Kara Swisher
Appearances
Pivot
Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
It gives you an insight to this company who are indeed careless people. But I'm not so sure... this is the best narrator to tell it, although a lot of it is really important. And lots of people I trust have mixed feelings on this book as I do.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Some of it. Some of it. Some of the memos she has are really important to read. Like, these are actual memos and things like that of how they did things. I just think it's her take on—she's always the hero in the story, and I know a lot of people who work there who try really hard to do the right thing. And I think in some places where they had successes, she takes a lot of the credit.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
I've heard that. I have to acknowledge that. Yeah.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
I think that's one of the things— Certain people like Katie Harbath, who I like very much, who have been big Facebook critics, find issues with this, like in the telling of the stories. Now, it's a memoir, so this is her telling of the story. And I just wrote my own memoir, so I understand how people might not agree with my take on situations either.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
But this has been met by a lot of people whom I know.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
trust saying this is not the way it happened that said i think her vibe is absolutely correct this sort of carelessness i think is absolutely true i think uh you know how they go about doing things is true uh the china stuff is really interesting to understand it gives you great insight into the company and that stuff is i think very much the vibe is correct
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Anyway, Puerto Rico. I'm in Puerto Rico. It's lovely here. Are you enjoying it? Yeah, I'm going back today. I'd rather not go back at all, but it's lovely. It's a lovely place. Food, amazing. Got a great Airbnb. It was great. Just a really nice. I had three of the four kids, and it's been lovely. Anyway, we've got a lot to get to today, including Elon's visit to the Pentagon.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
I also don't know why she waited so long if this was so critical. Of course, that's a Facebook argument, and I don't think it's a wrong one. But I do think Facebook has reacted emotionally on this stuff and has made it into a bestseller, so more people are reading it. Because one of the things, and I told this to someone from Meta, I'm like... They're like, it's not trustworthy.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
I said, neither are you. So it's not like we trust Meta when they're actually telling the truth. And that's the problem is that nobody has any trust for this company. And so you assume the worst of them. And in my case, I do think it does hurt for people who are critics of them when things aren't buttoned up. Unfortunately, you have to be super buttoned up with these people. 100%.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
And I was supposed to interview her, but there was way too many holes. I didn't feel like slagging her, and I didn't feel like defending Facebook. And I just think she's got the vibe right. She's got the vibe right.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
It did. I hate to say that, but I really did. And the Sandberg stuff, I'm a little kinder to her than you are. But I can see how that happened and the way she told it isn't correct. I can see Cheryl's very, I would say, sisterly or motherly with her employees. And all tech companies, and Facebook included, are far too familial with their employees.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
And especially in the early days, it was like a frat sometimes. Sometimes it was like a family thing. dysfunctional family, for sure. Facebook wasn't as much of a frat as, say, Google was in many ways. And I think there was a familiarity in those companies that has long gone now, but initially was present. And I think all these companies were sort of behaved in ways that HR would just blush at.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
And at one point, there was a meta, it was Facebook at the time, person in HR, and they had just gotten there. And I said, what's your job? And she said, I'm the vice president of keeping people from fucking each other. And it was like, I laughed out loud. And Facebook wasn't the worst of them, which is interesting, as I recall. But there was just a familiarity.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
So I could see her saying, oh, sleep in the bed. You're pregnant. Sleep in the bed. No, do it. Like, I could see her doing that in a very sisterly, motherly way. I can't see her.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
I don't think she's... She kind of does, but it's not quite there. Also, if you read it, it's sort of like, it's more invasive, I guess, than anything else, and it leaves the reader to decide what the intent was. But let me just say, I can see Saoirse being overly sisterly, motherly. I couldn't, this is just kind of ridiculous on some level.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
And so even leaving it open really irritated me, I think, in a lot of ways. Although, again... I would read it because I think some of the memos and the vibe is correct. I think she does nail these people is the kind of vibe they have, which is whatever it takes. And I think that is... But that is not a new, fresh piece of information for any of us.
Pivot
Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Tesla facing more trouble with a massive Cybertruck recall. I saw one Cybertruck here, by the way, Scott, in Puerto Rico. That's it. That's all I've seen is one. But there's not that many that were sold, apparently, as the massive Cybertruck recall has shown. Where are you right now?
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
That's why I recommend reading it because the stuff around the memos is really interesting. And I found it. I found insight in it. That's absolutely sure. Anyway, we should move on. Speaking of which, another person, another piece of shit in this. case, not Facebook, but RFK Jr. 's latest target is surprisingly one we can almost agree on, cell phones in schools, sort of.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Talking about the risk of cell phone use for kids on Fox and Friends, Kenny did mention depression and poor performance, but then what did he do? Let's listen.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
And there he goes, down the highway. Research so far has not found an association between cell phone use and cancer nor DNA damage. Last year, the Surgeon General Vivek Murthy called on schools to ban phones in classrooms for the good reasons, which are depression and poor performance, that he had to do this. Oh, God, I want to just... I can't slap someone.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
I mean, I would like to virtually slap him for doing this because it's an important issue. And as usual, he enters all kinds of conspiracy theories into it without, you know, I don't know what to say. Just once again, this is the exact same thing. It's like he's making a good point and then down he goes down conspiracy highway with his nonsensical bullshit. Your thoughts?
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
That's a trauma. Mine was Halloween. Halloween was mine.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
I just, I agree. That's a good, lovely story about the exorcist. But again, mine was Halloween. Mine was Halloween. I hate that movie. Fucking movie. I love Jamie Lee Curtis, but I hate that movie.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
No, no, that was a different one. Oh, that's Halloween.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Yes, that's right. Yes. No, it's not. It's just... Jamie Lee Curtis. Ugh. She's hot. She's a great person. Is she? She's a great person. Yes, I've interviewed her and have talked to her in the interim, and she's a wonderful, lovely, jolly, fantastic person. Just a really, a real... A real winner. In any case, RFK, we really think kids should not have phones in schools.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
You're now fucking wrecking it for us. Like, stop wrecking things for us. This is going to set it back, unfortunately. Same thing with, I think, careless people. But again, read it nonetheless. Okay, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, Elon Musk's visit to the Pentagon. Last week, John Levitt joined me to co-host an episode of Pivot, and it was a great one.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
If you enjoyed that, you'll love his podcast, Love It or Leave It. Love It or Leave It is America's top late-night political gay live comedy podcast. John takes on the biggest and most absurd stories in politics and helps you stay informed while laughing instead of crying. Sometimes he cries. Each episode promises big-name guests, unexpected conversations, and can't-miss moments.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Catch new episodes of Love It or Leave It every Saturday. Watch on YouTube. or join the live show in LA to witness the chaos in person. Scott, we're back. President Trump is denying a report that Elon Musk was set to be briefed on top secret war plans for China during a visit to the Pentagon last week.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
According to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Elon's visit was just an informal meeting about innovation, efficiencies and smarter production. Trump was later asked about Elon's possible involvement in Chinese foreign policy during a presser. Let's listen to what he said.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Well, at least Trump's telling the truth there, but I don't think he's telling the truth. I think Elon has enormous access to intel. I think both the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, I think, reported this, as well as the New York Times. The New York Times, I think, broke it. I just think this is exactly what they were going to do. And I don't believe Keith Hicks.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
I don't believe Donald Trump. I don't believe Elon Musk. And so in this case, I believe the reporters, and they probably pulled it back, the briefing he was going to get. I think he's got his fingers in all kinds of stuff that has potential conflicts of interest. I don't even think they're potential. I think everything he's doing right now has a massive conflict of interest.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Any thoughts on this one? Because there's also one, of course, SpaceX is positioning itself to get billions of dollars in new federal contracts or other support, according to a report, again, in the New York Times. NASA, the Pentagon, the FAA, and the Commerce Department are among the agencies with ongoing and new deals with SpaceX.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
SpaceX will also get a boost from Trump's new space-based missile defense project called the Golden Dome. This is just ridiculous. Like, he's just so, he's got so many business interests and so many conflicts, Scott.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
The Reagan one. What was the Reagan one?
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Oh, that's great. It's a ton of fun.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Good. We went to the rainforest. We went to the beach, the rainforest. Puerto Rico is a beautiful place. It really is.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
It's lovely. It's sort of, you know, it's like most tropical areas, but it's really lovely. And the people are wonderful. And the food is strikingly good. There's a lot of beans and rice and stuff like that, but it's been delicious.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
I know. Neither did I. And I actually have been very pleasantly surprised.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Oh, yeah. I think it's hard to do those tax moves. Like, Monaco was another one, right? There's a couple that people pull. Florida, obviously.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
g. g. g. g. g. g. g. g. g. g. g. g. g. g. g. g. g. g. g. g. g. g. g a Cybertruck face-off that was very sad for a Cybertruck and very happy for the Ford 150. There's this interview that his estranged daughter, Vivian Wilson, did for Teen Vogue and was on the cover. I love Teen Vogue, by the way. I think it's a really great publication.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Wilson, who is a trans woman, called her father cringe and a pathetic man-child. She said she had not had a relationship with him since 2020, not a very good one before that. This apparently did not sit well with Elon, who deadnamed his daughter on X again, calling out the woke mind virus yet again, saying he's going to kill it once again.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
He's also been amplifying a conspiracy theory about trans people vandalizing Teslas. He went on a rampage. I thought this interview was fantastic. It was very funny. It was like a 20-year-old, a young person, just pretty cool, a pretty cool young person who all who had a lot of wisdom at the same time really did understand herself in terms of not knowing everything.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
It was very self-aware in a really, I thought, a very smart way. It reminded me a lot of my own two older kids. They know what they don't know, but they also love to brag a little bit. And I thought it was a wonderful interview and I thought the pictures were wonderful. And that she gets under his skin so much is really quite delightful on so many levels. And it's a big risk for someone like this.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
She lives in Japan, but... She doesn't have financial links with him, but he's still a very powerful person. And obviously it set him off quite a bit, especially because she is everything. She is a delight online and he is not. She is funny online. He is not. And so she's everything he's wanted to be online, which is cool, I guess. Your thoughts?
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Wow. Isn't that crazy? So they're doing it just to avoid taxes, to avoid... You know, on some level, it's sort of like they should probably lower taxes. At the same time, the tax avoidance schemes are so insane. I remember we had some stories in Puerto Rico when a lot of the Bitcoin guys came in. They were sort of wrecking the place.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
I would agree. I don't think it's working, though. I have to tell you, my sons make constant. And they used to really like him. I have to say they did. But now they trade back and forth all these videos on Teslas and stuff. And they were horrified by it. His response to the daughter, they thought the daughter was cool. Like the daughter's fucking cool. Like she really is.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
And again, what I really liked about it is she understood what she didn't know. And she says like, maybe that'll change. Maybe I'm wrong. Like she had more self-awareness at 20 years old. in a very difficult position than he has had his whole life. So let's just give kudos to her mom, who was quoted in the piece, and I thought was a wonderful piece, essentially calling her daughter magical.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
And really, it was a wonderful quote from the mother. And sounds like, and I know Justine a little bit, and it's just really terrific. And thank goodness for that.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
She's lovely. She's really interesting, smart, and just obviously a great parent here in this situation, in this really incredibly difficult situation.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
It is, actually. I'm translucent. I've become invisible. We're going to move on. We're going to move on. Okay. Anyway, Vivian, great job. Great job, Vivian. We think you're amazing, and we think your father's an asshole just like you do. Anyway, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for wins and fails. Okay, Scott, let's hear some wins and fails. Would you like me to go first?
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
And at the same time, we're buying up these expensive houses and they were conducting themselves badly. And the whole thing was so icky. Like the ways, the gyrations people make to do this kind of stuff. It's a, it seems ridiculous on some level. I get the Monaco thing and I know people like different tennis stars have lived in Monaco to avoid taxes and this and that.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
I think you got to give the... Well, there's one small win, which is this New York Times piece on Hooters becoming a refuge for young gay men. And it's this wonderful piece where a lot of dads... Apparently brought gay sons to Hooters to try to get them, and the Hooters waitresses thankfully saved these gay people and were like, don't worry about it.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
It's this wonderful thing, and it was just, just go find it, Hooters Gay Men, and it's a delightful read, and thank God, and Hooters is on the... Recipients of bankruptcy, apparently. But thank God for Hooters Waitress. This is all I have to say in that regard. But I think you have to give it to the Severance season finale. I watched it here in Puerto Rico on Friday.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Yeah. Amazing. I'm not going to give away too much, but boy... Is Ben Stiller one hell of a director? Did he direct this one?
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
He did. He did, I believe. Yes. And it was... He directed a lot of them this season, more than he was supposed to, he told me. But he... It is just... wow, was it a mindfuck in a way that was really good and it leaves open for a whole new season. That is really great. It was not going the way you thought it was going to go, but it sort of did.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
So it had a very satisfying and you didn't feel at a loss. And at the same time, It was a lot about innies and outies and the relationship you have with yourself and the struggles you have with yourself. There's so much to unpack and every single person in it, Milchak, the guy who plays Milchak, did this incredible, there's a marching band, there was a big fire.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
There was a goat lady, there's so much to it, every single character. had their moment, and every single character took advantage of their moment in a really profound and wonderful way. And I couldn't recommend it more. It was really funny, too. It was really funny and also heartbreaking and et cetera. And every character was wonderful. So I just have to say that was such a win.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Okay. She's an actor, too, but she's also wonderful. But go ahead. Go ahead.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
You just waited for that. You don't want to talk about profound history.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Oh, my God. All right. I know. By the way, the story. Let me just tell you, Hooters waitresses rock.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Well, I'm sure she was lovely like all these people in this piece.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
No, I mean lovely in terms of the way that she handled these.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
But, and that's a, that's sort of a It's designed for rich people, I guess, that town or that country. It's so small. But it seems so icky.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Well, they weren't. They would just sidle up to him saying, don't worry, kid. You're fine the way you are.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
It is a sweet story. It's a sweet story.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
All right, so fail is that they really aren't finding as much of this Doge thing. I think it's an absolute fail. They are not finding as much fraud, waste, and abuse. Oh, you think? And especially with Social Security. Like, they're just not finding it. Like, there's a great story in the New York Times, at the Wall Street Journal, and all of them, they're talking about how
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
They're just not finding it, especially in claims of massive problems. Reforming government is a critical thing in our age. We should always be reforming government and making it better for people to get their stuff, the stuff you pay for. I'm very cognizant.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Like right now, the fact that we're paying for innocent people to be sent to El Salvador, to this lunatic who runs that country, and I know he's liked there, but nonetheless seems like a lunatic, is heinous. It's just heinous. So I just feel like it's always important to understand how government can work better. But this is making an argument that government does work well.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
And I think that's great. But at the same time, just like, stop it. Again, just like a lot of things, you're we really care about government reform, you're fucking ruining it for government reform. That's my feeling and I think we're going to have a problem with it because this will tarnish efforts like that for years to come. Scott, all yours. No Hooters jokes.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Cara Swisher, and I'm in Puerto Rico.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Agreed. Agreed. Of course, Trump is saying it's all fixed and he would know. Anyway, it's not. It's really real, I have to say. It's really fun to watch. I'd love to watch democracy like that. I like screamy town halls. I love screamy city hall meetings, too. Anyway, that's a great one. And they look fantastic and they sound fun. You're right. They sound fun, actually. We want to hear from you.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Send us your questions about business, tech, or whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. And elsewhere in the Kara and Scott universe, this week on On with Kara Swisher, I talked to Alvaro Bedoya and Rebecca Slaughter, the two Democratic commissioners Trump fired at the FTC last week for without cause. They didn't even mention it.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
It's an illegal act what he did. But let's listen to a clip.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
It was a great interview. It's really interesting. I'm sure they'll get their jobs back. But at the same time, the fact that he tried it is typical of Trump at this point. 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. Scott, read us out.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Yeah, I get it. I get it. I get it. I just, the Bitcoin ones were so...
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
unseemly here in in puerto rico i remember the stories i was always felt dirty right you know right because they just they're just terrible people that were you know avoiding taxes and and then a lot of it was but some anyway anyway it's a lovely place i recommend people going there just it is not a garbage island it's beautiful and people are lovely um and they're americans by the way but people always
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
go, oh, you're going to a foreign country. I'm like, no, Puerto Rico is American. And they should be the 51st state, and they should get representation, as should the District of Columbia, before we move into China and Greenland.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
No, I'm just saying it's an issue. I'd like to have my vote count. Scott, you get to have your vote count, but I don't.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
No, I'm a D.C. resident. We don't have, we're taxation without representation. We have a person in Congress, so does Puerto Rico, but we don't have, they don't, the votes don't count.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Yeah, I don't either. I don't know. I would like, we're one of the biggest, we have many, many, many, many, much more of a population.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
I understand, but still, I would like to have my vote count. Anyway, first, speaking of politics, bipartisan senators Lindsey Graham and Dick Durbin plan to reintroduce a bill to sunset Section 230, I guess. Okay. The bill would give Section 230 an expiration date of January 1st, 2027, with the goal of pressuring big tech to engage in negotiations for new regulations.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
President Trump has long been an advocate for repealing Section 230, although he hadn't been before. He's changed, like a lot of these politicians have. He's not alone in that. Graham has introduced repeal bills multiple times. This one, you know, we'll see if it happens. It's really a way to, it's just not the way to go here, but there seem to be no other ways to go.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
We'll see if there will be new regulation. There's also a danger that Trump administration takes control of our online speech, Ted Dirt's take, which I think is the smartest. Democratic senators team up with MAGA to hand Trump a censorship machine. It's really a problematic, it's like taking out your liver, I guess, or whatever you need.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Morgan, would you need your heart to fix a real problem of these companies not being subject to any kind of litigation or regulation? So it's a really difficult situation. It would really affect their businesses in ways that are really quite profound. I don't know. What do you feel? I would read Mike Masnick on the entire thing. That's how I would recommend.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Yep, I would agree. And again, I would recommend, there's a really good podcast that Mike Masnick has done. He's written a lot about this. Years ago, when they were doing this before, when they tried to do this again, I had him on and a bunch, and Jeff Kossoff and others who know a lot about it to explain why this is the, it's like, There's an expression throwing a hammer at a piano to make music.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Like, it just doesn't make any sense. And this is what he writes. How did the once obscure internet law become the target of bipartisan crusade? The answer reveals much about our current moral panic over social media and dangerous appeal of quick-fix solutions. It makes them default to fix this. What people don't realize is that Section 230 isn't really the root of their concerns.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Oh, my God. Did you see that scene? Oh, my God. I didn't. I've heard of it, though.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
Removing or even reforming it won't fix the people on the internet. In fact, it will certainly make things worse. So I think it's really important to get yourself educated on this. This is not the solution. Again, you're right.
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Meta Tell-All, Elon's Daughter Speaks Out, Cybertruck Recall
They could have passed all of the different bills Senator Klobuchar and others had around privacy, around all kinds of things, around some liability that they refused to do. They refused to do decent law. And they have to use this as a cudgel. Like, it's ridiculous. They should be able, if they can be bipartisan, they should be bipartisan enough to pass a series of laws
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that have teeth in them that have against these companies, privacy, algorithm, transparency, anti-trust rules.
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Yeah. Sam Rockwell. Yeah. Okay. I was a little worried there, but I'm allowing it. I'm allowing it.
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Why not have a regulation on privacy around a bipartisan... Right now. Right now. They could do it right now. And this is what they're going for. They're so stupid.
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Boom. Done. Tomorrow. Yeah. Yeah. I agree. This is really not the smart way to do it. Anyway, I urge you to learn about it because as it perhaps might have not... been correct in the first place. It almost was impossible to create these companies without it at the same time. So anyway, difficult times.
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Speaking of someone that Meta has made a bestseller, Sarah Wynn Williams released Careless People, documenting her six years at the company earlier this month. She was there quite a bit ago. I think 2018 is when she left. Meta has recently successfully stopped Wynne Williams from doing interviews based on a non-disparagement agreement signed at her termination.
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Wynne Williams has filed an emergency motion to overturn the ruling, citing lack of proper notice and whistleblower protection. She apparently wasn't present when they made the ruling. At the time of the taping of the book, it's number three on Amazon's bestseller. I think this was the strategy of this publisher. They didn't inform the company before.
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There was a lot of quietness around the release. They didn't seem to fact-check. The ones I checked, the people I checked, they did not call. And they have, you know, the company is very upset about the book and has been trying to stop it and in the process has made it very popular. She did a bunch of short interviews. There was one or two interviews before, but then has not been able to do that.
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But it hasn't stopped it, I think. I don't know. I think it's a problematic book. I have read it. We can discuss it, Scott, if you want, because you haven't read it. But there's a lot of important stuff in this book. And at the same time, a lot of stuff that is not, what I say, fact-checked, is what I would say, and is questionable about her taking credit for certain things.
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I think some of the personal stuff should have been fact-checked. There's some stuff about Joel Kaplan. about sexual harassment. There's some stuff about Charles Sandberg wanting her to sleep in a bed in a plane, which I think, I'm sorry, I don't believe. I believe it happened. I just don't believe it the way Williams is telling it. Although only people there would know, I guess.
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And I think Facebook is reacting rather emotionally to this because of the personal stuff in it. But the stuff around China is really interesting. It's really interesting that their preparations to go into China, but then they didn't. And I don't think she was there when they decided not to. So she doesn't know why they didn't, but they didn't do it. But some of the stuff is really interesting.
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I am so anal retentive. I have to. You don't understand. I have to wash everything.
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half-sibling online, I'd have a few nickels, which isn't a lot, but it's weird that it's happened six separate times. She's funny.
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I can't. I can't. I can't. I literally was up all last night because there's dust on everything. And I'm really, people don't realize this, but I'm highly anal retentive. And so everything has to go back the right way.
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Interesting. It's interesting. I don't like him illegally raiding and wrecking government more than this. I think this is his modus operandi with all these women. This is what he does. He thinks he should spread his seed. This is what he thinks. This is one of his theories of existence.
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Well, he must pay for them, I guess.
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Please don't say that. Girls need their fathers too.
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What say we of the lesbians, then? My kids, I think, are very well-intested.
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I can't speak if the glass isn't in the place.
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True? No. No. It's nonsense. It's nonsense. No.
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It's just not true. There's various and different people, just like straight couples. Some of the ladies are more manly, I guess, in some fashion.
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Two parents, absolutely. Two loving parents, I think, are the critical part. And involvement of men, certainly. We've spent a lot of time making sure the boys did have that. Have my brother, my son is fixated on you, as you know. And we think that's important. We think that's really important. But I would say it's two loving parents, I think, are the critical, if possible.
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And that's unfortunately not possible for a lot of people. And if not, then there's community stuff like churches or Boy Scouts or, well, not Boy Scouts, it's gotten so pillory, but any of those kind of things where they can have a feeling of community is critically important.
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I hate it though, moving. I don't like the whole, like all the things. It makes me want to be a Buddhist. I'm like, I would like to let go of all things.
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Well, it's part of his brand, right? This kid's everywhere. I fuck everybody and leave babies in my wake. This is his thing. This is his weird fucking thing.
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Yeah, that's true. Women just marry shitty men. So, the women I know. Anyway, don't be a shitty father, men. like Elon Musk, obviously. So obviously, yes. Okay, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, Trump's military purge in his latest hire. Support for Pivot comes from the NPR podcast, Tech Unheard.
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I'm like, what do I have this in multiple amounts? Like that kind of thing. And I just vowed I wouldn't move again, ever again. I'm just going to die. And I've decided I'm dying in this house. Like this is where it's happening.
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Scott, we're back. Stocks fell sharply last Friday, with the Dow seeing its worst week since October and the S&P wiping out almost all of the gains since Trump took office. The downturn was fueled in part by a drop in consumer sentiment index, which fell to its lowest level in more than a year, with consumers concerned about higher inflation.
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There are also worries about Trump's tariffs, as of the recording. Monday morning, the S&P 500 and NASDAQ were still down. There's also these government layoffs, which are going to happen. They're the biggest player in the country. Warren Buffett's in cash, has gone into cash, and he's not saying why. What do you make of the stock market situation?
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I don't know. I've got to have a theory of getting rid of all my stuff. I've got 25 plus years, essentially, to get rid of everything. So I have to have a theory of getting rid of things in some fashion.
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Elon's Ultimatum, Trump's Military Purge, and Amazon's 007 Deal
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Yeah. I just don't look. I just don't look.
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That's my don't look strategy. And then every now and then when it seems insane, I sell a little bit. It's like sort of gambling, but I'm not much of a gambler in any case. Also, President Trump announced on Sunday night that he's naming podcaster and former Fox News personality Dan Bongino as deputy FBI director. Bongino is also a former Secret Service agent and NYPD officer.
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The role of deputy director does not require Senate confirmation and typically goes to a senior FBI agent. In his post on True Social, Trump noted... But you know, he was willing and prepared to give up his podcast in order to serve. I have had backs and forth with him quite a bit when I wanted to interview him. He kept telling me how much bigger his podcast was than mine. It was very weird.
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But ultimately, he was going to do it. And then, of course, you know, wimped out as I expected.
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A goiter, when have you thought of the word goiter?
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That's a good word, goiter. I don't like a goiter. Wouldn't that suck to have a goiter and not be able to do anything about it? Anyway, sorry. Just thinking I lived in medieval times.
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No. Oh, actually, maybe I might, and then I'll be in charge of the military, and then I'll do the bad things that he doesn't want me to do and have a coup or something like that. This guy isn't qualified. He's not qualified. Like, who's a cop, okay? And who's a secret service agent? But this is just a ridiculous circus, these people, and it's dangerous.
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He's in a rage a lot. Don't go watch the podcast on video if you want to feel good about our nation's FBI. That's all I got to say. He's a lot. We had a really interesting back and forth, but he's a lot. He's a lot in a way that I don't think is particularly good for law enforcement.
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Anyway, he also, from hiring to firing, Trump fired the country's senior military officer, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General C.Q. Brown, late Friday night, Friday night purge. The move was part of a larger military purge with six Pentagon officials fired in total, including the chief of naval operations and top lawyers for the Army, Navy, and Air Force.
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Obviously, they're getting themselves in place. The official line from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth is that they're putting in place new leadership to focus on deterring fighting and winning wars, actually against the American people, probably. But in an appearance on Fox News on Sunday, Hegseth shared a little more about dismissing these lawyers. Let's listen.
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He's such an idiot. God, he sounds, what is roadblocks? This is, I'm quite concerned about this. They're putting, trying to put people in place. The person they put in place said he loved Trump, apparently wore a MAGA hat. But, you know, this seems regular.
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And just for people who don't know right now what we're on here, we just voted with Russia not to condemn Russia for the Ukraine invasion for the first time, which seems astonishing that we're doing that. It just happened in the UN. And we are on Russia's side in the Ukraine fight at this point or not condemning them for Russia. what they're doing. And this guy's in charge.
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And he, of course, didn't know, FYI, who started the war, Hegseth, on one of the TV shows. He's so dumb, but also dangerous.
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And blaming, this is... He called it complex when someone, even a Fox person said, you'd fair to say that Russia invaded Ukraine. He said, it's complex.
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Well, that's what they're hoping. That's what the German, the new German chancellor, or who's gonna be the new German chancellor.
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Yeah, well, the U.S. voted alongside North Korea, Belarus, and 14 other Moscow-friendly countries. So that was great. They're like, oh my God, he's like a, he's a useful idiot. I don't know what else to say. It's just astonishing. I mean, people, Ronald Reagan would be literally throttling him at this point, you know?
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Yeah. Yeah. It's still beautiful. It's still, you have nice things that are there, but I know what you mean. Right now, for some reason, every time I move, I have an existential crisis. I'm like, this couch will be here after I die. I did buy a couch. It was a nice couch. You'll come sit. Have you ever visited my house, do you think?
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What in the world are they thinking? I'd love to understand what he's actually thinking. You know what I mean? I don't know. Anyway, they're just clown after clown after clownish thing. And Marco Rubio is at the head of the parade. Scott, let's go on a quick break. We come back. Amazon has gained creative control over James Bond. A big deal to Kara Swisher. And no one likes Mark Zuckerberg.
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Scott, we're back. Let's get to some more headlines. Amazon has gained creative control over the James Bond franchise. A surprise. A tech giant will form a joint venture with Barbara Broccoli, who inherited control of Bond, and her brother, Michael G. Wilson, who remain co-owners. But they seem to have given up creative control. Amazon, that was a big deal when Amazon...
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gained the significant ownership as part of its purchase of MGM in 2021. Bond movies have made over $6 billion at the domestic box office. They have to replace Bond this year, by the way. I don't know if you care or not, but I do. I think it'll be interesting. I think they've been very consistently good, the Bond movies, over the years. But I don't know who should play Bond from your perspective.
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Oh, really? Yeah. I think Idris Elba.
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I like the kitsch idea. That's not bad.
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Tom Hardy, okay. All right, all right. I'm going with Idris. Who do you like? Idris, I think he'd be really good. I know he's older. You're right, he's older. Maybe, who's the younger Idris? I don't know.
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He was spectacular. I love all the Bonds. I think he's been spectacular. I don't know. Sean Connery remains the Bond.
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No, it's not. I just, I watched them.
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I wanted to fuck Sean Connery, and that's not something I want to do. So I'm just saying.
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He was until he got silly. I love Bond movies. I don't know if he was one of my things, Bond movies. I own them all. I love them.
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All of them. There's not one. You know, different parts. Some of them are pretty bad. I think Goldfinger, for some reason, I love because, you know, Fort Knox, like, stupid idiot. Elon wants to go see the gold. What a fucking idiot he is. Anyway, someone who people don't like even more, speaking of which, Democrats and Republicans are aligned on one thing. Neither likes Zuckerberg.
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A Pew study of likability of the meta-CEO and Elon Musk found that 54% of U.S. adults don't like Musk and 67% don't like Zuckerberg, while Musk's results falls on party lines with 85% of Democrats having unfavorable views and 73% of Republicans feeling favorable, although I think that is falling.
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Mark Zuckerberg is a great uniter with both 60% of Republicans and 76% of Democrats hold unfavorable views. What is happening? What is happening?
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I think they all think there's Steve Jobs who did it successfully, but he did it with class and grace, right? I don't know. I think they all think that. Like Bezos too. He's like, I'm like, go home, go home, be with the kids, go away, like that kind of thing.
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You can do that. I have a TV in there. You can do whatever you want.
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The lights on, as they say. Just remember the lights on like Motel 6. As for you, Scott Galloway. Anyway, I moved my office into a new studio, which I built in my house. I moved the house. And guess who's coming to Washington to live?
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I know, but Mark should stop threading. He should stop showing up. He should stop pontificating. He's just bad at it.
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It's like you want to hear from the most annoying person you know.
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Alex Karp, yeah. He's an interesting fella.
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I just like, Mark, nobody likes you. They just don't. They've never have, not since the movie. And let me tell you, that tracks in real life, too, for people who don't know. Just like I could not get away fast enough from Mark Zuckerberg. All right. Although we like the chains, Mark. We do like the chains. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for wins and fails.
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Okay, Scott, let's hear some wins and fails. Would you like to go first or shall I?
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Well, the German election, I think, you know, even though Europe is going to have to pull its own, put its shoulder into it, the Conservative Party won, but the ADF did. This is a fail, I guess. What's happening in Germany is young people, they're voting for Europe. It's interesting because the left had a big surge.
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I'm going to read something from a friend of mine who's German who gave me some insight, was showing me sort of the election results by age. Young people really leaned into the left party 25% and 20% for the right party, which was interesting. So they're really going...
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The young people are going different directions, 18 to 24, versus the older people who stayed with the conservative party or the version of the Democrats. The Greens lost some ground. Obviously, the version of Democrats called the SPD lost ground. The CDU will now form a government, but they have to get together with others.
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And this is what my friend wrote, as expected, young voters voting extreme, highly influenced by social media, unclear how long it will take to build a government. Schultz, the chancellor, did the Biden by not stepping down in time. Big questions about the transatlantic relationship. Metz is an old fashioned transatlanticist, but with supporting ADF, we'll see a baseline.
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Yes, indeed. That's right. We're moving her in a couple of weeks.
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It's great that 85 percent turnout, a very vivid democracy, but 20 percent voting for an anti-migrant pro-Russia party. It was worrisome. I thought that was... But she was saying social media leads the left and the right to support extremes. So I'm worried. Germany is a linchpin of Europe. And they're really, as the new possible chancellor said, are on their own in lots of ways.
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So they have to get together. My win is the main governor who stood up to Trump, who was threatening her. I appeared this week at the governor's forum. Jared Paulus had me in. to talk about education, which was interesting to the group. And I met some very nice governors. But Maine Governor Janet Mills told President Trump, we'll see you in court during this exchange around transgender athletes.
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Exactly. We will be. So literally moving things around, including my mother. You think she'll appreciate it? I don't think so.
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He called her out specifically. And I think she's like, I'm going to run my state the way we have our rules. So He threatened defunding, et cetera. It just was kind of a gross thing, but I kind of thought that was badass of her. And then secondly, just very close for the win, people don't know, Roberta Flack just died. And I love Roberta Flack. I love Roberta Flack so much.
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And I think two songs, obviously the most famous for her is The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face. I don't remember when that was, Scott. And Killing Me Softly was his song. And that's what I think of you when I listen to that song.
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Yeah. It brought it down. Yeah.
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Run by a lesbian. Run by a lesbian.
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20, 20, a little bit over 20. Just where they thought. It didn't improve it or lessen it. It didn't increase it for sure.
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I briefly considered moving her into your Soho place and that you wouldn't know she was there, like in the back.
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The Canadians are the good people.
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No, it's the best building ever. It's like the ghost building, the zombie building.
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Yeah. Can I add something? Just today, before we're on, Apple said it will create 20,000 jobs and open a new manufacturing facility in Houston as part of a more than $500 billion investment in the United States. They're opening this Texas plant, assemble servers previously manufactured outside the U.S. This is according to the Washington Post. They're expanding data center capacity, et cetera.
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Now, just so you're aware, this is part of a thing that they announced in 2021 where it would spend $430 billion and add 20,000 jobs in the United States over five years. So it's an overlap with the latest announcement. I'm not really clear, but it feels a lot. He met with Trump last week, and this is obviously a version of that.
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I say hi to everybody. I say, come on over when Scott's here. Scott would love to have you over for cocktails.
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Thank you. I love it. I love the whole thing. Speech. Sing it, sister. I like it. I like the whole thing. Anyway, I agree with Scott 100%. They're a bunch of wimps and Please read my paperback coming out soon, a burn book, where I add a chapter saying thus. What a bunch of, they have just, oh, they're such selfish pricks. Selfish pricks and boss dicks. That's what they are.
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Everything has come around to you, Scott Galloway. Dicks, dicks, dicks, dicks, as far as the eye can see. Anyway, we want to hear from you. Send us your questions about business tech or whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com slash pivot. Submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. And all you Dan Bongino listeners, come on over to Pivot and we'll serve you much better.
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Okay. All right. I have enjoyed staying there. I'm going to ask you one more favor to stay there, but I'm thinking of buying a place in New York so I can be near or closer to you.
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Anyway, now that he's whatever he's doing. Elsewhere in the Scott and Kara universe, I talk with comedian Ronnie Chang for the latest episode of On with Kara Swisher. Let's listen. You don't want to be an edgelord, Ronnie?
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Yeah. Anyway, it was a great interview. He says hi, Scott. He loves you. Hi.
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He is. I'm having a lot more comics on because I just can't take any more shit.
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You know what? They're great guests. They're really smart. That was a really amazing insight into what's happening.
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Yeah, I know. It's true. It's true. Zip recruiter. Yeah. Yeah. I need to. Louie's graduating NYU. I'm going to need to stay there because I can't deal with the hotel.
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Oh, okay. All right, get them all on.
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I love Reacher, of course. I love the original Tom Cruise movies, and I watch it on Amazon, absolutely.
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Oh, yeah, I haven't got to get into that. I know you love those guys.
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Anyway, that's the show. We'll be back on Friday. Scott, read us out.
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Yeah. We'll have a big party. Or just show up.
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Arm believes the future isn't about technology. It's about people and the possibilities technology can offer us. The future is built on Arm. You can discover more at arm.com slash discover.
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They do. They're like, oh, yeah.
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Best hotel in New York. And you know what? The only good thing about moving is I was blessfully not paying attention to news this weekend, which was horrible. Let me just say there was so much bad news that it was lovely not to be paying attention to it in any way when you're moving boxes. So we've got a lot to get to today, including Elon's chainsaw moment. You had some very funny moments.
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Threads about that, Scott Galloway. And Trump installing another loyalist at the FBI. In fact, it just, it goes on anyway. And also this thing he did this week, Elon pulling yet another page out of his Twitter playbook, ordering federal employees, millions and millions of them, to summarize their accomplishments for the week or face consequences.
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Federal workers received emails over the weekend with a subject line, what did you do last week? Elon warned on X that a failure to respond would be taken as a sign of resignation. He has no right to do so, by the way.
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Several agency heads are pushing back on the directive, including FBI Director Kash Patel, I can't believe I'm saying those words, who told employees to pause on responding to the email. I'm not sure it's a pushback or not, but I'm going to read five accomplishment lists that are making the rounds on social media because some of them are very funny.
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This one from a Threads user gives us a look at Elon's possible list. One, took too much ketamine. Two, danced on stage with a chainsaw. Three, ignored my new baby mama. Four, laughed at my own bad joke. Five, neglected all of my children except the one I use as a human shield. He also neglected him if you saw pictures he took. He walked ahead of a four-year-old and sort of lost him for a second.
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We'll get to the chainsaw and baby mama stuff in a bit. But this one from Shannon on Threads cuts to the chase. Dear Elon, five things I did last week. One to five, your mom. Amy Klobuchar posted her five weekly accomplishments, which included stood with Ukraine instead of Russia. The other senator from Minnesota, they're very sassy in Minnesota.
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No, but I like the dick one. But go ahead.
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Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Cara Swisher.
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Elon's Ultimatum, Trump's Military Purge, and Amazon's 007 Deal
I am going to push back a little bit. I do think people have an experience that I've noticed a lot of sympathy for these people. If you notice these meetings that Republicans are going to and there's widespread reporting on this, people are like, you're a fucking dick. Like, why does he have to?
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He is getting very bad reviews in the way he's doing this because everyone works in the office, you know, from the TV show, right? Works in that place. And I don't think people enjoy the schadenfreude at all. I don't think they know it could come for them. They don't like when they have it.
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I think it has actually a good point to point out the stupidity of it and the incompetence more than anything else. Like another dick move, dick boss move is a very good way to put it. The other thing is to point out the inaccuracy of everything. Another word for incompetence, like we say 55 billion, actually zero. I think those are very good things.
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These people aren't even effective and they're damaging people. You can't go to your public park anymore. You can't do this. You can't do that. I think those are effective. I think here's how government does work for you. And that sort of gets people in the mode of liking government. Oh, wait, I did like that. I did like getting my check. I did like the parks working.
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Scott, I'm exhausted. And not just by Elon Musk.
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I did like going to Yosemite or whatever it happens to be. Just I think you respond to people. I did like when I could buy eggs at the store, all those things. And I think adding on to the it's not just the stuff around his car is every single agency. He has targeted our agencies the most, our agencies that have been investigating him. And that's an issue.
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And I think he's got a—his numbers in the polls are very bad. I would say very, very bad. And they may improve, but I don't quite know how they will. And they're trying really hard. The Trump people are trying, but it's not working particularly well. They think he's—because he keeps doing these dick moves, essentially—
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I mean, for example, his appearance at CPAC, Elon wore his black MAGA hat, sunglasses, and at one point wielded a chainsaw on stage that was given to him by Argentina's President Malay. His onstage interview was full of crazy stuff. Let's just listen to a clip.
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I moved my house. I was in an apartment. I'm sitting here in the empty apartment right now. And moving sucks, Scott Galloway.
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No, he's crazy. That was, and they were all, he was laughing at his own jokes and they're like, and that guy who interviewed him was such a suck up, was like, it was so awkward. Scott, as you said on Threads, this is like when your ketamine dealer finally gets back from Cabo.
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I know. I know. So what did you everyone talks about him being allegedly on drugs. That was some performance. He was on something.
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I don't know what it brings down. I think him not having good polling. He's in political spectrum thing now. It matters. Polling matters to these people. And if you're getting pushback, if you're a congressperson in like Bemidji.
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Oh, I don't think people were offended. I think they were making great jokes. I mean, I don't know. You had a good joke. People aren't offended by him as much as, like, what a fucking tool. Like, mocking.
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Yeah, yeah, that's a good one. Then I'll ignore Steve Bannon channeling his nemesis Elon doing the Nazi salute.
