Raging Moderates with Scott Galloway and Jessica Tarlov

Trump Has “No Cards” in Iran as Deal Collapses and U.S. Continues Strikes

50 min
May 27, 2026about 2 months ago
Listen to Episode
Summary

Scott Galloway and Jessica Tarlov discuss Trump's weakened negotiating position with Iran as military strikes continue and a potential nuclear deal framework emerges. The episode also covers ICE detention facility conditions, AI regulation concerns following Pope Francis's encyclical, and broader critiques of privatized government services and military spending strategy.

Insights
  • Trump lacks negotiating leverage in Iran talks because he hasn't built domestic political support, hasn't coordinated with allies, and has signaled willingness to withdraw—giving Iran no incentive to compromise
  • Private prison profiteering creates perverse incentives that prioritize shareholder returns over humane conditions, contributing to the U.S. being the world's most incarcerated nation
  • AI companies use regulatory capture tactics similar to Big Tech and social media—publicly supporting oversight while deploying legal resources to block meaningful regulation
  • The U.S. military spending of $1.4 trillion lacks credibility when deployed without sustained commitment; asymmetric warfare lessons from Ukraine suggest smaller, cheaper, distributed systems are more effective
  • Democratic messaging on immigration and ICE has become politically toxic, allowing Republicans to own the issue despite legitimate humanitarian concerns about detention conditions
Trends
Erosion of U.S. military credibility through hollow threats and policy reversals weakens deterrence globallyPrivate sector capture of government functions (prisons, healthcare, defense) creates misaligned incentives prioritizing profit over public welfareAI regulation discourse mirrors social media regulation playbook: companies pledge cooperation while blocking legislative actionAsymmetric/distributed military technology (drones, distributed systems) outperforming expensive centralized platformsDemocratic political vulnerability on immigration allowing Republicans to frame humanitarian concerns as weaknessTourism decline to U.S. due to anti-immigrant rhetoric and border enforcement messaging damaging soft powerTech CEO public relations strategy of appearing thoughtful/progressive while enabling authoritarian policiesGlobal leadership vacuum being filled by non-state actors (Pope Francis) on AI ethics and human rightsPrivatization of essential services (healthcare, prisons, defense) creating systemic inefficiency and inhumanityMultilateral cooperation framework needed for AI governance similar to nuclear weapons treaties
Topics
Iran Nuclear Deal Negotiations and Trump Administration StrategyU.S. Military Leverage and Credibility in Middle EastPrivate Prison System and ICE Detention ConditionsImmigration Enforcement Policy and Democratic MessagingAI Regulation and Government Oversight FrameworkPrivatization vs. Nationalization of Government ServicesHealthcare System Inefficiency and ProfiteeringMilitary Spending Efficiency and Asymmetric WarfareTech CEO Hypocrisy and Political AlignmentPope Francis Leadership on Technology EthicsU.S. Brand Damage and Soft Power ErosionBioweapons and Nuclear Weapons Cooperation ModelsDemocratic Political Strategy on ImmigrationUkraine Military Success and Distributed Defense SystemsMultilateral AI Governance and International Cooperation
Companies
OpenAI
Sam Altman criticized for tone-deaf public statements about using ChatGPT for parenting while supporting Trump
Anthropic
Dario Amodei positioned as more credible AI leader than Sam Altman; company discussed in context of AI regulation
Nvidia
Jensen Huang criticized for donating to Trump administration while company sells advanced chips to China
Meta
Sheryl Sandberg's 'Lean In' feminism criticized as hypocritical given Facebook's documented harms to teen girls
Amazon
Jeff Bezos criticized for appearing mature/disciplined while supporting Trump's anti-progressive agenda
Corsivic
Private prison operator running Dilley family detention facility in Texas with documented inhumane conditions
Morgan Stanley
Galloway's former employer; mentioned in personal anecdote about leaving to travel Europe
People
Scott Galloway
Co-host discussing Iran negotiations, military strategy, AI regulation, and privatization issues
Jessica Tarlov
Co-host discussing immigration policy, ICE detention, and Democratic messaging strategy
Marco Rubio
Audio clip discussing Iran nuclear deal framework and diplomatic negotiations
Pope Francis
Released encyclical 'Magnifica Humanitas' warning of AI as new form of slavery and calling for disarmament
Sam Altman
Criticized for tone-deaf statements about using ChatGPT for parenting and political alignment with Trump
Dario Amodei
Positioned as more credible AI leader focused on safety compared to Sam Altman
Andy Kim
Pepper sprayed by federal agents during ICE detention facility protest in New Jersey
Tom Homan
Mentioned as having received $50,000 in undisclosed payments; sidelined from immigration policy
Stephen Miller
Described as sidelined from immigration policy due to being a political lightning rod
Benjamin Netanyahu
Discussed as pursuing permanent war footing; Trump attempting to control Israeli military actions
Jared Kushner
Mentioned as go-between with Netanyahu on Israel-Iran military operations
Sheryl Sandberg
Criticized for 'Lean In' feminism while Facebook documented harms to teenage girls
Jessica Gorman
Mother of Sherry Gorman, 18, murdered by undocumented immigrant; spoke at Trump rally
Vladimir Putin
Described as in hiding due to Ukrainian military success and deep penetration into Russian territory
Quotes
"He has no fucking cards. America wants him out. Iran knows America wants him out."
