the Warner Brothers battle.

47:22

What are the main takeaways of the foreign policy section from Donald Trump's State of the Union address? I do think they've made a decision to elevate domestic issues as we head towards the midterms. We'll see if that sticks because he keeps getting drawn back to the foreign policy issues. I'm John Finer. And I'm Jake Sullivan and we're the hosts of the Long Game, a weekly national security podcast podcast. This week we'll react to President Trump's State of the Union address, the situation with Iran and the eruption of violence involving cartels in Mexico. The episode's out now. Search for and follow the Long Game wherever you get your podcasts. This week on Net Worth and Chill, I'm joined by her first 100K, aka

47:32

Tori Dunlop, a fellow personal finance creator

48:13

who's changing how an entire generation thinks about money.

48:15

Tori's journey is a masterclass in turning

48:18

personal finance wins into a platform that empowers no millions. She opens up about the real strategy

48:21

behind hitting that six figure milestone without the typical privileged blind advice and how she's redefining what it means to be

48:26

a wealthy woman in 2026. We're diving deep into investment strategies for real people with real budgets and why financial feminism isn't just a buzzword, it's a movement. Get ready for an unfiltered conversation about

48:32

money, entrepreneurship, and what it really takes

48:43

to build both personal wealth and a business empire.

48:45

Listen wherever you get your podcasts or watch on YouTube.com YourRich BS EFF. Scott, we're back. Netflix may have lost the battle for Warner Brothers, but it's looking like a winner. Boy, this is incredible. The company stock surged. 14% of it formally exited the bidding war. It also now has $2.8 billion in the bank after Paramount paid the Warner Brothers breakup fee. Went after. The plan all along was to saddle Paramount with debt, drive up the price and walk away with more money. Ted Sarando said there are easier ways to make $2.8 billion. Very funny. He's also trashing it so beautifully. I have to say, what a. Like, it's ridiculously expensive. He's dropping all sorts of bone mouths. In that Bloomberg interview he did, I'm hoping to do an interview with him relatively soon. He noted that Paramount deals dependent on cost cutting leading to less production, less people working. He's 100% right. On the paramount front, CEO David Ellison, who got strafed by Barry Diller as a stunt pilot in speech, another thing just announced that Paramount and HBO Max will be combined into one streaming service. He also said there would be a lot less, I think a lot of cuts. $6 billion in cuts that he can quickly deleverage it. Nobody believes him or thinks he's capable of doing it. Sarandos had Talked more about 16 billion. Let me just tell you, Hollywood look out below. This is. Look, I don't think Ellison means to be incorrect, but he is incorrect about what's about to happen here. Because the pressures on this much debt. I talked to, as you know, Bill Cohen because you weren't around last weekend. But this much debt is enormous amounts of debt. It's like crazy. They don't have enough income. They have barely enough income. So they can't grow. They have to cut. There's going to be, there's obvious duplication that they will cut. But even more than that, anything they say at this point is just absolutely untrue. It's just, and I again, I don't think they mean it that way. I think they believe it that they can, you know, turn, turn shit into a, into chicken shit. Into chicken salad. But most smart math people don't think they can do it. Especially with competitors like Netflix breathing down and YouTube breathing down their neck. Your thoughts?

48:48

Well, I think I've been consistent on this. The biggest losers are the creative community. They don't realize it. I don't know, half a million of them just got lined up and shot. I mean, they're the amount of AI slop we're going to see come out of Paramount and Warner trying to pass for, you know, great breakthrough content. It's just going to be like I said, you know, in space, no one can hear you scream. Oh, trust me, you're going to hear a lot of people scream. And the biggest winner, hands down, and I told Ted this, I said, if you walk from this, you realize your stock's gonna go up 10%. I was wrong. In the last five days, the stock's up 30%.

51:03

Yeah. Back to other levels. Yeah.

51:46

Okay, so let's look at it this way. They, quote, unquote, technically save $120 billion by not acquiring it, and their stock's up 100 billion. Kara, they could go buy Disney right now for walking from Warner Brothers. So. And if I were them, and I was Ted, and I'd be pissed off. I'd be firing up my lobbyists and my lawyers and be like, delay an obvious. Make it create so much havoc for this deal to close. And by the way, every studio, every creative, they're all going to want to go to work for one place. Okay, do I want. If I'm pitching, I just had my latest book option for a series and for a documentary, which means absolutely nothing. I've figured out in Holland.

51:48

Your man, your notes on being a man.

52:33

Yeah, for an original scripted series and a documentary. Anyways, think of it as an R rated Wonder Years is how I've been pitching it.