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There's no such thing. There's no such thing. It's a Nazi salute. Stop it. Stop it. I've deeply studied the Roman salute. There's no such thing. It's the Nazi salute. Anyway, he's facing legal claims from right-wing influencer Ashley St. Clair. who were paternity in custody of their alleged child. St. Clair revealed her child's existence on X a few weeks ago. I actually knew about it.
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I think I told you about it. And said Elon was the father. Elon has yet to publicly acknowledge his paternity, but court documents say he has done so in various written correspondences. Another kid, his daughter Vivian posted on threads, if I had a nickel for every time that I found out I had a new sibling,
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Support for this show comes from ServiceNow, which is enabling people to do more meaningful, creative work, the work they actually want to do. You know what people don't want to do? Boring, busy work. But now with AI agents built into the ServiceNow platform, you can automate millions of repetitive tasks in every corner of the business. IT, HR, customer service, and more.
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There's a question of what it does to the dollar. The New York Times pointed out over the weekend that Trump's trade war is leading to retaliatory tariffs that specifically target Trump voters. Nearly 8 million Americans work in industries targeted by levies, and the majority are Trump voters, a New York Times analysis showed. They include corn, car makers, poultry, steel mills, and more.
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Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. Happy belated St. Patrick's Day, Scott Galloway, even though you're Scottish.
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Consumer sentiment hit nearly a two-and-a-half-year low in March. Inflation is exhortations absurd. So talk about this, because this is a huge opportunity that the Democrats are not taking in any way.
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Yes, that's correct. So one of the things, though, I thought Besson, I was watching him this weekend, I thought he did so badly from a messaging point, speaking of messaging, I thought he looked
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rich he looked like scrooge mcduck i don't know why like a gay scrooge mcduck but it was really gay has nothing to do with it nonetheless um that's what he looked like to me but um it was a bad messaging like you you don't have any right to chinese flat screens americans i'm like you don't it's none of your business what i have a right to it was so snotty um i thought i was i was sort of surprised by that messaging
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And I thought he did a bad job on all the programs he appeared on. He looks like he's a rich guy telling poor people to suck it up. You'll appreciate later once we get through this. But I'm like, there's no pain for you anywhere along this route whatsoever. I don't know if that's resonant, but I was offended by him. And I got some money, right?
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We're not going to say where you went, but you went to an exciting wedding.
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I was like, wow, you're really obnoxious kind of personality. I think Wall Street was quite disturbed by him because they thought he was sort of the reasonable guy.
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Shut the fuck up. I was like, why is anyone saying to shut the fuck up? Because I was saying it to the TV screen. I'm like, I'm not in business when I want to buy plastic toys for my kids till the end of time.
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There's no diamond. I hope you didn't do that this weekend, Scott.
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Well, last thing on the economy, I saw the best animation over the weekend comparing Warren Buffett and Cathie Wood's strategies over the past four years. Warren Buffett's kicked some fucking ass, this guy. He likes value stocks. Cathie likes, I guess, growth. I don't know. She's up 67.
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Like, it's crazy. He's had his ups and downs, but hers just kept going down. Why do people listen to her? Did you see that?
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Honestly, I just love, Warren Buffett, look, he's super old and he's not going to last that long, but man, does he the fucking goat. I'm just saying, I just love that animation. Kathy Wood, you, I just was, I love a visual. I love a visual because you're like, see what I'm saying kind of stuff.
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Anything exciting happen? Did you, you know, do anything embarrassing for the team here?
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Oh, my God. I'm so glad you're going to teach again. You should. That would be a really good class. Anyway, okay, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, more agency cuts by the Trump administration. Last week, John Levitt joined me to co-host an episode of Pivot, and it was a great one. If you enjoyed that, you'll love his podcast, Love It or Leave It.
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Love It or Leave It is America's top late-night political gay live comedy podcast. John takes on the biggest and most absurd stories in politics and helps you stay informed while laughing instead of crying. Sometimes he cries. Each episode promises big-name guests, unexpected conversations, and can't-miss moments. Catch new episodes of Love It or Leave It every Saturday. Watch on YouTube.
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or join the live show in LA to witness the chaos in person.
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Scott, we're back. President Trump has placed another round of agency on the chopping block, including the Voice of America, or VOA. It's kind of a screw you to Carrie Lake, but that's another issue. I'm perfectly happy with that. The VOA, run by the U.S. Agency for Global Media, broadcasts United States domestic news to hundreds of millions around the world to extend U.S.
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influence and to combat authoritarianism. Carrie Lake, who Trump chose to run VOA—she was the one who keeps losing in Arizona— the loud, nasty lady who keeps losing in Arizona, was planning to transform the outlet to fight an information war.
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The cuts made in an executive order also targeted agencies which address homelessness, fund libraries, and promote economic development for minority and low-income communities. So basically everybody but the rich people. I don't know if the BOA cut matters. What do you think of this Voice of America cut? No big deal? Big deal?
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No, okay. What are you, like, D-list?
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Okay, you did those things for your lovely wife, I assume.
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It's the smallest amount of money to spend, one, to keep it away. We have a better story.
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And by the way, the media is good. It's actually very clear. It's, you know, they're like, oh, they're anti-Trump. This is the whole thing, you know. obsessing them. But if you're in... Listen, Kerry Lake, who, I'm sorry, is a village idiot, he was going to transform the outlet to fight an information war. Yes, Kerry, that's what you need to do, but not in your trumped-up, ridiculous way.
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It's giving people good information about the United States and what we're doing here. It shows we're present. It shows we care. It's like, even if it's... It's just very solid. I have listened to Voice of America elsewhere. And we also fund things like Radio for Europe, et cetera. I know there's some things, and I do think about this a lot, that are of a different era and we shouldn't do anymore.
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And that means your people can focus on the work that they want to do. That's putting AI agents to work for people. It's your turn. Get started at servicenow.com slash AI dash agents.
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Good, good. I'm glad. I'm glad you had a good time. Sorry I wasn't there. I was moving my mom into assisted living. which was not quite as glamorous.
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Like sometimes we have to change in things, but this is money well spent, especially when the Chinese and the Russians and other people are putting out all kinds of misinformation around the world and information about themselves, right? Not just misinformation, but look at us. Look what we're doing and stuff like that. And I just think it's just the best way to say, you know, here's America.
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We're still here. We still are great. And I just what a what a the only thing that I get pleasure in is she doesn't really have a job, but that's fine. Like, that's just my personal pleasure. But the cuts they're making are so targeted to things that make us better as a nation that it's really it's it.
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It's just a fend for yourself thing that's happening, which I think is not the picture America has of itself, or maybe they do now.
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And she wanted to bring all her skills as a news—she was on a local news station, Carrie. Sorry, I don't find you to be the top-level media thinker of our generation.
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Although it's a nice place. It's really lovely, and the people are wonderful, and they're in D.C. Um, and I have to say they handle everything. There's so much stuff to do and they handle. And let me just tell you something. Amazingly, the food at this fucking place is so good. I don't even know what to say. I like would go, I would go there every night. The food is so good.
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That's what you should do, America. You should do that. They're getting rid of all these democracy organizations. You know, there's a million democracy organizations.
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Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
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Now I understand, but it's a beautiful place. It's one of these high end ones. And, um, I literally, everyone's like, the food can't be good. I bring it back to Amanda and she's like, that's fucking delicious. It's like, I want to eat there. It's like so good. So anyway, I was pretty pleased.
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Actually, it's going better than I thought. I ordered my mom the New York Times and the New York Post to be delivered here, so that's a good sign. So she can have her daily intake of crap and good news, good, well-done news. But anyway, she has a beautiful place. It worked out as best as it could, and we brought her to the house for dinner, and it's working.
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, , , , , ,, the en P P P P P P P P P,實 , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , a P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P
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It's going to be a lot for Kara Swisher. This is the third tribe for Lucky, and it's going to stick. Let me just tell you, it's going to stick. Anyway, otherwise, I was moving into my house, too. So it's been a really glamorous meet, unpacking boxes. You've got a lot going on. I do. This morning, I was like, oh, I dropped Claire off, then went and got candy cakes for my mom.
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This is literally like four bad jokes. What is happening?
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Okay. All right. One more quick break and we'll be back for wins and fails. Obviously, fails are four penis jokes in a row. Okay, Scott, let's hear some wins and fails. I shall go first. I shall go first. Let me say a win. I know you're with him this weekend, but Severance is so fucking good.
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I love you, Ben Stiller. Let me just say, both Amanda and I, it's so incredibly dense, but also fascinating. utterly fascinating. And you think about it all week. It is one of those shows. And I got to say, I was like, I like a lot. I love The Sopranos. I like The Bear. This one has me thinking and thinking and thinking about all kinds of issues around identity, everything else.
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But it's also fascinating really gripping at the same time and entertaining.
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Let me just say, and I always can say, oh, that's going to happen next. When I watch White Lotus, as much as I like it, I know exactly what's going to happen, essentially. I don't know what's going to happen in this fucking thing. They're so inventive. I have to say, Patricia Arquette, they're all good on this show. There's not a person that's not good. The guy who plays Mr. Milchak, he's amazing.
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But I love this show. And Ben, kudos. And it's doing incredibly well for Apple. The audience is growing week to week. And it's not one of those small audiences that everyone's talking about. It's a big audience for Apple. It's making a ton of money. Kudos, kudos, kudos. These are people at the top of their game. I have to say, I think about it all the time. So that is my win.
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My fail, well, obviously, Chuck Schumer, because, by the way, his book tour events were postponed after the backlash. He has a new book out called Anti-Semitism in America, a warning that's been postponed for security reasons, apparently. But that's not my loss.
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Where Are My Testicles. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. I would say this ridiculous. Trump is always doing a ridiculous thing and a distracting thing. But his statement this weekend about Biden's pardons are void and vacant because of the auto pen. There's no power to undo a pardon in the Constitution or case law.
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If he wants to do all his stupid parts, I'm not a fan of the pardon system by presidents in any way whatsoever. I think they should get three, and that's it, and they can't get paid for it. But get your—just, like, stop with this fucking ridiculousness.
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You can't—and the way he does it, he goes, hereby declared in capital letters, void, vacant, and no further force than effect, because they were done by the auto pen— Fuck you. Like, honestly, like, this was even, for him, was a ridiculous, stupid thing to do. And he has a list of stupid things. So, like, look, if we're going to keep...
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Do you know those peanut butter things from Tasty Cake? Got those.
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these dumb pardons, just stop acting like, this is what occupies your brain, like good maybe, I suppose. So I was really irritated by that for some reason. Anyway, that's my positive and negative. Severance, fantasticness, Trump, as usual, distraction, distraction, distraction, and it's working, unfortunately.
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Who do you like in the Democrats? Can I ask you to pick someone? Chris Murphy is being kind of spicy, AOC.
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And brought her her series. I bought a series of, like, National Enquirer. She likes people, National Enquirer, In Touch. I was embarrassed at the giant food to buy those things, but I did. And then visited her and then came here.
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He's the one the Republicans are nervous about, I can tell you.
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Eunuchs. It's a word you don't use very often. I like that word.
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Okay, that's good. That's good. I love him. I have a heart for him.
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Oh, you're win and fail. Fail is the Democrats.
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Oh, my God, that's terrible. You know what, Scott? It's coming for all of us, let's just say. It's not good. Diapers depends be coming for you someday.
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Yeah, can I put something out there? So they interviewed, Politico interviewed Chris Lasavita, who was one of the campaign managers of Donald Trump. And he was saying how stupid Europeans are. I'd love you to answer this. He goes, we basically subsidized Europe for the last 50 years, 60 years of post-World War II. And of course, we did the rebuilding. We've done all those things.
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Anyway, anyhow, it's going really well, and I think she's having a relatively good time for her. Anyway, today we'll talk about the economy as the S&P tries to recover from correction territory, as well as the effects of the latest round of Trump's executive orders.
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We're able to create these social paradises where the government paid for everything they didn't have to pay for was their national defense. You know, at some point in time, the gravy trains got to end. Well, the gravy train's ending now. The Cold War's over. The balance of power shifts. All these things have changed. Politicians in Europe don't want to change.
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They sure don't want to change at the pace that's being forced on them to change how they go about spending. So it's going to create a new level of angst. And then he said, at the same time, they're arrogant as hell. I've spent time in Europe in the last couple of years. They still don't get it. They don't understand there's a new sheriff in town.
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And he's a very, very set ways and pensions about America first means we're first, you're second. I think this guy's a fucking idiot. Like he doesn't see what's actually, we're actually going to make them stronger by this, correct? That's what you argue.
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But first, big cracks are showing in the Democratic Party after 10 Senate Democrats voted with Republicans to avoid a government shutdown this past week. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer infuriated fellow party members by crossing the aisle to pass President Trump's approved stopgap measure.
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Christel Savita, you're an idiot. You're the arrogant prick. Anyway, we want to hear from you. Send us your questions about business, tech, or whatever is on your mind. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. Elsewhere in the Kara and Scott universe, I talked to Ezra Klein this week on with Kara Swisher. Let's listen to a clip.
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I thought it was good. His book is really interesting. It's about the government, the Democrats getting a set of balls, essentially. And I think it's an interesting book. I know you've interviewed him, too. Okay, that's the show. Thanks for listening to Pivot. And be sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel, which is doing very well.
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Prominent Dems such as Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wanted to force a shutdown to protest Trump and Elon Musk's federal spending cuts. Schumer defended his decision to Lulu Garcia Navarro of the New York Times on Sunday. Here's what he said.
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Yes, many times. He's very popular. He's like the media sexy guy now, and you have to really compete. You need to compete, okay? Anyway, we'll be back on Friday, by the way. Scott, do not sing YMCA and read us out.
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That is his excuse, although how did you get in the fucking situation, Chuck? That's one of the things I would say. He's not really a terrific leader at the same time. He has a point. At the same time, they're cutting down the government. They are anyway, slowly. This is a quicker way to do it. So talk about this lesser of two evils thing. I've been talking to both.
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You know, I think the Republicans got them in a jam is what they did. There's rumors that Democrats are urging AOC to primary Schumer. So talk a little bit about this, because I think it's two choices of despair with one of the Democrats talking about it. And there's a real shift of like, let them shut it down then, and let's see what people think.
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And then there are others of, oh, no, they're going to shut it down, trying to protect all your marbles. So any thoughts?
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Right, which we talked about. I mean, though Fetterman was also on the side, we don't shut the government down. Now, Ted Cruz tried to do this with Obamacare. Remember, he pushed that shutdown, and I know the Republicans suffered for it. In a similar jam, the Republicans were in a jam for years, right? They had this kind of situation.
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Right, right. Well, that's the argument, is that whoever initiates the shutdown holds the bag of shit, essentially.
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Democrats Divided, Market Roller Coaster, and Southwest Airlines
I think Obama was in control then too.
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Democrats Divided, Market Roller Coaster, and Southwest Airlines
I agree with you. I think we were right when we said that in Austin. Like, let them do it. Let the chips fall where they may. And I don't think they have a choice because this is going to be a playbook for the Republicans the whole time. Like, put them in a jam, put them in a jam, and use Elon Musk as the boogeyman. Well, let him be a boogeyman then, right? Just let him.
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Democrats Divided, Market Roller Coaster, and Southwest Airlines
Let him look ridiculous, rich. over-privileged, cutting people. And yes, they can cut all this stuff. And I get that there's... It's just when you're always playing defense and you're always trying to catch all the balls and stop all the eruptions, you are the loser in that game because they can just... They're acting like they're in...
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in the minority in a weird way, even though they're in the majority, right? They're doing the bomb throwing, the blowing things up, everything else, which is really interesting to me.
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Democrats Divided, Market Roller Coaster, and Southwest Airlines
Yeah, no, I think AOC seems to be very articulate on this. Like, here's what we do. Like, she seems to have a plan, like, in that way. And Schumer's is sort of like, well, we don't want them to shut down the government faster. I'm like, well, they're doing it slower. What's the fucking difference? Like... They're going to do what they're going to do until you win elections. That's pretty much it.
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Democrats Divided, Market Roller Coaster, and Southwest Airlines
Hakeem Jeffries kind of dissed Sumer, which was interesting. He was trying to get something going on the House on this topic and voted against it.
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Democrats Divided, Market Roller Coaster, and Southwest Airlines
Well, he did hold that group together to vote against it. It's just that all the Republicans stayed together. They weren't expecting the Republicans. It was only one no vote. So he did hold those guys together, right? There could have been some peel-offs among the Trump areas, you know, the people that are in those mixed areas.
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But he held them all together, and Schumer did not, and obviously worked behind the scenes to get 10 people to do what he wanted them to do. Which, oh, they're all old, I bet.
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Democrats Divided, Market Roller Coaster, and Southwest Airlines
And I feel like— Let them do it, and then let the media write about it, and let people freak the fuck out, and move the story back to Trump cutting government in half, right? That's what I say. So let's get to polls. It's interesting. This is on the economy, but there's larger polls here because I do think there's real opportunity.
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Now, this new NBC poll shows that while Trump has his best approval rating ever, the majority of voters disapprove of how he's handled the economy so far. There's so much weakness there. We'll talk about the market collection, but I'm going to read from Kristen Soltis Anderson, who I really do trust. She's a conservative pollster. And she said that everything's mixed all over the place.
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And, you know, he thinks he has a mandate. He thinks he can do all this stuff because he believes he has the latitude to go big and bold to create some turbulence and cause some prices to rise in the church as he asserts himself. But as I dug into Mr. Trump's polling data, it looked increasingly that American voters' mandate to the president was more narrow than he sees it.
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After a prolonged period of inflation with a Biden administration that told Americans not to believe their lying wallets, voters clearly wanted the next president to stabilize the economy and make their cost of living more manageable. And so she's putting out that this is a very big opportunity for Democrats. You know what I mean? That they don't think what he's doing is great.
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But this is a dangerous gamble. Mr. Trump's agenda is carried out almost exclusively through executive power and public opinion gives government control. Back to his opponents. The Affordable Care Act proved too difficult for Republicans to uproot because it is enshrined by law by Congress and many, many support it. Well, Mr. Trump's actions are products of pen and phone alone.
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So the number one issue of America remains the number one issue, and there are real political risks to the strategy that asked voters to grin and bear it at the checkout line today for a promise of something better tomorrow. That's what they're doing, the Trump administration. The S&P closed 10% below recent highs. It's now trailing major markets in Europe and China, as you've discussed.
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It's down about 6% since the inauguration, and Treasury Secretary Scott Besson said, who sounds like a MAGA now, called the correction healthy. Also, by the way, he has a $22 million house while he was saying, just suck it up to people. He was saying that the aftershocks are normal for a correction and you need to grin and bear it. That's essentially what Scott Besson said.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
doing that and something you think is you know good or meaningful to you but then the overall goal of this corporation you're working for might be totally nefarious yeah the goal of the billionaires tech billionaires is fascism as it turned out and greed right it's all about greed well power no power power is where it is but or they know better and they will tell us what to do and that's what this corp lumen is like that too we know we care but then they don't actually care in any way
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
So there's a lot about the unconscious as a model of knowing, separating you from doing severed, but not entirely severed, since a lot of it creeps into the consciousness, like the happiness he has in one world and deep unhappiness in the others, and the idea that it would seep into it. What does it mean to have two senses of knowing? And how does it impact directing the actors?
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Because the actors obviously have to be two different people when you're doing it.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
You know, years ago, I had a friend who was in one of those psychiatric things where they did therapy every day for hours and hours and was trying to find out, you know, all about themselves and figuring out where suppressed memories was. And they said, have you ever been to therapy? I said, never. I just, I don't want to know that much about myself.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. We're off for the holiday, but we're bringing you a great episode of my other podcast, On with Kara Swisher, my recent interview with Ben Stiller, whom Scott and I adore. Ben is the executive producer and go-to director of one of my favorite shows, Severance.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Like something like that, something offhand, which is probably rude to someone who's in intense therapy. And they said to me, they were a pretty unhappy person, I would say. And they said to me, you're blocking. And I said, it's working. Because I'm happy and you're not. Which was kind of an interesting moment. And I thought about it watching this.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
I thought it would be really interesting to watch this if you're a therapist of some sort, too. Like, how do you look at this? Because everything's about the conscious and unconscious and what bleeds into each other. Yeah.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Yeah, well, except in this case, they use an advanced piece of technology to create the sever, right? To create the suppressing of the unconscious or the conscious. But even though it's an advanced technology that's happening here, it seems like everyone in the show is living in the 70s, as you talked about. It's a retro set. The costumes feel older on all of them, really.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Talk a little bit about that, why you wanted the look and feel. There's also a lot of doubling and duality, which was there's people walking together, right? in twos, or it's a theme of two characters playing two different people. Talk a little bit about that, the look and feel of why you had the retro set and also the duality that's happening visually.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
We talk about all things innie and outie, and Ben also shares his thoughts about being an Elon Musk target. Enjoy the episode. Scott and I will be back on Friday. The M7 is a little, it picks up noise. It's a much better mic, so.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Yeah, it's got the Stanford Prison Experiment vibe to it, too.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Yeah, I went back and looked at the movements, and it's all duality. It's really interesting. But it also has a level of suspense, since there is what the viewer knows and what two different people know, and then the pervasive sense of withholding information in a total surveillance environment, right?
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
There's a lot of misinformation happening here in this environment, largely by the Lumen executives, who are not severed, by the way, who know both sides.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Yeah, that's good. You're very manly. It's great. Okay, good.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Mm-hmm. Right, absolutely. I mean, it's also a return to work story, which is sort of in the news right now, this idea of return to work. Did you understand that at the time? You had a COVID period in here when you were making it.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
I don't remember any of that. I don't remember. Blocking is working. Someone's like, do you remember that? I'm like, I don't.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
I don't remember that. It's not going very well right now. We'll get to that in a minute. But no, blocking, it's working. I want to get into the business of this in a second, but do you have a character you particularly like? vibe with on the show?
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Hi, everyone, from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. This is On with Kara Swisher, and I'm Kara Swisher. Today, I'm talking to actor, director, and producer Ben Stiller, someone I've gotten to know over the past few years and really enjoy talking to. I really enjoy the second season of his hit series, Severance, and it's finally arrived after almost three years.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
The Defiant Jazz scene was my favorite when they were dancing. So awkward. I've been at that party. I've been at that office party where they have cake in the office. They do pineapples here.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Quite good. He didn't do his, you know, biting his lip enough.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
So I want to talk a little bit about the business. Have you been surprised how popular it's gotten? I know Succession got more popular in the second season, right? And Severance was Apple's first new series order after the company launched its streaming service. And it was trying to do an HBO thing. That was very clear. A place for big talent to come and make what they want with big budgets.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Now, Severance is reportedly costing a lot of money, and there have been cuts at Apple pulling the budget down. as the second season was being produced all across the way. But at the same time, Parrot Analytics was noting that you might be generating $200 million for Apple in terms of subscriptions and everything else. And at the same time, you're about to maybe announce your third season.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
I liked the first season, but the second season has really taken it to a new level. This is Apple TV's dystopian workplace comedy thriller about a company that's taken work-life balance to the extreme. In the world of severance, employees at the company called Lumen can choose to sever their brains into two selves, one for work and one for living.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Talk a little bit about the calculations here of how you look at it, because it used to be so much easier. Now, you made mostly movies over TV shows. But talk a little bit about the calculations, because it's a weird economic environment at the same time.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Oh, they don't. No, they don't ever tell you the analytics.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
And it always felt like a good- Well, it looks like Apple headquarters, but go ahead.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
When they clock in at 9 a.m., their brain is wiped clean of the outside world. And when they clock out at 5 p.m., it's wiped clean of work. I just love this show. I can't explain why you have to watch it.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
So you don't know, I mean, I'm just, this paired analytics is pretty accurate, $200 million for Apple in terms of, you don't know.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Yeah, does that change your, you know, going to Apple saying, I want more money, I want... No, I know, because honestly, I feel like they've been great.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Did you have any problems working for a tech company?
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Yeah, versus a Hollywood. Yeah. This is a whole new change with these tech companies, sort of Amazon and Apple.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
It's about a lot of things that are going on today, but it's a lot of things that have gone on for a while, and it's about who you are and the unconscious, and it's also very, very funny, which is the best part of it. Ben is the show's executive producer, and he's directed many of the episodes, so we're going to get into the themes, big ideas, and creative choices that have gone into the series.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Yeah, like Amazon. The creator of Transparent called me once, and I said, you're selling toilet paper. That's what you're doing.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Yeah. So what are the chances of a third season? You did get Tim Cook in an ad. That was a good sign.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
He pretends he's not a ham. He's a ham. He seemed to like it.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
So at the same time, there's the Netflix phenomenon, right? They regularly beat all the other streamers, more top 10 shows combined than all of them, despite the quality and reviews that Apple gets. They'll pop up anything, Netflix, like really pretty much. Now, you guys have been doing a bunch of marketing.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
You had the season two pop up in Grand Central Station that was hysterical, where you put them in a glass box and had people, had them do their work in the glass box, which was great.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
For three hours, and you were outside, people were shooting pictures of you at the same time. How do you, does everything now go around Netflix in that regard, or is there, streaming is sort of starting to settle, I guess, but maybe not?
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
which is written by a man named Dan Erickson. It's his first outing, and what an impressive outing it is. Severance is also a success for Apple TV. It's reportedly generated $200 million for the streamer. We'll talk about his experience working with the tech giant, get his views on how tech money is impacting Hollywood.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Well, you've made both types of movies, right? Sure.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Even more existential. In that vein, there's a question not from me. Every episode, we ask an outside person to record a question. Here's yours.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
That's presuming you have existential dread.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
and how Trump's return could affect the ability of artists to get their stories made. On that note, our expert question this week comes from Bloomberg reporter Lucas Shaw, who writes a weekly newsletter called Screen Time about the collision of Hollywood and Silicon Valley. So stick around.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
What didn't feel so... You had noted it in the New York Times interview, though, that when a decision is made, it's never explained to the creative person, or usually, if it is, it's not usually the truth, et cetera.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
But I do think you're right. The bosses don't know what's going to happen, right? That's the problem is they really don't know. And going back to existential jet, coming up with the guardrails for use of AI in filmmaking are important points in negotiation. The actors and writers strikes. We've talked about this. There was some recent controversy with the Oscar-nominated film The Brutalist.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
They use AI to correct the Hungarian accents of its lead actors. Do you think about AI's potential impact on the industry? Are you thrilled by it? Is there a line in your head that shouldn't be crossed when applying? I suspect you might lean into it. I don't know why I think that. Maybe not.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Well, they take your image a lot. Zoolander, all your different parts. I've often seen... That also happens.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
So you recently joined me in a not-so-exclusive club. We've both been called names by Elon Musk. I am seething with hate and an asshole, in case you're interested. I'm not going to repeat what he said about you. You know what he said about you. We're not repeating that word. Because I'm a good girl, okay? I don't say that word anymore. I used to when I was a kid. We don't do it anymore.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
But he seemed upset that you endorsed Kamala Harris and then... after you wondered in an interview whether Tropic Thunder could be made today, and I wish there was, as you know, I'm desperate for Tropic Thunder 2, he wanted you to be more upset about how Woke is a supposedly ruined comedy. Talk a little bit about this moment.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
I have no idea what that means. Do you think he's on the up and up now these days? Because he makes so much sense about everything he does.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
So tell me why, because he was retweeting a Daily Mail headline that read, Ben Stiller says woke America killed edgier comedy. That's not what you said at all from what I could read.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
It is, absolutely. The two of them together.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
He wanted you to agree with him that Tropic Thunder couldn't be made. Isn't that awful? It goes with the narrative of isn't everybody trying to stop us because we're the greatest victims on earth. Us rich people are the greatest. I think that's down that lane, something like that.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
He wanted you to agree with him, I think.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Yeah, but you don't. Okay. But one of the things that people are worried about is a Trump chill in Hollywood. Now, obviously, that's happening in tech. Everybody showed up at the inauguration, all the tech richest people in the world. New York Magazine recently quoted an anonymous producer who said there's more fear in the executive suites now than there's ever been.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
There seems to be a pulling back. Disney pulled a trans character, for example. Is there any indication for you that Hollywood executives would be more hesitant to fund projects with political messages, quite a few of yours have them. Now, besides sports that you endlessly blue sky about, which I don't understand any of your references, you're also very political. You don't shy away from it.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
I believe they're a basketball team in any case. You are a political, but do you think about that at all?
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
What about the art itself? Do you think how it will be impacted by the time we're in, if you could look forward? I know I interviewed Rachel Maddow recently, and we talked a bit about her podcast about Nixon's corrupt first vice president, Spear Agnew, called Bag Man. It's being adapted into a feature film you reportedly set to direct. Do you think about doing, are you directing that?
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Does it make you want to do more? Because I mean, angels in America came out of Reagan, right? It came out of that anger. A lot of that art came out of this.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Is there something that inspires you now at this moment? Because, I mean, do you feel more – I don't feel like you're going to be making Night at the Museum 7 at this point or whatever we're on.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Oh, your heist movie. What's it called, heist?
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Oh, wow. Well, I don't think anybody ever heard that. Oh, wow. Good to know.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Right, and Spear Ragnew is quite a character. He's such a fantastic character. That was a great podcast. I like all of Rachel's podcasts a lot.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
So my last question is where we go is this idea of influences you now, or perhaps before. I know your mother and father, the great Jerry Stiller and Ann Mira, she died in 2015, I think that's right, and he died in 2020. You're working on a documentary about them right now. Can you talk a little bit about this?
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
And I imagine they gave you a lot of advice about entertainment, business, and storytelling over the years. Is there anything about their careers from your perspective that endures and what influences you today?
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
And when does that, where is that coming out?
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
So last question, what then influences you today about doing this from them? What did you come away with?
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
On with Kara Swisher is produced by Christian Castro-Russell, Kateri Yochum, Jolie Myers, Megan Burney, Megan Cunane, and Kaylin Lynch. Nishat Kerwa is Vox Media's executive producer of audio. Special thanks to Kate Furby. Our engineers are Rick Kwan and Fernando Arruda, and our theme music is by Trackademics. If you're already following the show, you get a pineapple.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
If not, you get the dance experience, and you do not want that experience. Go wherever you listen to podcasts, search for On with Kara Swisher, and hit follow. Thanks for listening to On with Kara Swisher from New York Magazine, the Vox Media Podcast Network, and us. We'll be back on Thursday with more.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Ben S., welcome and thanks for being on On.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
That's obviously a severance reference for people who don't know. This show is about a world in which you can become a different person during working hours. The person is called your innie, and it is you, but your brain wiped of all the details of your outie life. So the innie is you, but not really you. It's without a lot of information or background.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
I'm just curious, have you ever thought about what your innie would be like?
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Well, you know, it's interesting because some people's innies are not. Like on the show, like Helly's is quite angry, right? She's instantly angry. And her outie is also angry in a different way.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Right. So you wonder where that comes from, right? Because a lot of them do, and then they suddenly get rebellious pretty quickly, all of them by reading books or going down the hall to see a potential boyfriend or whatever. They lose their They become outies pretty quickly, I would say.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Right. And a cynicism that goes with it because they're beginning to see things. So would you ever do get severed? I'm just curious. I was thinking, I was talking about with my wife, Amanda, like, would you let it happen? She said it would be impossible to sever me because I'd be the same irritating person.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Right. It's also, I go to hardware stores and browse. I do. I love them. So to be clear, you're not the writer of Severance, but you're executive producer and have directed quite a lot of the episodes. But you have been the driver of it, it feels like. You were supposed to star in it, and you said you prefer to either direct or act, but not both.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
So what attracted you to it and the writer, Dan Erickson?
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
What was the thing about it? Because if it reminded you, by the way, you are the voice of Keir Egan, right?
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Right. I mean, it's sort of like you put Mary Tyler Moore in an absurdist, a Sartre.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
play or something a little bit of no exit I guess because it's it's also a lot of friends of mine they're like I don't want to watch it it's too scary it's a thriller I'm like no it's a comedy but it's also sci-fi it's romantic it's dystopian it's absurd you've called it a workplace comedy is there I feel like it's
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
It also has a, I don't know how old this guy is, but do you remember one of the last Planet of the Apes, like Beyond the Planet, not Beyond, when they're sort of in Century City?
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Battle, Conquest, I don't know. I do remember that. It had that really cheap feel, but also, you know what I mean, in those weird places.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Or Omega Man. It had a little Omega Man. Omega Man, for sure. Yeah, with Laurel Charlton Heston.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
But there's also a sense in the moment right now that big tech controls us, but this is about big corporations controlling us, which is not an uncommon trope. There's been a million movies of that. In this case, it's with cooperation, though not full disclosure, which is what tech is like right now in a lot of ways.
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On with Kara Swisher: Why Ben Stiller Made Severance
Well, it's a maximalization of what is work even for, right? Like, what's the idea of what works even for when you're just a cog in a larger picture of it?
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I know it's bad. I think it is actually a hollowing out, not just of the regulators of Elon, although I think that's very clear. What is the percentage, the actual numbers? It's a very small amount. He's not saving any money. I mean, the whole thing is kind of a faint. It's a misdirect. It is a misdirect. And at the same time, they were going to pass this tax law anyway.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
They were not going to not pass this tax law. And I do think the Democrats, as we talked about last week, focusing in on Elon is good politically because he's disliked from poll after poll. The polls are very clear. So I'm not so sure it's the smartest idea to have this... This misdirect is different than DEI crashed planes versus something else. I do think it's at the heart of what Trump's doing.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
And I think he's... antagonizing a lot of his base. And by that, I mean people in Washington for no good reason when he could get these things passed no matter what.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
They do. There's always that sentence. Like, of course, we're all for government reform. If you notice, they always do that.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
He does look like his soul has come out of his body.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Yeah, we'll see. It'll take a while to get him out. Elon is a bit like mold. So let's talk about how Elon is influencing the business world by moving his Texas here to Texas. He's not the first to do it. Now Chevron, KFC, and Meta are talking about putting their HQs here. The governor of Delaware, where most Fortune 500 companies are incorporated, is now scrambling to keep companies there.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
What the fuck are you doing here?
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
You and I have talked about that. You have talked about being a good thing because Texas is more business friendly versus other places. I assume other states will try to do the same thing. Wyoming, I know, is doing that. Nevada. There's certain states that are doing that. Do you think Delaware is over as a place to do business?
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Why do they schedule us at 10? That's what I was thinking.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Would you move to Texas? Florida hasn't worked out as well. The whole Miami tech thing is sort of a bust right now.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I understand, but that didn't take off.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Is that fair? Well, maybe Austin does, but I know that. I'm aware of that. I'm aware. But let me say, I worry about my family a lot, like in different certain states. I love Austin. I love this area. But you have a state government that's hostile to my family. So it's really hard when I'm making—Florida, forget it. And I'm even worried in DC, my kid's in a DC public school.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
And, you know, she brought home, they did like a little diversity moment where they were just, it was coloring, a coloring thing. And I thought, oh, wow, one of these fucking senators from some state who has no values that I have are gonna try to mess with my kid's education. I think about it all the time. And then I'm like, great.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Yeah, it's just, you just, you have to be thinking really hard about where you want to raise your kids and where they're going to attack your family. I mean, I just, I think about it. I didn't think I'd have to think about it again in my life, except now I do.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I get it. But anytime a state can talk with me, I'm very aware of it. And it's one of the reasons I love California and stuff. But I get it. I get it. There's definitely a cost-benefit analysis, but I just find I'd rather be in states that support my family. That's all. So you think a lot of states will move here? You do. You do think they'll move?
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
No, it's her house. She has a house.
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You guys are building like crazy here. What in the hell is going on? I've never seen such, like every time I come back here, I think there can't be another building here in Austin. And then there's another fucking building.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
It's her house. It is. That's right. No, she's $8 million. She's $8 million.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
It's getting a little much, I'll be honest with you. All right. Let's go on a quick break. When we come back, we'll have more for you.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Yeah. That's not rich by these people's standards.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Yeah. All right. Okay. She doesn't trade stocks. Anyway, how is your South by Southwest?
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
And I interviewed Senator Elizabeth Warren where we talked about co-presidents Trump and Musk, the attack on government watchdogs like the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Trump's proposed crypto reserve, and how Democrats can fight back.
Pivot
Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Okay, Scott, we're back. On Friday, President Trump held the first ever crypto summit at the White House.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Can I just tell you, there is no way you could do what I do. See, the crowd agrees.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Let me just say, if you understood what's happening here, you're the pretty one, incredibly. You're the pretty one who just sits there and says things.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
No, I'm just kidding. Get us out of this now. You probably cry. I've never thought about having sex, just so you know.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Yeah, I'm just... Yeah. It just seems like the inevitable end of our relationship.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Suddenly we'll look at each other. It's like a movie, like a Hallmark movie. I just ate! Okay. All right. Okay. Now we're back. Okay. President Trump held the first ever crypto summit at the White House. Crypto experts, lawmakers, administration officials gathered as Trump declared a war on crypto is over.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
A day earlier, Trump signed an executive order creating a strategic Bitcoin reserve and separate digital assets stockpile. The reserve will be established with Bitcoin that has been seized from federal law enforcement. I don't know how much that is. During Trump's second term, the SEC had already closed several investigations. into cryptocurrency firms.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Sam Bankman Freed, if you saw him on Tucker Carlson the other day, he's hoping to get in on that forgiveness. The disgraced FTX founders have probably been campaigning for a pardon from President Trump. I bet he gets it. What do you think of the reserve? And will you be thinking about more crypto investments now that this is happening? You and I have been sort of
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
in and out on whether crypto is good. I ultimately think it's probably more, some of it's okay, some of it isn't. Some of the people in crypto find this disturbing, the way they're doing this, in the way they found the Biden administration to be too difficult in terms of rolling things out.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Which they're also trying to do, a sovereign fund. He's talked about that. Why?
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Because a lot of people felt the Biden administration had been hostile, especially Gary Gensler, who you and I both talked to. that they had been hostile to the development of it, trying to overregulate it. I do understand why their inclination is to regulate it, because it's currency, it does affect other parts of the economy.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Would you buy Bitcoin right now?
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Vegetables. Oh, God. I am jet lagged. I am jet lagged coming back from Australia.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
You told me that. Yeah, I bought it at the beginning. People know this story. I bought it at the beginning. I was writing a story about Wences Casares, who started Zappo. And I bought 10 or 50 Bitcoin. I don't know. But it was like 50 bucks each. And it must have been 10 because I spent $500.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
It's not in a drawer. I don't know where it is.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Yeah, go get my mother or do something.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
From Spotify. Anyway. By the way, Netflix is getting into podcasting.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Just saying. No Bitcoin for us. All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break and we'll be back with our next big story.
Pivot
Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
All right, Scott, we're back with our next big story. All right. You won't take a shot. I have liquor for you.
Pivot
Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I do. I make the big bucks. We're back with our next big story. Let's talk very quickly about IPOs. I want to get to the questions from the audience. I want you to be brief here. I know it's difficult for you. 2025 was expected to be a big year for IPOs, thanks to Trump and his pro-business, anti-regulation administration.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
But with tariff whiplash, regulatory changes, inflation concerns out there, we're not seeing an IPO just yet, although StubHub and Discord are reportedly getting ready to dip their toes in the waters. Some other long-rumored is Xi'an OpenAI and SpaceX. Is it a good time to go public? It doesn't seem like there have been any.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Xi'an, for example, is facing some headwinds with Trump, ending the de minimis loophole that allows them to ship cheap goods from China to the U.S. without paying taxes and import duties. Where is the IPO market, briefly?
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
And will it come back with any of these? Some of these are promising companies, obviously.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
There's also the lack of interest in being public. Because of regulation. It's not the thing you want anymore because of regulation, because of public-facing things. I bet a lot of these companies may go private. Do you ever see one of the very big companies going private?
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I think they're doing a lot more weed is what's happening. There's a lot more weed out there.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I'd just say that's my impression for my children.