Scott Galloway~25:00
"Artificial intelligence needs to be disarmed...freed from logics that turn it into an instrument of domination exclusion and death"
Pope Francis~60:00
"If you're not willing to go the distance, if you're not willing to continue military action, what leverage do you have?"
Scott Galloway~28:00
"The reason you have a kid is thank god there were people much braver than you who used to run organizations in america"
Scott Galloway~85:00
"We need to figure out we're the most incarcerated nation in the world...because there's money in it"
Scott Galloway~50:00
Full Transcript
When it comes to home improvement, even the most experienced DIYer has a limit. I'm not going to come in here with the blow torch and get it hot and solder and put the copper pipes to come. I'm not doing it. I call it a very nice man to handle it. When to call the experts and when to do it yourself. That's This Week on Explain It to Me. My new episodes Sundays wherever you get your podcasts. Welcome to Raging Moderates. I'm Scott Galloway. And I'm Jessica Tarlove. Before we jump in, tomorrow we're launching a new weekly sub-stack live show Raging Perspective. Jesse and friend of the pod, Aaron Parnas, will break down the biggest political stories of the week and take your questions live. It all happens Wednesdays at noon Eastern. You can subscribe now at Raging Moderates.ProbgMedia.com. Again, that's Raging Moderates.ProbgMedia.com. And if you happen to be in Los Angeles on Thursday, we're doing our live Prop G Markets tour and we're sold out in San Francisco, New York, but we still have tickets in Los Angeles for Thursday and in Miami on Saturday and Chicago on Monday. Gosh, a lot there. Jess, how are you? Yeah. I'm great. And I'm excited to see the Prop G Markets live tour Tuesday. I'll be there in New York. You'll be here in New York? Oh, good. Or there in New York. I'm actually in Los Angeles right now. I know. A good early morning to you. Let's get into it. The US says it's carried out overnight self-defense strikes in southern Iran as Tehran warns American bases in the region are no longer safe and is threatening retaliation. At the same time, the Trump administration insists diplomacy is still moving forward. The reported framework includes a ceasefire extension reopening the Strait of Hormuz, Iran resuming oil sales and separate talks over Tehran's nuclear program, including what happens to its enriched uranium. Let's listen to Marco Rubio explaining the state of play this morning. Well, look, I think our position is well stated. The president had a very important, I think historic call just a couple of days ago with a number of leaders from the region. I think there's strong alignment and agreement on what a preliminary draft should look like. I think like anything with something like this, and it's going to take a couple of days to settle on even down to the disagreements over a word sentence. So we'll have to work through that. If there's going to be a deal, we're going to have to work through that. But this is, you know, it's either going to be a good deal or there isn't going to be one. Yes. Was this all just to avoid going to Don Jr.'s second wedding? Like Brian was saying to me, we all know about the destination second wedding where we're like, get over yourself. I'm not going to that. So Trump was like, I want to stay home and shitpost Ro Khanna and make a bunch of phone calls. Maybe we're going to get a second round of the Abraham Accords eventually. And we both agree that that was a huge achievement of the first term. But the idea that they're even pretending this is a nuclear deal, it's a midterms deal. He needs a midterm deal. At this point, he's minus 52 on inflation, minus 24 on foreign policy. And because the fertilizer isn't getting through the Strait of Hormuz, economies across the world are going to starve. I mean, our problems are the high end of what's going on. We're in a good situation compared to other countries that are more dependent on the Strait of Hormuz. So they're just repackaging this, you know, we're going to get the straight open. I love this, how they say there won't be a toll, but the Iranians are saying that they're going to charge for a quote unquote environmental protection measure, which has never existed before. So it's a toll by another name, I guess. And what do you make of this, that the Iranians are still laying mines? And then we're saying that we're firing back in self-defense. I thought they were completely obliterated and had no capabilities. So I don't know how they would be able to be doing any of this anyway. But like they're not behaving as if we're about to have some sort of deal, even if it looks like the JCPOA 2.0. The Tehran Times is still posting with the same goals as they've had for decades. And you know, death to America, death to Israel, it doesn't seem like the Supreme Leader is on board with this. There's talk of huge sums of money, way more than Obama deals with the Iranians the first time around, which was only $1.7 billion, even though you hear stuff about like $20 billion in pallets of cash. And Trump is posting through it that nuclear dust or bust, but that's not what Marco Rubio just said on the plane. There's going to be this high stakes meeting at Camp David tomorrow. All the cabinet officials are going to be there because he needs to get buy-in from everybody. But that doesn't sound at all like what we were promised. And I don't even say promised on day one, right, when it was regime change and getting rid of the nuclear program and the proxies and the ballistic missiles and all of that fantasy land. It doesn't even sound like a week ago what we were talking about. Right after, when I was at Morgan Stanley and I was going to do a third year, I called the MD at Morgan Stanley who ran the LA office and said, I'm quitting. And I got a backpack and I went to Europe. And I was traveling around Europe and I met up. I tracked down this woman who I was just enormously in love with. And we spent about three weeks traveling around Europe and we were in Vienna and we thought, let's go to Hungary. There is a point here and I'll get to it in about two hours. I got all the time in the world for a backpacking love story. This is so much better than nuclear dust. This will date me, but I went to the American Express office and cashed traveler's checks. I remember doing that with my parents. And I had one of those fanny belts because we were also worried about having money stolen from us for these evil Europeans. And I got literally a stack, a brick of Florence, of Hungarian Florence. And so we're head to Pesh, to Budapest. And I'd heard some sort of rumors or murmurs of needing a visa. But we got on the train anyways and they stop at the Hungarian border and they come and they say, visa? And I'm like, no. And she and I look at each other and I'm like, no. And they pull us off the train in the middle of the Hungarian forest and say, you're on your