52:35

Who's playing me?

52:42

Herve Vilace.

52:43

Very funny.

52:45

Herve Vilache is in a little tiny souvenir Chalamet.

52:48

I see. Chalamet plays a.

52:51

With a puppy. German shepherd.

52:52

No, Chalamet can work. He looks like a teenage boy too.

52:54

Anyways, so these guys, the amount of money, let me put this way, say, say you're in the creative community and you have the hottest script or you're the hottest actor and you have offers from, from the Paramount studio, from Warner or for Netflix. Who you absolutely going to pick?

52:56

Netflix.

53:18

Oh my God, they're gonna.

53:19

Every day of the week and twice hbo. They look like heroes. You all hated Netflix, now you're gonna love them. It's really. And by the way, when the Democrats come into power, that's gonna be good for them too.

53:21

HBO just lost 30% of its value. Cause HBO's asset was it always was able to punch above its weight class. It did 2 billion in content relative to Netflix's 18 billion. But if there was a show people were talking about around the water cooler, whether it was Girls or Euphoria or Game of Thrones or Succession, it usually was HBO because HBO's culture and ability was, when I'm talking a lot about me, my favorite subject. But when we pitched my big tech series, everybody, all the creatives and all the stars, they all wanted to go with hbo. They love Netflix. But if we had our choice, we would have gone with hbo. Guess what? That just changed overnight completely.

53:32

I wouldn't do a thing with them. I have to say. I've got some shows I don't have no interest in what.

54:12

So they can figure out how to produce it for a third of the budget using AI.

54:17

Yeah, fuck you. And also one of the things that's interesting is that there was an interesting movement also. I mean, I think the CNN part of it is a smaller part of it. It still is going to be a lot of news, right? It's still because it's cnn, the merger, and they've already made a mess of cbs, but they're going to make a bigger mess of cnn. I, I have heard from so many HBO people that are like, fuck, like fuck was everything. In every like a dozen HBO people, CNN is losing its ever loving mind. Right? As they should. And they're like, they're like, what do we do, Kara? And I'm like, I don't know. I'm not going to be here. So it's not like substack podcast. I was like, I don't know what to tell you, but I wouldn't work for those hacks. But one of the things that's interesting is the idea that Netflix takes a little bit of this money and hires like Anderson Cooper and the best of them and creates a little news service. They should, a really good one.

54:20

I talked to the woman who runs content at Netflix and I said, I have an idea.

55:19

Bella, Bella, Bella. Yeah.

55:22

Start something called the Hour and hire the two thirds of the people from 60 Minutes that would like to leave right now and have a show, weekly show called the hour or 59 minutes.

55:24

I offer, I'm like, I'll tell you who's good and who's not. I like, I.

55:35

You don't Think all of those people are looking for a way to get off the.

55:38

Yeah.

55:40

Get on the last helicopter out of Saigon right now. Yeah.

55:41

And a lot of them want to be entrepreneurial. It's really interesting. They, they do see the need to change out. I mean, obviously the economics of a lot of broadcast and cable television is out of whack with the revenues clearly all through the industry.

55:43

By the way, Netflix is up 30%. Netflix.

55:57

Netflix should be up.

56:00

The market has decided that Netflix is worth $100 billion more by Netflix. Without Warner Brothers, they could spend a

56:00

very little amount of money putting together a really interesting news offering. At the same time, you know, as obviously CBS is gonna go, it's going right. In a really weak sauce way. It's really kind of wimpy. Right. And stupid. Right. But I mean if you're gonna be right, go all the way to Fox. That's my feeling like. And, and it's, it's an ever dying audience by the way. And I mean my mom's is an average listener. Essentially she's 92. But one of the things that I

56:09

think will help Fox has done really well actually.

56:35

Yeah, it has. That's right. You're not gonna get. You're not catching Fox.

56:37

Here's a crazy stat. Supposedly more moderate swat Fox and CNN right now.

56:39

Well, I'm not surprised. It's anyway one of the. Because the news part is, I mean like Jennifer and there's several people who are quite good over there, but there's a lot of great people at cnn. Let me be clear. There's a lot of great reporters throughout that organization and they do a great job. People tend to focus on Scott Jennings at night when there's lots of people.

56:43

But you mean. I feel stupider with Abby Phillips.

57:02

Okay, stop, stop. Scott Jennings is the problem over there.