Pivot
Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Yeah, that's interesting. All right, get ready to ask questions. Taylor, bring out the liquor, please. Thank you. Scott, you're going to have a shot. You promised. Thank you.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
You can do it. This is Taylor, everybody. Taylor Griffin, who is amazing. She's one of our, go ahead.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Anyway, she's amazing. By the way, take a moment. All our staffs on all our podcasts are amazing.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
No, they're great. They have to put up with Scott, obviously. Thank you, Taylor. Okay, give him the big one. I'll take the little Texas boot.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Give him the boot. Okay. Give him the boot. Give him the boot.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Yes, I'm not. Yes, because I want to have my way with you. Okay.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
All right. Okay. Let us begin with audience questions. Everybody, line up here, please. Stand up and ask questions of us. Start walking. You can ask anything you want. Anything.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I think is important is actual narrative in stories. And I think one of the things that's attractive about our podcast is you follow us over time, right? And I notice when we talk to our fans, when they come up to us, they like the story about us, about our relationship, not just, you know, and they like the whole story.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
And I think as we follow things and we learn and sort of start to analyze, it's not a bad thing necessarily. Obviously, sometimes we worry about the Elon-ness of it. Like at this point, we get it, but I got to tell you, we're growing. Like it's hard to, it's like Trump. You're sort of like stuck in a situation. He really is consequential. And so you can't ignore him.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
But we definitely think about how to be fresh and not repetitive. And that's hard because you have to come up with new insights all the time, Scott.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
But it's hard now because they're really fucking in Washington, these assholes. I mean, it's really, I always joke.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Yeah, it's hard not to, they're there. And, you know, David Sacks is deciding on this idiotic crypto reserve. You've got, like, they're all wandering. I live in Washington now. I moved. And then there they are, like the top day. And I'm like, fuck, how did they get here? Yeah.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
No, I'm not. You are so much leftier than I am these days. But go ahead. You think? Yeah, really. You've become somewhat of a San Francisco lesbian if I had to be honest. You have gone rather left. You're more, I'm more expecting the Trump people right here. Let's get through as many as we can. Go ahead.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I'm so jet lagged. I'm fine with it. Go ahead.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
That's a great question. I'll start very quickly. I think it's critically important. They do it in Europe, like all the time. And it's not, it's without the shame of it. There's something in this country thinking that college is a better option. It's just stuck in the minds of parents, I think, in a lot of ways. I have a son who I would love to be a chef, for example, and go to school.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I don't think, he happened to like college and it went really well. He's gone and he's graduating this year, my oldest son. But I do think, I thought a lot about like if he wanted to do other things, For my other son, college was critical because he's going to be in fusion energy and he needs to be trained and stuff. But it's definitely getting this.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
For some reason, there's a stink on the idea of it in this country. And I don't know why, because these are great professions. They're very difficult. They're AI proof in many ways. Right. And I don't know why there is a sense that that's not the way to go in this country. Right.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
That's how it happened. All right, I'm going to cut you off. Sorry. We're going to try to get—
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Yes, yes. It just did. It just did. I love you, Anna. I'll answer. I just was in Australia and they're terrified of Elon Musk coming over there and doing something like or Trump getting paying attention to them, especially on their online safety bill that they passed. And they're worried about they're they're absolutely worried about him funding.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
They have a less active right wing group there, but they're worried about him funding. uh that group uh he's gonna do it all over the world i don't see him stopping i i think this is his he thinks i don't think it was particularly effective in germany as much as the the amount of i think it was a negative effect with especially with the most charmless person in politics they doubled their results
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
All right, question. How many women are asking men out? Just curious.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
They did, but it was already on the way. They thought it would be more. They thought they'd really goose it. But J.D. Vance is the most charmless politician in existence right now. And I think that, you know, when they said Hillary Clinton was likable enough, when Obama said he's not likable enough. That's why I don't think he's the next president or whatever.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
But but I think that he will continue to do so. Scott, briefly.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Oh, it's nice. I'm just curious. Why can't that happen?
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I think you're doing it just right. I think your country seems reunited. I can't believe Doug Ford is attractive as a candidate right now. I think you're all pushing back in a really terrific way.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I think you handled it very well. Okay, here. Short answer, Scott Galloway.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I think the problem is older men. One time my son said, and I think this is a common thing, is we should send old men to war rather than young men, and maybe they'll stop. Like, you know, he was making what seems to be a pretty obvious point.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I think we really have a problem with the people above them, and it affects younger men, as anyone who has a young man as a son or relative or something like that knows. But I do think getting people to change at a higher level is much more difficult, as anyone knows, like when you're dealing with someone like that. It would be great, but I don't think they change.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I think they get worse and more stuck in their ways. I don't know. Very briefly, because I want to get to the rest.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I'm sure you're right on the statistics, honestly. But you should do that. Everybody should ask each other out. My sons were both asked out by the girls. They are now seeing their girlfriends.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
All right, we'll end on that one. I'm going to do one thing. I'm going to bring up a woman because we've had all men ask questions. So, sorry. First woman right there. Go ahead, yeah. I don't really care what gender you are.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Why don't you show your stomach? Like, as if that's the most attractive part.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
The Democrats need a Project 2029, a really serious one, and get ready to put it in place. All right. Sorry, we only have time for one more question. Sorry, right here. Sorry.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
It's a good car. We don't think it's not a good car.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Do you know what I think you need? Oh, God, here he goes again. Do you believe in love at first sight? No, no. Or should I walk by? Oh. Do you know what I'm thinking right now? I'm reconsidering the possibility of doing another four-year deal with Scott Galloway, but I've just re-reconsidered it.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Robin Denholm, the chairman, just sold a hundred and some million dollars.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Yeah, there's some really good Wall Street Journal reporting on this, on not just the money they've made as a board. It's really quite unprecedented. This is not a board of directors that has any independence in the way you think about a board. And most boards are not, by the way. But this one is a particularly... in the tank for Elon, and they've done well because of it.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
So the shareholder that they're most interested in is Elon Musk, and that's it. And the company has suffered because of it. And when it goes, you know, we'll see it goes down. But if he has a great car that comes out or suddenly robo taxis work, that would be great. I just don't see it at this point going forward.
Pivot
Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
It's like an episode of White Lotus. Thank you.
Pivot
Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
He is. I just wanted to mention. Voice cameo. Face for radio. Yeah.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Well, it's really about you. White Lotus is about people like you, just so you know.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
You're more Steve Zahn, I think. Anyway.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
That's correct. And he's not going to do that right here for you people, right? No, we're not going to do that. We're not going to do that. Anyway, I'm sorry. We can't answer any more questions because we've got another podcast coming up. That's all we have. Thank you for listening to your favorite podcast on your favorite podcast platform. And for watching us on YouTube.
Pivot
Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
We're killing it on YouTube. This is for some reason. I don't know why. We'll be back Friday with more Pivot. Scott, please read us out.
Pivot
Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
All right. You know what? We're going to end up together in like.
Pivot
Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Yes, I'll be wheeling you around.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Yes. And then I'll keel over and you'll be sitting there like by yourself. No one's going to want to talk to you. Anyway, speaking of shots, we're going to do shots here like we promised. I don't do shots. Really? Really?
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
What do you mean you don't do shots?
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
You literally just told him to drink and now you don't do shots?
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
You're going to do a shot today.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
You're doing a shot because it says don't mess with Texas.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
We're going to fuck with Texas today. Anyway, as I was saying, we're doing our thing. We've got a lot to get to today. We're taking questions from the live audience of which are going to be most of the show. But we want to talk about a couple of things following the news that Trump is reigning in Elon Musk. Neither of us.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
And Doge, let's talk about how Elon's actual business they're doing as he dabbles in government. SpaceX's largest Starship exploded this past week during a test flight. That's the second time it's happened. He does blow up a lot of rockets. Tesla sales and stock price are down and the company is at risk of bleeding cash.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Is this business missteps happening because of his role in government or in spite of it? How do you look at these? Because the and then Sterling, which may or may not go public, we'll talk about that in a minute, has seen competition from China, from Jeff Bezos, from all kinds of stuff. What's happening here?
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
But taking your eye off the ball, because there are now competitors, there's going to be increasing amounts of competitors. Will the same thing happen? Is this political collocation a good one for him? Because they may use Starlink at the FAA. They may use, but they were buying Cybertrucks for some reason for the State Department.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
You don't think so. What will happen then to Tesla from your perspective? Just a downward slide. I mean, they have to obviously update the cars. They're talking about self-driving, full self-driving. They're talking about robo-taxis, which already are in effect here with Waymo for years, actually.
Pivot
Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. This is a live broadcast. As we said, we were going to do it here. We're very excited. We always have a great time at South by Southwest. How is your South by Southwest, Scott?
Pivot
Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
So where's the benefit for him in this? kleptocracy you speak of
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I think that, too. I think people who are buying it are repulsed by it or actually repulsed by it and are not. But, you know, you see all these stories and actually you're seeing violence at Tesla facilities, not just there, but at charging stations. The cars are getting defaced. I think people are embarrassed to have them. I mean, the Uber thing is simple.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I actually don't, won't take a Tesla Uber. I just don't, I don't like the cars actually myself. I find them, it feels like I'm sitting in the inside of an egg. I know it sounds dumb, but if you're in there, it feels sterile. And I don't, if I'm going to pay more for a car, an Uber, I want a nice comfortable car. But that's besides the point.
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
I think it's just a brand destruction is what's happening. And he doesn't seem to mind because I think he's bored with his other businesses, and this is interesting to him, what he's doing. But the pushback is real from the thing. Do you think that's the case with him and Marco Rubio? There was a very funny SNL skit last night on that. Do you think the pushback is actually real?
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
People keep predicting he and Trump finally—
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Elon's Empire Struggles, Trump's Crypto Summit, and IPO Slump
They're actually real. They are actually getting fired.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Steve, thank you. That's very sweet. I'm four-term limits on Supreme Court justice. There's a number, I think it's 16 years, something like that, that I think works, or a certain age. I think probably age gating would be what I would do on the top end. I guess 75, I suppose, would be, I think, fair. Maybe even 72, maybe 70. I don't know, somewhere in there.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Number two, I think he will try, but I think he's going to be old. I think he's already, even though he seems vigorous, he's been nodding off. I don't think he really wants to govern. He just likes to make pronouncements. So in four years, I don't know if he'll be capable. I think that doesn't mean they won't try to prop him up, like Weekend at Bernie's, kind of do a pull of Joe Biden, essentially.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
And I think he likes to talk about it to bother us quite a bit and to show he has power over picking the successor. He may try to pick one of his kids. That's something I can see happening easily. Not Eric, obviously, not Tiffany, but Ivanka or Junior. So I don't know. I think that's what he'll try to do more than anything. Scott?
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
What's the age? Pick the age.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
70, you're probably in pretty good shape if you take care of yourself.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Sometimes I sleep a long time. I might want to sleep after this show. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
There are exceptions. Like, for example, I love Robert Reich right now. I love this whole Robert Reich videos. He's lively. He's informative. He's 78 years old. Certain people just shine. Sure.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
No, I'm just saying it depends on the person, but you just have a basic age. I think 75 is probably pretty fair, but I can make an argument for 72.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Yeah, no rock Trump and with Trump.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Like I said, I think he's going to try to get one of his kids in. I think he's also old. I think he, I literally, you can see, you know, again, he's a vigorous declining person.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
He just says things off the cuff. I think he's declining. I think he's, I think it'll come fast too. He's kind of like Reagan. You didn't see it and then you saw it kind of thing. He seems vigorous, certainly, but largely because he's, that's the way he's going down. But he's, To me, he's turning into, he'll be an old man in four years, no matter how he slices it. He just will. He just will.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
And today we have a listener mailbag for you because we love our listeners. We love our fans. By the way, everyone's come up to me in the past couple of weeks. Thank you. I appreciate it. And they all say hello to Scott. But now we're going to listen to them. So let's listen to the first one. Hey, Scott and Kara.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
All right, Scott, one more quick break. When we come back, more listener questions.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Scott, we're back with more listener mail. Let's listen to another one.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
You're clever and interesting. Go ahead.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Agreed. And we reach more people. We reach more people.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
And we wouldn't be very good. We'd be just so bad. Like a staff. Can you imagine staff? Like, I hate staff. That's the thing. And you're shy. People don't realize Scott is really shy. Interestingly enough, I had coffee with Andrew Yang the other day, who talked about you, Scott, in very kind ways, and who ran for president. I was asking if he was going to do it again. He might. Right.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
I thought that was interesting that he did it. It certainly helped him get name recognition and everything else and bringing some good points. They had a lot of people like him and don't like him, but he definitely got his points out, which were interesting. Then I talked to Mark Cuban about it because a lot of people are asking him. He polls incredibly well for president.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
I agree. I've been trying to get him to run for president. He seems, on the record, off the record, it's the same answer. I don't want to do it. I can have more impact doing what I'm doing. Actually, Mark, I think you could have more impact rather than for president. I do. In your case, you could get those prescription. You could do course plus or you could be president and do it.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
We want you to run it. He polls really well. He's the anti-Elon.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Yeah, that's right.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
People talking to you? No. Oh, my God. I'm shy in a very different way. I don't want to hear from people a lot of the time, although I love fans.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
You have to go beyond it. You have to go say, look, I have enough, and now I'm going to stop this nonsense. Let me just say, I think you should pick a spicy one. Jasmine Crockett. She just really communicates in a way that I think is tough and smart and also just double sassy, just something like that.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
I don't know what's going on with her, but I turn my head whenever she says something, and she handles it really well and goes just far enough. So I think you should give her some money. That's my feeling.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
All right. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back with one more listener question on jet lag.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Well, well, well, well. Let me just tell you something. We have producers, and we have great producers and writers and researchers. Scott has a bunch. And they give us a whole script of information, some of which we use, some of which we don't, but it's at our fingertips. We also know a lot of stuff. We also ourselves know a lot of stuff and have been covering things or talking about them.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
I don't sleep as much as other people. I don't know. I don't have as much as sleeping.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Four hours, five hours. Sometimes I sleep a long time. I might want to sleep after this show.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Mm-hmm. Martha Stewart's the same way. She's telling me. I don't know. I don't have any tricks for jet lag. I just get on the schedule. That's the only thing I do is wherever I land, like when I'm landing in Australia soon, I'm going to get on their schedule no matter how tired I am. And so I get on the schedule and that's what I do. Can't think of anything. You would know better than I. Yeah.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
But Scott, you can talk about what you use. I know you use ChatGPT and other things much more than I do. But we have lots of amazing people. For this show, I'll call them out. Lara Naiman, Zoe Marcus, and Taylor Griffin, for example, and Scott.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
So one of the things that people are, if you want to go for other things, there's certain things people recommend. There's something called Fly Kit that has kind of things like that. A lot of people say you should eat high protein when you get there, low carb meals. There's all kinds of tricks. There's a lot of great stuff online. Um, other people talk about fasting.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Some people said eating lights, they think you should wear the, some of the glasses sometime. There's, there's all kinds of things. Um, but there are also just some, some hacks of, of doing them. And I think, um, I do overnight things cause I want to get home to the family and I know it's going to, uh, it's going to affect me, but mostly two, two things is that I get, I get on the schedule.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
You just can't, you see to help you regulate if, You stay awake when the sun is up and you go to sleep if it's down and you drink a lot of water. That's another thing. That's always the answer to everything. Drinking water. Anyway, that was a great question. And let's move on. Before we go, some messages we've gotten from Canadians recently. And let me just tell you, we love Canada.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
We don't want you to be the 51st state. You're a great country, no matter what that is.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Just that jackass Elon said. We should be the 11th. We should. We would like to join Canada as the United States. So let's listen to our Canadian friends.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
I am coming to Toronto soon just for the donuts. We love Canadians. One more along the same lines.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Oh, I'm crying, Scott. The Canadians are so nice. If Canada did that to America, we'd be like, we're going to come up there and cut off your heads. Instead, they're like, thank you so much for being nice to us. Like, that's why they need to run our country.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
That was great, Scott. Many people mentioned that. That was a really great thing.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
And where's Whistler? Where's way up in the mountains up there? British Columbia is so beautiful. So beautiful.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
We don't want you as a state. And also Banff, that's where I went, Banff. Scott, what country are you going to suck up to next?
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Okay. Well, I'll visit you there when you're in Orlando.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Okay. All right. Anyway, we really appreciate all the questions, especially from the Canadians. Thank you so much. Send us more. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question. Oh, by the way, Scott, my first marriage was in Canada because they wouldn't marry gays here. I love Canada. It's the best place. I married in Niagara Falls.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
I did because, you know what?
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Let me just say what happened was they were so hostile to gay marriage here in this country and so mean. And we had already had Louie. I had already been pregnant. I had Louie. We go up to Canada, get married and like we go to the like the clerk and we're just poised for anger at us. Right. And instead they're like, oh, this is great. We're so happy you're going to get married. They were so nice.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
And it was such a big fucking deal to me that they were so decent. And it was like 30 miles from the fucking United States. It was such an asshole to us as a family. Right. And it was just, the whole experience was lovely. And then we went to see, went on Maid of the Mist and every single person was amazing. There was a donut store next door to where we had married. The donuts were delicious.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
And that was a big moment for me because the kindness, it was needed, especially starting a family. Anyway, thank you, Ken.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
You ruined my beautiful marriage story with the terrible blowjob story. Once again, once again. Niagara, the ED drug for women. You were wonderful to me at the time. It meant a lot.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Those were great questions. Send us more. Go to nymag. I love these listener mail things. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. Okay, Scott, that's the show. We love our listeners. We love our fans. Please continue to come up to Scott and tell him to stop telling dick jokes, but I think that's never happening. Eh? Eh? We'll be back on Friday with more.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Please read us out, Scott of Canada.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Yeah, but we do work from scripts, but we're very loose with them. At the same time, they're critical and necessary, so we can give you the right facts. We have fact-checkers, by the way, also, so that if we get anything wrong, and by that I mean Scott, we can check them very quickly or change them. There's time on that. A lot of podcasts do not do that, but we do.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
I'm not getting divorced ever. My wife is wonderful. Anyway, Scott, the next one comes from a TikTok employee. How exciting. Let's listen.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Bye. I think there's going to be a deal soon. If I'm going to make a prediction here, Scott usually makes his predictions, but I think there's going to be, it's being, the process is being run by J.D. Vance and Mike Walls. And I think they're trying to figure out if there's a way that the bigger U.S. owners, probably be Elon or Ellison, Larry Ellison, or something like that.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
I don't know what to say. If Elon buys it, do you want to work for Elon Musk? If Elon gets the big shot, which of course he's grifting around all over the government, so maybe he'll get it. Do you want to work for him? I think you have skills that are transferable everywhere in terms of what you're doing at TikTok.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
What a great product, away from all the mishigash around the ownership and the Chinese government. So I don't know. I might wait and see to see until the deal is done. Scott?
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Support for Pivot comes from Arm. Have you ever wondered what's powering your smartphone or the other devices we interact with daily? And what lies at the heart of life-saving drug discoveries and robotic surgeries? The answer is Arm. Arm technology is moving the world forward, enabling AI to create a more meaningful, more connected life for everyone, everywhere.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Okay. All right. A good one. Okay. Well, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, more listener questions.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Arm believes the future isn't about technology. It's about people and the possibilities technology can offer us. The future is built on Arm. You can discover more at arm.com slash discover.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Scott, we're back with more listener mail. Let's listen to another one.
Pivot
Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Wow. You know, we talk a lot about the Department of Government Efficiency. Companies have been doing this really recently. They've seen that they can really cut people and don't need them as much as they did. And so they're taking the opportunity to do so. Every company's got to be looking at the costs. Scott and I were with someone recently who said he's going from 6,000 software engineers.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
It's not just affecting middle management to 2,000 next year. I mean, I think everyone's looking for what they can make do with and not to just ruin it. They don't need as many people with AI. They don't need as many people. for what they're doing, and they're trying to put efficiency in. And you're going to see this happen everywhere.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
And if you're a company, that is your job is to, of course, they'll pay themselves more. That's what Meta just did. It just gave top executives more money. And meanwhile, they're doing layoffs. So even the very successful companies are doing this, not just the ones in distress.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Right. But I do think companies are finding ways to successful and not just really efficiency.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Also, you have to know what your leverage and value is. You should always, even the negative parts.
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Trump Term Limits, TikTok Status Check, and Scott's Presidential Prospects
Shut the fuck up. That's correct. Scott, say nothing. All right. Next, this one comes from Steve. Let's listen.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
No, it's called distributed negotiations, where one is a winner and a loser. I was reading a whole thing about his negotiating style, which doesn't work on the international stage. This is what Cuban said. He's going to say, pinky swear you will protect our border and buy more booze and stuff from us. They will say yes, won't actually buy the stuff, and he will declare victory, Trumponomics.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Let's listen to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau essentially called Trump's actions a betrayal of our alliance, which he just said.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Can you put a camera in your house so I can watch that? Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher, and I am in San Francisco and was on a flight last night having to read about Doge working all weekend taking over the government.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
I don't know. Anyway, that's a very good—he's also gaining. He's had to leave because of pressure from conservatives, too. And now they're all joined together. Just some more things, and then we'll move on to the next thing. Larry Summers has called the tariffs against Canada and Mexico inexplicable and dangerous. He's usually right about things.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
He's an economist, obviously, a well-known economist. Trump acknowledged it could cause some pain, but how bad could it get? As we said, alcohol, food, cars, toys, pretty much everything— These terrorists will also target that de minimis provision that allows packages of less than $800 to ship to the U.S. duty-free. That loophole has been a boon for Sheen, Taimou, and others.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
I suspect he'll be a paper tiger here, correct? I mean, do you imagine? I think that he's going to do exactly what Mark says.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Because he was. He was prices down and tax cuts, I think. And none of those things are on the thing. It's DEI at the FAA and tariffs and destroying the government, essentially, which seems to be taking advantage of his chaotic friend, Elon Musk.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Let me go through the other ones that happened. Over 8,000 U.S. government websites have been deleted, a result of Trump's ordered end programs to promote gender ideology. Information about vaccines, hate crimes, and veterans' care has been removed. Among the removed, 3,000 pages from the CDC, 100 pages from the FDA.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Oh, I have a bunch of things to do here. I'm speaking in front of a group from Columbia University Journalism School. I've got some appointments. I've got a whole bunch of stuff I'm doing here in San Francisco. I like to come and visit the place every now and then to find out what's going on here. You love it there. I do. I do. I don't have a lot of time here this time, but I'm excited to be here.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
200 pages from Head Start, a program for low-income children, and 1,000 pages from the Department of Justice, a lot around January 6th. Obviously, USAID was the other thing that was happening. Looks like they're closing it down. They went in over the weekend and took control of the agency, which they're trying to close down.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Apparently, Elon said on X, on Spaces, I guess, that they are closing it down. And they also tweeted it should die. It was a criminal organization making all kinds of accusations. Sounds like he has a band of Teenagers, young people helping him do this, troublesome.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
They are claiming that nobody without security clearance got access, but it sounds pretty middle of the night on the weekend, which he bragged about saying one of his advantages and superpowers is he works on the weekend. I work on the weekend, but I don't consider it a superpower.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Yes. Let's go to the sites.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Oh, come on, Scott. I'm sorry. It is. It's a war on lots of things. The stuff they're taking down across the government is, it's not just poor people. They're trying to like abrogate, to eliminate other, anyone else that has, remember, they're taking down like they have Black History Month or Gay Pride Month.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Well, that kind of stuff, it's the same message. If you read Project 2025, it's not just, of course, it impacts poor people, but it also impacts the idea of any kind of identity beyond, you know, veterans need to veteran, you know, CDC needs to CDC, don't talk about anything else. It's an idea that has driven them crazy, which is that we should celebrate diversity, I guess.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
It's a broader obsession that they have with this issue. And that's how you led to sort of the FAA thing, which is it had to be diversity, equity, inclusion that caused these crashes, even though we haven't had a crash in a very, very long time when those things were in place. which probably is a tragic accident. That's really what it is, and that's what happens in life.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
But I think it's a bigger ideological attack of things they're trying to eliminate in schools. Let me just say, my kids are in a public school in D.C. I am very nervous they're going to start meddling with the education system She came home and was talking. She said, oh, I learned the word diverse today. And I said, what does that mean to you? And she goes, oh, they were all different.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Anyway, it was a long weekend. Listen, this whole Doge thing has got me off to a bad start. But I am glad I'm in San Francisco, that's for sure. How are you doing?
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
And she wasn't using race. She was like, oh, we're all different people from each other. And it's good to be, you know, to have differences and it's good to have things in common. It was a very, like... chalk, vanilla, strawberry way of thinking about it. But I was like, oh, they're going to take that out of her education, just the word, which was frightening in a lot of ways.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
No, I know. I think they're going to do a lot of meddling in education.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
I very much think they're going to go after marriage. This is the hallmarks of all of it. I think they're going to go after that. They're trying to get it to the Supreme Court, just like they did with affirmative action. They're trying to get libel cases with the press.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
There's certain... This obsession about gender ideology has really twisted them in a way that's really... It's just twisted them in ways that I think is much more at the heart of ideology than just, let's attack the poor people. I think they have a real... They want to push back so much of the stuff
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
that has happened over the past couple of years, probably including among their children and everything else. So we'll see where it goes. But taking down pages is really just about, it seems so needlessly cruel. Let's go on a quick break. When we come back, we'll talk about winners and losers from the latest round of big tech earnings.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
We'll talk a little bit more about what Musk is doing by being not the second president, the president. Support for Pivot comes from Coda. We talk about startups a lot on the show, but turning your back of the napkin idea into a billion dollar business requires countless hours of collaboration and teamwork. It can be difficult to build a team that's aligned on everything from values to workflow.
Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
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Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
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Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
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Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Which place? What's that? Why? Who is at Walt Disney World?
Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Scott, we're back. We're recording this Monday morning. The U.S. market just opened a little while ago, and the Dow dropped 600 points. NASDAQ is down 2%, S&P down around 1.75%. Global stocks are also plunging. Scott, what do you think about this? Not a surprise.
Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Yes. Wall Street thinks you're an idiot, Donald Trump. It's been a few busy days for tech earnings also. Let's go through it to sort of line us up for that. Apple reported blockbuster earnings for its most recent quarter, but the numbers show a slight dip in year-over-year iPhone revenue. Probably not a surprise.
Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Showing Apple intelligence did not boost sales that they had hoped, although it introduced sort of at the end of the quarter. Microsoft reported a 12% year-over-year rise in revenue, although its cloud business is slowing. And Meta beat expectations, with revenue rising 21% in the last quarter. Really big performance from Meta.
Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Tesla mostly missed expectations on earnings and revenue, with $25 billion in quarterly revenue. Automotive revenue fell 8%. These earnings were announced during the initial deep-seek frenzy last week. There's questions about the AI spending plans. Microsoft has earmarked $80 billion for AI this year. Ometa has pledged as much as $65 billion.
Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Oh, nice. That's really nice. Yeah. Yeah, February is going to be a big month. It's going to be a big month and it has been in Washington, as I said, but it's just, it seems very active. It used to be a lot slower in the winter. Now it seems crazy. Maybe it's just I'm tired from flying all night and then being here.
Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Let's talk about, obviously, tariffs probably may or may not affect them. And At the same time, they've pledged fealty to Trump in one way or another. Another thing to throw in is metas or brilliant talks to reincorporate in Texas or another state, according to The Wall Street Journal, out of Delaware. It has to do with certain lawsuits that Mark Zuckerberg is facing, I believe.
Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
But Texas seems to be the place where they all have is their safe space. Thoughts about the earnings?
Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Do you see any effect of the deep-seek? That came at the end of the quarter, obviously, and it did shake up the stock market and people worried about the spending.
Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Oh, of course, Ted. Wait. Yeah.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
You were on that board? What?
Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
No wonder what happened to it. No, sorry.
Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
But that's why we're so close, you see.
Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Okay. All right. That's an interesting reference. Okay.
Pivot
Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
Yeah, I'm sure. We have a lot to get to today. May I start off by saying something? Someone who is a big listener of ours wrote me, and someone they knew died in that plane crash and said we were a little too glib about the plane crash, making it political. And I thought about it, and I really do think we were trying hard to separate it from the politics. And there's no getting around it.
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Trump's Tariffs, Elon's Government Takeover, and OpenAI's New Funding
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He says he's doing it on the president's orders.
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This is a terrible tragedy of people dying. I get it. For a lot of people, it's been turned into a political thing. And maybe we did a little bit more than we should have because we said we weren't going to. So I wanted to bring that up. I don't know how you feel about that. But I wanted to say these families are finally finding everybody there. They still have not found everybody in the Potomac.
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There are very little. It's interesting to see whether you saw those protests in Germany or not seeing them in this country. But Musk's favorables are quite low, really quite low, considering a lot of people look up to him, which is interesting. Because it does look, especially with this crew he's got around him, it feels like a movie someone made up, right? Some of this stuff. They're all kids.
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They're all kids of some sort that are around him or people that work for him. They're all his people that are coming in and demanding to see everything, demanding their, you know, they're like the evil genius bar, essentially, that's going into all these places. And they did take over what was essentially the genius bar for the government, the U.S. Digital Service, and they've renamed it the U.S.
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Doge Service. And that gives them access. These were already set up, these offices, in every federal government facility, in every department. And, you know, some of them literally was just a camp counselor and One kid did this astonishing computing around decoding these ancient scrolls, brilliant people who had brilliant coding skills and brilliant computer skills. But it's this sort of team.
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One guy is called Big Balls. That's his nickname, which I doubt he has them. That's what his nickname is. I bet they're small balls. It's just, the whole thing feels so bizarre and people are freaking out because I don't think many people can do anything, right? What do you do when he does this? It doesn't feel like Congress has a handle on it. The Democrats do not control Congress.
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It feels like it's a plain sight, just this is how they're going to go through every federal agency and do this unless they're stopped by courts, which is interesting. Now, Ezra Klein was making a really interesting argument, which I like. I'm going to read from it.
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There's a reason Trump is doing all this through executive orders rather than submitting these directives as legislation to pass through Congress. A more powerful executive could persuade Congress to eliminate the spending he opposes or reform the civil service. to give himself powers of hiring and firing that he seeks.
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To write those changes into legislation would make them more durable and allow him to argue their merits in a more strategic way. Even if Trump's aim is to bring the civil service to heel, to get rid of his opponents and to turn it to his own ends, he would be better off arguing that he's simply trying to bring high-performance management culture of Silicon Valley to the federal government.
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You never want a power grab to look like a power grab. I thought that was exactly on point. I don't know what you think. He's calling it weak. This is a weak flex.
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That's not good for him.
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He's his junkyard dog. That's what he is. He doesn't care what he does to get there.
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But reading these stories this week of these families was really heartbreaking. I found it. I found it very heartbreaking.
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Something has to shake it up. Something has to shake it up.
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Yeah. This is what he did at Twitter. This is the same tactics. You know, one of the things that, you know, when they were talking about, oh, look, the word fork in the road is in the letter. Elon Musk wanted you to see that. He wanted you to know it was, you know, it was me. Tell them it was me. You know what I mean?
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Like, he wants people to have us and the journalists to write that he's trying to copy what he did at Twitter, right? Which a lot of these moves... You know, remember he seized the systems, fired people, took over people. There was worries about privacy. It's the same kind of playbook that he has. There's sleeping in the office. That's his favorite thing to do.
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Apparently they have beds at the Office of Personnel Management. Bringing in his cronies. This is the same, you know, it's like watching Fast and Furious over and over again, except they're a bunch of geeks, I guess. Yeah. This is what he wants to do. But I agree with you. I do think it's the mark of a loser. And he wants to be seen as a king.
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And so he's sicking this guy on people and to scare them. And I'm not so sure they're so easily scared. I think this FBI agent that pushed back a lot of these people at these agencies are pushing back. And we'll see if Congress has any kind of balls, which they don't. in any way. They kind of like it in some weird way. The Republicans certainly do.
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And the concerns, of course, are privacy and the ability for these people to download all this information about people. We'll see what explanations they have, of course, but let's just say Scott and I don't trust them on First Blush. All right, one more quick break. We'll be back for wins and fails. Okay, Scott, let's hear some wins and fails.
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Scott, it's not helping Americans. It's not helping Americans. That's the stupidest argument. It does help Americans.
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I can't even. It's the cruelest. It's the cruelest and most petty and small-minded of cuts. There's so many cruel and just like cutting, like we talked about last week, cutting the security details of people who worked for this country. It's so petty. It's so small. It shows you this shiver of a little heart that we have at work here.
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Canadians are booing us, people. Canadians don't boo anybody. Let's just say Canadians. They're booing us. They're booing us. Anyway. All right. I'll start with mine. My win obviously has to go to Beyonce on her album of the year. Grammy win.
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Watching the Grammys was great. The vibe they had was like, fuck you, all of you. We're going to be black. We're going to be interesting. We're going to be talented. We're going to be enjoyable. There was not a lot of, the vibe was so good at the Grammys. I'm sorry. I didn't even know it happened. They weren't doing a lot of the like virtue signaling at all.
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In fact, they were just like, we're fucking better. We're cooler. We're so cool. We are so creative. Anyway, Beyonce's at the top of that. I love Cowboy Carter. I love that album. There's a lot of albums I love this year. Kendrick Lamar's was I liked a lot. But this one I really enjoyed and played it over and over again. She's been nominated four times in this category.
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This was her first album to win it and deserve it. Go listen to it. It's really a wonderful album in lots of ways and really fun, actually super fun and really moving and everything else. So congratulations, Beyonce. I know it's been hard for you to make it in this business. I also really enjoyed watching Taylor Swift dance her ass off throughout.
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She made kind of a little, like an adorable spectacle of herself dancing with kids, dancing in coats. And also Janelle Monae did a Michael Jackson. It's everybody. And Lady Gaga did an amazing duet of California Dreaming with Bruno Mars. Really wonderful. The whole Grammys was wonderful, wonderful, wonderful.
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My fail, besides this ridiculous antics of Elon Musk, which continues into the fucking millennial, make Elon go away is a really good thing to happen. He should go to Mars again. I think he should realize his dream. We should spend all that foreign aid money we're not spending on sending him to Mars immediately.
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But was an interview that Mitch McConnell did with Leslie Stahl on 60 Minutes, which is under attack because the owners are trying to pay off Trump through settling a lawsuit, as we talked about last week. But this is a great interview with Mitch McConnell where he goes, you know, she's like, you wrote this and this and this about Trump being a terrible person.
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He goes, well, that was a private conversation. And then she goes, well, it's in your book. And he's like, yes, it is. Yeah. He's just this guy had every opportunity to stop Trump in a very significant way and did not do so. And it mystifies me that he could act like he doesn't like him. Just he doesn't get the right not to. He facilitated Trump.
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And to try to pretend he didn't is really—he's a loathsome toad. He really is, of all the people. Because you can't hate someone and then be the reason they're still here and give them the lifeline that he richly did not deserve. So, Mitch McConnell, you also should go away. You really should. You've been a real—
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Exactly. You're no John McCain, my friend. You're just no John McCain. And I just act trying to be like that right now. I don't know what he's going for, but I would like his tour to be over and I'd like him to go back to Kentucky and just get the fuck out of here. Just leave. It's all your fault, Mr. McConnell. Anyway, that is my fail.
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Complex topic. I did an interview with him many years ago, and I think what he uncovered was astonishingly disturbing about the government spying on citizens. So in that way, a good thing. In a bad thing, the way he did it, I think there's all kinds of hair all over him in ways that are disturbing.
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I have talked to many national security people who find him to be a traitor, and they have very persuasive arguments. I have a hard time deciding about that. I do. Even after doing the interview. And I hate to say that because I think that in many ways he is, and in many ways he isn't. I don't know what to say. That's where I am. I don't know what else to say.
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I think it's a complex topic, let's just say. And they did make reforms after he did it, but at the same time, The way he did it was traitorous too. Why did you ask that?
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I'm usually with the national security people on this thing, and I think he did hurt our national security apparatus.
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I just have a smidge of I don't love the government, what they did. So anyway, we want to hear from you. Send us your questions about business tech or whatever is on your mind. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. Elsewhere in the Karen Scott universe, I talked to Ben Stiller about severance on On. Let's listen to a clip.
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Right. It's also, I go to hardware stores and browse. What do you do to sever, Scott? We already know, gummies, breath work, what?
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I so want to see that. I so want to see that. Can you put a camera in your house so I can watch that? And then I will sever watching that. That would make me happy.
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I would like to sever doing that. I would like you to do that for me. I want that as a gift. I want a video where I can watch it over.
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I don't know what else to say. Anyway, that's the show. We'll be back on Friday for more. Scott, read us out. Dance us out.
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No, I get that. I get it.
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Yeah, not at all. Let me just say, I would avail myself. Sometimes you can complain about media, but these stories about these people, and I read a bunch of them, are wonderful, especially this group of skaters and friends. And it's... You know, I know plane crashes do get more attention than other things. And as you say, not as many people die, but it's such a sort of horrific way to die.
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And the way it becomes a spectacle is also horrific. But let's just remember there's people on this flight. That's all I want to say. I did that after 9-11 too. I read so many of the biographies and stuff like that. And you don't do that for everybody every day of the year who dies. But in that case, it gives you a real sense of, mortality when those happens to everybody.
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And it just was, anyway, we're sorry. That was not our intent. And let's hope we figure out what happened and stop accidents like that because Scott is right. Our air travel is safe comparatively going forward. Anyway, we've got a lot to get today.
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Trump set off a firestorm over the weekend, slapping 25% tariffs on goods from Canada, Mexico, and 10% on China's products set to go into effect this week. What do you think, Scott?
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He wants to be the 51st state. There's that thrown in there, the Candidacy.
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Right. All right. I mean, the Mexican president, who seems much more aggressive than previous presidents, was making the point, stop wanting drugs so much. Do something about your own drug problem within the country and the demand, which you never do. There has been an effort by the Mexican government to slow all that down, right? There has been progress made.
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Just to note, we recorded this episode on Monday morning. Since then, Mexico has announced that it has struck a deal with the Trump administration to put tariffs on hold for a month, which is exactly what Mark Cuban said would happen.
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But again, this seems like in Trump's head, and I've read economist after economist, that it's just like this is the world's worst thing to happen to everybody, and it will be a tax. You know, there were a couple of...
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anchors who just doesn't seem to know math it'll be a tax on the american consumer that they're not going to get through tax breaks because the tax breaks are going to the very wealthy they're not going to uh and this is a direct tax on the american consumer it's really quite something and the price of everything all this weird i had no idea that so much stuff
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And I know that we're doing lots of trade up vaguely, but in terms of when you start to get the specifics of what we import, fresh fruits and vegetables, gas, obviously maple syrup, things like that. But some of it, you know, cars that go back and forth across the border. I was vaguely aware of that. But it's really, we are, they aren't the 51st state, but they sure as hell aren't.
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Just another country. That is true. And I think the same is Mexico. We have so much trade with them. And there was a hope that we'd put more technology engineering there so it was closer and less at risk than in China, right? He thinks it's a negotiating tactic.
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And one of the things, let me look it up, Mark Cuban said, which I thought was smart, is that he'll make some calls and call them off right away and then declare victory, essentially. You know, do a pinky promise. I think that's what he said.
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that he was tough and then he can take his win and go home, essentially, which it sounded like a pretty reasonable idea of what this idiot's going to do, essentially.
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This is from China, for people who don't know.
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But not in this case. So one of the things that's interesting is which firms are agreeing and which firms are not.
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To me, that's really like, why has these others saying no fucking way and the others are going along with it? And that, to me, is a really—and then what it does to their businesses. Because I don't mean to be rude, but I don't find lawyers to be the most, you know, backboney of people. Like, journalists are a different thing.
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When they start suing journalists, they may stick together, although we'll get to that later. They aren't in the case of the White House Correspondents. They're not joining as a group. But I do think that they—I'd really like to understand why—
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others, you know, even though they're trying to stop these punishments and federal judges are blocking these efforts, why certain groups did it and certain groups didn't? Because presumably they all have the same business problem going forward.
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He also wore a cheese head at one point. He didn't look bad in the cheese head, I'll be honest with you. Most people don't look good in cheese heads, so I guess that's a pro. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine, the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher. Scott is off today, and in his place, I got someone much more superior.
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I don't know. If I were the law firm, it's four years. I better do what he wants for the next, and then later I'll get him.
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So it's coming and going. I think it does create a really interesting situation for Democrats to whether they're going to be as bullying going forward. And you don't think they will. I think they will.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Well, where they're attacking is law firms, judges, media. It sort of makes a lot of sense. And it's very strict. It's a very strict effort to like stymie law firms from defending press people, for example, things like that.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
But that's, they also like money quite a bit, Jen. I don't know if you know that. I understand that. We'll go on a quick break. When we come back, Elon hits the campaign trail in Wisconsin and also acquires his own company.
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I brought in Jen Psaki, the host of MSNBC's Inside with Jen Psaki, who also has a new podcast, The Blueprint, which is excellent. I recommend everyone to listen to it. We're doing a little crossover event because I was on her show this weekend. She promised to bring dirty jokes in Scott's absence on the show.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Jen, we're back. Elon says the destiny of humanity rests on the Wisconsin Supreme Court election, which is happening Tuesday afternoon. Elon appeared at a town hall in Green Bay, Wisconsin on Sunday, where he gave out million-dollar checks to two Wisconsin voters. He also wore a cheese head at one point. He didn't look bad in the cheese head, I'll be honest with you.
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Most people don't look good in cheese heads, so I guess that's a pro. But I think it looked okay. I think it worked for him. Okay. And blamed George Soros when he was heckled, which is kind of ironic since he was paying people to be there. The Wisconsin Attorney General did try to stop the giveaway, but his suit was rejected by the state Supreme Court just before Elon's event began.