own. And there's one cab driver there driving a lotto, which is the Russian equivalent of a Ugo. And because clearly this happens, there's always a couple of dumb Americans who don't get the visa. We're in the middle of the forest and I'm thinking, okay, he's going to murder me and rape my girlfriend. One car. And the guy, and I say how much? And he says, I don't know, whatever it was, like a hundred bucks or something. And I'm like, 90. And he looks at me and just smiles because he recognized at that point in the middle of the Hungarian forest at 11 PM and there's one way out of the Hungarian forest. I have no leverage. Trump is me in the Hungarian forest right now. There we go. Close the loop. There we go. Close the loop. Because he never bothered to consult Congress and offended them. Because he never even signed up or even briefed European allies. Because he did not in any way coordinate anything around intelligence around the Straits of Hormuz, getting expats out of the Gulf, figuring out putting in place the right defense mechanisms. He has no fucking cards. America wants him out. Iran knows America wants him out. It's like someone who's running from a fight and says, give me your wallet. Like, if someone attacks you, you punch them in the fucking face. Your attacker is running and screaming behind themselves. Give me your watch. It's like, this guy, and I'm going to sound like a war hawk and we might get some pushback on this. If you're not willing to go the distance, if you're not willing to continue military action, what leverage do you have? He has no leverage right now. Americans know this is a very unpopular war, that he's leaving. He's basically already left and he's making demands. I don't know how the embargo is going against the Iranian ports, but this guy is such a terrible business person and has ignored his security apparatus and clearly has no one in the organization and the administration that understands actual game theory. The IRGC has no incentive other than just to grin fuck him and that is pretend to have meetings because every day this goes on, he loses more and more support. It would be as if he said, I know, let's go back and start fighting the Viet Cong again. There's about as much support right now for escalating the war in Iran because he has done such a terrible job building any semblance of support. He has no cards. So all that's going to happen now is he's going to pretend there was some sort of victory, change the objectives and get out of dodge and unfortunately it looks like Iran is going to come back probably even stronger. He is in a Hungarian forest with one Lada. But does he have a woman that he loves? There he goes. Because Melania doesn't seem like she's that into it. She wants nothing to do with him. I wanted to ask you about the Israel element. So apparently they were surprised that Trump had a very tough talk conversation with BB towards the end of last week and was basically like, I'm in charge now. Like this is in a joint plan. But I saw that Ben Gavir, the horror who's the National Security Minister is saying that Israel quote, not allow Trump to make a deal with Iran. Do you feel like if there is a chance even at this what we're calling a midterms deal, not a nuclear deal that Israel will continue its assault on Iran? I mean, what they're doing in Lebanon is separate from this because we're not involved in that. But do you think there is a chance that they will essentially go behind our backs and continue this? Or you feel like Netanyahu knows that they have to fall in line with what we wanted if Trump wants out and has gotten Gulf partners to sign on to that, that that is the direction that we're going even if the job isn't completed and it's original casting. In the first administration or the first tenure, President Trump, he used to have someone else fire them. Do you remember when he fired Omarosa and he pretended it wasn't him and he's like, he called Omarosa and said, oh, I can't believe they fired you. I don't believe the Israelis. I think he's using Israel as now granted, they're going to have different objectives. Netanyahu is on a permanent war footing. Some people would argue that it's strategic, taking out an enemy sworn to the death and eradication of Israel and trying to push them or mow the lawn or trim the daisies, whatever metaphor you want to use while they're weak and don't have their air defenses. A lot of people, I think, have real valid concerns that Netanyahu is fighting for his political life and the way to get any sort of support is to be on a constant war footing. It all comes down to a very basic thing. The world is going to be a much better, safer place when both Trump and Netanyahu leave the global stage. I don't buy. I think that essentially Trump is using Netanyahu as his bad guy to do things that I think America is totally not America. Trump is on board with everything Israel is doing and can point to them and say, yeah, they're out of control, but wink, wink, have at it. But the honest answer is I don't have a sense for whether or not Israel and Iran will be able to or how far Israel will go here. Antisemitism is obviously increasing and it feels like the diaspora is really paying a price for what is legitimate concern about an overreaction, a propensity towards extreme warfare of violence on the part of Israel. But back to your original question and I'll turn it back to you. I don't buy that Trump hasn't signed off or agreed with everything that Israel is doing. I mean, considering the Kushner-Wickhoff connection and the go-between there, I think that you're probably right. I do think that there is some validity to the argument that Trump has gotten more frustrated even just based upon the press that he's getting and his approval ratings because BB is a bit impervious to what's going on essentially internally as long as he stays out of a courtroom, which to your point about the permanent war footing is how he's able to do that. But I think that Trump can see that there's a pretty direct line between going along with what Israel wants to do, which he agrees with and wants to be the greatest quote unquote friend to Israel that we've ever had, which is what BB calls him and has the pressures coming from Kushner and Wickhoff and understanding then that the American people are just not here for it, that there was no case made to them, that they don't feel safer because of what's going on right now in Iran. I mean, we're on day 88 of this war and all of the wins that they were touting from the first. I mean, it's kind of incredible actually that like after the first four weeks or something like that, we haven't had another big win. We've been doing this ridiculous game of, you know, it's a bridge and tunnel day and we're going to blow them all up. We're going to go after desalination plants and it's just been a series of online threats essentially. Right? Like it's been a long time since we took out their Navy and it