57:06

So no, CNN is the problem for

57:09

putting him on and having Crossfire, that show is. But I'm saying there's a lot more to CNN than that show. So it gets a lot of attention. But one of the things that I think is interesting is it really opens up an opportunity for Ms. Now because they're by themselves over there on the left. Like it's a great business. Right. Like it's just. It's sort of like the Fox of the left. And so they have a huge opportunity. It seems to me you are in

57:11

love with traditional this. I'm not in traditional media. This is who it's an opportunity for. It's an opportunity, a small opportunity for Bill Cohen and Ben Thompson and Kara Swisher, I know that you are about to see a massive diffusion of power from these industrial brands.

57:35

It's already happening.

57:51

The means of production is way too expensive to all these little media company startups and stub stacks and podcasts.

57:52

I agree.

57:58

And newsletters and this, all this hand wringing that. Oh no, the Washington Post can't go away. Doesn't fucking matter folks. Those people are gonna find their own little niche media companies and they're gonna punch above their weight class. And I can be saddled by the blood sugar level of a guy on human growth hormone in St. Bart's I get it.

57:58

I just think Ms. Now by itself being. I think CNN should have been independent. Would have given an opportunity to be innovative. They have an opportunity to be innovative. They do. They absolutely do. And so that's a good thing for them because they're all by themselves over there on them.

58:16

This is the best use of CNS cnn. We have an iconic popular Gavin Newsom and he stacks his cabinet with CNN anchors. Dana Bash is make a great vice president.

58:30

Yeah.

58:40

Yes.

58:41

Dana does a great job. There's a lot of really great. There's amazing people.

58:41

Michael Smarkanish, I think he could be secretary of Defense.

58:44

There's a lot. Anderson I think does a good job. Every single. Caitlin Collins. I have so much admiration for her.

58:47

She can be ambassador to the eu.

58:53

Okay.

58:55

Literally I can play. I could pull together a cabinet that looks like the fucking Kennedy administration from CNN angles.

58:56

Well and it would be so much higher than Pdagsev on anything.

59:03

Just think about it. Jeanine Pirro. That's. I mean look who we're competing. I am down for networks as cabinets at this point. I think the CNN people are so impressive. But they're all about to. And they've been doing this last two years. I'm thinking about starting a podcast because they're having the uncomfortable conversation where I used to make 7 million a year and they've offered me 2.

59:06

Have you had every conversation with all of. Not just cnn. It's throughout the.

59:25

It's everywhere. It's everywhere.

59:29

All the media people, they. I could have a business people anchor

59:30

off the most money they've ever made and think that's what I'm worth. No one ever thinks to themselves, wow, I'm overpaid right now. I can prove to you statistically at any moment in time there's a 50% chance you are overpaid right now relative to the market.

59:34

I'm not favoring media. I just think it's I always see it as an opportunity. I always see as an, like, you can still do well. It's a good business. It makes a lot of profits. You could do well here and it could give you an. It gives an opportunity for Ms. Now to have a lane all to itself. And I think that's always a good thing. Always a good thing.

59:46

Who's Ms. Now star? Is it Rachel? She's only one day a week Rachel.

1:00:04

There's a whole bunch of there. But let me say Rebecca Cutler is Stephanie. There's a whole bunch of people over there that are great, very talented and they're hiring a lot of great reporters. And Rebecca Cutler, who you don't know about, is amazing.

1:00:07

Like, she's, she's, she's, she hired me at cnn.

1:00:18

She did at the plew. And you know, I think there's lots of opportunity and I think the Ellisons will bollocks it. And coming to you soon to Kara Swisher's docuseries. Kara Swisher wants to live forever on cnn. No, I'm kidding.

1:00:21

I just hope it closes before then so I can see a photo with you and Larry Ellison.

1:00:36

No, it's not, Listen, it's going to be soon. I will be out. I'll be, I'll have removed my things from the closet long before.

1:00:40

I'm so curious who they're going to ask, who they're going to ask to run.

1:00:47

You know, let me just tell you everybody, Scott Galloway is in the second episode and he's looking fine. And, and it's, he looks, it's, it's an adorable Kara and Scott moment.

1:00:50

That'll save them. That's their answer.

1:01:01

It's actually a really good show, I have to say. I'm very.

1:01:04

You have to say your show's really good. You're going to love this.

1:01:07

What?

1:01:09

I did a podcast today and they asked me what was my favorite moment with Kara Swisher. And I said when you and your wife came down for the weekend and I let you pick the streaming media thing we were gonna watch, big fucking mistake. You picked some like art heist from PBS or like the history of great museum thefts or something. I went, oh, fuck.