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Elon and his affiliated groups have now spent over $20 million to help the conservative candidate in this judicial race. We're recording a day before the election. I'd love you to assess his political. If you're in a political suit, how do you think his communications are? How do you think his impact is?
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By the way, there are also two special House elections in Florida this week to fill Matt Gaetz and Mike Walz's seats. The race for Wall's seat is tighter than Republicans expected, although both Republicans are expected to win there. Talk to me a little bit about what the Elon effect is happening. Again, there were Tesla take-down protests all over the country, some very creative.
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And it's ongoing, and it's really affected Tesla stock as much as President Trump and others are trying hard to stop it.
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Do you have any? Do you have a dirty joke that you promised on the air last night?
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So money, just money. Do you think, I mean, his destiny of humanity, I think he's done this about, I've heard him do it 27 times in the time I've known him. It's like, if Tesla doesn't survive, humanity is doomed, he told me once. And I was like, okay, all right, sure, Chad.
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And one of the things that's, he's very dramatic about this, but isn't it positive for him to be so, like, imagine a Democratic president and say Reid Hoffman decides he wants to be next to the president at all times, you know, and there was a little bit of pushback in the Obama administration when Eric Schmidt was there too much, right? He was buddies with Jim Messina.
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I think they were on, like, speed dial. Yes, exactly. So how do you deal with that? Do you think it's a good thing, or has it gone too far here? Everybody says they're going to have a breakup. They are. You and I disagreed. I don't think they're going to break up. Why would they? Their money is good. He's a heat shield. Those are my arguments.
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So why no? Tell me, I'll tell you my yes in a second, but why no from your perspective?
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
I mean, we've got a lot to get to today, but like, how is it going there? Now, explain what you're doing. You're doing 103 shows for MSNBC. Is that correct? Or what's the... Approximately.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Right. And how do you eliminate, excise someone like that? Just so people are aware, Tesla's shares are down another 4% today. It's down... 13% for the month, although year over year, he's up 50%. It took a big leap during when Trump won. Well, do you think Musk would exit himself or you think it's Trump exiting him?
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
I think he exits himself, his business interests, but he seems to be doing all kinds of manner of Of hoping AI, you know, using the bubble and things like that. So I don't see Trump cutting ties with him. I just don't. I just think it's too problematic. He's brought him in too close. What happens? How do you deal with an angry Elon Musk? Because he's unstable, right?
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
He could do anything with enormous amounts of money. I think you keep him in the tent. You have other rich friends who take his place in the tech world or other worlds. But I'm talking about an unhinged Elon Musk attacking you. Like that could be a very, it would be the story, right? It's a great story.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Yeah, it's interesting. So, last question, one of the things we talked about was the idea of these protests, because thousands of people, over 250, protested him over the weekend with rallies held at these Tesla showrooms around the world. The protests were part of a so-called Tesla takedown movement, an effort to push back against him, encourage people to stop buying them.
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Protesters brandished signs that said things like, fight the billionaire brologarchy and send Musk to Mars now. What do you make of these protests? Is there—they seem—I don't think there is—you know, Musk is blaming victimization. These are real protests. People really don't like—my son writes me about it now. He's like, what an asshole. And he liked them, right? And so—
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
How do you look at these from a Democratic perspective? Is it a good thing for the Democratic Party to see these happening? Or to me, they just don't like them. Like Reid Hoffman says, they just don't like you, bro. That's why they're there.
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But I think that's the only thing that's a little— Is that you wish they were—this is what they're mad about and not anything else.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
That's a really good point. Yeah, it shouldn't be about Tesla because then he's not the president.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
That's why it doesn't get affected of Trump. Although Trump's affiliation with Elon is so strong, it does have residual effects. And one of the things... Speaking of money, Elon Musk's X has been acquired by Elon Musk's XAI. Elon announced the deal on X saying the two companies' futures are intertwined. They've already been intertwined, by the way.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
They're using X data and this technology for Grok, which is their product. This officially combines the data, models, compute, and distribution. It officially does, but it's already been combined, by the way, everybody. The all-stock deal valued XAI at $80 billion and X at $33 billion. I don't think that takes into account the debt, but I'm not sure. There's a big debt thing on there.
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The price is down from $44 billion Elon paid in 2022, but it's higher than a recent $12 billion valuation. I think this is all made up because I think the company has never been a particularly good business. And all it does is it hides it now. It hides it completely within... within this AI boomlet. And even XAI probably shouldn't be worth $80 billion. It doesn't make anything.
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It doesn't make any money. It makes a lot of noise. And he's not alone in this. All the other AI companies are high. But he's just putting money from one pocket into the other. And it just looks good because what he's doing is attaching. I wouldn't be surprised if he brings Tesla in on this too and merges it into Tesla.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
and then completes the picture to bring Tesla's shares up, giving it an AI value, essentially. That's why he's doing it, you think? Yeah. It gives it like this fake, phony boost? Until it's not, right? Someone's going to get ahead in AI, and so why not just fold them together, and then you don't understand the actual businesses themselves.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Yeah, yeah. We're going to do the horse and carriage.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
That's what I said. I said, remember the mime?
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Well, you just said very quickly, like, it's another topic. You shouldn't have briefings.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Well, why wouldn't they do that? To me, being angry about it is like, someone was like, can you believe they did it? I'm like, yeah, I can believe it. Once again, I can believe that they would put state-run media in there. Why wouldn't they? that's good for them. Like, they'll do whatever is good for them. I don't know if we have any choice in there, honestly, to leave or go.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Somewhat innovative in a very terrible way.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Call it that. Yeah, anyway. Let me ask you one more quick question because you were there. How would you have changed if you were still there, if you were not working for Trump but a Democratic? What would you have taken from what they've done here and said, okay, good idea, this not so much? How would you modernize it? Give me two things.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
When you're thinking about this, your transition from politics, you know, it's been a while. You and I met right before you started, after you left the White House. What's it been like for you shifting over?
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Yeah, I agree with you at the screens. You could have people from across the country. Yes. Anyway, one more quick break and we'll be back for wins and fails. Okay, Jen, let's hear some wins and fails. I'll go first. My fail of the week are these continuing attacks on these students at colleges.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
They should be able to say what they want anytime they want and even criticize the United States and things. I don't even agree with some of them. And I really find it a fail that people are not more upset about this, that students, just because of things they say, Same thing with Elon Musk's attacks on people who don't like Teslas.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
If you don't like a Tesla, you should be able to say you don't like a Tesla. If you don't like Elon Musk, you should be able to say you don't like Elon Musk. And he shouldn't have to spin a conspiracy theory about it because he's sad. And one of the things that I've always noticed about this group of people, as I've said on your show and many other shows, every accusation is a confession.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
With these people, like everything they accuse people of, they're doing themselves. And so I find it really, these are students that are here. We're supposed to be an open society. If they want to dislike us, come here and dislike us. That's fine, too. That's fine, too. In fact, it makes us stronger, makes us love our countries more. our country more.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
I think a win is, I'm going to give it to Lisa Murkowski. Actually, both Republican senators, Dan Sullivan and the other. And they're really doing different tactics to push back on Trump. I would say I prefer Lisa Murkowski's efforts. more. She's in a safer position now that she's shown she's got the grit to stick in there, and she has the political capital to do that.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
But I do think there should be more. You see Senator Lankford doing the same thing and calling for a look into signal gates. It would be really nice to see more of these Republican senators find their set. And of course, it's a woman who's doing it first. And I do think that's something to look up to, and we should praise those efforts when they're done by the Republican Party.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Because I do think it's, as much as we talk about the lack of spine for the Republicans, I think it's super, super hard to be in that situation if you want to have a role in government. And I'm going to add in a last one from International. Marie Le Pen, barred from the presidential run after embezzlement ruling, is really something it shows there are
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Now, there are other leaders now who have taken her place, so it's not going to really slow them down. But I do think that just shows that other countries know how to handle problems of their elected officials and are much more fair about it. Of course, there's going to be a whole conspiracy theory around her. But nonetheless, I thought that was something surprising for me.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
I didn't even know that was coming. So your turn. I didn't either on Marine Le Pen.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Yeah, I would agree. I would get, I would dump him. I think he should. Just so you know, for people who don't know, Representative Kazar is from Austin, obviously. He also includes Elon Musk's largest factory. And he is terrific. He's really terrific. And he's been attacking Musk, among others. And before Musk became Musk, he had a little tangle with him. He did.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
And he's also saying, let's stop with the purity tests and stop being so. He's got the right message. And it's really interesting. And it's an interesting place he's from because he's from Texas, although Austin is not really Texas, is it? In any case, those are good ones. See, that wasn't hard. See, you did it. No.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
And you have still not told a dirty joke, but let me have a comic come on and talk a little bit. We want to hear from you. Send us your questions about business, tech, or whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. Elsewhere in the Karen Scott universe, I talked to comedian Michelle Bateau on with Kara Swisher this week.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Let's listen to a clip.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Anyway, she was great. I think comics are doing some of the most interesting work right now, don't you? I have a comic on every eight weeks at least because I think they're some of the smartest people talking about politics right now and have fearlessness.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Right, right. I'm going to try to get Amber Ruffin to come on and do her set. Good. Yeah, yeah. So no jokes from you then. No jokes from you. All right, I'll do one. Why do melons have weddings? Why? They cantaloupe. Okay. All right, one more. Here's a dirtier one. Okay, dirty. That wasn't even a dirty joke, Kara. If I knew it was like a, you know. All right, let me do a penis one then.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Why did the sperm cross the road? Why? Because I put on the wrong sock this morning. Okay. Oh, but I don't even know what that means.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Okay, that's the show. Thank you so much, Jen. Jen is the host of MSNBC's Inside with Jen Psaki, Sundays at 12 p.m. ET. and Mondays at 8 p.m. ET. Come this spring, she'll be making the move to MSNBC's Primetime as the host of the 9 p.m. ET hour, Tuesdays through Fridays, so Jen Psaki everywhere. She's going to be surrounding you.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Well, I'm not on Five Nights a Week on Primetime. Anyway, thanks. I knew you'd be good at this, and you are indeed. Thanks for listening to Pivot. Be sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'll be back on Friday. I will read this out, but thank you, Jen, so much.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Today's show was produced by Lara Naiman, Zoe Marcus, and Taylor Griffin. Ernie Enderdot engineered this episode. Julian Villard edited the video. Nishat Kerwa is Vox Media's executive producer of audio. Make sure you subscribe to wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. You can subscribe to the magazine at nymag.com slash pod.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
We'll be back later this week for another guest host. I'm not saying who it is. And another breakdown of all things tech and business. But Jen, again, thank you so much.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Right, right. So we're going to give you a little workout today on that. So you're going to have a lot to get to today. So including Tesla protests worldwide, Elon buying his own company in a weird situation. kind of flim-flammy kind of thing, and Trump's latest pardoning spree.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
And we're also going to talk a little bit about the White House Correspondents Association, which you have had a lot of experience with. I have some thoughts on all the things.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Okay. So let's first talk with the latest with Signalgate. I call it Whiskey Leaks. I know.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
I like that Whiskey Leaks. It's good. Come on. I'm sorry if you could have that, but you deserve it. This weekend, there were reports that Trump was asking around for opinions on whether he should fire National Security Advisor Walz. But when asked by NBC, the president said he doesn't, quote, fire people because of fake news and witch hunts.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Defense Secretary Pete Hegg says is really helping the We're Not Messy cause by reportedly bringing his wife to two meetings with foreign military counterparts where sensitive information was discussed. So talk about this. Like, you've been in there where there's been a gate, blank gate, whatever it happens to be. Every administration has them. something occurs. What happens inside versus outside?
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
And this is a unique president who just doesn't want to give in to the media. I think that is a bigger deal than people realize. But neither did Biden, right? Biden probably doesn't either, right?
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
It looks like everyone was freelancing because he had that disastrous, Waltz was disastrous. Even on Fox News, he was disastrous. If Laura Ingraham doesn't believe your line of bullshit, you're kind of fucked.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
A fuck-up. So what happens now? What happens now when it's still here? It still hasn't left. It's a little bit like a sore that won't heal.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Yeah, I don't think they will. I don't think I think he'll survive it. Yeah, exactly. So more on Trump's feuds with lawsuits. Wilmer Hale and Jenner and Block have sued the Trump administration over executive orders targeting them for employing. Attorneys are representing groups he doesn't like. Since being in office, Trump has signed five executive orders targeting law firms with punishments.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
One firm, Paul Weiss, got out of Trump's crosshairs by agreeing to perform $40 million worth of pro bono work for Trump-friendly causes. Skadden, another major law firm, has agreed to provide $100 million of free legal work. Federal judges have temporarily blocked Trump's efforts to punish Wilmer Here and Jenner and Block, and others like Perkins Coie are pushing back. How do you think about this?
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Because this is something maybe you wished you could have done in the Biden administration, but you're always—and a lot of these firms are doing it for financial reasons because— Clients will leave them if they don't have security clearances or if the Trump administration is hostile to them. So they would see an exit of clients, presumably.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Even if they lose, because the judges are pushing back on these things, it will have done business damage to these companies, these law firms. And so it doesn't matter. And then I think later administrations, including Democratic ones, will be looking at a lot of these moves and thinking, hmm. This worked.
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Elon Merges Companies, WHCA Cuts Comedian, and Guest Co-Host Jen Psaki
Maybe they may not have the permission structure Trump has, but it's not once it once it's crossed, you're like, huh, could I do that? Even if you say I'd never do that, you kind of are like, I could maybe have a little more influence over irritating lawyers or irritating press people. So maybe I'll sue a little bit more. I think it opens a floodgate of behaviors.
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And I think if Democrats think they'd never do it, I think they're not telling the truth.
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Support for this show comes from ServiceNow, which is enabling people to do more meaningful, creative work, the work they actually want to do. You know what people don't want to do? Boring, busy work. But now with AI agents built into the ServiceNow platform, you can automate millions of repetitive tasks in every corner of the business, IT, HR, customer service, and more.
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
No, they make you put them in a box. They make you put it in one of those lead boxes.
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
The astonishing reaction of, well, nothing happened. The operation was a success. I'm like, I don't care.
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We don't know. Who knows? I don't trust any of you people to tell the truth on anything. And then misdirecting it towards Goldberg. Two things. Let me make two points. One... You're a bunch of morons. Again, lying morons. Two, Goldberg was doing the right thing here, and he's a fucking badass for doing all... He did everything right. Ethically, he did.
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
I can't believe this happened right after we taped the last show. Let's get right into a fallout from Signalgate. Some people are calling it Whiskey Leaks. Do you like Whiskey Leaks?
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
And then when they challenged him about whether it was true, he didn't release the text initially. But then he's like, fuck you. I'm going to release the text. The third thing is, let me just tell you, Do you know who's also a quiet hero here? Lorraine Powell Jobs, owner of the Atlantic, is letting this keep going, right?
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Because there's a lot of corporate people who are pulling in their horns for Trump, whether it's Disney paying that settlement with George Stephanopoulos or Paramount considering it.
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Fuck Paul Weiss. Like all these people are doing this. And Lorraine Powell Jobs is running the Atlantic. If you don't think they're going to come at her or they've already come at Jeff Goldberg over that Nazi piece he wrote about Trump. You remember Jeffrey did that story that infuriated the Trump people.
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Let me just tell you, if you look, I was just thinking, who's the Catherine Graham of this era? Right. People like her, like, that are not backing the fuck down. And there's a billionaire. Not all billionaires are bad. She's a billionaire. She has got a lot of bravery to put up with this stuff and to be able to take the pressure.
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When I think of Jeff Bezos, Mark Zuckerberg, and the rest of them, and Musk sitting and sort of prostrating himself to Trump and what she just did, just, again, just a real differential. And this puts people in danger. And I think it's, again, a good topic for Democrats to attack on. You're incompetent and you're liars over and over again.
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And then the other excuse they're using on Fox News, which are also complicit in trying to defend this after attacking Hillary Clinton relentlessly for years over something that was much less serious by a factor of 10. Do you remember when you accidentally added a random person to our pivot text chain? Do you remember that?
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
You did. You added some guy. And he's like, hey, I'm here. Okay, if Scott does that, that was fucking annoying enough. But the media on the right is saying, well, everyone knows about that. Everyone's done that. That's so me, isn't it? Jesse Waters, you're a moron. You're a fucking moron.
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I think it was someone with a JG on the staff that he thought he was adding. I think he thought he was adding someone else. That's what I think.
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You know what? They all had the same attitude. What in the actual fuck? That was the tone. What in the actual fuck? The only person who's conducted himself kind of like better than all of them is Trump, because he's like, yeah, I think it looks like they fucked up. But Then he, of course, defends them by attacking the reporter.
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Do you think someone's going to pay? No. Walls, maybe. Let's take a bet. Which one?
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Heg Seth or Walls? Not Heg Seth. He seems to like Heg Seth, despite the fact that it looked like he was drunk texting. That's what it seemed like to me.
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I don't think he cares that he's putting- He had documents in his bathroom.
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Do you like their schemes of how he got? It was a hoax. It was a hoax. Yeah, it was a hoax. He's a spy. He's an asset. I've never met him. And then, of course, inevitably, when he goes, I've never met Jeffrey Goldberg, literally picture of them standing, talking together. They have met. He's a national security person. Jeff Goldberg is known for national security reporting.
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They know each other, like literally. It's sort of when Trump always goes, I've never met Maggie Haberman or I've never, you know, I don't know that person who worked with me for five, 10 years.
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We are so annoying. Journalists are so fantastically annoying these days. I love it.
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Perfectly. Perfectly. We'll see if it matters. Actually, the snap polls are people are like, what in the act? Because one thing that it does, I do think it's more, this is a real crisis, is because everyone understands this. It's very easily understandable what they did, because everyone has been in. The one thing they're telling the truth is everyone has been in these things.
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And they're like, you did what? You did, you know what I mean? Like this, this is something understandable to the average citizen of incompetence. Like, Even my mother at first. And of course, my mother immediately went when she didn't know about it because Fox wasn't covering it properly. And then I explained it. She was like, well, that's not good. And I was like, no, it's not.
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
And she goes, but Hillary did it. And I'm like, that's where you go. I was like, not really. And then Biden did it. But that's where they're going. Here's one of my let me just finish this by one proposal. I was thinking about what do you do about this? Like this shit has been going back and forth.
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between Republicans and Democrats, this leakage of information, right, in this highly informational age. I think we just decide from this day forward, everyone else before this, you get off the hook for it. The government is sloppy around everyone in the government, whether it's Democrats or Republicans, have been sloppy.
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arguably sloppy around communications and especially classified communications. Everyone gets a pass. From now on, if you do it again, if you've sideloaded shit or you're using your personal phone, you're going down. From now on, we're going, everybody, nobody gets a pass from, it's not going to happen in the Trump administration, but let's just clear the playing field.
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
And from now on, these are the rules. And if you break them, you're going to jail. That's what I would do. What do you think?
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
The other thing I think they were doing, and I think people haven't talked about it enough, is they're on signal because they're trying to avoid accountability. And they don't want people to see these things.
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What are we going to do? Are we going to dry out clinic with you? What are we doing? What fun thing can we do?
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And so what they're doing is they're – all this stuff, just for people who don't know, the government is supposed to preserve all their communications on things like this, and they're trying not to preserve them. And the only last thing I would say Walz did that was astonishing to me, on Signal, you can have disappearing information. This stuff can disappear.
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And usually people set it to an hour or a day. He had four-week disappearance. I was like, are you an idiot? Like, if you're going to disappear it, disappear it right away. But I think what they were trying to do was avoid accountability.
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
But that's what, at the heart of it, they were trying to abrogate their responsibility to preserve accountability. And I think that's why they were on that chain. And so they were hiding. They were hiding, and then they got caught, essentially.
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
And the Russians don't know. The Chinese don't know. And the Iranians don't know it. This is this is so it's it's just moronic. It's moronic and they're liars and they're trying to hide at the same time. Anyway. OK, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, Trump unveils his latest tariffs.
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
Scott, we're back. President Trump announced a 25% tariff on imported cars and car parts. Let's listen.
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I understand you're looking for... It makes sense for me to drink less. Tell it to Pete Hegseth, Whiskey Link's, the head of Whiskey Link's.
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
He's so obsessed with, first of all, his digressions are so strange about the desk, but his obsession with we're getting cheated is really, it's becoming like, what's your fucking problem, dude? Everyone's not trying to cheat you all the time. And again, every accusation is a confession. He's a cheater. And so he focuses in on cheaters and takers and things like that.
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
And that's exactly what he is. The terrorist will go into effect on April 2nd and will apply to finish vehicles shipped into the U.S., including from American brands that assemble outside the country. Almost half of all vehicles sold in the U.S. are imported. But lo and behold, Tesla will be spared. While the Musk company does import parts, it makes vehicles in the U.S.
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
And that means your people can focus on the work that they want to do. That's putting AI agents to work for people. It's your turn. Get started at servicenow.com slash AI dash agents.
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
However, Elon posted on X saying, important to know that Tesla is not unscathed here. The tariff impact on Tesla is still significant. No, it is not. Again, a lie. Do you think Trump will pull these back? And what does he keep doing here? Because it really spooked. The markets were recovering a tiny bit, and then they didn't. So any thoughts on this?
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You're not going to ask my blood pressure. I just had it taken. Do you want to know?
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Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
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. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . and la in
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Well, it's got a janky inside if you stay there. It's like a really old hotel. It's made out of a firehouse, but it's all these twists and turns.
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
So I was just thinking about this, like things were on par with advertising to do really well this year. And now this tariff thing that Trump's doing is fucking with everybody's business and ads. They're showing a little bit. Now they're like, oh, maybe not so much because things were really sort of the juice was going for a minute there.
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
But they're noticing that when people pull, they're going to pull from this. Is that a worry?
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
The shift, yeah. Maybe people are thinking, you're right. Okay, I wanted to understand that. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for predictions. Okay, Scott, let's hear a prediction.
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Can I make it... An interjection here, because there's just a new story from New York Times today that Trump administration abruptly cuts billions from state health services. This is across our country. States have been told they can no longer use grants that were funding infectious disease management and addiction services.
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Okay, we're going way off the whiskey leagues.
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
They've cut $12 billion in federal grants to states who are being used to track infectious diseases, mental health services, addiction treatment services. and other urgent health issues, that means these state health departments were already underfunded or in real trouble. They received notices Monday that the funds which were allocated are being terminated.
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Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
And let me just say, in Lubbock, Texas, public health officials, this is not to, these are red states, just so you know, red state people. They're leopards about to eat your face. Public health officials have received orders to stop work supported by these three grants that helped fund the response to the Whiting measles outbreak there, according to Catherine Wells.
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So what are you doing with your health? Let's move away from children.
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On Tuesday, some health departments were preparing to lay off dozens of epidemiologists and data scientists. This is the same thing. This is goodwill and the things that the government does that are effective for people. And it's going to be the same issue in this country. The question is who's going to come into the breach, right? Which is what you're talking about with the Chinese doing that.
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It's the same attitude across this country and it will have repercussions.
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In some ways, they're just interested in making money.
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Yeah, I know. And that's not good for the public comment.
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Lesser services. Exactly. All right. Elsewhere in the Scott and Cara universe this week on Profiteer Markets, Scott spoke with Karsten Brzeski, a chief Eurozone economist for ING. Scott's been talking a lot about Europe, what's going on in Europe. Let's listen to a clip.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
So interesting discussion about what's happening there. I thought it was. I listened to it.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
Yeah. You know, and you've been talking about the European. Now, suddenly, I'm seeing stories in the Wall Street Journal how the place you should invest in is Germany.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
You were great. European value stocks. Just for people who don't speak German, which I do, Schuld is debt, the debt, S-C-H-U-L-D. It also means blame, guilt, fault, liability, trespasses. So, Schuld, you know, when you say, excuse me, and Schuld again, or something like that, something like that.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
All right. That's our show. Thanks for listening to Pivot. And be sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'll be back on Friday. Scott, read us out.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
You just got a thing that said stop drinking. What are you doing, high blood pressure man? Where's the statin and the sitting around watching, hugging and watching?
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
Let's go back. You know, whiskey leaks. Let's go to whiskey leaks. The Trump administration is denying and downplaying the wrongdoing, even though the next day, Jeffrey Goldberg from The Atlantic, the editor-in-chief. of course, released the text from the signal group that he was mistakenly added to. This is so unreal what happened here.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
The newly released messages show Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth sharing a timeline of the Yemen attack and a description of the aircraft involved, which is classified, Pete. Sorry, it is. They're pretending it's not, but it is. The latest White House strategy is insisting these were not actual war plans, which they were.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
And as Pete Hegseth told reporters on Wednesday, he knew exactly what he was doing. Let's listen.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
What an idiot. Just one. Meanwhile, national security officials were on Capitol Hill getting questioned about the signal leak and hearings becoming contentious. Democratic Congressman Jim Himes noted the worst case scenario of the whole incident at one of these hearings. Let's listen.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
Among other things, where were they? Who was listening? What devices they are on? So talk about what your initial thoughts and hearing the story and what you think about the White House strategy here, arguing about semantics of what war plans and classified is and making decisions.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
Jeffrey Goldberg, the enemy, and he keeps just dropping the receipts every five minutes, and they're caught out lying. Are they making things worse for themselves by not owning up to it and taking responsibility?
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
Press Secretary Karen Levin, who I like to call Tracy Flick, did say in her briefing that Elon has offered to put his technical experts on the case to go figure out how Goldberg got out of the chat. Oh, my God. Stop with the Elon solution. He doesn't know anything about this. Talk a little bit about this, and then we'll get to the repercussions, if there are any.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
Right. He knows more about national security than all of these people put together.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
And you know what's incredible is, of course, Trump uses his – a couple things. One, they're morons. Let's just be clear. They're also liars. They're liars about what – they're morons and liars, and then they're hypocrites because of what those things you just read. They literally were – making a big case on a much less egregious violation, right? So that's one.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
Two, who knows what phones they were on? Were they on personal? They were not using, you know, my ex-wife worked in the government. I saw the phone she had. She didn't like it, but she used it because it was secure, right? She couldn't use her iPhone. You can't sideload Signal on these things. By the way, the Signal CEO is like our... She's like, I cannot fucking believe this shit.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
Like, this is crazy that they were using our stuff. Now, journalists use it to talk to sources. Lots of people use it to have encrypted communications. But these are not impenetrable systems. By the way, it's a commercial app. They were definitely doing them on personal phones, and they also were definitely doing them from places. You don't know what network they were on.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
They were definitely not in skiffs doing this, which is these protected little tents that they make. They weren't on protected communications, and they were talking about war plans. Whatever word you want to use, it's information that should not be on a commercial app. The second thing is the way they put Jeffrey Goldberg.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
I think what happened is there was someone with his initials that they brought in because that's happened to me with several tech companies. I've been brought into emails at Facebook by Sheryl Sandberg one time, I think. I've been brought into seeing the earnings of a tech company before they were released to the public once because someone with my name was similar there.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
to someone at the company, and I just got emailed. I got into the email chain. It happens. People do that. But the fact that they're doing this not on a secure line and doing this with such cavalierness was just so moronic. And then to lie about it afterwards and then get caught again, it's the second time when he releases what was there. I just...
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
I don't think anyone will get fired because the people in charge of the Justice Department will not do their jobs because they're very busy protecting Elon Musk. And no one's going to get. So it may be Mike Walz will get because he also apparently his Venmo is open, too. Like, it's just... They're being sued by the government watchdog group for using Signal to discuss military plans, by the way.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
And you can't make this up. Trump's not-so-favorite judge, the one overseeing the Venezuelan deportation case, got assigned to the Signal case. But is there any—it looks like Trump is just going to defend his people and maybe throw one over. But is there any recourse here? Do you see anything— What do you make of their response?
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine, the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Cara Swisher.
Pivot
Signalgate, Auto Tariffs, and Trump's Crypto Empire
Like, just from a marketing point of view, trying to get this, you know, this move on. Everyone was right after, let's move on, let's move on, let's move on. That was sort of the message from all Republicans. Now there seems to be some cracks in it because it's so serious what they did here.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
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Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
They are just going – this is a huge opportunity.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Oh, he was always like this.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
No, he was super aggressive. He was always – let me just tell you, of all the people I covered, he was the most tweaky when it came to stories he didn't like. He does not like journalists. He doesn't. He doesn't. He never did. Marc Andreessen actually kind of liked journalists.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Oh, Scott, it's like, oh, I feel like so in need of not moving anymore ever again.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
I know that's what it is. I'm just saying. Bezos came from Wall Street. He worked for whatever, a hedge fund, D.E. Shaw. I don't know what that is, an investment bank hedge fund, whatever. He was older. He was money-focused. I never thought he was anything, but I called him Farrell in my book. He was Farrell. And I think he broke up with his wonderful wife.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
And look, Lauren's fine, whatever, but it's a different personality. And he had an opinion. If you listen to that 2018 interview, it is a different person. Now he likes wearing those weird, unfortunate shirts that he wears and tight jeans and showing off his chest and living the good life on the yacht. And he doesn't give a fuck. You know, who knows? I think he's a really dull thinker.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Anyway, moving on. How do you really feel? President Trump hosted his first cabinet meeting, speaking of stupid, Wednesday with co-president Elon Musk in attendance. Really, truly standing up, talking almost as much as Trump. Trump recognized Musk to speak first and surveyed the room on approval for Doge's work and whether they like Elon. Guess what, Scott? Everybody applauded. Yay.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Although Marco Rubio looked like he was, you know, having diarrhea at that moment. Elon at one point said Doge had accidentally canceled an Ebola prevention program. Let's listen.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Not true. According to expert after expert, everyone on the field say nothing's been restored. It's gone from 60 people to six. He just opens his mouth and he tells, he's disingenuous. Trump also addressed efforts to slash federal workforce, which he's going to continue, including 65% or so of the EPA. He talked about terrorists, the upcoming meeting with Ukrainian President Zelensky.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
He's trying to shake them down for mineral rights. So it's paper-flay military help, which we really have sort of done, but not this explicitly. Just the whole thing. And getting the cabinet just to applaud, they probably were like, they tried to resist some of this Doge stuff, and now they had to applaud in public. Yeah. Like, can you—I wish someone had gone, yeah, I don't like him.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
He's a fucker, President Trump. But no one did, of course. Anyway.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
And— They're claiming 60, right? They're claiming 60. Yeah, they're claiming 60.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
I think that's how it's done, Scott. It's how it's done.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Yeah, yeah, grandpa, I'm a lesbian.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Yeah, I would agree. And what's happening here is they're really hurting people who voted for you. Have you seen the space? There's a great one speaking, which in the Washington Post, she hoped Trump's victory would change her life, but not like this. Doge cut her job and she was like, oh, I thought they were going to take DEI people.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Oh, Jesus, those senators. Oh, I gotta tell you, Scott, being in, right now we're like, okay, now we're in Washington and like, we're like, should we leave Washington? Because it's just so heinous. Although we never see these people, so I guess who cares, right? Who cares?
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Like what, you know, honestly, leopards should eat every one of these people's faces as far as I'm concerned. You know what I mean? They did everything in their self-interest. And then he didn't do anything he said he was going to do so far, and they're cutting them. And so they're going to, you know, no schadenfreude here, but they voted for what they voted, and this is what they're getting.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
First, Measles death since 2015. First one. Planes are falling out of the sky. There's been like seven of them right now, at least seven really dangerous plane things. I mean, as I say, they exchange DEI for DAF. Dumb as fuck. Okay, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, more on Doge.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Scott, we're back. Let's talk about some of the notable Doge moments since last we taped. The White House confirmed that acting administrator of Doge is indeed not Elon Musk, but a woman named Amy Gleason. Gleason's LinkedIn lists her as U.S. Digital Services Senior Advisor. CBS News, when contacted Gleason regarding the story, said she was in Mexico and declined to comment. They just gave a name.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
And that very testy woman who does press for Trump gets very testy. Very testy. She's got very Megyn Kelly vibes. Anyway, 21 Doge staffers resigned, saying in a letter they would not lend their expertise to carry out legitimizing Doge's actions. The staffers were previously part of the U.S. Digital Service, which was created by President Obama.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
So these are people who were there helping the government update themselves, and they're just not going to put up with big balls and the rest of the crew. It's the idiot douche boys crew. The Trump administration in Doge had a rough week with courts.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
On Tuesday, three federal judges dealt setbacks to the administration involving federal spending, refugees, and foreign aid, though Chief Justice John Roberts temporarily delayed a midnight deadline for the administration to unfreeze $2 billion in foreign aid payments on Wednesday. Scott, I have no comment on this. I'm in Mexico. Okay.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
She worked for the old service and from people there, she was not... She's a figurehead.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
She was not... She did not impress people with her skills. That's what I would say is how they talk about her. No, she's just a figurehead. It's ridiculous. I mean, what's interesting is, you know, they do want this to be in court all the time. So they just... It's like a ground war with these people, right?
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
And they keep pushing back the way they... After the Apple shareholders and they're going to threaten Tim Cook. They just never frigging give up. They're like... They're swarmers. I don't know what else to say. The strategy is probably very smart just to keep making trouble and move from department to department, making destruction, and then fixing it will be just impossible, right?
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
That's the goal, I think, here.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Why don't we have any weed ads? You're like edible, edible ads. You think? Jesus. Not for you.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
E.D. slash weed ads. All right. Go ahead. What's your question?
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
He's been awfully wrong about a lot of things. If you really actually follow him closely, you know, he's like, this is how it's going to go for Trump. He's going to lose this way. And then he did. So and someone noted.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
I know that's true, but we're not James Carville. Right. So I think it's not a bad idea, except if it's a very serious thing. Right. If it's something really hair on fire, we should be here on fire. I think we should be – I think the Republicans, when they got into office and they were in the minority, just speaking of someone who's retiring, Mitch McConnell shut it down.
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Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
And I think that's what we should do. I think we should be difficult, obstructive, not worry about people blaming us for it. Just get in the way. Just muck up the gears. Let them make a mess. I would agree with him on that. I would agree. There's no use saying, can you believe, like someone was, I was on CNN last night with Caitlin Collins and she goes, what do you make of this Gaza AI thing?
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
I'm like, I don't give a fuck. It's racist. It's obnoxious. He's doing it to distract us. Moving on. It's stupid. And why are the belly dancers having beards? I don't know. I don't care. I don't care. And I think it's mean and terrible and cruel. But what do you want me to say? That's what I think he is. So I think that's the kind of reaction.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
We can't like swing at every stupid pitch these people put out. I like it. What did you think?
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Great. That was great.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
And also, I went to a wedding with him. He likes to party, but go ahead. You'd like him.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Yeah, that was essential. And his wife, Mary Matlin, they're an act. They were the funniest people at the lesbian wedding, but go ahead.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
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Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Yes, 100%. I think aggression is, I think we let them own everything and then aggression, just be like a fucking, like do a Mitch McConnell, just do a Mitch McConnell.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
You have to write in their face. You do, because I was, I told you this, I was at an event and one of the stupid tech bros came up to me and they're like, oh, we're beating you, Kara. You know, we're beating you. And I looked at them and I said, you're still a dickless asshole. And they were like, I go, and I still don't want to talk to you. And I moved along. And they didn't know what to do.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
They were not going to get me in any way. Yeah, you have to still punch them in the nose, punch them in the nose. Anyway, speaking of punching in the nose, speaking of not lack of erection, it's been a tough week for Tesla. Tesla shares plunged more than 8% on Wednesday, pushing its market cap below $1 trillion. The stock is down 25% for the year.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
That drop followed the news that sales in Europe are down 45% from this time last year. Elon backlash is being credited with some of the recent decline, but other factors include increased EV competition from China, BYD, and consumers wanting a new model. Like, where's the new fucking model, Elon? Why don't you make better new cars? Not better cars, it's a good car. And there's lots of choices.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
And nobody likes this fucker. And people are putting things on the cars, writing on the cars. People have signs on their cars saying, I hate him too. I don't know what, stop, you know, taking the air out of my tires and keying in my thing. I don't do this, but I think about keying them. I do, and that's the thing, I never think like that.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
I'm like, oh, I should key this fucking car, but I don't, just everyone know that. Is there anything to be done here, or is it just a declining situation for this company?
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Oh, I love that, Corey.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Yeah, it's a good looking car. For people, for context, as Scott was saying, year-over-year, it's up 47, almost 48 percent. Five-year, it's up 561 percent, and max, 22,000, 23,000 percent up. So six months is up 40 percent, one month is down, but down is where it's headed. Look, if they had a great car, people might buy it. But you're right.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
I think that a hassle, even if you like Elon Musk, is probably going to bother people. And I don't hurt any of these cars, but I did yell a pin dick to someone in a Cybertruck recently, which I enjoyed.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
I think one of the things that's important that people should think about is, is the product good can save you a lot of stuff. Although even if the product is good and people think you're an asshole, it does affect it. You just stop buying it. I definitely have bought less Amazon stuff because I'm like, why should I give this guy money? I'll give it to Macy's.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
It's a little harder, but it's not that much harder. They still have a better product in terms of delivery. But I'm like, I just don't like them. I just don't like them. Or I like, you know, I just, I don't want to give Jeff Bezos money. And that's how people, that's how it begins, right? And then you find other alternatives. It's a real opportunity for other car makers, that's for sure.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Yeah, yeah, exactly. Small little decisions like that. All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, we'll talk about NVIDIA beating earnings expectations and Trump's plan to woo wealthy foreign investors.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Contracts, big fat contracts.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Scott, we're back. NVIDIA has done it again with another blockbuster earnings report. Quarterly earnings were $39 billion, a 78% increase compared to Q4 last year. Profits spiked 80% from a year earlier to $22 billion, beating Wall Street's expectations. The company projected revenue in the current quarter will rise 65% to $43 billion, a little less than $78 billion, but still good. Has NVIDIA put
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
these deep-seek fears to rest. Remember, just a month ago, NVIDIA had a $600 billion wipeout when deep-seek burst on the scene. It seems like nobody's talking about that now. Thoughts on this? Because, you know, again, by the way, for people to understand, it really, the stock market rises and falls on NVIDIA's shoes right now. And only, speaking, you know who I interviewed? Aswath.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Yes, he talked all about this. But it's seven stocks that are moving the stock market, and NVIDIA's at the top of the list.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
He sold his Nvidia, just so you know.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
What's going to happen here? You still feel people are going to start spending less on it. They're also seeing competition. They will see competition as has other companies.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
You mean we'll talk about erect penises? Okay.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Interesting, interesting. Can I tell you, Aswath said not to do that. He thinks these U.S. companies are global companies. And so you are investing globally.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
He's on my podcast today, but yeah, go ahead.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
And some are in cash, like Warren Buffett is much more in cash. He's moved hugely to cash. But Oswald said, don't do that because you can never time it correctly and you can... You can be too slow or too fast, like you were saying the other day. Anyway, speaking of cash, President Trump is unveiling a new visa to attract rich foreigners to the U.S., the Gold Card.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
For $5 million, very high-level people will get legal permanent residency and a new route to citizenship, according to Trump. The Gold Card would replace the current EB-5 visa, which requires investors to put in $1 million and creates at least 10 jobs. The new initiative is set to be rolled out in two weeks, although some experts are skeptical that it can happen without congressional approval.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
I don't know. More than 100 countries do offer golden visas to wealthy investors and individuals, including Australia, Greece, Italy, and Spain. It's not a new idea. I don't know. It's another hand-wavy distraction. I don't know. I just feel like whatever. Like rich people always get to live where they want. So, okay.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
But it's also, Scott, it's in plain sight. Look, they're thinking of switching. Starlink people are working at the FAA and suddenly Verizon might be losing its contract to Starlink. It's like, it's so like, obviously, it's so in the open. Like, that's the thing. There used to be sort of back rooms where this shit went down. Now it's front room.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Yeah, right. Exactly. We're going to get the bad ones, like the kind of sketchy ones.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
But it's kind of the sketchy ones, right? It feels like there's a lot of mobsters from Russia.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Some of them. But it definitely, I think the rich people, the very fine rich people are already here.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
You say it like this, fancy.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Like you're watching it, and then they're telling you why you're stupid for not thinking it's smart. Like that's the whole trick. It was interesting because I have a lot of federal workers in our school, as I think I've told you, wonder if – I always ask what they do, and it's always so helpful, like the stuff they're doing, whether it's at the FDA or at the –
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Butlers. Butlers. They're good butlers. It's a butler economy. Can I give you a piece of information? Dame is an honorific title given to women who have been admitted to certain orders of chivalry. Well, it's like being a sir. Sir. It's a sir. Yeah.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
That's correct. Well, whatever's Trump. Sell your stupid gold things. You're not going to make much money at it. But whatever.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
I feel like we're getting the sketchy types. It's going to be it.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
David Fahrenthold calling David Fahrenthold, The New York Times.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Yeah. All right. Come on down, you sketchy people. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for predictions. OK, Scott, let's hear a prediction.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Yeah, he's got his work is done.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
one is at the ag department, one parent's at the, and it's just so important what they're doing. And like, they don't know what to do about the stupid five things I did this week kind of thing. Like, you know, and then Musk mocks them saying it's inane and trivial. They should have been able to do it. And then, so they have an ounce of sense in the middle of lunacy.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
No, they don't like Musk. Nobody likes Musk.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Mm-hmm, yeah, he's not quiet.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Yeah, it's interesting. People like the idea of the government efficiency thing. So do you and I.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Yeah, right. Exactly. But listen to this. This was – Puck's Peter Hamby wrote a piece not just about the polls, which you can take – the White House is saying polls show people love him and love it, which isn't true. Hamby looked at focus groups and swing voters. Who cares about the MAGA people? They're going to like no matter – he can shit on the stage. They'd like it.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Recent focus groups of swing voters in Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Florida – They like the idea of efficiency. They hate Elon Musk.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Polls, for instance, don't tell you that Musk is a weird nerd, which is how Adam, a Trump-voting hockey fan from Macomb County, described the billionaire last week, or that he's a complete tool, as Michael from Milwaukee put it, or scary, Taisha from Toledo, or selfish, DeAndre from Milwaukee, just looking to enrich himself.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Perhaps Eric, a real estate appraiser from Pittsburgh, put it most poignantly, extremely radical, scary, I just shudder that Trump has given him carte blanche. It's really these are the big things. Musk and Doge are treated with skepticism. They like Trump because he looks strong when Biden was weak. So it's not affecting Trump.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
That's what drives, like, sure, they could do it, but why? Or let me give you a good example. It's not everybody because Look, Apple shareholders voted, so did Costco and John Deere, to keep DEI initiatives in the company. They can do that, right? Instead- Private company. Private company, except now Trump is threatening them, and Tim Cook has to say, we've got to follow the law.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
They just don't like Musk, you know, and eventually it will affect Trump and that's when he'll act. But swing voters do not like this fella, no matter how you slice it. Anyway, we'll see. You're right. That's a great prediction. Elsewhere in the Scott and Kara universe, this week, Scott spoke with David Bernad, the Emmy-winning executive producer behind HBO's White Lotus.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
They discussed the making of the hit series, The Shifting Landscape in Hollywood, and wait for it, Scott's surprise cameo in the next episode of White Lotus.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
All right. I'm so excited. I'm going to watch White Lotus.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
I am going to download it. I'm going to Australia on Saturday, just so you know. Really? Yeah, I am. I'm going to listen to White Lotus so I can hear your voice.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Yeah, I know. It's true. Moving the books. Okay, let's listen to Scott. Let's listen to this interview.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Let me just say, I came to your apartment. I go into Scott's apartment. I walk in and there is Lucius Malfoy sitting there and a guy from the asshole from the Patriot. I was like, oh my God, hello. And he was lovely. And you and he were running lines, whatever. He was in the kitchen. You were in the studio. And I was like, hello, Lucius Malfoy. What are the? What the fuck are you doing here?