was at the bottom of the sea or that we were destroying their missiles and then as that's going on, Iran is rebuilding and we're frozen stuck in the same cycle essentially. And I think Trump just woke up and was like, I got to break it. Like enough Republicans have called him and said, we're going to lose our seats if something doesn't change and we can't go into an election with $4.50 gas. Which is, we can't do it. So the general approach in corporate America was as a CEO to underpromise and over deliver, to be measured and beat your earnings and not boast, not promise things you couldn't deliver against. That changed with tech where it was, we're going to be the biggest, best company in the world. We're going to have data centers in space, over promise, get cheap capital and then pull the future forward with that cheap capital. That strategy actually has worked well for a number of people. The line between that and claiming that you're elevating the world's consciousness when you're just renting desks and fraud has gotten increasingly blurred, but it's been the right strategy for big tech. It doesn't work in politics and that is at some point he keeps threatening and never, I mean, you know, taco, what's the new one? Nacho. Nacho. At this point, and also in again, call me a warhawk, you don't go in unless you're willing, quite frankly, to stay and really punish. Otherwise, I mean, my attitude is there's a lot of people who I think are understand about our foreign adventures or what they would call misadventures overseas. I think it's a really valid argument that the punishment that Iran has levied on its own people, safety and security in the Middle East that a lot of people in America are like, look, it's just not our problem. We have, maybe it's a problem, but we have bigger problems here that require resources and attention. Fine. If that's the case, then let's cut our military budget down to the size of China's at $400 billion and take the additional trillion dollars and pay down the deficit. But if you're going to go in, you don't quite frankly, you don't continue these hollow threats as the IRGC realized this guy came in with no basis support and is already, I mean, they're essentially already leaving. And so all of these threats are just so ridiculous. They weaken the credibility of the United States. They weaken the credibility of our military. What's the point of spending $1.4 trillion if you're seen as you have a glass jaw? This is the problem at some point. At some point, intelligence needs to become in vogue again amongst our political leaders, not just charisma over competence, not just bluster over strategy because the IRGC has this guy's card. And it's like, look, our populace is willing or we're willing to subject our populace to a lot more pain than your populace is willing to have pain subject on it. No one's talking. They're not releasing polls in Iran about inflation and the IRGC and the Mullahs and the Ayatollah being losing seats at this upcoming election. We are a much more, our tolerance for pain, it's like, I love that joke where men say, now I know what it's like to give birth. I had a cold. Yeah. The Americans tolerance, I mean, this all comes back to weak sauce, terrible strategy, terrible negotiation, terrible incompetence across our security forces and our defense secretary and cabinet members and decision making, sclerotic decision making, objectives that change overnight, such that we can't even present a unified force. But some of it does come down to the fact that don't spend $1.4 trillion on the military and don't go in anywhere unless you're willing to stay until you have some bargaining power to get some sort of reasonable deal such that this thing doesn't diminish the full faith and credit. How seriously is anyone going to take military threats in the U.S. for the next 10 or 20 years when it's like, well, they'll come in, we free just kill 14 of their people, maybe take oil up, then they're going to back out and leave and make threats. It just, the whole thing has been a tremendous erosion in our negotiation power. And to the far left's credit, I would argue that moving forward, we should seriously consider a dramatic, dramatic decrease in military spending to move towards asymmetric warfare. That's the big learning from Ukraine and Iran is that $20,000 Shahid drones or $2,000 Ukrainian drones are quite frankly, 80% as good as a $4 million Tomahawk and you can build a lot of them. So this is, this again is a total display of incompetence and basic game theory on the part of the Trump administration. I'm all for a Ukrainian approach to how we do warfare and they just incredible that they are now, everybody admits that they're winning that war now. Isn't that amazing? I'm glad you brought that up. I think that is, if we're looking for a silver lining or good news here and it hasn't got enough reporting, Putin is basically in hiding right now. He's basically in hiding. He's worried. He's got body doubles. He's sending all kinds of fake signals around where he's, he's actually worried that Ukrainians have now penetrated so deeply into Russia in terms of counterattacks. It's just, it is arguably the greatest government organizational feat of this millennia so far is the Ukrainian army's ability to repel Russia. And it's also a victory for the West and Europeans who've stepped up here and to a lesser extent the US and the brave men and women of the Ukrainian army, but a small motivated fighting force with great technology. And quite frankly, that again lends itself to, I think we should seriously think about taking our military budget down from $1.4 trillion to half a trillion dollars and potentially have a more lethal fighting force based on the learnings from Ukraine and Iran. Okay, let's take a quick break. Stay with us. Support for the show comes from Hymns. You don't just want to lose weight. You want to look better and feel better. That's why weight loss by Hymns now offers access to the FDA approved Wagovie pill and the FDA approved Wagovie pen. Wagovie is designed to help you lose weight and keep it off so you can stay on track with your goals. With Wagovie at Hymns, you can lose up to 20% or more of your body weight would combine with diet and exercise. It can help you regulate your appetite and eat less. So success is within reach plus Wagovie is the first ever GLP one pill for weight loss. So there are no needles needed plus Hymns has everything online. You'll connect with a licensed provider who will determine if the treatment is right for you ready to reach your goals. Visit Hymns.com slash moderates to get a personalized affordable plan that gets you. That's H I M S.com slash moderates Hymns.com slash moderates weight loss by Hymns is not available in all 50 states. Wagovie is the registered trademark of Novo Nordisk AS to get started and learn more including important safety information. Wagovie clinical study information and restrictions visit