1:01:10

Oh, that was a good show.

1:01:30

And we're sitting there and we're all eating and over comes white LeBron, your 14 year old monster. And he sits down and I'm not exaggerating, we all pop eight inches into the air.

1:01:31

Yeah, it's true. He's bigger than ever.

1:01:43

And also the next day you were, you Were scolding him like a mother does. And you were literally. Your neck was craning so hard up at him. It was like watching.

1:01:46

They listen to Mama.

1:01:54

It was like watching Billy Barter. Barty lecture Shaquille o'. Neal. I said to my sons, I'm like, look at this. Look at this. Look what's going on over there.

1:01:55

Yeah.

1:02:03

Anyways, that's my favorite moment. That's right.

1:02:04

I should. I should parent everybody.

1:02:06

I think you kind of do.

1:02:08

Anyway, let's go on a quick break. When we come back. Back wins and fails. Okay, Scott, let's hear some wins and fails. I can go first if you want.

1:02:09

Go first.

1:02:24

I have to say, I talk too much about. He don't. Robbie. But I thought Connor's story did a great job on SNL this week.

1:02:25

I usually talk about, oh, my God, that's my win.

1:02:33

What? What?

1:02:35

Okay, you take my win.

1:02:36

You take it. You take it. Let's discuss it. Go. Go ahead. Go ahead. Take it.

1:02:37

I feel that SNL thread. My win was snl. I thought they thread the needle perfectly this week.

1:02:41

Yeah. Not every week.

1:02:49

Yeah. They honored the women's team. But at the same time, I think it's bullshit. All the shit the men have taken.

1:02:50

Yep.

1:02:57

I think for them to. Wouldn't have been great. If you listen to the video, this was President Trump taking everyone back to the 50s and mocking women. That is not what we need. We need a more evolved sense of masculinity that celebrates great athletic performance. By the way, 8:12 medals from the women. The goal, the overtime goal, in my opinion, one of the great moments in sports history of the women's hockey team. They threaded the needle perfectly. Because I do think the men got more shit than they deserved.

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They got invaded by Kash Patel. Let's blame Cash Patel.

1:03:25

That's exactly right. But what are they gonna do? What are they gonna do?

1:03:28

I agree.

1:03:31

Anyways. And if you listen to the tape, when Trump made those wildly sexist remarks, there were one or two men's hockey players saying 2 for 2. They were trying to acknowledge that both the men's and the women's team and SNL did it perfectly.

1:03:32

They did.

1:03:47

They didn't Virtue signal and say, yeah, women and, oh, that book sucks. They made some jokes.

1:03:48

They had the women make the jokes, and the men were.

1:03:53

And the men were there to take it.

1:03:55

Take it.

1:03:56

And they were fine with it. They thread the needle perfectly.

1:03:57

And it was critical that Connor's story was standing in between them. I have to say, he's Such a likable person and such a talented physical comedian. Like, his stripper who got in a car accident was so fucking funny. Like, I don't believe they pulled that one off. I have to say, he is such a delightful.

1:04:00

He's very talented.

1:04:18

He's a delightful figure. Both of them are.

1:04:19

And I'm telling you, season two, like, scorching hot rivalry with the women's hockey team. Daddy's here for it.

1:04:21

Yes. Yes. And I thought the women handled it well.

1:04:28

So well done. The writers at SNL are geniuses.

1:04:31

And you know who sucks? Cash fucking Patel. Why are you invading these guys Win. Like, as if in reflected fucking glory, you tubby loser. Like, forget it. Like, how dare you? Now, I've focused only on Keshe Patel. I really am. I think he's just the worst. So my fail is, I think this situation with Anthropic, I think it has to be. We are not.

1:04:34

We're the same person today. We're literally the same person.

1:04:58

Okay. All right. I think they are bullies. I think they use Twitter as a way to attack in a way that's really unprofessional. You can have differences, and everyone's already always grabbing for power and grabbing for money. I get it. It's gone on since the beginning of time. But the way you're doing this is all about your insecure childhood traumas that are being writ large on the rest of us. This is not professional. You do not have to do this. And they do it as keyboard warriors on Twitter. I got a text from someone. I'm not gonna say who it was who said, the world is happening on Twitter. You gotta be back here. And I was like, I'm not back to that Nazi porn bar that enjoys making children sexual. I was like, the world is not happening on Twitter. The world is happening in the world. You guys, like, you need to fucking get out of your own fucking way. You have to understand that what you're doing is damaging to most people and that we don't want to hear about all your beefs and all your traumas and everything else else. If Anthropic doesn't want to do business with you, just let's move along. Let's just move along. And I'm sorry you're not as successful as Dario Amodi or Smart Emile Michael, but you're going to have to live with it as being an unctuous toady to the powerful. Stop it. That, to me, is the loss. You go ahead.