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
He's a handsome man. Very handsome man. Handsome man, yeah. So this is great. This is great. I'm excited to hear you. I'm excited to hear you.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
They love Pivot, the whole White House team.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
even though shareholders who are supposed to be the best friends of these fuckers want something else. It's just amazing. It's amazing.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
He was lovely. He was lovely.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Oh, my God. There's a great article about her in New York Times today. I love Parker Posey so much. I'm so thrilled she's getting the recognition.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
You were a little bit shook up, but you loved it. Let me just say, he still is handsome and has a great head of hair. Scott, I'm excited to hear you. I'm going to listen to White Lotus because of you. While we're at it, let's put this question on threads. Which one of us would survive an entire season at the White Lotus and who would get killed off, Scott or Kara?
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
It's going to be 90-10. It's going to be you auto-asphyxiating. That's really where it's happening. It's going to be you doing the David Carradine out in Thailand. Anyway, just weigh in if you could think of something. By the way, we're killing it on YouTube. We're growing like crazy, and I'm very excited. We're all over the place. So visit us at pivotpodcastofficialtoanswer.com.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Scott, before we go, this just came over the wires. Katy Perry, Gayle King, and Lauren Sanchez are going to space on the next launch from Blue Origin, Jeff Bezos' rocket company. It's not really a mission. They're calling it a mission. But they're going to join three other women as the crew set to launch in the spring. I thought I'd give you a chance.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
It's the 11th crude flight of the New Shepard rocket.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Oh, I knew you would do this. That's okay. I allowed it. I allow it. I allow it. Anyway, good luck.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Godspeed, ladies. That's why they come here.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Okay, Scott, that's the show. We'll be back on Tuesday with more Pivot. Please read us out.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Commuting by e-bike isn't just great for your health, it's a game changer for your wallet and your time. Here's my tip. Head over to upway.co to find e-bikes from top-tier brands like Specialized, Cannadeal, and Aventon at up to 60% off retail. Whether you're into MTBs or speedy city bikes, they've got you covered.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
He might announce a bunch of tariffs until he like- Except he's got permission from shareholders to do it, right? The shareholders have spoken of what they want.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
They want the EI, so does Costco. Either you listen to shareholders or you're not trying to protect them. They've decided knowing full well what the price is, what they want. Anyway, we'll see where it goes. But speaking of which, we've got a lot to get to today. The one person we're going to talk about initially is exactly this person.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
We're going to talk though about Nvidia's earnings, which were blockbuster, Tesla's struggles. No one wants to buy their shitty cars. They're not shitty cars. They're shitty because of their owner, their creator. In fact, not even their creator.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Zero to 1939 in three seconds.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Himmler. Oh, nice, Himmler. Often a forgotten Nazi, but very critical.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
No, he did a lot. He was quite horrible. Anyway, and Trump's gold card, which is ridiculous. But let's start with Jeff Bezos. Speaking of tiny goals. The Washington Post opinion entered David Shipley. By the way, my wife used to work for him. She quit and is thrilled that she did now that this came out. Has stepped down after Jeff Bezos announced a significant shift. to the opinion page.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Bezos said the Post will now publish daily opinion stories on two editorial pillars, pretty much, and you have to be for them, personal liberties and free markets. You can't be against those. What does that mean? I will tell you, yes. Personal liberties, I'll do what I fucking want. Free markets, I'll do what I fucking want. There you go. Okay. I get what they're trying.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
They're trying to be the Wall Street Journal. It's that the Wall Street Journal has intelligent people working for it. And the Washington Post has Megan McArdle. The opinion section will cover other subjects as well. Not really, but will not publish viewpoints opposing those pillars. What's the point of having them?
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Meaning if you're against, if you're for social justice or some regulation, you can't write a piece. Right. You can't oppose free markets, even if you do. Like, if you have a very good argument about why we need guardrails on Amazon's shitty behavior, and I don't know. Whatever, you can't oppose Jeff Bezos.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Plus, you can get $150 off your first e-bike purchase of $1,000 or more with the code PIVOT150. You can thank me later. I love e-bikes.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
He said he believes the viewpoints in the new categories are underserved in the current market of ideas and news opinion. No, they're not, Jeff. They're done by the Wall Street Journal, which does them. Don't always agree, but pretty fucking good. Sounds like not original idea.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
The head of the opinion section, David Shipley, who already took a fall, he just fell down when he was doing the Kamala Harris thing, has decided he can't do this. I can't believe he didn't go the first time. But here it is. And of course, Jeff Bezos, in an interview with Matthias Dockner in 2018, said he would never do things like this. And this is exactly what he's doing.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
He said he'd be embarrassed and he would feel terrible when he was 80 years old. So here we are. He can do what he wants with this fucking newspaper, but it's a piece of shit now.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
He says the internet has viewpoints opposing those pillars.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
I kind of get it, but it's so like kindergarten version of opinion sections. It's like, oh, we need more diverse voices. Okay, get them, publish them, do them. Have everybody argue. If you You have to have viewpoints opposing personal liberties and free markets if you really want to have an opinion section. But he doesn't really want to have it. He wants a billionaire propaganda arm.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
That's I think he's this is what Penny that I think is dropped in his in his noggin. is that I can use this as a cudgel, right? If Musk can use Twitter X as a cudgel, I can use this as a cudgel. So I can do this via. Now, interestingly enough, the Wall Street Journal has been very critical of Trump, right?
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
They've been very critical about the tariffs, about the behaviors, about the nonsense, and actually making some great arguments. And they've featured those. I'll be interested to see what Bezos—well, I'm not interested at all, but, you know, we'll see what he does here. But it seems like he'll try to get someone—I don't know.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
There's a lot of people who think this—who go on and on about say and do what you want, and then when push comes to shove, you don't get to say and do what you want. You get to say and do what your billionaire owner wants.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Significance, relevance.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
They don't anymore, actually.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Right. Are they going to get MAGA readers? They're not. They're not. MAGA readers have really good stuff to read. You want to read Ben Shapiro? You want to listen to Megyn Kelly scream at you for whatever fucking reason she likes to scream all day?
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
You have plenty of choice in that area. So they're not going to, you know, they're like, the sensible center is horrified by Donald Trump. So kissing up to him seems like the stupidest move ever.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
I don't want to hear about your erections. Can you move along, please? Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
And we're going to debate the shit out of it.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
I'm having lunch today with one The New York Magazine just grabbed.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
They are picking and choosing. I've talked to The Times people who do this hiring. I've talked to the journal people. And they're calling me to ask me who's good, what do I think of this person, this and that. And they're not going to grab everybody, by the way, even if they're really good. But everyone's leaving.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
And, you know, today I'm having lunch with Ben Terrace, who's a wonderful political reporter. And he's joined New York Magazine. Fantastic. Like, fantastic. Like, did great work at The Post. And by the way, let me just weigh one in. They are doing, some of the reporting has been excellent. They did a great piece on Elon being a welfare queen, which you retweeted, $38 billion. They did another one.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
They did like six or seven really great accountability stories in recent weeks. So it's just when is Bezos going to meddle there, which I think he will 100%. But you're right. It's an opportunity to pick an area to go into and really drill the fuck down. The way he's going is so stupid. I would deploy AI in a really smart way. They're doing it in a stupid way.
Pivot
Elon's First Cabinet Meeting, Trump's Gold Card, and Bezos' WaPo Revamp
Scott, how you doing? I finally finished my move.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
So, you know, and the guy who runs the FTC is such an unctuous toady. Andrew Ferguson, let me name him. You're an unctuous toady. To allow these people, they're going to have a dominance. They need to add one more person to the... They're going to have a dominance anyway, so I don't know why they need to do this. But it really does.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
It feels like payback to everybody standing up there at Trump, all the tech billionaires, in terms of antitrust cases and everything else. Even if you didn't agree with Lena Kahn, that's the whole point here is the party in power gets to decide. And this is just a wholesale giveaway to the billionaires again, once again.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
I am, just for a few short days.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
I know. I know. Amanda required it. He didn't require it, actually. My two younger kids have different vacations because they're at different schools. And this was the only crossover. And then Louie's coming, too. Alex just recently went on his own vacation, so he's not coming. He's got school. But, yeah, I know I'm going to, like, not do anything for four days, which is probably not true.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Google bought the Wiz for $32 billion, for people who don't know. It's a security cloud company, cloud security startup.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
It is. It's enormous. So it really is anti-competitive because it's one of the most fast-growing software companies in the world right now. So it's taking out, again, a really robust competitor, which is really something.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
FTC chairperson Ferguson, again, unctuous toady, his new nickname, posted a statement on X saying he had no doubts about Trump's constitutional authority to remove commissioners. Oh, my God. It literally says he can't remove commissioners. It's so weird. It's like them saying, oh, president, someone in MAGA are saying you can, president can stay three terms.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
And I was like, the 22nd Amendment says you can't. And these people are arguing the Constitution says you can't. Literally the opposite of what it says, they say. And it's so irritating. Senator Maria Cantwell and Amy Klobuchar, by the way, who serve on the committees that oversee the FTC, even though they don't have power right now.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
President Trump's dismissal of Commissioner Slaughter and Bedoya not only illegal, but also hurts consumers by undermining an independent agency that Congress established to protect consumers from fraud scams. And monopoly power. Now, the FTC is moving forward with its meta lawsuits. Ferguson said they're going to move forward with meta. We'll see. We'll see.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
I think that's probably their strongest case. And again, if they can move forward with these things, and if they lose, they lose, right? So, you know, we'll see how much they're going forward. So I guess Mark Zuckerberg's appearance didn't help as much as the others, essentially. Anyway, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, Starlink gets installed at the White House. Even worse.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
God, it just gets worse and worse. Support for Pivot comes from Delete.me. It's pretty safe for me to assume that your personal information is accessible online. And no, I'm not just talking about your name or your pictures of the year you graduated high school. I'm talking about even more sensitive information.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
But I'll probably be talking to you.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
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Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
I've been using Delete.me for a while now, I have to say. I am still shocked by how much of my personal information is on the internet and how it's collected. And especially someone like me who knows a lot about privacy and a lot about these issues. Well, you can take control of your data and keep it privately private by signing up at Delete.me. Now at a special discount for our listeners.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Get 20% off your Delete Me plan when you go to joindeleteme.com slash pivot and use the promo code pivot at checkout. The only way to get 20% off is to go to joindeleteme.com slash pivot and enter code pivot at checkout. That's joindeleteme.com slash pivot code pivot. Last week, John Levitt joined me to co-host an episode of Pivot, and it was a great one.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
If you enjoyed that, you'll love his podcast, Love It or Leave It. Love It or Leave It is America's top late-night political gay live comedy podcast. John takes on the biggest and most absurd stories in politics and helps you stay informed while laughing instead of crying. Sometimes he cries. Each episode promises big-name guests, unexpected conversations, and can't-miss moments.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Catch new episodes of Love It or Leave It every Saturday. Watch on YouTube or join the live show in LA to witness the chaos in person.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Where are you coming up with all these bad jokes? Did you get a joke book?
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Scott, we're back. Starlink is now accessible at the White House. White House officials said the move is an effort to increase Internet availability, saying some areas of property couldn't get cell service. This is nonsense. The system was reportedly routed through the White House data center.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Officials said Starlink donated the service and the gift was vetted by lawyers overseeing ethics issues at the White House counsel's office. So many tech types I talk to say this is dangerous. It's like putting Putin's listening device in the White House. But that might already be there in the form of the president. So I don't know. What do you think? It's also ethically ridiculous.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
I know. I know. I know. But lately, there's been five or six really bad jokes.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
I just don't know why they, the security issues to me or whatever. They can get whatever they want from this guy, the Russians. But you can imagine this creates a more porous environment, which is maybe the point.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Another thing they're doing besides making us less secure is also, from a technical point of view, is removing information from websites all over the government that is, you know, mentions people. And there's two things that really stood out. The first The HHS has removed the Surgeon General's Advisory on Gun Violence from its website.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Yeah, that's true. That's true.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
A spokesperson for the agency said the content was removed to comply with Trump's executive order to protect Second Amendment rights. Firearms are the leading cause of death for children and teens in the U.S., also recently removed. This was heinous. Articles about Native American code talkers have been removed from some military websites, having been labeled DEI.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
The Navajo code talkers aided America's victory at Iwo Jima. historically critically important group of people who did this. And I think they're removing all kinds of things that, well, some words don't work and they end up removing the wrong thing because they have a list of fucking words that don't work instead of going through this kind of thing.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
They just do this wholesale, you know, cut and paste, essentially. Replacing this information is going to be very difficult over time because it will be replaced eventually. But between the firearms and these code talkers, it's... I feel like I'm living in 1984, like in the book 1984. I don't know how you feel.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
No, text, you text them. My sons don't pay attention. Oh, I didn't read your text. I didn't read your text.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
It's un-American. It's petty and it's cruel and it's weird. It's just weird. It's just so weird. I mean, especially these – the gun stuff is – Beyond belief. It's just a fact. And I think what's really, you know, obviously it's yet another attempt, like with the judges. This has a theme, everybody. You remove the judges, you remove information, you only tell people, I don't think it works at all.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
I agree. I don't even understand it. What if the house is on fire? I know that. Well, you wouldn't text that, would you? Would you text that?
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
I honestly don't. I think people are sick and tired of this and they get it. And Americans are uniquely different. difficult group of people. And so I don't think it works. I don't think it holds. I think in other countries, sometimes it does. But in this one, I think people get furious about especially stuff like this. I mean, literally just to, they have one issue with DEI and they cannot stop.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
That's the thing. They cannot stop with one or two things. They've got to completely erase DEI. Everything, especially this cut and paste of words. I forget what they took out, some dumb thing. But that's beyond belief. This to me is ridiculous. And everyone knows that gun violence kills kids. That's it. I don't care how many things they take down. Everybody knows. And everyone's aware of it.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
And they will... pay the price here for going overboard on almost everything.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
I love all your stats.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
The house is on fire.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
And it's very typical. It's not a surprise. I think karma is a bitch. I think putting people in jail that never had a criminal record without due process, everything is karma is going to be such a bitch here. I just believe that because it's one thing after the next where injustice happens. And so we'll see. Let's go on a quick break. We come back. We'll talk about BYD's big breakthrough.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
No, no, no. We rented an Airbnb by the ocean. And so it's near El Yunque, Amanda loves Puerto Rico. I went there as a kid. I haven't been there in a long time. It's a beautiful place. And so it's on the beach and it's near the beautiful rainforest there. So we're going to go hiking, get Louie to cook, obviously, because he's now the babysitter and cook for the situation.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
And just relax for just a few days. It's not very long, but I need it, I think.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Yes, I haven't vacationed in a long time. When I vacation, I don't vacation. For people who need to understand this, I don't take time off.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Yeah, I know that. I'm aware. I'm aware of the entire thing. We're going to have some guest hosts in a few weeks because actually you're doing a thing with your kid, but that's different. That's a little different.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Thank you. Thank you. . . . . . ., en P. P. P. P. P. P,實 , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , a Laboratory a
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
College tour. Oh, my God.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
No, don't say that. It's hard to get in, but actually I heard Harvard was off like in terms of applications.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Oh my God, stop with the Wokistan.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
What's a good U.S. retailer that competes with Shein and Timu? Who would you say? I mean, they're all the expensive ones, right? The Gap sort of doesn't.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
There's no low-cost. There's expensive ones like Hannah Anderson Rocks, or there's all kinds of really wonderful higher-end children's clothing, for example. I'm just thinking of children's clothing. But it's, I mean... I'm trying to think. H&M, I like a lot. I like the other one.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
It just sucked. I never could go in that store. It was like terrible. And I like a cheap clothing store. In any case, we'll see what happens with the others. But obviously, as Scott said, it's global. OK, Scott, let's pivot to a listener question. The question comes from Kyle. Let's listen.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Support for Pivot comes from Arm. Have you ever wondered what's powering your smartphone or the other devices we interact with daily? And what lies at the heart of life-saving drug discoveries and robotic surgeries? The answer is Arm. Arm technology is moving the world forward, enabling AI to create a more meaningful, more connected life for everyone, everywhere.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Yeah. Yeah, we'll see. I mean, in concept, it's a great idea. And, you know, again, what's really the point is rich people need to pay more taxes. Like, I don't know why that never gets- And corporations. Corporations. That's really what has to happen.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
And soon tariffs. Yeah, so hand-waving for right now. Anyway, you got a question of your own, go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. Okay, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for predictions. Okay, Scott, let's hear a prediction.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Yeah, so it's not that big a deal.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
No, I haven't. No, I haven't seen it at all. I've heard about it. I've heard it's amazing and depressing and upsetting. But everyone, I've heard several people talk about it.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Can I ask you a question? Because I tend to avoid these things now, even though I've heard a lot about this show and also Euphoria or any of these. There was a documentary about teens. There's all kinds of these things. I kind of avoid them because they're so upsetting to me. How do you deal with that? Because you're writing a book on it, obviously, which comes out when?
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
No, you should. You've been the leading woman.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
What? I mean, I got to get it out. Oh, no. You need to dare him to a fight. But how is it watching these things? Because I think I have noticed I have tended towards happy things when I'm watching things, and Severance, because it's so good, by the way, season end this Friday. Yeah. I just, it either has to be really astonishing like severance or very happy like running point, right? I can't.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Talk a little bit about this because you're writing a book on it. These topics are dire. How do you manage to feel hopeful watching any of this? And that's one of the reasons I avoided adolescence.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Has anyone- You are posting happy things on, on, I've noticed. I've got to. You really have. A lot of them are delightful, by the way.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
All right. Adolescence is a recommendation and a prediction, I guess. Okay. Elsewhere in the Cara and Scott universe, this week on Prof G Conversations, Scott spoke another happy thing with Dr. Fiona Hill, a senior fellow at Brookings, chancellor at Durham University and former White House Russia expert, also testified during the impeachment hearings.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Really smart person who worked for us and now does not. Let's listen to a clip.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Well, that's heartening. That's an interesting thing to say. She's brilliant, actually. She's really brilliant. I'm glad you had her on. 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 Tuesday. Scott, read us out.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
I would agree. Except for your obsession with woke-ascended colleges, because I think they're mostly beaten down by now. So I think we can move along on that issue. I think that has been sucked in. Oh, I don't think so. Okay. In any case, I think a lot of colleges do do this for people who don't know. It's not a new and fresh idea from Harvard. That was the thing I was not aware of.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
And it is true. And if you make under a certain amount, you get the whole thing free, right? That was if you get in, if you get in.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
You know, I'm going to Puerto Rico. Did I tell you? Oh, yeah. Sorry. Go ahead. Go ahead. A lot of sunblock. A lot of sunblock. Sunblock. Sunblock. They are also under siege by the government right now.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Come on. Stop it. Trump is acting like a total asshole. Anyway, we've got a lot to get to today, including more presidential power grabs, the Chinese EV company putting Tesla on blast, and the fast fashion war claims its latest victim. By the way, I have a little text thing with Jess Tarloff. She'll come to Paris with me. I'm just saying.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Arm believes the future isn't about technology, it's about people and the possibilities technology can offer us. The future is built on Arm. You can discover more at arm.com slash discover.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
I'm going to steal you from her. I'll steal her from you.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Okay. All right. Okay. No, I just like her. She was teasing. She goes, I can't believe you. Now, you know that there was a movie where all the people who had affairs with the guy got together and took revenge on him. It's with Cameron Diaz. And oh, my God, what's that movie called? Anyway, that's what's happening here. All your exes are getting together and we're going to take revenge on you.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
That is correct. That is correct.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
That's right. In any case.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Okay. Anyway, let's bring it back. All right. First, speaking of losing, the judiciary is really pushing back on Donald Trump. Chief Justice John Roberts clapping back against President Trump. Earlier this week, Trump called for the impeachment of a district judge who'd ruled against him over the deportation of Venezuelans, which led Roberts to issue a very rare response. Let me read part of it.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
For more than two centuries, it's been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision. The normal appellate review process exists for that purpose. It's a little bit weak sauce, but there was. One GOP representative introduced articles of impeachment against the judge.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Let's listen to what President Trump had to say about it on Laura Ingraham.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
This is what he said about every judge who deals with him. This is just a typical thing he does, is insults the judges in any way. According to a sworn filing in an immigration and customs enforcement official, many of those deported did not have criminal records. It's really quite amazing. They just grabbed people. He's lost, I think, six times with judges.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
So, again, appellate courts are the way you win here, Donald Trump. You tend not to win because what you do is... illegal. But anyway, this is a major showdown, I think, between Trump and the Supreme Court. And he's setting up a real fight with the Supreme Court, because all of these are going to eventually get to the Supreme Court. Any thoughts?
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Yeah, that was by the guy who runs El Salvador, who seems like an asshole. I think that was his with the music. I think he put them up.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Well, I think that's why Roberts did that. He's issuing a warning because he's lost in the Supreme Court several times recently, especially because of Amy Coney Barrett and Roberts together with the liberal wing of the party. It keeps being 5-4. And I think that he doesn't seem to – the Supreme Court orders he has yet to over not do. The issue is he's also the enforcer of these things.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
And so – and J.D. Vance keeps quoting Andrew Jackson, let him enforce it. If he wants to say this, let him enforce it. But it's also, you know, really, it's just, this is what he's doing. And what he's doing is he's raising, he goes, you wouldn't, you can't do that. However, we have bad judges. The only judge he likes is Eileen Cannon, who does whatever he wants, right? Anything that's for him.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
And she's a, she's a. She's incompetent, a judge, essentially. But she gets to stay there until they remove her. And she can be overturned on appellate court. And that's the whole system, which is what Roberts was talking about. But we'll see how far he goes here. Like, he's already gone very, very far down the line. And his little handmaidens to sedition, like...
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Laura Ingraham, are really disturbing. Like, it's a disturbing thing to agree that you're going to attack judges. Now, in other countries where they've tried this, the guys, typically, they don't win. The courts tend to win. But we'll see. We'll see what happens.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
I see the future of the GOP right here. Right here it is. It can only do so much. We'll see what happens. And I think Roberts is a critically important character, even though most people think he's a limp noodle. But he did that. And for him, that was like screaming, I think, I believe, according to lawyers I know.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
And by the way, he keeps Trump is lost and lost and lost yesterday, particularly over and over and over again.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Right. I think he has started to not ignore them on some things, and the others, they play fast and cute. Especially that border czar, Tom Homan. What a clown. Well, he looks like he's... enjoying a cocktail or two when he speaks to the press. But he says, we'll do what we want. He seems so dumb and a clown.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
Anyway, President Trump just fired, by the way, the two Democratic members of the FTC, which is very illegal, saying their services is inconsistent with my administration's policies. That's right, because they're Democrats. Just for people to know, The FTC typically has five members with the president's party holding three of those seats. They're seven-year terms.
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
You can't fire them except for gross incompetence, not inconsistent with my administration's policies. That's the whole point of having two members be from a different party. The two fired Democrats, Rebecca Kelly Slaughter, who I know very well, and Alvaro Bedoya, plan to challenge Trump's decision in court, obviously. Bedoya told the New York Times,
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Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
I'm sure there are lesbians who have Cybertrucks, but I'm not speaking to them anymore. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher.
Pivot
Roberts Criticizes Trump, FTC Firings, and White House Installs Starlink
When people hear the news, they need not think about me. They need to think about the billionaires behind the president and his inauguration. And that's exactly what this is. This is a payback to the people who sat on the front row. FTC is investigating all of these companies. Whether you agree with them or not, they'll lose in court if they're not. They don't have a good case, again.
Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
So you use the word chaos a lot. It's important. This is one of Elon's signature moves, chaos. to create chaos or create trouble and then make accusations. He's got six or seven moves, including attacking you for revealing the names, for example. But chaos is the point here, I think, in many ways, so that everyone has to run around and do these Band-Aid approaches.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Can you give people a sense of why they want that? I have a theory, but what is their need for getting that, to get to the data?
Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Cara Swisher. Scott is off today. Who knows where he is? But in his place, we have someone so much better, Katie Drummond, the global editorial director of Wired. Wired has always been a powerhouse, but particularly in the era of Trump, Elon and Doge, which I'm calling doggy now.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
It does vaunt Grok ahead, which is not ahead. Grok is not ahead. But it puts him in a pole position. Because, as you know, many... AI researchers think we're running out of data, right? That's been the big discussion recently. Well, there you go. And you're right, he does. But for what purpose does he want to run it? That's the part that's going to be very difficult to report.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
when you're thinking about it in that big a term.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Or he wants to go to Mars and he needs the government to do so. There's all kinds of theories on that. So let's talk about the relationship you mentioned between Donald Trump and Elon Musk. They sat down for a joint interview with Sean Hannity, the House reporter there at the White House. And I mean that in a negative way. Hannity said he felt like he was interviewing two brothers.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Hannity, it was the biggest wet kiss. He licked them up and down the entire time. Elon shared how much money he's trying to cut from the deficit. Let's listen.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
God, that's the idiot's guide to how countries are run. But that's not correct. That's not correct. But, well, Doge says it saved $55 billion in federal spending. So far, the actual data shows it's much less. One major error found on the Doge website, it mislabeled the contract as $8 billion when it was actually $8 million.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
You all have been doing a lot of reporting around this, this idea of what the cuts that are being made. And NPR just did one showing the same thing, that this is not $55 billion. And of course, now they're also talking about sending people dividend checks, which is trying to make people happy with them and allowing them to keep doing what they're doing. It's come rather early.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
The payoff has come rather early. But talk a little bit about this and what these young people are trying to do. And are there more of them moving into the space now that it's gotten momentum?
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
and its coverage has become required reading. Katie, welcome. You've had a busy couple weeks with all these scoops on Doggie, which led to a record-breaking increase in subscriptions. We'll get to that in a second, but welcome. Thank you for coming.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
When you are looking at who is doing this, it's indiscriminate because they're also inexperienced. The vetting of these people who are doing this is also... you're doing the vetting. Wired is doing the vetting. And a lot of them have sort of what I'm not surprised by, but typical obnoxious tech bro behaviors, you know, in terms of being on certain sites, doing certain things.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Okay, all right. Well, you're here, at least, as opposed to whatever the hell Scott's doing, taking edibles and not skiing, wherever he is. So I want to talk a little bit, because you guys have really come on strong here. Now, tell me about your approach to covering this administration. Now, you became Global Editorial Director relatively recently, right? Is that correct? Yeah.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
And explain why he wants those young people to do it. I know why, because the older people wouldn't.
Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
It is. It is. It is. And yet older people just wouldn't do it. They do have older people, as you've noted, and others have reported, very sophisticated lawyers and everything else. Someone who's not hiding his disgust for Elon is Steve Bannon, which is interesting. Bannon called Elon, Elon, I think, this week, a parasitic illegal immigrant, though he did compliment Doge.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
And he said Elon wants to play act as God. He does seem to be a fan, as I said, of Doge's work. He told CNN. Let's listen.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
So Bannon later called out Elon, Mark Zuckerberg, and Jeff Bezos as oligarchs who don't support the MAGA movement. What is going on here? I think he would turn and be pals with Elon in five seconds. No question with this guy.
Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Right, right, right. And that's what those compliments for him. When you think about those who are pushing back, are there really true people pushing back? And what can be done? Obviously, Scott makes fun of the people, the Democrats standing in front of agencies and yelling. But, you know, there is something to protest, obviously.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Is there real pushback within the government and within technology circles? They just seem to be quitting. A lot of the techies who are in there are leaving, are going. Yeah.
Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Yeah. Among the biggest people is the cyber people. They're terribly worried. That's the ones who are sort of sounding the alarms in terms of the porousness of what's happening here. Yeah. All right. We're going to a quick break. When we come back, more about Doge Central and Wired's amazing reporting. Support for Pivot comes from Delete.me.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Katie, we're back. There's obviously been a lot of questions. You mentioned about conflicts of interest since Elon came to Washington. I agree. I don't think his big thing is to make money, although he doesn't mind doing it. And he's supported, like he's using threats to push X. He's using threats to this and that. He's doing the typical shakedown kind of thing that can happen.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Wired has done some new reporting on SpaceX engineers in the FAA. They're also putting his people within the FAA. And also, apparently, President Trump's trying to get him to figure out why he doesn't have his jet. Like, he's putting him on that, too. Talk about that.
Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
I'll note SpaceX launches are regulated by the FAA, and the agency has alleged that SpaceX violated safety rules in the past many times. Talk a little bit about the story today.
Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Yeah, and it's happening all over the government. Obviously, you guys have been reporting on that. And again, who's running SpaceX and Twitter and all these others? Obviously, Steve Davis, who's been a very active Musk minion. What is the point here of putting them there just for eyes? I assume eyes and ears.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
What's the impact on the companies? Because Because by the way, Tesla's not doing great, by the way. They're not, you know, but what is happening at the companies when they pull these people out?
Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Could he put, he could put them in every agency, his own employees, correct? That they're that are beholden to him and nobody else.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
And who is coordinating all that? Elon is not doing this alone. Who do you think is the most critical person helping him coordinate this?
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
And why did you have that instinct? Because of AI around the world, regulatory issues, that was the focus, was that everybody's going to be focused in on what AI means and the governments included.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
And he always has those. He has those all the time that are loyal to him. What people have to understand, they're loyal to Elon Musk, not Donald Trump. These are not Trump. These were not Trump supporters, and neither was Elon for a long time. So I want to ask you about the president, because what is his role in here?
Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Last week, he's channeled Napoleon posting, he who saves his country does not violate the law. He was trolling people with that. He also called himself king on Wednesday as he tried to kill Congestion pricing in New York. He's busy. That interview was really something. It doesn't seem like he knows what Elon is doing. That's my impression.
Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Nothing at all. All right, Katie, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, we'll talk about X's new valuation.
Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
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Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Katie, we're back. Let's get to a couple more headlines. Elon Musk acts as in talks to raise money from investors at a valuation of $44 billion. If that number sounds familiar, it's because it's the same price Musk bought the platform back in 2022 in December 2020. Fidelity Investments marked down its stake in the company by 70%.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
This follows a trend of Musk Company valuations soaring since he's taken a significant role in the Trump administration, even if the companies are suffering, such as Tesla. Numbers are down and the price was up. X is not in the same place it was pre-Elon. It's smaller.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Today, the Wall Street Journal published a very good story about X people pressuring advertisers to get back on or else maybe they'll face an investigation or they'd be added to a lawsuit that they're doing. They're using a lot of legal means. to try to force advertisers onto it, what is clearly a less good platform. Talk about this.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Although, again, it's not for him to make money is not maybe his guiding role. He certainly is doing it. And here's a perfect example of it.
Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Right. They are going to either pay or not, but you're going to be in trouble eventually. in some way. Let me read you someone. I asked them about this today.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
I think this dynamic's playing out that every advertiser who knows what they're doing, no media buyer, indeed no marketer, once their CEO gets a call from Elon Musk berating them for not advertising on X, it sounds judgment to avoid by throwing some money to the company. Everything about this I loathe. It creates bad precedent. It puts money in Elon's pocket. It undermines the advertising business.
Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
You know, I think it's just prudent business. I have heard stories That the team is making veiled threats, perhaps not so veiled threats, and I think it will ultimately bite them someday. But this is a classic story of corruption that, you know, it's just a kind of thing like that. You cannot build businesses on threats. I mean, you can't, but you can actually.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
When did you sort of get the idea that you should really look at Doge? Because I think it's really, I mean, I'm feeling like, how did they get into this USAID? Where did you get this? You know, all this stuff that you were getting and the identities and information about all these people that were working for it. Because that's years of beat reporting, essentially.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
They are saying, I've heard them say it to me, that we don't have a choice. We can't do it right now. We can't do anything about it. Is there anyone else trying to take it back? Obviously, all the tech leaders showed up at inauguration in that shameless display of fealty.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Is there any resistance in tech at all? besides Reid Hoffman and maybe Mark Cuban?
Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
So last question, the Democrats, I don't think we're as close to tech as people thought it was. I thought Obama was, you know, in that regard with Eric Schmidt and others. Do you think it's a wholesale change? I think it's an opportunistic change. And the joke I make is that If Kamala Harris won, Mark Zuckerberg would be asking us to calling him they-them. Yes.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
I mean, I was trying to figure it out. I'm like, wow, they were up to speed rather quickly and rather accurately on what's happening. What was the strategy there? Yeah.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
You know, I don't think it's anything other than that because I don't think they're committed in any way. And I think Steve Bannon's right. They're not MAGA friends. They just are opportunistic. In that regard, is there an opportunity for Democrats in that way, besides giving these toddlers what they want? You mean to get closer to the tech industry? To get back to closest.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Or do you think it's an overall shift that's permanent?
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Okay, Katie, it's time for this week's Threads poll result. Last week, we asked you all what you wish Democrats were doing in response to Trump administration. That's why I was asking about that. Here are a few responses. Carrie said, replace Schumer's entire comm staff with Pete Buttigieg. From Marina, primarily retire all those old white men and support young, ferocious, fearless candidates.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
And Nick said, talk like human beings, stop fundraising texts, demonstrate understanding of urgency. We know the house is on fire. We want to see firefighters, nurses, cops. Good answers, kind of what you were saying. I mean, I think this is right. It's the elderliness of it, the tone definite, the lack of social media. I think the Republicans are excellent on social media.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
And comparatively, and that the Democrats certainly aren't as much. Some are, certainly are. Do you see anybody being very promising? I mean, Pritzker suddenly has sort of developed a backbone and is using social media a lot. Obviously, AOC uses it. Is there anybody? And how important is that going forward?
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Waving, Scott says waving their canes at people. I would agree. I actually see Chris Murphy doing some interesting things. There's a bunch of them. There's a bunch of them, but it has to be coordinated in a way that, you know, and you still have the power of the Rogans, although he's slipping a little bit. You're starting to see slippage with him.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
I think the audience is up for grabs, that's for sure, if they want to have the right questions. All right. Now for this week's questions for our audience. Do you think China will agree to the sale of TikTok under the Trump administration? Katie, I want your response very quickly on this one.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
And do you see any person besides Larry Ellison rising to the front? I would say Musk, obviously, because he's acceptable to China.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Yeah, I think it's probably going to be the Elon thing once again. He's going to fix everything. And it's good for Twitter. It would be good for Twitter because that's an actually good product as opposed to Twitter. Visit us on threads at pivotpodcastofficial to answer. So we'll hear the answers that we get from listeners.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
If you've got a question of your own or you'd like answered, send it our way. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. All right, Katie, one more quick break. We'll be back for your prediction.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Okay, Katie, let's hear a prediction. You are Scott Galloway today.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
And it's just your wish, your wish that he, that he will do this? I think there is a 1% chance that it will happen. And so I'm using it as my prediction. He used to support, I just was looking at texts he sent me about the climate change thing. He was so upset in the text, like Trump was doing. Same thing, oddly enough, with gay and lesbian stuff.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Well, we'll see. I don't know what could happen. Getting off the evening activities, I don't know what could happen.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
You never know. His daughter is nice to him, who can't stand him.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
He is consistent. Donald Trump is consistent. He has not changed one bit except he's got a rich friend that he uses as a cudgel on everybody else. But we'll see. That's a really good one, Katie. I like it. Thank you. I like it. Excellent. I like it. We'll see. I will have you back in six months if that happens. All right. I just want to say absolutely stellar coverage.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
You guys are not just a scoop machine, but the context and you're sticking to it. Let me ask you a personal question. Are you worried in any way for yourself with all these threats? People ask me that a lot because when he recently threatened Scott and I, and I was like, oh, did he? Like, okay. But it's not something that's not in my mind, legal action or threats. you know, pressure from people.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
I have seen it. I'm seeing it happen. I was supposed to appear with someone. They pulled out. They're like, oh, you're too hot. Like, and I was like, I don't think you mean that in a nice way, like kind of thing. And do you feel pressure not to keep doing what you're doing?
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
I used to tell that to our reporters. You just have to get it right. It has to be right. Yeah, it has to be right. You cannot make a mistake with these people because the minute you make even just the slightest one, you know, you have an Achilles heel showing them they will come for you. And that's what they'll do. But still, there are issues.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
I think you're right to be concerned about digital issues, about technology. hacking about legal attacks and stuff like that. And so that's why it's all the more courageous for what you and others are doing in terms of, and keep going, keep going for big balls. I don't, you know, and the fact that you couldn't, I'm sorry, it was so good. We shouldn't laugh at this, but come on. How good is that?
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
You like it a little bit.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Okay. That's the show. We'll be back on Tuesday with more Pivot. I will read us out. Today's show was produced by Lara Naiman, Zoe Marcus, and Taylor Griffin. Ernie Enderdot engineered this episode. Nishat Kerwa is Vox Media's executive producer of audio. Make sure you subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
You can subscribe to the magazine at nymag.com slash pod. We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. Thank you, Katie. Thank you.
Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
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Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
That's interesting that you use the word forceful because I get what you're doing because we've done it. We did it previously at All Things TV with Uber or Yahoo, whatever the story was. It's nothing like this story. I'll tell you, this is quite... I wouldn't even know what to do with this story. But talk about forcefulness because it's really important to have an editor who is...