Hymns.com. Hi, I'm Maria Sharapova host of the pretty tough podcast. Each episode I sit down with high achieving women to discuss the pursuit of excellence without apology. This week model sports illustrated cover girl and entrepreneur Ashley Graham talks about the time she almost quit. I called my mom and I said mom I just I'm not going to do this anymore and she told me no you are going to stick this out your body is going to change someone's life every decade you're going to go through something different so be really happy with who you are right now because things change. Check out pretty tough new episodes on Wednesdays. You can watch it on YouTube or listen in your favorite podcast app. Big news this week for all my Gordon Gekos, my Robin Hooters, my Klaude Squad, and Thropic which is newly the most valuable AI company in the world announced it would be going public. That news follows reporting that open AI plans to go public as soon as September and that that news follows reporting that SpaceX which also considers itself an AI company will be going public in maybe just a few weeks from now. Welcome to the era of the Omega IPO. We are about to see millionaires, billionaires, and yes probably even the world's first trillionaire created overnight and yes it's that guy. This is the chainsaw for bureaucracy. Chainsaw. But all the tech bros who are going to make all the money they need our money way more than we need their products and we're going to remind you why on today explain from Vox. Welcome back. Meanwhile Democratic Senator Andy Kim says he was pepper sprayed by federal agents during a protest outside a New Jersey ICE detention facility where detainees are reportedly on a hunger strike over conditions and lack of medical care. Kim says he was trying to de-escalate a confrontation between protesters and immigration officers when agents moved in with batons and pepper spray. Jess we haven't checked in on ICE in a while and scenes like this are what the Trump is this does the Trump administration like seeing Democratic senators pepper spray? Does this tickle the sensors of Fox viewers? Check in with me on the five later this afternoon. I'll I'll see the level of glee but you know I think that this is an important reminder that even though immigration enforcement in this country is not on the front page anymore that the shit is still going on right it's not as brazen as the tragedies with Renee Goode or Alex Pretty but there are still very real problems and frankly they're centered around the role of private prisons in this country and how poorly and inhumanely they are operated this detention center in New Jersey Delaney Hall privately run and should note as well that Governor Mikey Sherrill was also denied entry to go there there were four representatives a senator and the governor and none of them were allowed in. They say there's a hunger strike going on Mark Wayne Mullen our new DHS secretary is out there saying that the hunger strike is made up like I don't know I'm going to trust all of the Democratic caucus that showed up more than I'm going to trust DHS on this one you know reports are hundred men jammed into one room no guards that will actually come in there sharing maybe one or two filthy backed up toilets I was revisiting in preparation for this you know the reporting around the Dilly family facility in Texas again operated by a private prison group Corsivic it was opened up under Obama when there was that huge influx of families into the country then Biden shut it down in 2021 Trump reopened it I'd encourage everyone to go back in February that pro-publica piece where they were the reporters were actually able to communicate with some of the kids that are in there it's just harrowing stuff what was going on you know food with meal worms in it kids aren't supposed to be held for more than 20 days kids are in there for months verbal abuse from the guards kids cutting themselves attempting suicide and they were writing letters to these guards about what their lives were like and why they want to get out and a lot of them losing faith in the United States as a result of this right like we came here for a better life and now I'm living in this place I don't know if you saw this but alligator alcatraz in Florida is being shut down they had to well DeSantis had to pay hundreds of millions of dollars for it and guess what the federal government stiffed them just like Donald Trump did with all of his government contractors and they're like we can't afford to keep operating this the conditions there were supposed to be completely abysmal that you know it's in the effort leads it's stinking hot there was no air conditioning they didn't have enough bathrooms they weren't getting the right medical care I mean all of these themes happening over and over again and you know we can't lose sight of it Stephen Miller has been sidelined it seems quite clear that they have figured out whether it's Trump or just Susie Wiles was like I'm doing this myself that he is such a lightning rod not only you know the image of him you know seeing him pop up on your television screen but the kind of policies that he's trying to implement which he's been dreaming about you know since he was killing squirrels or whatever he was doing as a youth in Santa Monica that he's really harming the administration I mean they took the immigration was their best issue now he's minus eight minus ten depending on the poll on immigration even minus two on border security the border is completely closed right and I don't hear democrats complaining about it I'm not complaining about it I I think net net it's a good thing I you know want the asylum system to work better but you can't have more people who are here illegally in equal past taxes than actual americans like that's an unsustainable situation for us but they totally trashed the situation on immigration doesn't mean democrats have picked it up on the other end we should talk about that that we need we need a plan ourselves um but you know I I'm not glad it happened because I don't want Andy Kim to get pepper sprayed or any of that but I've felt for the last month or two that it's not a good thing that this has fallen off the front page because there are still atrocities being committed against people who are here illegally in this country and have committed no crimes so a civil infraction when they came in here yes but committed no crimes once they were here and I'm sure that there are tons of cases we don't even know about of things that are happening even to american citizens like they were in minnesota and in Chicago and in portland yeah it brings about host issues so for the first time since pre since covid tourism to the u.s is down and it's resulting in billions of dollars of lost business and restaurants and hotels will close down and americans will lose jobs people coming to the u.s is down across the board but it's really down from canada used to be the largest