1:05:00

Mine's exactly the same, but I'll look at it through a shareholder lens. I'm looking at a company called Mercado Libre, which is the Amazon of Argentina. And one of the reasons I'm looking at it is that effectively when the BRICs were in vogue, the price earnings multiple of certain Latin American markets was about 20 and it went down to 8 because all the flows went into US tech stocks, which meant you could increase your earnings two and a half fold over 10 years and your stock was flat. You can't outrun multiple contraction in a market as a stock. And it's all under the same auspices of market dynamics trump individual performance at the same time. It's almost impossible to be wrong when you have multiple expansion. American investors, we all think we're geniuses right now in our 401s, we have had multiple expansions since 2008. And we're about to experience multiple contraction. And we're already experiencing it. We were 21 out of 23 markets last year on a dollar adjusted basis. Everyone else outperformed us. And one of the reasons, reasons people don't realize we have just lost trillions of dollars. When the Pentagon starts picking winners and losers, if Anduro, which makes weapons, decides that, yeah, we are going to figure out we're going to use Silicon Valley ethos to help the Defense Department kill people. And people freak out, well, guess what? They're allowed to do that. It's not illegal. They're allowed to do that. When Palantir says we're going to work with the government of Israel to track down terrorists and kill them in their homes, that you may find that distasteful. It's legal. They're allowed to do it. And anthropic, when they decide we don't want to provide our services or data for what we feel is the surveilling, the illegal surveillance of US Citizens, they too are allowed to do that. And when governments start playing political favorites in markets, the rule of law is no longer applied. And your multiple on companies, your price earnings multiple begins to contract. Freedoms and systemic laws and a separation between government and business results in higher price earnings multiples and Greater increases in 401s and your ability to retire earlier. And this bullshit Pentagon stationary war on anthropic is going to cost US investors trillions of dollars as people decide to go where they know who they're waking up next to that they can invest in a company and they do the assessment based on, based on the laws at hand, is this company succeeding or failing based on the current laws and they don't have to try and guess what the one off individual laws will be in a few months. So I have the same win and same fail. But I look at it as an investor. I'm now looking at markets. People get angry atocracies in China or in the Gulf. They have a huge respect for the domain or the sovereignty of investors and having uniform laws that apply to everyone equally. And we are now becoming that nation where we decide which companies win and lose. And all that means is rpe. We're about to experience multiple contraction which you cannot outrun.

1:06:23

Not for long. Let me just say. You feel it. Can't you feel it? And speaking of feeling it, Scott, this has been a great discussion. I have to say I was a little worried this morning. I was also tired. But this has been a really great discussion about these things and disagreeing in a really civil way. But let me say it's going to continue because we're going. Where are we going? Scott Galloway on Sunday exists and unsubscribe.

1:09:29

Big announcement, full time resources. And by the way, Sam, it's not going to be a good night for you.

1:09:49

No, it's not going to be a good night.

1:09:55

And guess what, Sam, we're talking about 48 hours. You put Kara Swisher on an invite in 48 hours. We sold out the Pantages at thousand seats.

1:09:57

Both of us. We sold it out. And we want to thank Tein Danger for doing an amazing job for us in Minneapolis.

1:10:06

My favorite point, he's your favorite porn

1:10:10

star and he's an amazing Danger and our staff who's working really hard, we sold out right away. We are coming to Minneapolis. We have special guests. We are very excited and we will talk about the next move. Scott. Will Scott, who's the president of Resistant Unsubscribe. I'm just a helper. We want to hear from you. Send us your questions about business, tech or whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com pivot to submit a question for the show or call 85551 pivot. Okay, that's the show. Thanks for listening to Pivot. Be sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'll be back on Friday.

1:10:12

Today's show was produced by Lara Naiman, Zoe Marcus, Taylor Griffin and Kate Gallagher. Ernie Intertodd engineered this episode. Jim Mackle edited the video. Thanks also to Dubros Mesaverio and Dan Shalon. Nishat Korez, Vox Media's executive producer podcast. Make sure to follow Pivot on your favorite podcast platform. Thank you for listening to Pivot from New York magazine Vox Media. You can subscribe to the magazine@nymag.com pod we'll be back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Cara, have a great rest of the week.

1:10:44