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
you're a critical part of this, as I know, because I've been there, like not on this biggest story, but talk about the idea of forcefulness and aggression in doing that and not in a negative way.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Another thing is people do try to stop you. They say, why are you being so aggressive? I think people don't understand that when we were very aggressive on Uber and what was happening there with Travis Kalanick, a venture capitalist approached me at a restaurant called Murad, and they said, when are you gonna stop being so hard on him? And I said, when he stays down.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
And they were like, well, that's, you know, rude. I'm like, what? Like, I'm sorry. He's a terrible CEO. He's doing terrible things and he's not staying down. So when he stays down, that's probably when we'll stop or even beyond. It was interesting. It's hard for people to understand. Do you feel pressure yourself? Because this is big stakes. I mean, that was just Uber, like who cares kind of thing.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
I don't mean to say who cares, but you know what I mean. This is the bigs. This is really the bigs. Do you personally feel pressure? Or do you feel that you have to pull back anyway? I've noticed a pullback among certain people, for sure.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
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Pivot
DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Yeah, exactly. One of the things that was the attacks were so disingenuous. You know, you're saying who they are. You are not saying... little pricks or anything else. You know, you were, I was saying that. But you were very clearly just saying, this is who's working on this stuff. This is the federal government. It deserves transparency. And those attacks were disingenuous.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
I mean, he attacked, Ilan attacked Scott and I for being mean to them or something like that. It's part of a narrative they have, trying to get on how these poor kids, how dare you attack these poor kids. Right.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Yeah, exactly. And those stories were anything. So let's go into some of these stories, because I think it's really, people are sort of, it's a breathtaking level of scoops, I have to say. It's really, and I think a lot of people are doing a great job now. I do too. They've stepped up since you stepped up.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
It actually creates an energy around the coverage itself, which I think I've noticed just today. I saw about three stories elsewhere, and I was like, this would only be because Wired's been so aggressive. I appreciate that. But you can feel it. You can feel it. But people were slow to the idea of what's happening here. So it's been a month since Trump took office.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
There's a lot happening in the land of doggy, as I say. So let's dig in. One shocking thing we learned this week, Elon Musk's apparently not in charge of doggy. The White House said in a court fine that Elon Musk is not the U.S. doggy service administrator. I'm sorry to say it that way, but I'm going to keep doing it. He's an employee in the White House office akin to a senior advisor.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Talk a little bit about this, and I'm going to go into some of your stories, too, but talk about what you thought. Is this the loopiest of loopholes? The White House can stand up legal trouble. Several states' attorney generals argued in a suit last week that Elon is wielding power that can only be held by elected officials and people.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Confirmed by the Senate, but a federal judge ruled there isn't enough evidence for irreparable harm to justify a temporary restraining order. This is a legal nicety. The judge also expressed questions about what the White House was doing.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
So Wired published a story this week about a law that could possibly stop some of Doge's actions. Explain that. Explain what you're doing, because you are building a case, right, in your own way, in a journalistic way.
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DOGE’s Chaos Strategy, X’s New Valuation, and Guest Co-Host Katie Drummond
Do you have a legal reporter? How do you, because I think the lawsuits will reveal a lot, but it's the slowest way of dealing with a very difficult situation.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
All right. Perspectives, different perspectives. I agree. I think that's fine. I think that's great. But let me just read. Oliver Darcy wrote a column that I thought was perfect, actually. The harm, of course, isn't just that Newsom is failing to challenge his guests as they lie about important topics to a sizable audience.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
It's that he's actively contributing to the normalization of extremists by treating them as serious policy thinkers and instead of dangerous right-wing talkers who have caused immense damage to our country. Figures like Bannon, Kirk, and Savage aren't merely conservatives with different policy views.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
They're performers whose platforms are built on deliberate deceptions, dangerous lies, and hostility towards basic democratic principles. By inviting them onto a show without seriously challenging their rhetoric, Newsom has introduced these dishonest figures to new audiences, and he's done it while portraying them as serious voices who deserve respect and consideration.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher.
Pivot
Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
Now, he also goes on, I'm going to finish this part, is Newsom's friendly approach also represented a possible missed opportunity. Real dialogue across political divides can have value, but only when there's actual accountability. Hard-hitting questioning, challenging of false narratives, and yes, fact-checking would have made for interesting show.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
Imagine how Jon Stewart or John Oliver would have interrogated the positions of these two these far-right wing personalities. Had Newsom engaged in this style of interview, his podcast would have served a valuable purpose, exposing rather than amplifying dishonest media figures. It would have been far more interesting than watching him bro it up with MAGA World.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
And he did come to the same conclusion. It's a move that frankly suggests he values his own political future more than holding some of the world's most toxic media figures accountable for their corrosive impacts on society. In his sense, this podcast revealed quite a lot about his character that he's willing to do in the pursuit of power. I really hate to say that, but I would agree with that.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
You know I like when there's debates across things, but these are unreliable and disingenuous people that are doing things to advantage And this is what Jess and I argued about when you guys were staring at us, because you spend all your time solving the lie, and then you don't actually have a discussion.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
How you doing, Scott? I just saw you last night when we were together.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
It was fun. Did you like it? They love us together there on Anderson Cooper.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
I like when Pete Buttigieg goes on Fox News. I like when Newsom was doing that. You know when he did a good job? Ron DeSantis. That was a really interesting debate, okay? Because he pushed back thoughtfully. I don't mind thoughtful discussions. In fact, a lot of journalists have interviewed Steve Bannon. I get it. I get why you should do it.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
The jocular stuff and pretending those things, these people specifically specifically do these things as a way to manipulate people. They aren't doing it. They're doing it not because of their beliefs. They're doing it to tickle MAGA in some way. And I just think if you are going to do this, then act like you did with Ron DeSantis. Show some preparation.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
Anyway, we had a beautiful time, and it was very nice to see you. It was very good to see you.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
I don't expect him to be a journalist, but I don't expect him to pretend this never happened. And that's what these things are.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
Right. I don't think he shouldn't. What I do think he should do is do the job he did before. And I was perplexed as to why it was like all joking, all joking. Oh, don't we all get along? And I think some of these people, particularly Bannon, is... I think about whether... I would do an interview with him or not.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
And as part of me, you know, I think I made the joke, you know, is it good to ask, you know, like, because he's warring with Musk. So everyone's like, oh, you should talk to him.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
We've seen a lot of each other, Roots South by Southwest.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
I don't know if that's enough common ground to really have anything that's thoughtful in any way, because you're constantly spending your entire interview fixing the lie and then the conversations about the lie versus actual policy debate.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
Yeah. Yeah. Are you tired of me?
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
That's all I wanted. That's essentially—when he did the dissension, when he goes on Fox, I don't think he's hostile. I think he's having a great conversation, actually. I don't think he's like, gotcha. I just was like, what happened to that Gavin? Like, what in the world happened? And when he announced this, I thought, great idea. You do very well in those environments.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
And the conversations must be had. But this was, I just don't know what he's up to here because it's not the guy who goes on Fox News. It's not the guy who wades into people he disagrees with. I do know California does need this funding from the Trump administration. I see that he has to be a little more solicitous of these people. But at the same time, and he kind of wants to denuder them
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
before he runs. And so he doesn't get all the flack that they may they will inevitably aim at the next Democratic presidential nominee.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
I kind of like that. That's perfect.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
We do. I do. But I do wish he had done what he had done with DeSantis and others, and he's not doing that here.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
He should also have left-wing figures he disagrees with. Anyway, apparently they won't go on. He told me they won't go on.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
Yeah, I like her a lot. She's unusually tall. I didn't realize that until she got up.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
No, I don't. No, I don't in any way.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
You know how to get me out of a conversation by making a ridiculous remark about the sexiness.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
People would love me, Cara. They would have barbecued you on the outback by then. You would have been gone on the outback. Okay, Scott, let's take a quick break. Now you know how to get me out of a conversation. When we come back, Trump's chaotic tariffs.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
Yeah. She's a tall gal. Anyway, are you tired? I made Scott come early to work today because I'm going on The View.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
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They'll handle the whole transition for you. No tech expertise required. Just visit kinsta.com slash pivot to get started. That's K-I-N-S-T-A dot com slash pivot. Scott, we're back with the ongoing tariff whiplash. The EU and Canada announced billions of dollars in retaliatory tariffs on Wednesday after President Trump's levies on steel and aluminum went into effect.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
The markets continue their rollercoaster ride, fluctuating with all the tariff pivots, speaking of pivots, which you and I called red light, green light on Anderson Cooper last night. But steadying slightly with positive inflation report, but people are still expecting inflation to rise.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
I'll note we're recording this Thursday morning, so Trump may change his mind on tariffs several more times before our listeners hear this. We'll get into recession concerns, which I'm calling Trump session in a bit. But what do you think will happen next? What do you think about these tariffs over the last few days? Are markets overreacting or are they getting it right?
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
The Wall Street Journal reported on a closed-door gathering of CEOs this week at the Business Roundtable where an impromptu poll was taken about the economy. Oh, this was the Jeffrey Sonnenfeld one. 22% said stocks would have to fall 30% before they would take a stand. Jamie Dimon finally did after saying Trump's get over it on the tariffs is now saying this is a bad thing. Start with tariffs.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
You know how you get a lot of attention? You jump up and down to the stage in Austin. I have had that picture sent to me so many times. Oh, that was magic.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
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Pivot
Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
Yeah, I know, but I was sitting there going, sit down, sit down, sit down. I've gotten that picture sent to me. Like, what is going on here?
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
Boom, boom. Professor Galloway gives you his lecture in class. Even worse than this?
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
Oh, wow. That was a lecture. I just felt like I was macroeconomics back in college right now. That was a macroeconomics professor. Thank you, Professor Galloway, for that cogent analysis. It sucks is what I would say.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
No, don't do that. Don't do that. Don't do that. That's wrong. No, that's wrong. That's wrong. That's wrong. Listen, let me, I will give a much shorter thing. I was on the Amtrak train when the people were coming back from the business round table to New York and all of them were insulting Trump. Every one of them, even if they don't speak out, they all said, what a fucking idiot.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
This uncertainty sucks. And they were all insulting it and saying, what do we do now? Second, because they talked too loud on an Amtrak train, all these men, they were all men. And then secondly, a CEO of a very big public company that is going to be affected by tariffs, and I'm not going to say what it is, I said, what are you going to do now? What are you going to do now?
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
And he said, pass it on to consumers. I was like, thought so. It is going to hurt his business. He was like, I'm going to have to pass it along to consumers, there's no other way. It's going to affect his business across the globe, absolutely. It was like, we don't know what to do, so we're going to do anything.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
It's going to affect everyone along with the cuts in government, the non-scalpel like cuts in government, which would hearten people, the across the board cuts where you don't know where it's going to happen with crazy Elon with a chainsaw. Same thing. Nobody knows because there's, you know, it's interesting because the Department of Education cuts, everyone's like, oh, it's not useful.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
How about, what would you like for Christmas?
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
They mostly have privatized much of their research and studies and stuff that's actually somewhat useful to know if things work or not, different testing and things like that. That's all been privatized, so that's going to have second and third order effects, and mostly across the country, not in Washington. And so, although Washington is also going to be affected, so the effects are everywhere.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
And so that's why there's been a lot of talk of recession lately, which I call a Trump session. I'm going to keep saying that word until it catches on, like Bidenomics. Though Trump is dancing around that language. Let's listen to what he told Fox Business's Maria Bartiromo earlier this week. By the way, Kara Swisher is not a fan of Maria Bartiromo when asked about the possibility of a recession.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
No, I don't think so. But I did get that picture sent to me and asked me what was happening. And I said the typical day in the life of Pivot.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
This issue has been a real hair up his ass, the idea that tariffs will work. He's way back in the Smoot-Hawley days. But Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick had a different take on tariffs and recession in an interview with CBS News. Let's listen.
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I now know why this guy is not respected on Wall Street when he opens his mouth. He's such a clown. He's a suck-up to Trump because he's finally relevant. He goes around talking about how he's best friends to Trump in Washington, all over the place. He is the thirstiest public official I've ever seen. And it's because he's not beloved on Wall Street.
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That's right. Okay. Yeah. It just takes away all fear. Let me think. I'm comfortable with being unfunny. Interesting.
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And secondly, he's spewing nonsense, just nonsense out of his mouth.
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So do you think a recession's likely at this point? Because again, with this fell in charge, I mean, I'm thinking Gina Raimondo is so smart and this guy is so dumb, like actually dumb. Like I think he, when macroeconomics was taking place, he was the one sleeping behind me, the dude sleeping on the desk behind me. That's what it feels like. He's not paying attention. to almost any obvious thing.
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And you're right, when we did some of these trade deals, we didn't think of the effects here enough and figured out how to retrain and get people into new jobs and things that were more competitive and figure out what advanced manufacturing we could do here with our population and et cetera, et cetera. This is an opportunity for China.
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So do you, you know, and the second thing is people worried about their 401ks and portfolios during this volatility. I mean, do you think there's going to be a recession, very briefly? And then what would you say to people with the stock market? Warren Buffett looks like a genius. Tariffs suck. I'm in cash. Look who looks like he is the goat. He should be president, but anyway.
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What would you do, you know, you're in the stock market, just leave it alone.
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Well, those pictures will endure. That's the good thing.
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Death decisions are the metaphor of my life. You know that. That's what I always do when I'm deciding what to say and do.
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Yeah, excellent, excellent advice. Professor Galloway, this was a very professorial. I used to fall asleep in macroeconomics.
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I was like this. I used to do that. It was at 8.10 in the morning. Anyway, let's go on a quick break. We'll be back to chat about Trump and Elon hawking Teslas at the White House. Support for Pivot comes from Brex. This goes out to all you finance folks. There's a lot of pressure these days to save money and that's important. But the best finance leaders focus on more than that.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
Scott, we're back with our second big story. The beautiful bromance of Elon and trust continues. That's from our producers. The rest of us worry about dismantling of our government. President Trump is focused on a very important task, promoting sales of Teslas. After posting on True Social Tuesday morning, he said he would buy a Tesla to support Musk. I bet he hasn't.
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Trump welcomed Elon and a fleet of Teslas to the White House. The president had a cheat sheet of notes and kudos to that photographer who got that picture in his hands while praising the company. Let's listen to what he thought when he sat in one of the cars. And by the way, he hates EVs. He said he actually hates EVs. He doesn't drive, et cetera, et cetera. So this was why this was precious.
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As you know that Steve Jobs essay that he did, actually it was a speech that he did at Stanford I read all the time. I recommend it to everybody. It's all about living.
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He hasn't ever been inside a car in like a long time. I mean, a car that looks like that. Tesla stock is down 26% in the last month, the time of the taping. It had a bump from Trump, but most people, there were two analyst reports showing that Tesla's in real trouble, that are taking the stock price down quite considerably, although it's hard to bet against Tesla because of stunts like this.
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Scott, did you know that there's a computer in a Tesla? Just what the fuck? What do you think of this stunt?
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No percent down, whatever. Yeah, yeah.
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I think he's uninterested in Tesla. I think he's uninterested in Tesla anymore. I don't know what else. because they haven't innovated on the product. I know everybody sort of looks at the polarization that he's created, and he's repulsing his customers, and he's not going to attract the ones who like him now, right? They may like him, they're not going to buy his car.
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They might, I mean, they might, I guess, but I doubt it. Sean Hannity supposedly bought one, whatever, and he's like, it goes fast. I was like, these are good cars. That said, you know what? I complained again to Dara Khosrowshahi. I was like, I just ordered an Uber Black and a Tesla showed up and they're still not luxury cars. Now I'm making the argument to him, it's not a luxury car.
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It's very tinny and a bumpy ride. And if I wanted a luxury car, send me an actual luxury car if I'm paying for it. But that said, I think it was pathetic. But now, interestingly, if support... doesn't do what Elon was hoping in the long term, which was at least stabilize Tesla shares, which are drifting down. I suspect they're going to be drifting down again.
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No, he didn't invent the phone.
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It's not the only way the president is attempting to help him. Trump also said he would label attacks against Tesla dealerships domestic terrorism. Nobody likes these attacks. These are stupid. They're allowed to protest. And the fact that he's trying to link regular protests with
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Domestic terrorism is ridiculous, but attacking, you know, charger facilities, et cetera, is just violent, is what it is. It's not terrorism. It's just obnoxious and illegal, and those should be arrested. And Elon Musk is paying back the favors. He reportedly plans to give $100 million to President Trump's political operation that Trump can control rather than Musk.
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During the election, Musk donated over $250 million to his pro-Trump super PAC that he controlled. He made up that $100 million in the rise in Tesla stock. after Trump did this infomercial. But it feels so pay to play. It's like so right in front of you. And I agree, Biden should have included a Tesla in that particular event at the White House.
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That is true. You used to be his defender. Yeah, I did. You're right. I agree with you. I did. Well, I was mostly attracted to that he was focused on important things. I was so tired of people... You know, you're right. I was. There's no way out of it. There was. There was. But I think I'm more than made up for it. I feel like I'm more than made up for it.
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And, you know, someone was arguing that presidents always promote different American products, but not like this. This was like, it was, plus he didn't know how cars worked, which would have made him seem older and more like an old man in my I think that also was weird. His discomfort inside of a car felt very, I don't know, it gave me like a Biden feel, like a doddering old man kind of.
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And I think he is much more vibrant, obviously, than Biden. Any other thoughts about this money that's going back and forth between these two?
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
You know, it's interesting because there is a point to be made that, you know, other politicians are getting paid under the table and this is explicit, but it's gross no matter how it happens. And it doesn't look like it's about the products, right? It never... It's not about what's best, it's who can pay me the most.
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We're not focused on making things that are good, we're focused on who knows the money. We all know that about American politics, but it's not implicit or explicit, it's grotesque is what it is.
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I know. I'm catching up. Anyway, we got a lot to get to today. I'm in New York, as I said. I'm picking up my mom. And then I'll go back down to Washington. I've been in Washington for a little while, but.
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You could call your kid Swisher. You want to change the kid's name to Swisher?
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Totally. I don't even know how much that cost. That probably cost, like, it's the amount of money this guy just throws away of taxpayer money, like on golfing or his dumb military flights of immigrants that are overpriced, and then does this. You know, it's just ridiculous. And, you know, and the only person that benefited was Elon Musk with the stock going up.
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And somewhere, somehow, there's money in Trump's pocket every time.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
Yeah, I agree. Now that you really don't want to own a Tesla. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for predictions.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
We have a lot to get to today because Washington is where the action today is because of the market chaos from the Trump tariffs and the Tesla stunt at the White House, the car sale at the White House. We've got a lot to talk about. But first, Amazon announced this week that seven seasons of Donald Trump's reality show The Apprentice will soon be streaming on Prime Video.
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Okay, Scott, let's hear your prediction and just say you thought that they're going to break up. Do you still think that? You said Doe should be over and Elon would be gone. But let's hear your prediction first.
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This follows Amazon paying a reported $40 million to license, not even own, license a Melania Trump documentary. Trump's cut of the new streaming deal hasn't been revealed, but he was an executive producer on the show, and he actually is well compensated when it was shown.
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And guess what country has alternatives? China. And Jeff Bezos is working on things. To Starlink. Now, Starlink is dominant at this point, and he keeps saying there's no other alternative. He said that about Tesla. There's other alternatives. There's going to be other alternatives. And then he is... up the creek without that proverbial paddle. You're right. I agree with you.
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Interesting prediction. We'll see. There is a staying power. There's a weird relationship happening between these two, though, that he stays there, that he's at the White House, the kids around. There's something much different here, but I would agree. He almost teared up when he was talking about the money he was losing.
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Even the world's richest man doesn't like to lose tens of billions of dollars on any one day.
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That's the Scott Galloway message.
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No. As Starlink. Starlink's a superior product. And by the way, Tesla was a superior product, but he hasn't improved it. And again, as I say over and over again, a lot of people are banning Tesla because they're repulsed by Elon Musk, but they have not innovated their product.
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If you have a great product, and in this case, it's the repulsiveness and the danger if you go with him in this case, and that's why Europe is going to abandon him. And so is Canada, as Canada has. It's not just that. And there's going to be plenty of competitors in the Starlink business very soon.
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Netflix also just made a deal with Tony Hinchcliffe, the comedian who sparked controversy with that racist joke at Trump rally last April. October about Puerto Ricans. Talk to me about this. I watched all these seasons of The Apprentice. I can see why you would buy this because he's the president, he's popular with half the country. I like the show, so I get it.
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All right. We'll see. I'd be interested. That would be great. And then they can go to Mars and it'll be great for them to do that. We want to hear from you. Send us your questions about business, tech, or whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. Scott, that is the show. When are you going back to London soon at some point?
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What are you up to? I'm moving my mom to Washington, as I told you. I'm picking her up today. Yes. Then I will be in DC, but then I'm actually going on a little vacation myself.
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Puerto Rico with three of my four children. We're going and we're going to have a little L-U-K time and be in Puerto Rico, which should be a state as far as I'm concerned. I'm excited. Amanda loves it. And so we're going to go there.
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I love Puerto Rico. It's beautiful. It's a beautiful place. It's a really nice place. And it's in these United States and people should go there. People should go to all the places that were sort of hit by hurricanes too. I like going to places that are in the United States and also deserving of our attention. Anyway, I'm not a big vacationer, so I'm excited to- I'm going.
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Yeah. Okay. All right. All right, Scott, that's the show. We'll be back on Tuesday with more Pivot. Read us out.
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I'm surprised that it wasn't available. widely, I don't recall looking for it. And I don't know why you'd watch it again, necessarily. The Tony Hinchcliffe I get, they're going to invest in all these things like this going forward. And they're going to be behind the times because the ones you want to get are the Bill Burrs or whatever, which they already have, of course.
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But what do you think of these programming moves?
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Absolutely. In that case, yes.
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Yeah. I was not expecting this, this India move. This is really interesting. I would agree. The Melania thing, it feels like such grift. I mean, they don't own it. The money is ridiculous. They're not going to get the watching out of it. I mean, it's wild. It's whack. It's a bribe. That felt like a bribe. The Washington Post thing certainly did, and it continues to do.
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By the way, they lost their very excellent head of public relations there in communications left, who's a pro. So many people are leaving there. Ruth Marcus, also a columnist, great columnist, one of their most popular columnists left. when they spiked a piece that was mild at best, which she published in The New Yorker. She's been there forever. She was there when I was at The Washington Post.
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The Apprentice, I'm going to say it's a reasonable enough decision, I guess, for that one. But you're right. It looks like payments to Donald Trump in some fashion or ways to get an advantage with him in some way, especially at Amazon, all told. Yeah.
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Yeah, I think that's a great idea. What I was sort of yelling about last week is that they're not getting their advantage through innovation and products. They're getting their advantage through access. And that's a bad sign. It's a bad sign for an industry. It's a bad sign that this is where they're putting their focus and not on what they're making.
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And it looks like pigs at the trough is what happens. Anyway, it's not a surprise, but... I'll be interested to see how The Apprentice does. Actually, I really like The Apprentice as a program, although I knew it was all cooked. It was like watching wrestling. And apparently he was handed every single remark he made on The Apprentice. People who worked there told me that.
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I don't know how it would be interesting now. It'll feel like such a throwback. I'm going to watch a couple of them to see because I did watch them all and I really enjoy them at the time. But then when you go back and watch things you used to watch, you're like, how in the world did I ever watch that? Like Three's Company.
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Go do that for a little test for yourself and you'll be like, oh my God, this is not keeping up.
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Yeah, you did. Anyway, don't watch that show. You won't feel good. I don't think you can get it. Maybe Amazon will buy it.
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I know, I have a hard time with ads now, it's weird. When I see them on the show, I was up late last night watching Hobbs and Shaw, but they kept having commercials and I didn't know what to do. I was like, what do I do now? Why am I waiting for this? Anyway, speaking of things that are perplexing to me, and I know Jess yesterday liked it, but I have a new argument against what she said.
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California Governor Gavin Newsom had none other than Steve Bannon on his podcast saying, The two kept up a reasonably friendly tone, and Newsom didn't push back when Bannon claimed Trump won the 2020 election. He did the same with Charlie Kirk and Michael Savage and things they said that were just absolute nonsense lies, really, essentially.
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And didn't mention, for example, Kirk's—he has a wide range of terrible things he's said. that are really just awful. Their hour-long conversation was mostly focused, this abandoned one, on economic issues and areas of common ground. One of those areas, Elon Musk. Let's listen to a clip.
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Arm believes the future isn't about technology. It's about people and the possibilities technology can offer us. The future is built on Arm. You can discover more at arm.com slash discover. I got to get dressed for Whoopi Goldberg. You know who's on right after me? Donny Osmond.
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Tariff Turmoil, Trump’s Tesla Ad, and Newsom’s Bannon Interview
Newsom isn't the only one making podcasts this week. Former First Lady Michelle Obama has launched a video podcast with the Obama's media company, Higher Ground. It's with her brother. The podcast IMO, which will focus on, it's in my opinion, on thoughtful conversations about life, is co-hosted with her brother, Craig Robinson.
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The Newsom one, and I texted him about it, I had a lot of problem with because I understood his need to talk across the aisle with people. First of all, there's a lot of people he could talk to that don't constantly lie, and his first three guests are really problematic in that regard. But if you're going to do that, you have to address that.
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the real differences and not debate them, but point them out, factual inaccuracies. And his sort of jocular tone is not, I found it, I feel like it's just a political, he's doing it only for politics and to reach out to MAGA voters, perhaps. I'm perplexed by the entire endeavor and said so to him. What are your thoughts?
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Yeah, so we have to offer positive things going forward. I agree with you. All right, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, President Musk takes center stage in the Oval Office.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
How you doing, Scott? What's going on?
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Scott, we're back. Elon Musk joined President Trump in the Oval Office on Tuesday to discuss his work on Doge. I'm going to call it Doggy from now on. I'm not calling it Doge. Doggy. He gave a very casual explanation of what he's been up to. Let's listen.
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I just bought a beverage refrigerator.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Actually, in the best interest of Elon Musk, according to a lot of reporting, by the way, a lot of these cuts have to do with his businesses and a lot of these attacks are mostly around things that affect him. He said he speaks to Trump almost daily and checks with him before making decisions. Meanwhile, Trump signed an executive order giving Doggie even more power.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
The order requires the Doggie team, I like saying it like that, to be stationed at every government agency to oversee hiring decisions now and will only allow agencies to hire one employee for every four that depart. Aside from that, that was the weirdest visual I've ever seen. His four-year-old was there looking what Elon used to call this kid a cute prop. And that's what it was.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
We renovated our house. We're moving back in. And I thought, I need a beverage refrigerator in my little pod room. I created a pod room. You know that?
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
And he kept talking to the president who seemed out of it. Elon was casually dressed, sort of dressed. pontificating, saying, so what if he made mistakes about the gauze of condoms? Who cares? He makes mistakes. It was the strangest thing I've ever seen. And Trump looked like he was drugged or something. But I don't know. How were your thoughts on that?
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Oh, no, don't make kid jokes. Keep it out. Keep it out. Even Grimes was like, that kid should not have been in public, you think?
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Oh, my God. Okay. All right. Okay.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Talk to me about this. That's true. Yes, he did. You're right.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
I have my own home pod studio like you. I'm trying to keep up with you.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Well, he's called it that.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Yeah, but I got one of those old retro ones, and it's blue. What do you think?
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
See, I did not. I had an exact opposite. I was like, what is going on here? This is so strange with a kid saying things to Trump. I mean, a lot of people put words in the kid's mouth. One was, you need to shush now.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
I'm not even going to go. He was talking to the president, saying something. He was saying something. And the kid shouldn't have been there. It's such a weird thing to do that. And I don't care. You can attack me all you want. This is not an appropriate place for a kid, largely for the kid's sake, not for you shouldn't have kids at work or whatever. It's just it's weird. It's weird.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
And the kid is going to suffer for it. No, I don't. I'm going to make that parenting. declaration right now. And his own mother said the same thing, by the way. But whatever, Musk wants to do it and he gets to do whatever he wants. It was disrespectful to the office of what they were doing. I still believe that. I still believe in that, even if you don't or people don't, I do.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Secondly, I thought Trump looked old next to Musk and it looked like Musk was running the government. I thought that's the visual I got out of it. But maybe that was
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Sure is. So why was he sitting down and just looking out of it and saying nothing?
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
It's not Smeg, actually. Frigidaire. Someone bought the Frigidaire name and it has Frigidaire across it in that script. I'm very pleased. I'm very pleased with my refrigerator. I love a refrigerator. I've always had beverage refrigerators and my kids have too. I think it's important. I have one in San Francisco. I had a whole mine upstairs too. Anyway, we have a lot to get to today.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Yeah, you're focused on the kids. I'm focusing on Elon. I agree. This kid should not have been there.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
It was weird. It was just a weird thing. And I thought Trump did look aged. I don't think he looked powerful. I thought he looked like the kid and he were just overplaying with blocks over here and Elon was running the government. Anyway, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has some harsh thoughts about Elon Musk after his bid for the company.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
There's a lot of legal back and forth this week, by the way, about this. There's a lawsuit and then Musk made a bid, which seems like a fake bid. Either it's a fake lawsuit or a fake bid. I can't tell. But let's listen to Sam Altman.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
The backhanded compliment. Well done, Sam. In court filing, OpenAI has said the bid contradicts legal claims Musk made in a lawsuit against the company last year. In fact, it does. Musk now says he's willing to drop the bid if OpenAI remains a nonprofit. By the way, there are emails where Musk indicates he wanted it to be a profit. So he's just, whatever works for him, he says at the time.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
As of Tuesday, Altman told employees the board hadn't received an official offer from Musk, which is probably true. I'm going to believe Altman here over Musk. You know, he's just trying to slow him down. That's what it seems like.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
He'll say whatever it takes to slow OpenAI and drag it into controversy and take advantage of people either have left OpenAI or who have ill feelings towards Altman, et cetera, which is going to be many.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Oh, no, that was like, what an asshole. Yeah, I watched how he did it. I've seen him do it before, you know, these sideways attacks, and they're funny. And he's like, oh, I feel sorry for him. He's such an asshole. I feel sorry that he's an asshole.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
My God, the news is insane, Scott.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
So which one do you think, this is just about slowing down. Both of us think that, but it's just about slowing down open AI, not a real lawsuit and not a real bid. Possibly could be though.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
It's not clear because it's a nonprofit if they have a special responsibility, but go ahead.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Now we sort of stacked it with friends of us.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Besides that weird Elon Oval Office presser with the kid saying whatever he was saying, we have also how DeepSeek is threatening Tesla's dominance. We've got a million of things. Of course, it's all about fucking Elon. I'm so tired of him, but he's right in the middle of everything. So what are we going to do?
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Well, in the case of Twitter, there was a really good, there's been very good reporting when the CEO at the time, Agrawal, We have to look at this offer. It's an offer. It's a huge offer. I'm sorry to say we don't have a choice, even if he's an asshole, essentially. And then they had to take it because it was so good and ridiculous and so above their thing.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
In this case, they can do whatever they want. And it's not that far above it. And maybe the nonprofit gets more money or something like that. But they'll be lost. He'll just keep throwing. Listen, Elon Musk has two moves. I'll buy it or I'll sue you. These are his two big moves. And sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Right, right. It's exactly what Musk wants to happen, right? That's exactly what he wants to do. He wants to cut them off at the knees. He's very clever that way. All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break. How deep seek is threatening Tesla's next.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
What are we going to do? But first, President Trump said he and Russian President Vladimir Putin have agreed to start negotiating an end to the war in Ukraine. Trump and Putin had what was described as a lengthy and highly productive phone call on Wednesday. Trump later spoke with Ukraine's President Zelensky.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Scott, we're back. Chinese electric car company BYD is bringing deep-seek technology to its vehicles, of course. The EV maker has added advanced driver assistance systems in most of its vehicles, including a model that costs under $10,000. They also continue to be adorable. The cheapest Tesla model on the market is $30,000.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Tesla stock is down 17% in the last month because people are actually doing math and not thinking that Musk's ascendance will benefit Tesla necessarily. You know, he's a CEO, but he's focused on a lot of other things. Scott, this week you talked to Alice Han, Chinese economist and director at Green Mantle, about this very thing. Let's listen.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Why wouldn't you buy a BYD? They're great cars.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
But Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth offered some insights on what Ukraine can expect from a peace deal. Way to go, Pete, telling people what we're going to do before we negotiate. But go ahead.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
As long as they're safe, they're going to raise questions. I've had people write me about whether they're safe or not.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
I'm just saying, they have to be if they're here.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Talk about these autonomous vehicle licenses. He needs them in China, right, if he can get these from the Chinese.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
I do think that China... I agree with you about sort of the fast follower, right? The planes are covered with the bodies of pioneers, that kind of thing. That said, I do think there's a ton of innovation. I think... You can see it through TikTok. I think what Alibaba has done. There's a lot of innovation there, too, of their own. But they definitely wait, watch, and then innovate.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Yeah, I don't think they necessarily steal every minute of the day. But there is that. But these cars are very different than anything I've seen. So it's not like they're copying, right? They're sort of copying. But there's also innovations around it that I have never wanted to buy a car more than a BYD car. And I love my Ford BYD. I love my Bolt, as you know, and I think it's adorable too.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
I know, but have you seen them? I like they're inexpensive. They're beautiful.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
They're beautiful and they're cool. And if you're a young person, you'd want one. 100%.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
It's a Uniqlo of cars. Great analogy. You know, like whenever I go to Uniqlo, I buy 10 shirts. I like, they love them. And I have to say, I love them. I don't think I'm using them as just throw them out. They're just inexpensive and adorable. I just, I mean, I look adorable, by the way.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
And as long as they figure out the safety, which they'd have to in this country. I agree. I think he's just, here's the deal. Musk does not make cars that are interesting anymore. That's all. It's an interesting car. It was an innovation. He hasn't, you have to update these things for consumers. And he does, I don't think he cares about the cars anymore. That's my feeling.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Some better news for Tesla and Marco Rubio. In a totally normal deal that had no strings attached, the State Department procurement forecast for 2025 includes $400 million in armored Tesla vehicles. At least someone is buying them besides douche-nozzle men. They tried to hide it. They had Tesla on there. They changed it to armored vehicles and they're cyber trucks. Nobody else wants to buy them.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Consumers don't seem, a small group of consumers do, of course, as there would be, but it seems like it's one of those things people buy because it's weird and interesting. But nobody is buying them and very few people are buying them and now the government is buying them. Another gimme for Elon Musk. The grift keeps grifting, I feel.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Right, so they're buying them from him.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Yes. Yes, please do. I mean, just paper filet. He's not going to be mayor soon. That's the thing. He's out. Don't you think? I feel like he's not going to be.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Oh, no, it's utter play. You know what, Eric Adams, you're a crook. Like, you're a crook. You're a shitty crook, by the way. You only want tickets to Istanbul. Like, what a loser. You know, I know you're backing a particular candidate in New York. I forget who it was. Who was it?
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Yes. But there's a bunch of people running. You know, there's a bunch of people.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
But there's a bunch of very good candidates who are not going to be criminals.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Yeah, they should make an example of him.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
I know. I think he's Grifty McGrift from the start, from the go. He wasn't living there. Everything came out of his mouth was a lie, this guy. And he's such a ridiculous peacock and surrounded himself with such... I get New York mayor has to be like a little bit grifty, but this guy was like... Grifty-ish. Grifty-ish. You know, they all are. I mean, come on. I mean, but, you know, like...
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
So Hegseth also noted that NATO membership for Ukraine is not on the table. I mean, Russia sort of won at devastating cost to itself and to Ukraine. But they're essentially saying, well, they got the land they got, and this is where we do. And I get that on some level.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
He's just he's an embarrassment for a great city. He won a little greatness out of a mayor of, you know, even back in the day, Rudy was not actually, you know what? I didn't support Rudy. He was the thug to a lot of people.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Who would you put in place?
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Oh, good idea. I love it.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Great idea. Love it. All right, Kathy, get on it. All right, last thing. The Gulf of Mexico is now the Gulf of America, at least on Google and Apple Maps in the U.S. Apparently, there are consequences for not using the new name. Associated Press reporters have now been barred from multiple White House events after AP continues to use Gulf of Mexico in its reporting.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
The AP is calling this a violation of the First Amendment, but Press Secretary Carolyn Leavitt, also known as Tracy Flick, says we reserve the right to decide who gets to go into the Oval Office. Oh, my God. It's so stupid. Distraction, distraction, distraction. I'm going to call it the Gulf of Scott. I don't give a fuck what people do to me if I do that.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
It's so stupid. It's so stupid. It's so manifestly stupid. And I'm sure I don't even think like, oh, yeah, we're calling it the Gulf of America. Whatever.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
We'll show them. I got to tell you, I'm loving the new president of Mexico so much. She's such a badass. I'm going to try to interview her.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
She's like, fuck you. You know, but at the same time, she deals. She's a dealer, too. Anyway, it's a distraction. Googie, you look like wimps, but whatever. And nobody looks good. I'm going to call it the Gulf of Scott. That's the end of it. All right, everybody?
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
At the same time, it's kind of Putin's kind of won because he was willing to put up with all those losses on his side and the damage that they did to Ukraine on the other side.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Doggolf. Doggy. No, Dogg. Gulf of Dog. No, I like Gulf of Scott. No, Gulf of Galloway sounds good.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Gulf of Galloway. It feels like real.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
It feels like Ponce de Leon would have named it that. Gulf of Galloway. Anyway. All right. It's time for this week's Threads poll. This one's open-ended. What do you wish Democrats would do in response to the Trump administration's actions? What do you wish? We've had our opinions on that. Something besides standing in front of a building and yelling. That's for sure.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Visit us on Threads at pivotpodcastofficial to answer. By the way, have you noticed AOC is not outside of the buildings? She's not. Have you noticed that?
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
She does great online stuff, I'll tell you that. She heard Pete are killing it.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
She and Pete Buttigieg, I have to say, are very appealing.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Well, we would love our listeners to write in what do you think they should do. And no violence, please, if you don't mind. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for predictions. Okay, Scott, let's hear predictions.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
You did? What happened? What were you taking?
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
I'm getting notes from Lara saying no, no, no. But I say yes, yes, yes.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
All right. Go ahead. Prediction.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Here you go again.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Have I been saying that? I have been saying that.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Or the people that want to buy those cars.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Go in there. You're fine. You're going there again. I love you. Once more into the breach, Scott Galloway.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Well, the numbers are the math is math, right? Look, before they were on the upswing in terms of like the quality of cars, what they were releasing. Instead, they're forced to sell things to Marco Rubio, who has to do whatever everybody says because he's such a beta. Just so you know, on that thing about...
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
search uh atlantic politico vox jim bankoff sent me this another major publisher suing ai startup cohere for copyright and trademark infringement escalating the news battles legal a battle over the technology that's from the wall street journal is a canadian company it's valued at five billion dollars and they're using thousands of copyrighted works to train its large language model hmm
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Anyway, they're suing Tim Bankoff on the attack. Atlantic, Politico, they must have coordinated it all together. All right, so those are your two that searches. Those are good. Those are big ones. Those are big ideas.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Someday you're going to be right. Anyway, you are right. You were right before on terms of the numbers. It just didn't matter. In this case, we'll see. We'll see what happens.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Predictions? I predict I will buy yet another EV this year. I will. The key is getting a little long in the tooth. And I'm trying to debate whether to get the hybrid, which I think is really, hybrids are growing like crazy.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Oh, interesting.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Let's go to China. I bet we're popular in Hong Kong. You know, we did one of my conferences here. I had a stroke there, as you know. Last time I was there, I had a stroke. That's funny.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
No, let's go to China. Let's do it. That would be really interesting.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
China, we want to come visit you. And we're going to drive a BYD. We're going to drive it across the ocean.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Reach out to us. We're coming to China. We'll do an event, whatever you want.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Bring us to China. They're so good. All right, let's do it. Let's do it in 2025.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
After we see, we're going to see Wicked, my friend.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Are they going to let people? It's all about a surveillance economy. I wonder how big it is.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Do you know what, what are you doing this weekend? Anything interesting?