source of tourism when you treat immigrants and generally you just come across as an asshole america's brand has always been we're loud and obnoxious but we try eventually eventually we get after exhausting as churchell said every other option we do the right thing we're generally a good people and we like to have a good time and disneylands great and the hollywood bowl is amazing and in and out burgers incredible so and driving up the one is the most beautiful drive in the world and people said yeah okay all that still exists but if your assholes will go spend our money you know at euro disney or we'll you know we'll take my wife to see the coliseum in roam and this is directly eroding our brand and our margin power and our ability to not only exert influence across the world and stop terrorist attacks from happening because people generally see us as the good people but it absolutely hurts our reputation abroad and manifests in a number of ways including tourism the other big issue is that our government is all fucked up in the head in terms of what makes for good private enterprise and what should be government run mom donnie should not be opening what i believe are just going to be state sponsored food lines the grocery business should be a private business it is a cutthroat competitive business is about logistics merchandising 70% of the bodegas in new york are run by immigrants they do a great job of trying to keep prices low got you know the same person who runs the dmv should not be selecting your produce that should be a private business unfortunately we have decided to take things that should be government run and not profitable in other words run a breakeven maybe even lose some money such that the primary measurement the primary metric is well-being of the citizenry not profits and unfortunately we've decided to monetize for shareholders our health care system in some instances our education system and our prison system and the number one donors to campaigns to promote things like three strikes three shoplifting convictions and you go to prison for life because we privatized prisons and so your incentive is not to have bathrooms your incentive is not to have anything resembling conditions that don't result in violence or people who commit more crimes once they're out of prison some sort of reasonable humanity such that our brand abroad still maintains margin power we are what's the term socializing certain companies and instances we should the government has no fucking business in intel the government should not own a golden share in us steel the government should not be talking about bailing we should not be in those businesses that should be the full body contact violence of profit and loss at the same time we should absolutely socialize and nationalize uh health care 45 cents on the dollar of everything that goes to insurance for health insurance is for profits and administration meaning even if you had government in all its waste you would still be able to deliver better health care at a lower price as evidenced by the fact that japan pays 5500 per consumer per capita for health care we pay 13 000 because if you're forced to buy health insurance and your prescription company the drug company the hospital system are all verticalized such that they can consolidate and then raise prices faster than inflation that levies a tremendous tax on the well-being of americans and we result in 40 percent of american households with medical or dental debt which takes a huge toll on the well-being of america's well-being so we have all and this is just an example of it prisons should not be for profit we we need to figure out we're the most incarcerated nation in the world now is that because we have more criminals is that because we're tougher on crime there's probably some reasons we should be a highly incarcerated nation i'm not arguing that should we be the most incarcerated nation in the world no and why is that because there's money in it and there's money in incarcerating people that have no seat at the table because then the person that owns the prison can get 50 60 70 000 a year and then go about trying to figure out a way to make every prisoner as profitable as possible by not providing them with adequate care so i think this brings to the fore a lot of different issues and then before we even get to the depravity and the weirdness that is my ice and let me just finish up here and i'll get your comments after this word salad i also think that when democrats talk about abolishing ice that's really fucking stupid yep we need we need immigration and customs enforcement we need it we need to reform it but not abolish it that's about to become the new defund the police it already is at least where i work say more i mean they're like oh you don't say that anymore but you say abolish ice and then i have to be like you know the dork being like well actually when you go into the cross tabs you see that it's more popular to reform ice rather than doing away with it overall even though abolishing ice is at record high levels of support between 45 and 50 percent but it's kind of it's one of those things where you then if you give people the option that we could reform it to make sure that we're still getting the folks in this country or here illegally and committing crimes against americans out of the country they're like actually that i would like that to happen and well two things i want to say on your it wasn't a word salad i totally got all of it though i do just like love salads but tom holman and the $50,000 in the kava bag right like you you have the guy who's been in charge of ice you know undercover fbi agents posing as business executives to give him $50,000 which he never had to answer for in any of the hearings second of all on the abolished ice front i don't know if you caught any of what you didn't and you shouldn't have but trump did a rally in rockland county on friday um for mike lawlor and bruce blackman who's running for governor against kathy hokel and this is where all the controversy that jackson dart introduced him the new quarterback for the giants and the other giants like freaked out like why would you be introducing president trump anyway one of the speakers there was the family of sherry and gorman who she was 18 years old murdered by someone who's here illegally and call away college in chicago a complete tragedy that the democrats mishandled their certainly their initial response to it like city council people pritzker was better than the city council people then ended up being great about it eventually but there's this resistance to admitting that something terrible has happened because of the politics of it right that it opens the door to criticism of sanctuary cities or our border policy under joe biden or whatever it is and you listen to the sorrow in jessica gorman sherry and gorman's mother's voice as she's talking about what happened to her baby and she they love president trump because president trump is all over them right like that's his thing angel families but she made a plea for politicians in general just to take this seriously that policies have to reflect the fact that american citizens are dying at the hands of people who are here illegally who have prior criminal histories like what happened to lincoln riley in georgia and why you saw dozens of democrats supporting the lincoln riley act that had poison pills in it yes but still it was a symbolic acknowledgement of the fact that this is unacceptable and that you can't run a country that way and you can't have a set of immigration policies that allow for lincoln riley to die or kate steinley from san francisco or sherry and gorman in illinois and i found it to be really powerful and then for that to be met with abolish ice just makes you look like you've lost the plot as much as we did in the biden years at least for me let's take one last quick break w a police confidential is true crime in real time we've got seven good suspects did a packet of beef jerky help you catch a killer you can hear the screams coming from the window he could not recall how many people he had killed every week we take you inside real active police investigations how do you solve a murder without a body how do you catch a professional hitman all the latest on cold case mysteries and a whole lot more w a police confidential the official w a police podcast every week wherever you get your podcasts there are those who have the edge with 5g plus on ee and others not so much those who can download a kid's film while boarding a plane or those who can't those who put the only taxi nearby or those that like we're gonna have to walk sara stay one step ahead when you get the edge with 5g plus on ee the uk's best network search ee best network root metrics data age 225 verify at ee.k slash claims check coverage at ee.k welcome back all right so let's move on to el papa so another warning on the impact of AI came in 42,000 words courtesy of the first american pope i love this guy poplio released his first open letter to the public titled magnifica humanitas or magnificent humanity i like that magnificent i'm starting a boy band called magnificent humanity i like that the encyclical warning of new forms of slavery tied to the rise of artificial intelligence and called for the technologies disarming let's listen artificial intelligence needs to be disarmed the word is strong i know but deliberately chosen because this moment needs words capable of attracting attention awakening consciences and indicating paths forward for humanity disarmed freed from logics that turn it into an instrument of domination exclusion and death i love this guy picks a good one yeah so i've been thinking a lot about this and around bioweapons and nuclear weapons we coordinate with our enemies our enemies russians and china and suppose we have covert agencies that cooperate and if someone is mixing up a bioweapon in their bathtub we find them and we kill them and we share intelligence around it because we realize we have a vested interest in mutual interest in ensuring that bioweapons don't get out of control or that enriched uranium doesn't end up in the hands of a terrorist group i'm beginning to believe that this is another example of and i don't know if it should be socialized or whatever you whatever you want to call it but ai what i don't get is if you're the ceo of an ai company and after you've sold a hundred or two hundred million dollars of your shares on the secondary market and then start claiming that ai is the most dangerous technology ever if it's in fact according to them if we're to believe them that it's much more powerful than nuclear weapons would we have nuclear weapons sold and developed by private companies would we have jensen huang going over to china giving money to the trump administration or potentially donating money to a ballroom such that he could go to china because invidia sold nuclear weapons so the total lack of government oversight here and the notion that we're falling it again daru amota is the new hero right he's he's a good man he's he can do with this and i don't doubt he's a good man but the incentives for private companies zero to say whatever the fuck you you need to to get the share price up a cent every day that's your incentive that's how capitalism works and now my attitude is if in fact this technology is more threatening or dangerous nuclear weapons there's an argument that it should be nationalized and the government should oversee these companies or own these companies or at least we need some sort of regulatory framework and with such a disappointment from the trump end to a certain extent the biden administration that had you know never really met with she is i do think that she and the president could come together to try and figure out at least some basic global frameworks for the use of ai to keep it out of the hands or to keep it from going haywire in terms of cyber attacks or shutting down hospitals because they're vulnerable you think the chinese would not like would be honest about it though i feel like they just say like yeah we'll do a signing ceremony and then just do whatever the fuck they want no i think it all comes down to incentives and that is the biggest nations i believe have a vested mutual interest in cooperating with each other around certain moments of ai because what ai does unfortunately is it levels the playing field and puts nuclear weapons potentially in the hands of much smaller organizations that are much less powerful who quite frankly have a lot less to lose so i may be naive here but and if we had an actual diplomatic corps that hadn't been gutted and exchanged competence for fail t look we we cooperate with the russians on nuclear weapons we we'd hated each other didn't trust each other didn't like each other lied to each other and we came to an agreement we said all right nuclear proliferation we have a mutual vested interest in not having 40 000 missiles pointed at each other so i do think it's getting to the point i think a real leader could come in and sit down with she and a lot of different western leaders and potentially even putin and say okay we need to get to a point of checks and balances where we can trust each other and ensure that this technology is not being used against any of us or shutting down our economies or our hospitals or launching our nuclear weapons without our knowledge there is i think a mutual just with the same with bioweapons nuclear weapons i do think there's an opportunity here if there was a leader if there was more leadership for for for multilateral cooperation and pope leo i think is he's turning out to be one of the better leaders are kind of he's stepping into the void here of leadership globally i think he's i think what he said was very powerful your thoughts i felt that way as well and at this particular moment it's important to