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
All right, that's not very far from where you are. And I'm really excited.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Yeah, okay. You know where I'm going? I'm going to SNL's 50th concert.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
No, there's going to be a show on Saturday. I'm just going to the concert the night before. It's at Radio City Musical.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Anyway, we want to hear from you. Send us your questions about business tech or whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. Okay, Scott, that's the show. We'll be back next week with more Pivot. Please read us out.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Yeah, I agree. I think it's really, you know, this is what they said they were going to do. So it's not a surprise. But Hegseth is just reading from a card, by the way. I don't think he has a fresh idea in his head ever. I think he's just handed things like the TV host that he was.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Zelensky, who's basically been sidelined here, posted on X after the Trump call writing, no one wants peace more than Ukraine. I would imagine so, given the devastation of his country. And it's just, the question is, can Europe have, does Europe have, this is the goal Trump had, which was Europe should pay more of its own freight, presumably, after we have been supportive of him for so, so long.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
And what he's doing is he's acting like this is a real estate deal, right? Yeah.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
And then another country just went off of Russian oil the other day. They turned on the lights. They had kind of a weird Eurovision event. One of them, they were like, fuck you, Russia.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Turn off the electricity and let's dance. Let's dance. And now we dance. I loved it.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
But, you know, it's this idea of giving into Russia. This is a realpolitik, right? All right, they're there. This NATO thing on top of it, it's like they should be in NATO. They want to be in NATO. They're a European country. They are so innovative. Speaking of drones, I mean, this was a technologic.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
To me, in 10 years, there'll be tons of technology going on there when this is all settled, which is a good thing, right? They'll create a really innovative, interesting technology. But if they want to be in NATO, let them be in NATO. And the fact that Hegseth did this is, you know, we all want this war to end, obviously, especially for the people of Ukraine.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Russia gets what it gets because it invaded. I'm sorry for the people who died and the Russians, but I'm not because they did it, right? So they have to pay their price. But, you know, to be attacked like this and then have us throw them under the bus is just not a surprise at all.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
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Pivot
Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
That's why you do all the negotiating for us, because I'm always saying what I think on the top of my head. That's why I like working with you. You're always like, and then we do this. I'm like, what? Oh, all right. Okay, fine. Like, I don't know. Anyway, it's a shame. And I have to say, I have a lot of regard for Vladimir Zelensky.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
They're going to jam him out. That's the next thing. They're going to find a way to get rid of him and put a pro-Russian government in there. No question.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Yeah, it feels very Chamberlain, doesn't it? It feels very Anthony Chamberlain to me. Anyway. Well, we'll see where it goes. But Pete Hegseth just reads things on a card just so everybody knows.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Or was it Will Chamberlain? Neville Chamberlain. I'm sorry, not Anthony. Neville Chamberlain. Thank you for checking my historical references.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
I was thinking of a different Anthony because there's so many Anthony people.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Richard Chamberlain.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
We need to redo. Oh, my God. I just talked about the Thorn Birds with someone. I was being interviewed this week from Australia because I'm going to Australia in a week.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
You're not going to believe this. I mentioned it to one of the interviewers from Australia. I'm like, I love Australia, thorn birds. And literally this person was maybe 12 years old. They're like, what's that? An Australian. I was like, I need to go now. You don't know thorn birds? I need to leave now. Anyway, we'll move on from that.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
I don't know how we got to thorn birds from Ukraine, but there we are. Okay, the latest inflation numbers are out and they're higher than expected. Inflation rose 3% in January, the fastest monthly increase since August of 2020. The surging price of eggs was a big factor in the increase, up 53% from last year, which is fine with Kara, as I noted. I'm not an egg fan.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
President Trump was quick to point a finger at these numbers, calling the Biden inflation up. Sorry, dude, you own the car right now. And for those expecting lowered interest rates, Fed Chairman Jerome Powell says inflation numbers show there's more work to be done. So Jerome was right, and Trump was wrong.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
And now he said he didn't fix the price of eggs on day one, which he promised several times, and now says it's Biden's. It'll take longer. What do you think about inflation right now? Obviously, we talked about it a lot in the Biden administration. It was a big factor in his loss.
Pivot
Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Whether you're into MTBs or speedy city bikes, they've got you covered. Plus, you can get $150 off your first e-bike purchase of $1,000 or more with the code PIVOT150. You can thank me later. I love e-bikes. Turn off the electricity and let's dance. Let's dance. Let's dance. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher.
Pivot
Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
I sent you that essay. Did you get that essay?
Pivot
Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
It's not woke. It was like in economics. Anyway, go ahead.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Yeah, NIMBY NIMBY.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
You think Trump would do this, Mr. Real Estate, right? Studies like playing games in Ukraine.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Should you and I get a house together?
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Sounds like you, but go ahead.
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
All right, but here's the thing. Will this inflation stuff going to stick? There's the tariffs, everything else, although they're kind of a paper tiger in that regard, for now at least. Is it going to stick to him? Because he made so many problems about fucking eggs. He went on and on about eggs. Is that going to stick on him?
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Trump’s Putin Call, Inflation Rises, and Sam Altman Strikes Back at Elon Musk
Yeah, nothing ever sticks this guy.
Pivot
Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
Did you see Sergey Brin was talking about everyone back to the office and we got to hardcore it? One of the founders was talking about the need to do that in order to prevail in AI. He even was sounding the alarms.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
The national security implications, I mean, it's just, they come up with something every time. Like, we must have strong national champions. It sounds so, I don't know, Chinese, Russian.
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One of the things that I was saying to one of the questions, and they said, what bothers you the most? I said, well, a lot of times they competed. I was, you know, as I go look back on, I'm talking about my book and stuff like that. Like Steve Jobs competed on product, right? Or tried to compete on the actual product. There's so many bad products. Like Tesla has not innovated.
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I said, I'm offended by Elon because of Elon, but the car hasn't innovated, right? Very much. And that's why he's losing. Or Google Search hasn't innovated. And all kinds of products aren't better, right? A couple of them are doing a better job. I think Apple has come up with several new interesting products over the past 10 years, for example. AirPods, the watch, things like that.
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I am still in Australia. I am still in Australia. I know. I've been here a while. I've been all over this amazing country. I was in Brisbane. I was in Adelaide. I was in Sydney. And now I'm in Melbourne, which I think is my favorite city. I hate to pick one because all the Australians who love us will be mad at me. But it's a great city. It's a fantastic city.
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But right now they're competing on oligarchy and technology. access and proximity, and none of it's about the actual product. And that makes me, I don't know, I was like vaguely like, it was irritating that they can't, that this is the way they're going to get an advantage. And I get that's why, but it feels that's late stage.
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And it's a real turn for them that they can't compete on actual things. They have to get whatever angle they can in order to stay in business. Like Starlink, I want to be close friends so I can get whatever I want. Although Canada just kicked him out. That Justin Trudeau has gotten a dose of backbone. Have you noticed that? He's extra adorable recently. I have.
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Yeah, they're looking very handsome. They're looking very handsome.
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Well, they are. They're acting like leaders. Not just because I like what they say.
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They're being clear and crisp.
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The rich people like this stuff.
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It's bringing them together too.
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The crevice. Yes, it's the crevice. Also, there's a lovely video of Justin Trudeau making a maple milkshake.
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I'm sorry, go ahead. Oh, that would be hot. Anyway. All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, Trump's address to Congress, the Democrats' divided response with posters that they think we're unimpressed by. Also, John Fetterman was unimpressed.
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Support for Pivot comes from Delete Me. It's pretty safe for me to assume that your personal information is accessible online. And no, I'm not just talking about your name or your pictures of the year you graduated high school. I'm talking about even more sensitive information.
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Oh, my God. Oh, I can't believe you have a dirty Australian joke.
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Scott, we're back with our first big story. President Trump delivered a joint address to Congress this week. And for those watching, it felt like yet another campaign rally. He has got to get some new material. Over the course of one hour and 40 minutes, very long, Trump touted his accomplishments, revisited old grievances and repeated lies. It was Finch. It was a good version of what he does.
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He praised Elon Musk and Doge, mocked Democrats and wokeness. He didn't unveil any future policies or plans. It was a greatest hits, and it was a good version of greatest hits. We'll get to the Democrats in a bit. What did you think about the speech?
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And I'll just note, Trump also noted in the speech that he's working to end the war in Ukraine and also say the letter he got from Ukraine's President Zelensky apparently now is ready to come to the negotiating table. He's had to He's had to get the lesson in how to suck up to Trump, which is unfortunate. It follows this explosive meeting between Trump, Zelensky, and J.D.
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Vance in the Oval Office last week, the second most interesting thing J.D. Vance has done on a couch, according to the American people. Trump suspended military aid to Ukraine earlier this week, and he's cut off intelligence sharing as well, which is probably even more devastating. First, talk about what you thought of his speech and then the Oval Office situation.
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Tomorrow, yeah. Well, the day after tomorrow for you. Go ahead. Sorry. Yeah.
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We'll get to the Democrats in a minute. Talk about him. Why do you think—I agree with you. Why do you think he did well, even though it was the greatest hits? He did the greatest hits well, is what I thought.
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Eggs up. Trump take egg.
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Oh, transgender mice. Oh, go ahead.
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No, he was an effective liar. He was an effective liar. That's what I thought. I'm like, he's lying excellently here. And it was like, so it was easily proven lies. The transgender mice thing was insane because it's transgenic mice and they put DNA. It's not what he was describing it as. But of course, he wins the day because it's like transgender mice. And, you know, it's ridiculous.
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I've been going on my book tour. I didn't come here when my book came out last March.
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No, Scott, I literally have sold out. You're huge. We are huge. Everyone asks me about you. It's really irritating. They're like, when are you and Scott coming? I have sold out major venues here just by myself. We could sell out a stadium. We could sell out a stadium.
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It feels bad. Nobody. No, it's.
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No, it was cheap. It was a cheap shot. It was a cheap shot, as they say. Anyway, what did you think of the Zelensky thing, speaking of beating up on someone and planning a ridiculous attack?
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And then he defended it. Then he defended it.
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Him and Lindsey Graham. Lindsey Graham. I can't believe it. I can't believe it. Listen, foghorn leghorn. Closet in foghorn leghorn. Just go back to your closet.
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I don't even know what that means.
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Oh, I still don't get it. Don't explain.
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I'm not that person. I'm a very simple lady. That's good. Yes, it was depressing. And the whole thing around the outfit.
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Let's go back to Zelensky. The outfit, like, with Musk was there. They just have no irony. Like, they had Musk there looking like a lesbian from the 1980s, a badly dressed lesbian from the 1980s. And then they're insulting guys wearing a military uniform, his country's military uniform.
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You know, his people are like, good job. Like, good job that they went after him. And like, go, go, fella. It's so ridiculous. Ooh, God, it was so, that was really, and then, of course, Zelensky's had to, like, walk it back because and say it was unfortunate. And, you know, when I rewatched it, I was like, was he that difficult?
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And I, just to make sure, and I was like, no, they really egged him on. You could see it happening in real time. He certainly got a no-show.
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Yes, they want us to come.
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I know. Oh, it's so gross. It's so gross.
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And they're all upset that you talk about not wanting to come there.
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Yeah, yeah. Well, except if everyone lived here, it wouldn't be far. You see what I'm saying? Ooh.
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You have impressive friends.
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Very impressive. The beating up of this guy is crazy, but they think it's like sport. And then the language that the Republicans use, people like Lindsey Graham and Rubio, who are very much supportive of this, have literally lost every bit of credibility. It's embarrassing not to be. And so they can say they were so mean to Trump. They weren't mean to Trump. They just wasn't. It wasn't.
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But that they think this is a win is pathetic. Anyway, Speaking of pathetic, let's talk about the Democrats who tried all sorts of tactics during Trump's speech, none of which worked. Congressman Al Green was removed from the chamber after interrupting the speech, shaking his cane and shouting to Trump, no mandate to cut Medicaid. I didn't mind him as much.
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And other forms of protest, some Democrats wore pink, some held up auction-style paddles that said false and Musk steals. A few walked out during the speech. One lady was wandering around, this is not normal behind Trump. It was juvenile. It was so, oh, they were trying to make...
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Fetch hacking, like completely. The whole thing. If you call someone Hitler, wearing pink is not the response, people. I'm sorry. It's just not. The only person I did think was a good job was Senator Alyssa Slotkin gave a Democratic response after the speech where she talked about the dangers of Elon and Doge. I thought she did an excellent job.
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Let's just listen to her and then I want your response of what you thought.
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Thought she was great. That was the only high point is a really nice response and a very clear centrist, very, very focused on the audience, which is the American people. So tell me what you thought about this and what would have been an effective strategy here.
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The signs. I was like, ow, ow, ow, ow, ow. This is not going to be a viral moment. This is so bad.
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I miss all that. I miss all that here. But I do a lot of walking. I do a lot of walking. And like the, you know, it's such a, it's a weirdly diverse place. You know, there's all kinds of different people from countries all over the world. And I kind of like that. It feels very, even the smaller cities like Adelaide just feel, Just really interesting.
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It's not the place for it. It's not the place for it.
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I like a good protest. I thought it was a loss for us. So what would be effective in the strategy? Just sit there quietly? Or is there an effective strategy? I mean, obviously, some people are doing things. Pete Buttigieg is appearing everywhere, it seems like. What would be an effective strategy from your perspective? Judge Carville's saying, do nothing.
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Play for dead for right now because you're not going to win anything. You look stupid.
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I literally said that to Saul the other day. He was like running terror at the house. I was like, do you do this at school? He goes, no. They won't let me. Yeah, no. Yeah.
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That's what the Republicans would do. That's what the Republicans would do. And they did, you know, that's what they do. I agree with you. I thought it was embarrassing. I thought they're trying to create a viral moment. It was sort of like, hey, kids, look what we're going to do. And people should be relentlessly critical of this, of what they're doing. It doesn't have any discipline.
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I mean, in a weird way, they kept shooting to Nancy Pelosi, who did sit there quietly, by the way. Did you notice that?
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She looked sour, definitely. But I have to say, I was thinking, this wouldn't happen under Nancy Pelosi. I'll tell you that.
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I'm just saying, she ran that place with the Democrats very tight. She had them tightly organized. I thought Hakeem Jeffries did a bad job. He had no control over these people. And again, if you think this guy is Hitler, that is not the response. This is something much more significant.
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Yep, I agree. I had a really interesting back and forth with Mike Birbigli over this because they sent him Fetterman slams Dems unhinged protest during Trump's speech. And we were going back and forth, but what Mike was pointing out when we were going back and forth is they're not thinking of the audience, right? They aren't thinking—for some reason—
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And maybe because it's sort of a familiar environment, and yet it's not. Anyway, I love it. I went and saw the Sydney Opera House. I took walks. I did the whole thing. I did it. I love it here. Last time I was here, I took my boys, Louie and Alex, and I were here.
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The Democrats do not think of the audience, of, like, what the audience is hearing and seeing. And they just weren't thinking of, you know, how to hit back in a way that's effective in some fashion that shows—they feel so non-genuine, and it feels so—it's such a weak and sad, you know, response. I don't know. It just—
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Do you want measles? Do you want these hacker kids fucking with you? Do you like paying more for eggs?
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And be ubiquitous with the messaging. I mean, it was interesting. I have an idea for Kamala Harris for a podcast.
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So I think she should do a podcast called Recently Unemployed with Kamala Harris and go around and talk to people about the economy, go to places she's not welcome and make herself a nuisance, like in that regard, like talk to them and go around. But I was thinking all of them have to feel like they're listening to the American people, right?
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That they're listening and they're present and they're responding and listening. I know it sounds like Bill Clinton really listened, felt like he was listening. I don't know. That's...
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Did you say hi? Say hi to her. Say I'm Kara's friend.
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I don't agree with you. I think she was just beginning to be—she improved a lot. I don't think she did that bad a job.
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Well, a Democrat has to step up and feel ubiquitous in the very least. and feel like they're speaking to Americans, right? Again, I think that's Mark Cuban, as you know.
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Yeah, Fetterman is. Fetterman is. Not everything that he's doing I like.
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No, sometimes he can be obnoxious. He could be a little nicer. That's all I'm saying. All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, we'll discuss the latest on Trump's trade war.
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Scott, we're back with our second big story. U.S. automakers got a one-month break from Donald Trump's 25% tariffs on Canada and Mexico. The tariffs went into effect on Tuesday, roiling markets and creating headaches for companies in the U.S. and around the world. Canada quickly announced retaliatory tariffs. With the very handsome Justin Trudeau doing it. Mexico is announcing countermeasures.
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Yes, I didn't see any kangaroos this visit.
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She's also fantastic, the president of Mexico, this week. China is also taking action after Trump added 10% to existing tariffs. Trump acknowledged his address to Congress that there would be a little disturbance from these tariffs, but he's okay with that. But then he turned it around, which means he only wants to sort of threaten American interests. it felt like.
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He's trying to, like, let certain people in and pay homage to him and this and that. So stocks have been on a roller coaster, as you noted, over the last few days, with Dow falling almost 700 points on Tuesday. The markets rebounded on Wednesday on the news that automakers were getting the exemption. It's such a fucking game. It feels so deep state and manipulative. And anyway...
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We'll see more exemptions. And if you're a CEO right now, it would be very hard to know what to do. Target and Best Buy CEOs are already warning about price increases. And is the rest of the world just going to start doing business without the U.S. if these tariffs continue? Warren Buffett looks like he's sick to his fucking stomach. The first time he didn't respond...
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He said terrorists were ridiculous and it's a tax on the little guy. But then when someone asked him about the economy, he's like, I'm not going to comment, which is bad news because Warren Buffett always gives the straight scoop on things. What do you think?
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Interesting. See, you need to come here. You know a lot about Australia. This is great.
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Crazy stuff. There was—what was it? Sledgehammers? It was like a bunch of—like something else that was so strange. I had no idea it was made in Canada besides maple syrup. I got that one.
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So what about these exemptions? Because a lot of people feel that he is sort of trying to get companies in line with him, like, make sure you're on my side.
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Mob boss. That's what it feels like. Deep state mob boss, like, hey, you know. You pay me.
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You know what else we could do besides going around in stadiums? You and I could do our tour, and then for the last part, you and I go to the Outback, and only one of us comes back. What do you think?
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Not innovation. Again, not innovation. Not making better cars or making better anything. It's this ridiculous bullshit. I mean, the face of Buffett really haunted me when he was talking about it. Like, he's not a young man. And he's like, it was like, are you fucking kidding me? I'm 100 years old and you're pulling this shit.
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This is like a little economy professor joking. As if.
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Do you know what's going viral is from Ferris Bueller? You know, they had the Smoot-Hawley section.
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Anybody? Anybody? Anyway, there's a great scene that's going around where he talks about Smoot-Hawley, and it was a disaster, and this is going to be a disaster, and then they're going to do exemptions, and then it doesn't matter, and then they're mad at us, and it doesn't matter. The whole thing is just, ugh, it just is so embarrassing. It's just embarrassing, right?
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So, I mean, this is where, speaking of rubber meets the road, when these prices go up, it's going to be problematic. And again, Democrats need to focus on that. Guess who did this? Donald Trump. Guess why eggs are more expensive? He tried to put the eggs on Biden, but he gets the eggs. Trump take egg is the other meme, by the way, the viral meme.
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Anyway, the world will move on without us is what they'll do.
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Because if two of us went out in the outback, only one of us would come, who do you think would make it?
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Cherry tomatoes, apparently. There was a whole bunch of really interesting that I had no idea to learn about. Anyway, it's a bad idea. We think it's a bad idea. And Aswath, I had Aswath on talking the same thing. Every smart person I know is like, this is... And now it's being run badly.
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The tariffs are even being run by letting people out, putting people in, and that means you don't have any credibility about it. It's a stupid negotiating tactic, and you think it'll work. And the same thing happened with Zelensky, where... He threatened him, and now Zelensky has to apologize. That's not a good outcome. It doesn't matter that Zelensky folded.
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The fact that he had to fold is pathetic. The same thing here. The fact that they put them out and then take some back, it's not a good tactic.
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You know, getting back to that thing, a lot of his points during that thing were things that sound good in concept but aren't ever going to happen. And it's lies, ultimately. Anyway, it's time for last week's poll results, by the way. We asked each of you which of our hosts would end up dead on a season of White Lotus.
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I did. I watched it on a plane. I was very pleased. I was very proud of you. I was very, like, I was very proud. You did a great job. And you're reading, thank God Jason helped you on that one.
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But the answer was 56% of you said Scott would end up dead on a season of White Lotus. 33% of you said both of us, and only 11% of you said me. No surprise there. Not a surprise there. Moving along, it's time for this week's Threads poll. Do you guys in the audience think Elon will end up doing an interview with Jon Stewart? He should. We think you should, Elon. Go ahead. Go into that lion's den.
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It'll be just fine because you're very strong. Anyway, if you've got a question of your own you'd like answered, send it our way. Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT. All right, Scott, one more quick break. We'll be back for wins and fails. Okay, Scott, let's hear some wins and fails. I shall go first.
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I'm going to say, I was going to talk about, there's a really great column by Mike Masnick in Tech Dirt talking about how he writes about tech a lot of the time. And he's written a wonderful piece about how He's now a democracy blog, and he was talking about the importance of tech reporters to really explain what's happening. And I agree with that. I think Wired's doing a great job.
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I think the Wall Street Journal has done a great job, and New York Times has, and a lot of publications, big and small. So I think that's the thing. But actually, I'm going to actually say something I watched on the plane. I binged.
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watched it it's called Running Point our friend Justin Theroux is in it he's fantastic but the star is Kate Hudson and this most astonishing group of very funny people it's about basketball essentially it's about it's a group called the LA Waves it's about a basketball owner and it's kind of like silly and stupid and a bit of an ad for basketball how good sports is, kind of a feel-good comedy.
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Highway to help those people? The Highway to Help People?
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And critics don't like it because it's not mean and how terrible it is. But I loved it. And I think Kate Hudson is the most adorable person ever. And it's very, very, very funny to me. I love this show. It's on Netflix again. And I get it. I get why critics don't like it because they're snotty bitches. But I had a great time at watching it. And I watched, I binge watched the whole thing.
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And again, Justin is amazing in it among the many actors in it who are amazing. Every single person is. But he does, he wears a, I wrote him, I said, your scarf work is excellent. He plays a basketball owner, basketball team owner. Anyway, I love it. It's really fun. My negative, I'm trying to go between, I try not to talk about people's outfits, but it's very hard this week.
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I'm trying to go between Elon's new haircut, which is, again, a very lesbian-level haircut from the 80s, and Zuckerberg wearing Benson Boone's powder blue jumpsuit for his wife Priscilla's birthday party. I try, Scott, but they need to stop. These people need to stop because I can't contain myself. I think it was so performative.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
Everything is so performative with these people, and I want them to go away. Like, go away from us and stop posting themselves doing wacky, crazy things. And it feels a lot like Rome is burning and they're fiddling. So that's why I think it offends me in so many ways. Besides being so awkward, it's painful. I didn't want to see Mark Zuckerberg's chest in any way, and there it was.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
And it was hard to avoid. Anyway, yours? Go for it.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
Yeah, you did. Took it a little too far. But look, you know, and I can say I really like, the only reason I want to do the Outback, I'll come back and I'll go, a dingo ate my Scotty.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
That's good. That's good. Just in case. All right. Okay. All right. Very good. Just in case. Oh, my God. We're going to Austin. We're going to Austin. Are we going to have a good time? That's my win. You and me in Austin. I miss you. There we go. We're going to have fun. There we go. We're going to hang out. There's a party. We're going to do a live pivot.
Pivot
Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
I have to also interview Chelsea Handler, who is the number one book in the country right now, and Elizabeth Warren. Yeah, I'm doing two live things there.
Pivot
Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
They're not going together. They're separate. Although I could put them together, couldn't I? No, I'm not going to do them separately. Anyway, elsewhere in the Scott and Kara Universe this week, this week in Prof G Conversations, Scott spoke with Dr. Anna Lembke, professor of psychiatry at Stanford and author of Dopamine Nation. Let's listen.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
Oh, wow. It's Thandie. It's Thandie, just so you know. Anyway, back to Australia. We love Australia. We love Australia. And you and I are coming here. All right, Scott, we've got a lot to get to today, including Trump's tariff roller coaster and how the Democrats' resistance tactics keep falling flat. But first, let's talk about Jon Stewart and Elon Musk.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
You could fill that space, but go ahead.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
It's on brand. Go ahead.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
It's also, you know, it is. And it's another thing I've been talking about here. It's frictionless, right? It creates a lack of friction. And friction is good for it. And tech people constantly talk about frictionless experience. They want everything frictionless so that you just sit there.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
and don't go anywhere, and it creates growth for them, and it creates, friction is the best thing that can happen to people, like problems, friction, mistakes, and stuff.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
We get to see the two of them sit down for an interview after an ex-user suggested that you should have a conversation. Musk said he'd be up for it if, quote, the show airs unedited after Stewart accepted, and obviously the show is always unedited, Elon. Musk proceeded to call him a propagandist, saying he used to be more bipartisan and sort of backed away.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
I'd rather have them have sex than have porn. That is absolutely true. Anyway, here we are. And Kate Hudson's adorable. She really is. Okay, Scott, that's the show. We will see you in Texas, in Austin, with a live pivot. We'll be back on Tuesday with more Pivot. Please read us out.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
Let's listen to Stewart's fantastic response.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
Yeah, that was good. That was good. That was good. You know who's doing really well? I think comics have, like, Stuart and Bill Burr has been really funny. And Bill Maher has kind of been up to, like, Chelsea Handler. All of them are really handling it, like, really well, I would say. Like, in a way that's funny, approachable, and also very pointed. I just, I find them funny.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
I don't know, for some reason, quite good. I don't know if you do.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
I don't think he's going. No, no, he's not going. He's saying he's too bipartisan. He's such a chicken shit.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
I'll fight you anywhere in jujitsu.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
No way. No, because he can't keep up. Stewart's too fast and too sharp for him. He's not... I think people should realize, I mean, Elon's not, he's a very smart person, but in this regard, he is not. And Stuart would run circles around him in a way that would be embarrassing.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
I saw you were at Mobile World Congress. Like, I haven't been there in years. Unbelievable event. Huge event. Yeah, I haven't been there in years. I used to send reporters there. And what were you discussing? I saw you on the stage looking very comely, by the way. You look very fit and...
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
Oh, wow. Yeah, people are super—everything is linked to tech right now, of course, which puts it in our wheelhouse in a lot of ways. And I think, you know, especially abroad, they're sort of absolutely confused by the whole thing, and they don't know what to do because— You know, they endured Trump 1.0, but this is something far different for them.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
And even in our own country, a group backed by Musk is spending millions in Wisconsin's Supreme Court election. Like, what is he doing over there? Ads run by the group highlighting progressive values appear to be coming from supporters of a Democratic-backed candidate, but instead come from conservatives. Musk's America pact is the biggest outside spender in the race.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
The outcome of the election will have major implications in Wisconsin, as the core is expected to face issues surrounding abortion, voting rules, and unions. liberals gained a four to three majority two years ago, if you remember that, and after 15 years of conservative control.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
I heard from the people who are backing the woman candidate for the judgeship, who are working really hard, who won the last time they had this fight. But the money from Musk is, this is where you're going to see it all across the country, people that are against Trump in some way, this money is going to move in like crazy.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
I mean, this is so obvious.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
I'm behind in AI. I would like this to happen. I agree.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
They do. They do. I think they actually believe some of their nonsense. Anyway, speaking of which, it's not just Musk. Google is urging officials at Trump's DOJ to back away from breaking the company up. Reps from the parent company, Alphabet, argue that breaking up the search engine could have national security repercussions. I'm sure of that not.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
As a reminder, the Biden administration called for Google to sell off Chrome and make other business changes after the judge ruled the company to be an illegal online search monopoly. A federal judge has set a rule on what Google must change at a hearing next month. But the judge is going to decide this. But they put a donation to Trump's inauguration and
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
You know, these people have been running from regulation for decades, two decades now. And here is what I consider a minor thing, a minor change that other industries have not been able to get out of. And here they are doing the same thing. So it's not just limited to Musk, although he's the most egregious example of it. But they're all sort of pay to play kind of stuff going on.
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Trump's Big Speech, Trade War Roller Coaster, and Elon v. Jon Stewart
I didn't want to see Mark Zuckerberg's chest in any way, and there it was. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher, and it's tomorrow where I am Scott Galloway.
Pivot
Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Well, they move very quickly is the problem. They don't quite know where they're going. They have the advantage here in that regard, is they can show up at various places and you don't know where they're showing up.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
I get it. The issue is, even when the judges stop them, though, they say, oh, we have security clearance, but no proof of it. Like, they're persistent. Elon Musk has said to me. Move fast and break things. It's Mark Zuckerberg. That's correct. This is what they're doing. And, you know, like Elon Musk has said to me, we have self-driving in a year. We have self-driving in a year.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
We have security clearance. Anything, like one of them was like, how do you know they don't have it? I go, because their mouths are moving. They're lying. They lie as a practice in order to get to the next thing. They're high risk takers. they're willing to, they know you're not going to stop them, ultimately, because it takes effort. They don't want to govern. They want to break.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
And even though they're in charge of the government, they don't want to reform it. They want to break it. They want to destroy it. They want to take it down to its studs so that they can then rebuild in the way they see fit. And the The arrogance of these people, I cannot tell you. You could like fuel a rocket to Mars with the arrogance of these people.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
And what's interesting is there's a bunch of lawsuits filed, as you said, as part of the counteroffensive. Unions, federal employees, and others are challenging the legality of Elon and Doge to get access to federal systems, destroy agencies, or push people out of jobs. I'm telling you, Elon also loves a legal fight, right? He doesn't care. He doesn't care. He waits people out.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
This is perfectly designed for someone like him to behave. And every one of his... actions is very much the way he's behaved. That's one thing. You know, when I said, he's not going to listen to that, he's going to go to the next one. And someone was like, how did you know? And then he did it. And I'm like, because this is his little act, right? This is the same thing every time.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm Kara Swisher.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
He's not particularly creative in new methods of this kind of stuff. But one of the things that's important to keep in mind is that he does have a pattern of that he does all the time, and so do all these people, by the way. They all have the same pattern of making a mistake, whether it's for your teen girls and making them feel bad and going, we're so sorry, we're so sorry, we're so sorry.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
And I think that's the one thing that's not fully appreciated, that they're not sorry, nor will they pay attention to the law, even if a court orders something. You know, right now, court orders Musk out of the Treasury computer payment system so it can sort out whether the Doge is a legal government entity. You know, are they out? They were in there before.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
You know, that's the whole thing is I don't know if they're actually nobody knows that they're out. And then let me say the last thing what they're going to do is find little cherry pick costs. that look bad, right? And make things up because they just lie. They just lie.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Money laundering or they're criminals. This thing about subscriptions and Politico, it was $24,000 at USAID. They were using their Politico Pro just like you'd buy a subscription. And may I point out that Elon, the government pays Elon $15 billion. So everybody, for his wares. And then they, so it's petty and unbelievable nonsense. And they'll cherry pick stupid little things.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
A lot of them inaccurate, like the condoms to Gaza, for example. A lot of them deeply inaccurate or based on stories that are specious. So they'll keep doing that constantly so that we're like cats chasing a laser pointer.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
May I say the media is doing the same things. These headlines in some of these papers, it's like innovative way to deal with government. I'm like, it's a coup. Stop saying this. And one thing I did have as a theme in my book was the juvenileization of men and the coddling of them and persistent sidelining of women in Silicon Valley and people of color or anybody that was different.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
And this is a 30 years going of this idea that these people... have the right idea. And I found some stories that I wrote. One was called The Men and No Women of Facebook, and The Men and No Women of Boards. And one of the things that was interesting is I was able to put those headlines because I controlled my own media. You can't believe what a bunch of idiots. They have such disdain for people.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
And the press is treating it like it's an equalized thing, and it's just not. I'm finding it so frustrating. I even, you know, I, you know, I'm on CNN and on Friday I was like, this is a hostile takeover. You need to treat it. Stop talking about DEI and the plane crash. You can talk, right? Stop. You need, this is what this is. It's a hostile takeover of government, probably illegal.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
And you can't look at it like, well, look at that kind of things. I just, I'm perplexed as to why it isn't a five alarm fire everywhere, all day long, every minute in the media. Yeah.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Why don't you just go down to Washington with the gang that's taking apart the government? I think they probably have some information on how to do that.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
They will be prosecuted by this Justice Department, because all they're doing is getting rid of the threatening companies that have DEI. That's the first thing Pam Bondi did.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Yeah. Okay, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, Trump continues to flood the zone with crap. Support for Pivot comes from 1-800-Flowers. Roses are the classic way to say I love you, and with Valentine's Day coming up, you can start planning the best way to say it. I'm sending roses right now to Scott Galloway.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
two dozen roses so you can get double the roses for free. I just got my roses here and I'm looking at them right now and I have to say they're very beautiful. I like cut roses. I don't like cut flowers that much, but I happen to love cut roses. They smell delicious. They look fantastic. And it's a great Valentine's Day. It's a classic. It's a classic, as they say. The bouquets are selling fast.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
You can lock in your order today. Win their heart this Valentine's Day at 1-800-Flowers.com. To claim your double your roses offer, go to 1-800-Flowers.com slash pivot. That's 1-800-Flowers dot pivot. Scott, get ready for dozens of roses.
Pivot
Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Scott, we're back. And President Trump is making all sorts of headlines this week. Trump surprised pretty much everyone with a plan for the U.S. to take over Gaza and turn it into a Middle East Riviera, Mar-a-Gazo. That's the joke, which is not funny, actually, though some administration officials are walking that back a bit. His cabinet nominees are Kate Jr.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
and Tulsi Gabbard appear to be on their way to confirmation. He's reportedly getting closer to an executive order abolishing the Department of Education. He's doing everything by executive order because he doesn't want to bother with legislators. Questionable executive orders, I'd say. We talked a few weeks ago about the strategy of flooding the zone with shit.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Let's talk a little bit about this and how people can avoid falling into the trap of distraction, Trump throwing up these crazy ideas and orders while Elon is making this power grab. It's quite coordinated from what I can tell, although I don't think Trump knows what he's doing. Courts have done a few things to keep them in check. They're stopping him from He already was in the Treasury.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Now they're saying get out of the Treasury. Who knows if he will because, again, liars, all of them. A federal judge did block the birthright citizenship order this week. But then Trump was busy signing executive orders outlining plans for a government-run sovereign wealth fund, which would potentially be used to buy TikTok. That's called state-run media.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
The fund would also support other national endeavors like infrastructure projects. I, you know, I don't know what to say. I talk a little bit about the strategy as a marketing thing. I hate to say that, but this is, he's, and then we have a story in the New York times. It's like, well, it's good that he's shaking up the difficult problem in the Mideast. Maybe it will create fresh ideas.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Now I was sort of like, what? Like moving people against their 2 million people against their will to where they've lived their whole lives is a, fresh new idea, especially because Gaza is absolutely destroyed. Again, they destroyed it and now they've destroyed it, they can't go back, that kind of thing.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
All right. Listen to me. You can't disassociate. There's no disassociation allowed.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Well, here's the problem. Ketamine. I know, ketamine, exactly. But this plan, literally, Israeli defense minister said his instructed military to draft a plan to allow voluntary departure of Gaza from residents. The only way they're leaving is if you ethnically cleanse them. And I know- None of it makes any sense. You know, it's funny, like one of the right-
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
You can't. You have to be in this. You got to like, everybody's writing me like, I can't keep up. But I'm like, you know what? It's the long fucking run with these people. You got to stick in there. They rely on your exhaustion. They rely on you being overwhelmed and you need to not, you need to just keep going. Why do you want to disassociate? You have to associate. That's how we win.
Pivot
Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Most of the conservative think tanks are sort of like, oh, dear. Like right now, if you look at some of they were like, no, this government thing isn't good. This Gaza thing isn't good. And they're like, don't be hysterical and use the term ethnic cleansing. But I'm like, only the comedy shows are getting it right.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Like The Daily Show, they have different euphemisms for what it is, like, you know, voluntary departure or. Thank you. Thank you.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
We associate. They're disassociative people, these people.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Thank you. Why don't you do a happy drug? Like not one that's so ruminative.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
I don't know. I never take any drugs, so I have no idea.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Well, then do that. Do that. Do that. Yeah, I don't know. You'll try to hug me. You'll call me and say loving things, which would be disturbing to me, but that's okay.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
I know, but there's a lot of hugs happening. I never took it. I never took it. There's hugs, right? There's a lot of hugging and dancing.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
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Pivot
Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Oh, interesting. I don't know. Never tried it. Never will. I'm high on life, Scott Galloway.
Pivot
Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
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Pivot
Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Although, let me say, I'm looking out the window right now. I just got back on a red eye from Los Angeles. I was in San Francisco, Los Angeles.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Can I just make a note here? Real competitor, and this is me talking to Hollywood people yesterday, is YouTube. Oh, 100%. YouTube is the competitor of Netflix.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Thank you. I'm wearing the same clothes. I was out to dinner at a very fancy, the Mother Wolf in Los Angeles. Have you been there? It was really good.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
I think they're going to do a lot more originals, FYI, but go ahead.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
I have a secret project going on there, another secret project, which will soon be revealed. But it has to do with lesbians in Washington. That's all.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
And can I just make a point? They also put out so much content that's pretty good, right? It's not, none of it's really, one of the way, someone was telling me a story who was with last night, who used to work at Google with Susan Wojcicki, the late Susan Wojcicki, and they were thinking about getting into originals and they walked her through.
Pivot
Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
the economics of Hollywood because she wasn't familiar. She had been very successful at Google and she had just taken over YouTube. They walked her through it and she got up and she goes, this isn't a business. Only one hit carries all the losses. Like she was like, she immediately clocked the problem, right? Like she goes, this isn't a really sustainable business if you don't have this one hit.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
And she goes, why are they operating like this? And she was, I think she had insight into the idea that if you had a lot of little hits or spread it out with stuff that people... like you would do a lot better. And that's what Netflix has kind of done here. They have nothing, every now and then they have a big one, but all the others are fine.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
And they help sustain the fact that it's a good product. You find efficacy in the product. You find pleasure in the product. Same thing with Spotify. At its heart, It's a good product. I don't know what else to say. It's like enjoyable to use. You find what you want. Maybe it's not like soaring like an HBO can be sometime, but every now and then it is.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
And it's, so that's, you know, it's a good, I don't know what else to say. It's a good product. Like that's how I feel about both those companies.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
I, unlike you, I do very short trips and I come back on red eyes. So I'm here. I took the kids. I took Clara to school this morning and made her lunch, made the kids lunch. I get back so I can do that. One of the, I went out, you know, I went out with two people, my brother and friends of mine to Zuni, which was amazing.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
And a decent product, a decent, pleasurable product. Oh, it's a fantastic product.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Yes. It was great. San Francisco was great.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
You're right. It's on top of it. I got to say, Waymo is so integrated into San Francisco now, and you're going to see it all over the country. It's so convenient. And they live together with Uber, by the way. That's in a very comfortable way. I took both in San Francisco this week, and both were great. Prices are still too high for all of them.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
And I know they need to make money and stuff, but it's a really interesting time. You're right. Dara's done a nice job here and there are no competitors really. And I mean, Lyft is sort of a competitor, I guess. Anyway, one more quick break and we'll be back for predictions. Okay, Scott, let's hear a prediction. Okay.
Pivot
Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Oh, really? I don't mind. It was a lay down bed. I slept. That's fine. That's fine.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
You know, I'm wearing my aura ring and it tells me that I'm quite ready for the day. It's weird. I don't sleep.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
I would leave you. I would scold you. I would. I'm going to make a very brief prediction. You know, there's a lot of new polls out. The Economist had a poll that back in November, 47% of those surveyed Republicans says they wanted Elon Musk to have a lot of influence in the Trump administration, while 29% wanted a little influence. And 12% want him to have none at all.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Yeah. I don't know why. I think it's lying to me. Anyway, we've got a lot to get to because I need to be rested and ready.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Today, the number of Republicans who say they want him to have a lot of influence has fallen substantially to 26%, according to this story in The Hill. Meanwhile, 43% of Republican respondents said they wanted Musk to have a little influence. and 17% they want him to have none at all. I see that, but I have to tell you, I had thought they would have a falling out.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
I think he is, as I have said, he is little pussy for Trump, the mob boss, essentially. He is the heat shield. He is the junkyard dog. And I think Trump understands this intuitively. There's one thing about Donald Trump, he has an intuitive sense of things. Musk is good for him because he gets the shit done, even if it's illegal and he's willing to. And nobody else is.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
And as much as these insiders are going to complain about him being bigger than his britches or overstepping, I think maybe he might be around a little longer. I think I was wrong about that falling out. I wish I wasn't.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
But I do think even if people are indignant, this guy has a, everything has shown when everyone thinks Musk is going to lose on the pedophile case or with the SEC, he's got an ability to not just to take risks, but also take ridiculous, heinous risks, but to also stick it out. So I don't know. I think Trump recognizes that it's good to have a junkyard dog. You're my junkyard dog.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Can I tell you, Amanda's always like, Scott used that word wrong. She's like such a word person. Several times you've used words that- She means I used it incorrectly. Incorrectly. That's correct. Yeah. Anyway, she's often doing that to me. I'm like, did he? I don't know. She's like, you need to tell him. I'm like, I'm not telling him. I forget. I completely forget the minute she tells me.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
All right, I'll tell her. I'll tell her she can be your spelling lady. Anyway, elsewhere in the Karen Scott universe, which is growing by the second.
Pivot
Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
This week on Prof G Conversations, Scott spoke with Mo Gadot, the former chief business officer of Google X, bestselling author and founder of One Billion Happy. Let's listen.
Pivot
Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
That's a good one. OK, we've got a lot to get today, including Democrats finally showing some backbone and Trump's plan to create a sovereign wealth fund. This lunacy is every single day. I forget what. Yes. Well, anyway, plus earnings from Disney, Alphabet and Spotify. But first, I think we know both know why Google searches for the word coup are up this week.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Right, that's correct. Who the fuck is Elon Musk? Who the fuck are any of these people? But that's where we're going. Okay, Scott, that's the show. We'll be back on Tuesday with more Pivot. Read us out.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Elon Musk, who is now a special government employee, whatever the fuck that is. has had a very busy couple days, essentially shut down USAID, offered buyouts to every member of the CIA, and his Doge team got access to the IT systems of Medicare and Medicaid, NOAA, which is weather agencies, and other agencies.