have somebody that continues to take big swings no matter the repercussions like he's not afraid of certainly the trump administration or it seems like anybody and expressing his views and they all seem to be so human centric right like that's what he wants to go spend his time you know talking to refugee kids and he wants to talk about what ai may do to us and these new forms of slavery like that's about celebrating humans and that doesn't mean that we shouldn't have these huge technological advances that's incredibly important maybe not as much for his day-to-day life but for us generally as a society but i love how he's so grounded like in us right like in our corporal form and the things that we need that we need to be loved and to be cared for and to have access to food and somewhere to sleep like this return to the basics as we've turned into kind of zombies walking around you know counting every step counting every calorie counting every wink of sleep etc um so that's kind of affirming for me um in all of this i you know anthropic dario moody like he just needs to look better than sam altman which is not hard to do since sam altman doesn't really connect with people like even listening to him talk about his son he has a baby and the way that he's optimizing for you know taking care of him and how he wouldn't be able to get through this without chat gpt like that broke my heart a little bit i'm not saying don't go to the internet for tips on like how to get your kid to fall asleep but a little little bit scared about what he and his chatbot um are talking about when it comes to a six-month-old um but i think this is not not a good thing and i hope that to your point you know the multilateral cooperation is hugely important but there is an executive order that was sitting on trump's desk that he was supposed to sign about a cooperative relationship between the federal government and these ai companies and the and a role for the government in regulating them and democrats should be out there you know maybe not your policy you know number one on day one that you're going to be regulating this but the american people are asking for it the only group that is in is the 65 plus right because they just kind of think that this is fun and they're on their way out the door but you know everyone who's facing a job market that is incredibly uncertain whether you're a blue collar worker up to a white collar worker is concerned about this we've been talking about all of those college graduation speeches where ai is getting booed and they're and they're not even thinking about the you know nuclear weapon capacity of this they're literally just thinking i spent you know 300 400 000 and i may not be able to be employed for the next two or three years because everyone's just gonna throw my job into an lm and you know i'll see you when i'm 25 and i don't want it all to be about politics but i do like to win elections and it would be really great if this was a focal point of the democratic platform that you were talking about these concerns and had a plan for regulating them and take them up on their word bring in anthropic whoever else wants to play ball and get them on some sort of commission where they pledge you know this level of regulation will be fine by us right these are the kind of cooperative relationships that we want to have with the federal government to make sure that ai you know doesn't go too fast and end up eating us all i don't really know what eating us all means but part of these things that it's also just like robots and stuff like that will be uh will be coming for us too we fall for it over and over and the whole regulate us i'm scared of this technology we're open to regulation that was the same lie that shelt samberg kept fomenting that oh yeah we absolutely agree that we there should be some regulation in social media as they deploy hundreds of lawyers to overwhelm senator clobasher our staff and block anything resembling regulation or legislation and i empathize with these guys that at some point you know they're such targets of so much shitposting and there's a there's a communications industrial complex and when it works is able to get cheap capital if the ceo seen as a leader or empathetic so they have sherald do a book signing tour and talk about the very important role or discussion around gender equality in the workplace as she creates a business model that convinced 14 year old girls to cut themselves too much i don't think so anyways i mean as a as an elder millennial that grew up on lean in it's been fascinating and very sad to see where this has all gone especially when it comes to you know what we know now about what facebook was doing but when sam alvin i mean at this point with sam and after bezos and like unfortunately there's no money in the strategy they should just stay quiet um that would be my advice if i were you know on their board at this point you are just so fucked and quite frankly the identity politics and the intercom inequality has created so much anger towards rich white men you're kind of wrong before you open your mouth so you should just not open your mouth but unfortunately no one's going to pay millions of dollars to a comms firm to tell them just don't say anything when sam alvin who has been especially tone deaf in my view and i think he's a smart guy and he's probably a good man when he says i i wouldn't know what to do with my kid without chat gbt okay i find it cynical and ironic because the reason that sam alvin had the reason he can have a child is because of the progressive ideals and leadership of presidents and congresspeople who said we need to bring um gay people and non whites into the wonderful rights of the rest of america including prosperity fair trials and the ability to adopt children and the ability to marry another man and so when he sucks the cock of a bigot uh president trump who will absolutely turn back the rights of people outside of the mainstream he is making it harder for other people to have children and the same rights that he enjoys so if he it is so insane these tech bros saying whether it's bezos saying he's a more mature disciplined person or sam alton showing up at the white house i empathize with the fact they have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders but the reason sam alton can marry someone and have children is because he is standing on the shoulders of people who said no and risked personal and financial well-being and said no to bigots and said no to people that wanted to deny to deny the rights of people who were disenfranchised or or less powerful so sam the reason you have a kid is thank god there were people much braver than you who used to run organizations in america that's my indignance talk now that we've gotten a bigot cock sucking situation i think there you go grab this baby up all right let's leave it there jess that's all for this episode thank you so much for joining us today