Pivot
Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
We're going to talk about Trump and Gaza and the craziness in a bit, but I want to start by focusing on Elon. Overall thoughts, what we've been seeing, Trump still thinks he's in control, saying this week Elon can't do and won't do anything without our approval. You'll be shocked to learn that Senator Susan Collins is very concerned about Elon and Doge's actions.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
People at the Trump White House, they're leaking all over the place that he's too big for his britches. I'm like, when did you start to notice his pants were tight, my friends? He's totally too big for his britches all the time. You've been saying, where are the Democrats? They're starting to show signs of life, protesting Elon's power grab at a rally outside the Treasury Department.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Some House Democrats are trying to subpoena Elon to testify before the Oversight Committee. They're making a lot of trouble. The motion didn't pass. It probably will pass at some point. Democratic Senator Chris Murphy was on Morning Joe talking about the game plan. First party, let's listen.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
I think he's been pretty good. Jamie Raskin has. Obviously, AOC is terrific. So talk a little bit about the Elon situation and making, you know, they're making him the villain so that it sort of offloads it from Trump in a weird way. He's sort of the, I'm calling him a heat-seeking shield for what they're doing. But, There's protests that have popped up around the country.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
It doesn't mean anything's going to happen, criticizing particularly Musk. So talk a little bit about this and what the Democrats should do.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
I think they did that on purpose, from what I understand. They wanted it. What Scott's referring to is they're sending emails, not in a way that's safe, to the White House. They wanted things like that.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
Well, you know, they're trying to, the local officials are trying to make that official. The newly installed Trump are threatening people for naming their names, just so you know. But go ahead.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
No, we get that. I think repeating it doesn't matter because they are blowing through stop sign after stop sign. It doesn't... See, this is a very typical... I've talked to I would say a half a dozen governors, senators, congresspeople this week. And they were like, well, we're going to say something. And I was like, he's going to break the rules. Like I said, you don't understand.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
He's not going to stop because you tell him he's bad. There's no way he's stopping. And like, look at everything he does. He blows past the SEC. He keeps going. He does lawsuits against the press. He does lawsuits against competitors. He blows up rockets until he gets it right.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
I was like, this is a person with a high risk tolerance who has noticed that when you break things or break rules or open your company when the government of California says not to, they don't stop you, or it's very hard to stop you.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
And in the very act of doing it, even if he gets stopped later by a judge or whatever, because legal is slow moving, as you know, even if he gets stopped later, he's already broken it, right? Instead of reforming things, Which is what they should be doing if they don't agree with this stuff. They're destroying them. And if you read any Peter Thiel, any of their stuff, this is what they talk about.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
The destruction of a liberal democracy. And then starting from scratch with a unified CEO theory, which is essentially a dictatorship. And the question is, a lot of them are like, what do we do? They're literally asking me, what do we do to stop him? I was like, I just don't, I was like, you don't, you actually don't have the means to do so because these poor people are in these agencies.
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Elon Pushback, Trump's Distraction Trap, and Disney Earnings
And when these idiots come in, these children, these arrogant little pricks come in and say, we're going to call the federal marshals or the president has ordered you to step aside. They kind of have to, you know, you have to be resistant and be walked out by security. And then security doesn't know which one to listen to, right? Essentially. Yeah.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
That's one of his tricks, by the way. He does that in interviews all the time. Show me a specific example, and then I have 10, and then he goes, show me a specific example. It's just, it's exhausting.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
He burns PR people like you can't believe. And he had some good ones many years ago, right? But he, obviously, PR is critically important to him. He wants to be seen as the center of attention, you know, when he seems like a nuisance. And he pretends to be funny when the only person that's funny is his daughter, Vivian, right? Who's actually funny.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
That's correct. Hi, everyone. This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network. I am the very nasty and openly lesbian Kara Swisher that's according to my number one fan, Megyn Kelly.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Repellent, isn't that a good word?
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
It is, and I think one of the things that I heard one Republican making is they don't have any game below Donald Trump, because I think he's still popular with the people he's popular with, period. And I do, you know, I think that if he's not present, their bench gets real thin and really irritating. Like, you've got the charmless J.D.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Vance, you've got the sad, soulful Marco Rubio, who looks like a loser, you've got, like, there's no game. And then crazy Howard Lutnick, like, you know, he seems like Crazy Eddie from the old days. And it just, it doesn't have, if Trump's not present, it's really hard, like, for them to do anything. And at some point, he's not gonna be present.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Scott is off today, but in his place, I brought in someone who Megyn Kelly might also take issue with, and obviously will, the host of Crooked Media's Pod Save America and Love It or Leave It, John Lovett. Welcome, John. Hi, good to see you. Good. Did you see Megyn trying to flirt with me online? Did you see that situation? I...
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Interestingly, in contrast, New Jersey Senator Cory Booker invigorated Democrats this week with a 25-hour speech in Congress against the Trump administration. Booker is now in the record books for the longest speech in Senate history, surpassing Strom Thurmond's stand against Civil Rights Act of 1957.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
I have a serious question for you, but first, let's listen to Senator Booker explain how he managed not to go to the bathroom for the 25 hours.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
So an impressive accomplishment of not peeing. But why do people like this? It's got a huge following. Lots of people watched it. I was sort of surprised by those numbers. It had a, you know, Mr. Smith goes to Washington quality to it. But why do this? Because sometimes, I'll be honest, Booker does a lot of stunts that I'm like, oh, a stunt. But this was a good stunt, I feel like, in some ways.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
And I don't mean to minimize it by saying stunt. But, you know, it is what it is. He's trying to garner attention and get focus.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Right. What are we getting? Does that raise his profile as a presidential candidate going forward? I mean, he's always been bandied about as that.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Seriously, what is the deal? Did you understand I like LGB, but not T?
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Yeah. It was interesting. When I was in Michigan, a lot of the students were asking me who was going to run. It was sort of surprised. I'm like, oh, I don't know. And then maybe go through the various and sundry people. It was interesting. They certainly are interested in looking over the Democratic Party in that regard. He definitely raised his profile.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
The book, the this, the that, the peer at Harvard.
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Yeah, it'll be interesting to see what works. Okay, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, it's Trump against the world with these new tariffs.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
I don't think she knows what Q is or plus. What is plus? What is Q?
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
John, we're back and recording on the day after Liberation Day. Do you feel liberated?
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
President Trump unveiled his latest tariffs, the most expansive yet, at the White House on Wednesday with the help of a giant poster board. He's imposing a 10% tariff on all U.S. trading partners as well as double digits. He's calling them reciprocal tariffs. They're not, just so you know. About the worst offenders, he seems to—nobody thinks these are good things, and the math is, like, nuts here.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
The EU will face 20% tariffs, Japan 24%, South Korea 26%, and China an additional 34% on top of existing tariffs of I think 20%. Russia conveniently didn't make the cut. Trump also is slapping tariffs on unexpected places like some uninhabited islands in the Arctic where only penguins live. People are having a good time with that. The EU, China, and others are already planning retaliation.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
He's been very flip-floppy on terror, sort of red light, green light, which caused chaos, and now he just dropped the bomb. He really did essentially drop the mic. The markets opened just a little while ago. The S&P dropped 3.4%. The Dow fell 1,200 points, more than 2%. The Nasdaq is down 3.8%, big numbers.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
A number of sectors are getting hit, but in terms of tech specifically, things are looking rough right now for tech, particularly because they're so invested across the world. Apple's down over 9%, Amazon down 8%, Nvidia down 6%, Alphabet down 4%. U.S.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
tech companies are becoming collateral damage when it comes to retaliation, getting hit with fines, restrictions, and new taxes by major markets worldwide. They also have obviously interconnected with so many different markets. What do you think of this rollout? Peter Navarro is back, my friend. He's back and he's crazier than ever.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Yeah. I didn't make a response to the New York Post when they called me for one. I felt that was the right way to go, didn't you think?
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
That he's trying to do it. Chris Murphy had that in his, I'm going to read from some of it. Chris Murphy, who's been very vocal, just like Cory Booker, the senator. Those trying to understand these tariffs or economic policy are dangerously naive.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
The tariffs are a tool to collapse our democracy, a means to comply loyalty with every business that will need to petition Trump for relief, which many people are. And what he was saying essentially is that this gives him power, and the reason he can is because he's taking control of spending and taxation into his own hands and rewarding loyalty and punishing dissent.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
I called her a rage machine last week on the show. Right. Because she is. She just yells at everybody. And, you know, and she wasn't, she... I hate to say this, talking about Elon Musk, they weren't exactly like this then. And so it's kind of a shock. What happened is she had canceled on the show and we had back and forth, back and forth.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Our own revolution was spurred by the king's use of heavy taxation on the colonies to punish our push for self-governance. The king's message was simple, stop protesting and I'll stop taxing. What do you think is happening here? Besides, even Scott Besson looked like an idiot, and I don't feel like he is.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
And I think I wrote sort of to the staff and her person, like, when are we going to do this thing? And then the person said, our sister died. And then I wrote, I'm really sorry. So the whole thing is, I didn't know, right? And then it was ridiculous. Of course, I'm sorry, her sister died. It's just very strange. I think it was just an excuse to yell at me for a little while.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
implications right now, right at the beginning of this? Obviously, the stock market's down. Obviously, Wall Street's screaming. So are farmers. So are everybody screaming, essentially.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
uh they they're being asked to reduce their tariffs that don't exist below you know this is about a trade deficit no and the i think the one thing that's not being noticed is service terror service issues because that's tech companies and we are in a not a deficit we're in quite the opposite where we have the advantage there by i think 300 billion dollars um we're in a surplus in that regard and now they're now europe is going to target the
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Yeah. She has a podcast network like you guys. Did you know that?
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
, , , , , ,, in P P P P P P P P P,實,實, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , a P P P P P P P P P P P P P P P
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
And I think people then, and that's what Joe Rogan was doing. Wait a minute. I have tattoos. Just a second here. All right. Let's go on a quick break. When we come back, we'll talk about the latest in the bid for TikTok. I know you're fascinated with TikTok, John. I am. John, we're back with more news. President Trump is reportedly reviewing proposals for TikTok this week.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Obviously, the administration is said to be considering bids from Blackstone, Oracle, and Marc Andreessen. Amazon threw in a last-minute bid. It actually makes sense. It's probably not a top contender, but Walmart was in the last go-round here. Oracle was, too. The TikTok ban requires no more than 20% of TikTok or its parent companies owned by foreign adversary countries.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
So they're thinking about letting ByteDance stand for 19%, apparently. I'd love to know, you use TikTok a lot, correct? Well, I'd love to do a day in the life of your For You page. But what do you think is going to happen here? And there was an interesting story, which I think there's sort of a poll that's been cast over for TikTok on this, like where it's going, who's going to own it.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
A lot of people feel that if they don't get the algorithm, it's not going to be as good. As a product, it's lagged a little bit recently. Maybe I'm wrong about that, but it feels like it a little bit. that creators aren't putting their shoulders into it the same way. Maybe I'm wrong about that. But how do you imagine it's going to happen here? I thought Elon might get a hold of it.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Maybe not a good idea to give it to Elon right now from a perceptible point of view.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Right. Well, China has to cooperate here. And now with these tariffs, I'm not so sure they're feeling cooperative.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Right, that he was in M13 or whatever, that he was a gang member. MS-13, excuse me. And then he wasn't, right? It was just like nonsense.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
The law that it should. They didn't make the case. Many people argue that.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Show me your homework. Show me your homework.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Really? You have recipes and Conan O'Brien?
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
You know, that's Scott Galloway's favorite, too. Just so you know.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Rocking their delts. What do you imagine is on mine? I don't use TikTok that much, but what do you imagine?
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
No, no. You'll be surprised. ASMR. ASMR. ASMR. I love ASMR and cooking. I like watching people cook. I like watching people. I don't want to do recipes. I just like watching people, especially there's one on threads called food porn that I love. Do you cook? I don't. I do. I'm a good cook, but I don't do it very often as much as I should. But I like watching other people cook. That's weird.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
But I used to watch the Galloping Gourmet when I was a kid. I'm not going to go into it. Okay. Remember him? Then he drank at the end, drank himself under the table.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Galloping Gourmet was a guy who seemed gay, but wasn't.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Look at that. Yeah. He was like Julia Child, but funnier. I used to watch him cook all the time. Then he'd always drink a bottle of wine by the end of it, and it was very amusing to an eight-year-old.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
I bet you like Paula Deen. I bet you secretly like Paula Deen.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
They are never in. They've never been in. Anyway, what do you think the resolution is going to be? Make a prediction.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
It's a nothing burger. You know, it's owned by a lot of U.S. people.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
people own a lot of this thing. And then it's not going to be any more protected if there are problems with China. And I, unlike you, believe there are indeed abuses by the Chinese, and they're a little different than China. I believe that. I believe that. I agree.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Mark Zuckerberg is dangerous, but I don't really want the Chinese government also up in our grill in this way because they have different goals besides just fucking us. They want to fuck us and beat us kind of thing. And, but I think that they, it's going to be more dangerous than ever in those regards from a national security point of view.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
And they won't solve the problem and then everyone will make money. The people that, the same people you're complaining about, but. We'll see. I don't think Elon will be part of this, but maybe he will. Maybe he'll get him. He's such a nuisance, he'll probably try to get in there. All right, John, one more quick break. When we come back, we'll be doing some predictions.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Okay, John, let's hear a prediction. Do you have a prediction for us?
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Because he'll lose the mayoral election. He just announced today he's going to be an independent.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
What job will he get? I guess, who are they going to take out?
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Oh, my God. They're all moving here. Speaking of moving here, I'll tell you what I'm pretty pissed about. Supposedly, Elon's leaving. I don't think he is. He's such a nuisance. He's going to stay. Apparently, Mark Zuckerberg bought a $23 million mansion in D.C. So he's here, too. I moved here, John, and they followed me here. The stalkers that they are, they're all here.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
And it's all the bad ones. The ones I liked are not here. The bad ones are.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
That's true. I get it. I get it, honestly. Although $23 million seems cheap for a house in Milwaukee, like one of the big ones. But he was supposedly lobbying Trump to avoid the antitrust trial. I'm not so sure that's going to work. Because ultimately, as dislikable as Elon has become, Mark Zuckerberg has always been dislikable.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
And I think he polls, you know, all those polls show they still don't like him at the White House. They still don't like him. But anyway, he's here. I'm so excited to see him at brunch or over drinks at Cafe Milano.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
They're not going to leave their houses. I mean, unless there's some MMA fighting or something happening, he'll not be going anywhere. But we'll see. I just don't want them here. I'd like them to leave, you know. Already, I'm not thrilled to be here, but here I am, and I actually live here. You're not thrilled to be there? I like it. I like it. I like it. You should try LA. I love LA.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
I love California. I cannot get my wife to move us back to California.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
I have this beautiful new studio you're seeing behind me. I like DC very much. It's very lovely, and you've spent a lot of time here. But I really miss California so much. That's for you, right? Los Angeles. I love Los Angeles. It's so beautiful. Despite all the problems you've been having lately, it's still, I was just in San Francisco. It was gorgeous. It's wonderful.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
So anyway, I will not go on about that. John, one thing before we go, is there something you're watching or reading that you love lately? I mean, everyone's talking about White Lotus, obviously, or Severance. Is there anything else?
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
That's interesting. So go rewatch that. I'm going to give the recommendation Hacks is about to come back. And I love Gene Smart and Hannah Einbender. Yeah, they're amazing. It looks hysterical. And I think they're the best pair of like, speaking of conflict, the two, the most fantastic pair that I never expected. So I'm very excited for that comeback. Anyway, okay, that's the show.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Yeah. The guy, that was the gay barber? Was that the gay barber?
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Thanks for listening to Pivot. Be sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'll be back next week with more. And Scott will be back from his college tour. Just so you know, he hung out with my son and his frat yesterday. And I can't wait to hear that story. But thank you so much, John.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
You can hear John on Podsafe America and Love It or Leave It every week, wherever you listen to podcasts. They're wonderful podcasts. I will read us out. Today's show was produced by Lara Naiman, Zoe Marcus, and Taylor Griffin. Ernie Anderdot engineered this episode. Jim McIll edited this video. Nishat Kerwa is Vox Media's executive producer of audio.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Make sure you subscribe to the show wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. You can subscribe to the magazine at nymag.com slash pod. We'll be back next week for another breakdown of all things tech and business. And John, thank you so much. Thank you.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Yeah. I mean, it's ridiculous. It's just ridiculous.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
It's evil, all of it. Well, good for John. Anyway, we've got a lot to get to today. It's really kind of a dark time at the same time. It's tons of material for us to talk about and tons of things to get up in arms about, about what's going on. And we've got a lot to get to today, including Trump giving the middle finger to the rest of the world via tariffs.
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Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
with these sweeping new tariffs, which seem ridiculous, and every economist on all sides is pretty perplexed about the whole thing. And plus, what's next for TikTok? But first, President Trump has reportedly told his inner circle that Elon Musk will be transitioning out of his administration in the coming weeks, according to Politico.
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
The White House is denying the report with Press Secretary Carolyn Leavitt calling it garbage in a post on X. Elon also waited on X saying it's fake news. We'll get to Elon's role in Wisconsin election in a bit, but the big picture of Elon is indeed beginning to step back.
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
What do you think about the move in the timing, the 130-day tenure as special government employees due to end in late May, early June, whatever that is? It might be time for him to focus back on Tesla. The company shared its dramatic numbers this week, dramatically bad. Sales plunged 13% in the first three months of the year, the largest drop of deliveries in history. Nobody wants it.
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Obviously these protests are counting, but also the fact they don't have any innovative cars. What is, from your perspective, what's going on here with their communications? And then what happens when he's not in his orbit and stops the day-to-day government business that he's doing and what will happen to Doge when that happens?
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
In Scott's absence, just to finish it up, I'll note he predicted Elon's exit and the end of Doge just a few weeks ago. Let's listen.
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
So talk a little bit about this. What do you imagine is happening here?
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Yeah, I had talked about the idea of a heat shield that he does, like he wants to do these things and not get blamed. And it is interesting that Elon has such bad negatives. I think Harry Enten on CNN said he's political poison for anybody who's near him. And we'll talk about Wisconsin in a second. But And he's much, but Trump has less negatives, even though he's his boss, presumable boss.
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
So he does, heat shields are not the worst thing in the world. You know, someone, as you said, rampaging through the government. And I think one of the things I had said, you know, when these reports came out and when the Wisconsin thing happened, they were like, OK, that's it. I'm like, no, no, he's not. He doesn't care about a failure. He'll make it not a failure.
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
He'll pretend it's not, which he did here. And then he'll move on to his next disaster, this kind of mess, and he doesn't care. I think the issue is making a nuisance of himself, making himself the center. And in Wisconsin, he was by himself, right? Trump wasn't physically present there the way he often is. And so with Elon as the center of attention wearing that cheese head,
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
It was kind of like the caucus and the tank. You remember when he had that picture or any of those unfortunate pictures or around the Santas and the boots or things like that. But so let's talk about the Wisconsin election where despite spending $25 million, Elon was unable to buy a state Supreme Court seat.
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
You can buy a presidency for $200 million, but you cannot buy a state Supreme Court seat for a 10th of that. Democratic-backed candidate Susan Crawford handily beat her conservative opponent Brad Schimel, maintaining the liberal majority on the Wisconsin Supreme Court. She's replacing another justice who is a liberal justice.
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
In terms of the other elections this week, Republicans did keep those House seats in Florida, replaced Matt Gaetz and Mike Walz through margins were significantly narrower than in the last election. The strategy making Elon the enemy was effective in the Wisconsin race. I think he's just irritating. And though he didn't help himself, as I said, with the cheesehead hat. What is the playbook?
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Because he's not always going to be there to beat up on. And of course, on Sunday, he said the entire destiny of humanity hung on this race. But he later said, I expect it to lose. There is a value to losing a piece for positional gain, which I'm calling downward facing doge. Right. What is happening here? Because I'm trying to sort of like, is it a good thing? Is it a bad thing?
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Like, I'm always quite wary, even when these people lose, of how much they actually lose.
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
I call him repellent. He's repellent to voters.
Pivot
Liberation Day, Elon Exit Rumors, and Guest Co-Host Jon Lovett
Why is that? Why is it? Obviously, rich guy, rockets, this and that. What has happened here?
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Yeah. And what hit him? He had an aneurysm. Okay. And he had a bunch of things that he didn't know he had, and it just hit. He had a headache, went to sleep, didn't wake up, essentially. He woke up briefly when he was in the hospital, but I didn't see him. I didn't see him after that night. Wow.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And then when he woke up because of the damage at the time, today would have been a very different story. He probably would have recovered. But then they had very little knowledge of what was happening or ability to do anything about it. They knew about what was happening. And so he had lost his, much of his brain function. So he would have been a vegetable or, or akin to that.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
At one point he woke up and kept calling my mother pretty lady. Like he was, he went back, he reverted to childhood, which was. Interesting. I mean, what's known about the brain is such an incredibly complex and beautiful.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Yes, he became exactly. Because, for that reason? I guess, yeah. He had an opportunity to work at early Microsoft. He probably should have taken that job because all his friends who did now own islands in different places. But he became an anesthesiologist like my dad. My dad was in the Navy. He was poor or middle class and wasn't able to pay for college.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And so the Army, the Navy paid for college for him. And then he got out at 34 after he'd served the time because it paid for college and medical school. And so he then had to serve, I guess, 10 years. And when he got out, he had a great job. His first big job, bought his first big house. It was a head of anesthesia at Brooklyn Jewish in New York and died, just died. Right? Right then.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Right as he started. Yeah. Well, no, he didn't. He had the aneurysm at home and then they took him away and we didn't see him again. My mom did, but he died very soon after. Do you wish you had seen him again? Probably not. I wouldn't have remembered. You know, that's what kills me about memories. You don't really... You have bits and pieces of them.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
That's something I would love to figure out if you could access those memories. I've thought about being hypnotized and stuff like that, but I think you can't. I think it's like a computer. It just kills—the memories just flush out.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I guess. But are they accurate? What are you seeing? There's a lot of really interesting science fiction. I've interviewed several authors because it fascinates me, this idea of— figuring out what you can see. And there's Welcome to the Dollhouse author Jennifer Egan. She had another book. Yeah.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And her book was about a tech person who creates a way that you can store memories and access them and see them. And the only way you get access to other people's memories is if you store yours with them so other people can see your memories. Oh, interesting. And so this part of the book, which was really interesting, I love this concept, And would you do it?
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Would you want to know those memories, right? Yeah. And so one of the things is this one girl has a day, her favorite day with her dad, and she goes back and sees it and she's like, oh, what a wonderful day. And then she accesses her father's memory and it is not a happy day for him. And she sees him, what he thought of that day, which was not good. And so that was devastating to her.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Like, do you really want to know what people thought of things? I mean, I don't know if you'd want to re-experience lots of things.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Just think of all the pictures and the photos and the videos that people take of each other. We do have a documentary going on constantly of our lives, right? And the question is, do you understand how you felt at the moment? Now, I have a memory drop like you cannot believe. Like, not for any good reason. I just, it's good for me. Everyone I go out with is like, don't you remember that fight?
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I'm like, I don't. And they're like, I remember. And I'm like, well, I don't. Like, I just, out of my brain. And I'm like, I don't know. Was I mad at you? I don't remember. Right. And, you know, it's a running joke about people I've gone out with. Like, I don't remember. But you remember this was a fight? I'm like, can't recall.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Yeah, there's a theory of people whose parents have died at a young age or experienced trauma at a young age. So when you're a young person, very young, and one of your parents dies, half the people you know die, right? If you think about... your relationship to young kids, you don't have a lot of contemporaries at five years old, right? And so imagine half of your friends dying.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
So if that happened and you sort of form, it's called highly functional. My brothers and I are highly functional. That's how I would describe us, actually. And the worst thing in the world happened and then you survived.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Oh. I have to say, when people ask me, people are like, what's your favorite? And they expect me to say Steve Jobs, which I also liked, or Bill Gates or Mark Zuckerberg or Elon Musk. And I always say that interview was really one of my best interviews.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
So you're like, oh, I'm not upset by that. Like, it's very hard to upset me. I was just thinking that the other day. Like, even the election, you know, my wife was quite traumatized. You know, like, oh, God. And I woke up. I had actually gotten sick then. I had a little bit of a flu, and so I went to sleep, so I didn't watch it, which is good. And I woke up, and she's like, oh.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I was like, oh, well, next. Like, I was much more in the, okay, now we're on to the next thing, and I think it has to do with that. I know we'll be fine or whatever. We'll figure it out or something like that. Right. Because you've survived and you're fine.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I mean, I think he went like, you know, he got rid of my dad's dog under very mysterious circumstances. My dog had a basset hound named Prudence and suddenly it was there and then it wasn't. And he got rid of it. And I don't know how. I still don't know to this day. I wish he would tell me if you're listening. You terrible person. How would you do that to children?
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Now that I have children, I literally, if I could like hunt him on the Savannah, I would. Like that kind of thing. I think that, you know, you, he did all kinds of cruel things all through his life. Just if someone, he was jealous of us all. As a unit for a short time and therefore sought to I'm very I understand Trump completely is dividing people. I understand people who divide.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And so he was one of those people and stuff like that all the time. Very insulting. I mean, one terrible thing he did to my brother was my brother was quite. Jeffrey? Jeffrey was a bit arrogant about his grades. He had perfect grades, and then he got 800s on his SATs, and you remember those days, right? Oh, yeah. Right?
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
No one cares now, but then it was a big deal, and getting into college was easier, but you cared more about those, weirdly enough. Yeah. And so my stepfather got all—he applied to a bunch of schools, and he got all the letterheads from all the colleges that Jeff applied to and sent him rejection letters. I know, right? Right? Like— Are you serious? I am serious. And Jeff got one a day.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And, you know, this was a 17, 18-year-old kid. Like, what? It's abusive. It's crazy. Oh, my gosh. I thought it was funny. My mother also thought it was funny. We did not think it was funny. My brother and I did not think it was funny. Why did your mom think it was funny? Because my mom's a bit of a sociopath, I would say.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
You know, something, you know, just, just a narcissist. Again, I know narcissism. Yeah. And so it was, you know, cause she was in love with him. Like, you know, that happens a million times. Yeah.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And she's a narcissist herself. And so he's a malevolent one. I don't know what's going on with her, but partially malevolent. And so, you know, I never thought that was funny.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
My brother sometimes laughs about it now because he's older. He's like, in his 60s, he's like, who cares? He did great.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
But to do that to a kid, it went on like that. Like, you know, we lived with a lot of wealth and he would lock everything. Like, and he would tape things in the house, everything. He just, it was... Tape, like tape it down? No, no, no. Tape, put bugs in the house. So my brother and I used to make up drug deals all the time. I've never taken any drugs.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I'd be like, I've got the stash of cocaine and the thing. And my brother's like, okay, I paid 50 for it. We would make it up. But that made us resilient. I hate to say it. You get resilient through negative things, which is interesting. And did you guys have gallows humor? Yes, very much so. We also had very supportive. My grandmother was incredibly important to me.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Yeah, we did it in Los Angeles when I was there for my conference. And you were very nice because the studio was really janky.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
We had a lot of supportive people around us, too, at the same time. So, no, it's just I bounce back a lot quicker than other people because of all this.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I do think, you know, one of the things I realized when my son was five is how much he knew me. So I must have known my father very well, right? I don't remember it, but we were so tight. And my daughter and I, she's five, very tight. We know each other so well. Therefore, he imprinted on me before my stepfather could. And so I knew what was good. And there was no changing that.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And I do think kids get a lot in the first five years of their life. And so I remember my son turning five. I was devastated because I finally understood my devastation through my relationship with him.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
That's exactly the word that I was using. The microphone smelled like, I think like a Snoop Dogg.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And you understand. disaster and mortality at a very young age. A lot of kids go through this around the world in different circumstances. And one of the things, another thing that I think about a lot is mortality. I think about it all the time. Death is something that's ever present. I respond to it well. And instead of, I'm very aware of how long, short time we have on this planet.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
even if we live a long life. And so everything I do when I'm doing something and I sort of don't like it, I'm like, oh, I'll be dead in 50 years. I'm leaving. Like I have a very good decisive thing. Like I was in a job I didn't like. I sort of liked it and it was a very high profile one. And Everyone's like, oh, you have to stay. I'm like, I really just don't like it. I don't like these people.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And I decided to go. Like, I do that very quickly. I make decisions very, very quickly. And the person at this place was asking me why I was leaving because it was a high-profile job. And I said, you know... me, you know, just me. And I was trying to be polite as I can. I'm not very polite. I'm not impolite. I'm just honest, I guess. And they said, why are you leaving?
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And I said, all right, if you want to know. And they said, okay, tell me. And I go, I don't want to talk to you anymore. And they're like, what? And I said, I have... you know, so many minutes on this earth. And right now I'm wasting them on talking to you. And I just don't want to talk to you anymore ever. And they're like, wow. And I'm like, yeah, that's really it. I'm tired of talking to you.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And I haven't talked to them since. Wow. I feel good about it. Okay. Yeah. And how do you... I like talking to you. You're not wasting my time.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I won't waste my time. I like walk out of things. I'm like, I have to go now.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
It's not pissed off. It's like literally I'm aware of how many minutes.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
You know, I always say to my kids, whenever they're super slow in getting to school, like putting their shoes on takes 10, 15 years. And I often go tick tock, tick tock, minutes of my life or whatever. ticking away and we're still putting on our shoes. Yeah. Like, let's get going. And they laugh about it. So they always go TikTok to me.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I have an app on my phone called WeCroak, which I love. It's a little frog. WeCroak? WeCroak. It's my favorite app on my phone. Look, there's one coming in. It has a little frog on it. And Bhutan, if you think about death five times a day, you're happier because you know. You're like, oh, I'm going to die. So I'm going to do this. I'm going to not do this. I'm going to make better choices.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
It's a Buddhist thing. Like you realize that everything is ephemeral, right? That ultimately stuff, everything. Like I've never been a money person. I was offered a lot of internet. I would have been very wealthy. And I just didn't want to be with those people. And I know it sounds dumb. I make enough money. Like you don't need $10 billion if you have enough.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
You know, I did the Succession podcast. Okay. And one of the great things about Succession, the people, the writers on it, all these theater writers, there's a lot going on there if you rewatch it.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
But one of the things they did really well was create, and I have witnessed this with all the billionaires. I know so many billionaires. I know so many billionaires. I can't believe I just said that, but I do. But one of the things they do, the people's worlds got smaller and smaller and more and more. So it's Kashmir prison.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
So they were in tight places. And then they go from their expensive apartments that are like airless to their cars that are airless. to their planes that are airlifted. And they move and never touch anybody else. And this is what's happened to a lot of the internet people. They don't experience real life in any way. The thing they love to talk about in tech is, let's get rid of the friction.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
They're always like, let's remove the friction. And they want you to remove the friction because it's addictive. Frictionless environments are addictive. And you need friction in life to be a good person, to be an alive person. Why do you think that is? Because it creates, you know, edges are important because it stops you and it makes you, one of my favorite books is The Trial by Franz Kafka.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And it's supposed, everyone thinks it's about communism, but it's not. It is not. It's about existential crisis, right? And where you are. And the first line was, someone must have been telling lies about Joseph Cade because he was arrested one fine morning, something like that. The word arrest means to stop. It's about God stopping him.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And the last image is of someone trying to get him to stop, and he never does, this character. And I just think you have to stop sometimes, and you have to... Pay attention. And if you're in this wealthy environment, you just don't because everything is brought to you. Everything is comfortable. No one disagrees with you.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And you become a warped version of yourself unless you have incredible character. Elon Musk is the opposite. He's removed anyone who disagrees with him from his environment. Right. And therefore he's, you know, in desperate need of attention and love.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
You're an asshole. Because I disagreed with him. In fact, in that instance, I hadn't, I had agreed with him, but he was so far gone that he thought any sense of tweeting something where I agreed with him of someone that disagreed with him was disagreeable. It was crazy. Yeah.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
He was. He asked me if I knew I needed to fix him up, but then I said no. Right. Because I thought he was nuts.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
This was pre being the richest man in the world. He wasn't right at the time.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
He has a great knowledge base in that area. And video games and things. He's quite good at video games. But yeah, I think, you know.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I mean, it's very easy. Why would I be hard on someone who has handled themselves with such grace? Yeah, so, well, thank you. Well, it's true. You made one mistake, big mistake, but you've acted better than pretty much everybody in this entire time. Never dropped a dime on people, never took advantage of it, did nothing. helpful things after, like you moved to doing the bullying thing.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
It's interesting. I just, I'm not, I don't know if it was from there or just the way I was because I was never impressed by anyone unless they're impressive. Like I treat, I will treat a janitor like I'll treat a billionaire. Right. Just depending on the person. And by the way, there can be a lot of jerky janitors and a lot of nice billionaires.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Like I don't assume anything about them except that if you're very wealthy, you do have a lot of yes people around you.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I love my kids. It's the best thing I've ever done. It's the only thing I think worthwhile. If I had to pick, if you had to, you don't have to snack around things in life, but if they said, if you have to pick, it would just be the kids. That would be it. I've had a great career. I like my career, by the way. And I think it's great.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And so I think just having them, I've always wanted to have kids since I was very young. I bought, as I wrote in the book, I bought a onesie when I was in college because I was like, and being gay and having kids at the time was not something you thought you could do. So that was another thing. You know, you'd have to get married if you wanted to have kids.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And so I was very much intent on having children. And I don't know why. I just always thought I would be a good parent, and I think I am. And I wanted a lot of kids. And so when I got remarried— And Amanda was like, well, here's the thing. I want to have kids. I'm like, great. I don't have very many regrets. I don't have almost any except for this one, which was I wish I'd gotten pregnant again.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I liked being pregnant. I loved it, actually. It was one of the best experiences I've ever had. I know a lot of women don't, but I did. What did you love about it? It was so cool. It was so cool to have something moving inside you. I wish men could experience it. It'd be a lot nicer these days. Just the creating of life was really astonishing. It's a miracle.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
You got to know your body better than you ever did. You understood it a little in a different way that I hadn't. We're so out of our body now. And in that case, you're forced into your body. I learned lots of different things, negative and positive.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
You know, at the time when I was getting pregnant, I bought a bunch of sperm and I went to visit one doctor who was a man and he was like, ah, geriatric pregnancy is what they call it. I'm like, excuse, I pay attention to words. I was like, excuse me. Oh, well, you know, you work so much that now you might not get pregnant. And I was like, go fuck yourself. And I got pregnant the first time.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I like, we ran this thing like it was a space launch, like nothing's going wrong. And it was so offensive to me that I was like, revenge pregnancy. I'm going to get pregnant right away. And I did. And now I own a ton of sperm that I don't know what to do with. Same thing with my ex-wife. She got pregnant first time.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I did it the old-fashioned way, just an IUI. But it was just great. I liked it. I was like a little hippo. I liked Louis kicking me. One thing I used to love to do is I love Law & Order, so I watched it all the time. It relaxes me. And you know the ding-ding, that noise? So I used to—I was huge, and I put a sandwich on my belly because it's a great place to put a sandwich when I was watching. Yeah.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Because it was big. And every time there'd be a dung dung, Louie would turn. And I would love that. I'd be like so amazed by it.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
You moved to doing things that were honorable and helpful rather than, you know, you could have gone a lot of different directions. I always think of directions people could have gone in when I do interviews, like choices they could have made and they didn't, which is, you know.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
No, he doesn't. He doesn't. But I was amused by the entire thing. So...
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Yeah, that was it. That was the one. It changes everything. It changes everything. I really think I'm successful because of it. even though I think I probably would have been less successful had my dad lived because I would have felt safer. But feeling unsafe is not, understanding lack of safety is a terrible way to learn things, but you learn them quick.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And you also learn that you'll be, you can put one foot in front of the other. I think that's the thing. And you have limited time, all those together. And then later when I had my own stroke, it was further emphasized that, like, guess what?
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Anything can happen at any time. I'm very aware of randomness. I'm very aware of death. I'm very aware of chaos. And I'm comfortable with it.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Well, so does my son. So I have one over here that I don't like. It's a ginkgo leaf. Everyone thinks it's a shamrock. That's my first one. Yeah, I was going to say it looks a little like a shamrock. How would I do a shamrock? How dare you think I would put a shamrock on myself? Come on. I know, that's not very Kara Swisher. A ginkgo is the oldest tree in the world. It's one of my favorite trees.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Okay. And everyone thinks it's a shamrock, so I hate that tattoo. It also is somewhere I can't see it. Tattoos are for me, so it should have been on this side so I could look at it. And I enjoy looking at my tattoos. Well, maybe you should get rid of that one.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
It's there. It's going to go with me to death. So then I got all my kids, which are Alex, Saul— Louis and Clara. I had Louis and Alex for a long time. Then I added these two. They're little hearts. They're like your Wonder Woman bracelets. Right, exactly. But then I put on these. Louis got me to do this. But I told him he could get them at 18. He has like six now. So this is entropy, chaos.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Chaos. Entropy and centropy are the two contrasting forces. As everything is destroyed, it is created. So everything, this idea that everything's on its way to something else is a really comforting feeling. Like every cell of your body is going to be an apple someday or whatever. I'm totally aware. You know, eating the worm of a fish, that King story or whatever.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
So everything that's destroyed gets created into something else. And so the world is constantly push-pulling between creation and destruction. Indian, you know, Ganesh is like this. There's all kinds of stuff like that. And that appeals to me, the idea of it'll be okay long after we're gone. This will become this. This will become that.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And it's a very comforting—if you're not religious, it's very comforting. I'm not religious.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I think you're not going to like the answer. I don't think it is a superpower. I think the loss is the loss. And I have never recovered from it. I think of my dad every day. I understand the giant hole it left. And I've talked to a lot of people who have lost a parent or a parent who has lost their partner and then the kids are young and they're like, what can we do? And I said, nothing. Nothing.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
He was a wonderful person. It just was bad. There's no good. There's no good to come of it. And I guess, like, I'm resilient. I'd rather not be resilient. I'd rather not be that way. I'd trade it all.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Right? Not by choice. I mean, I wanted to be in the military, actually, but I was gay at the time. Speaking of Bill Clinton, don't ask, don't tell. Terrible. Yeah. I couldn't be in the military. And so it was... It was a disappointment to me. I wanted to do that. So it was impossible at the time. It was very different than it is now. And it may go back to that, by the way.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
So I have this thing where I decide whether, Is their prickishness too big to account for their productivity? If they created something that was amazing, how much of a prick can I take? And I'm leaving out pedophilia and stuff like that here. But it's behavioral. Like Steve Jobs can be difficult. He parked in a handicapped parking space.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Now today he looks like a gentleman, and he was in many ways. But he was heavy on privacy. He created all these amazing products. So he has a product. He wins on productivity versus prick. right? His prickishness was not so bad. Other people's prickishness can go up and their productivity goes down. And so I just would do that. And that would be my justification for speaking to them.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Now I have, I've got to make a new one because someone was like, would you interview blank? Right. And I'm like, no. How about a chode chart? Chode chart. Yes. Like, would I interview? Because some people are just... bad narrators, they're liars. I have a hard time interviewing active liars. Like tonight I was supposed to be on a CNN panel and there's three people I have no response.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And I'm like, I can't, I just can't. And they were like, you're good, you know, you're good. At slapping them down, I'm like, I'm mad that I'm good at that. I don't want to be that. I don't have to be a... It's like, you're good at shooting people. I'm like, hmm, don't want to shoot anybody. Like, we'd prefer... I know I am, actually. And so I get claps for slapping down bad people.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Well, it's interesting because it's a very misogynistic. It's not even misogynistic. It's not anti-women. It's no women. It's different. Like some of them are misogynists, no question, but it's not quite as crystal clear as that. They think they're better. That's all. Like it's different than just hatred because it's very easy to do hatred, right? It's very, it's like, okay.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
You're a terrible person. It's more the lesser than. And that's different. Is that hate or is that they just believe it? And they believe in themselves so much and their rightness. I always say they're frequently wrong but never in doubt. And they're so certain of what they're like.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Sometimes I think AI is really interesting to me because I'm spending a lot of time dealing with all these AI people. And they're the same people, by the way, FYI, who created our last internet. And one of the things I think about a lot is why there's a lot more men using AI than women. It's a really interesting statistic. Huh.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I have decided, this is my new theory, I don't know if it's right, men can't create life. They can't. And by the way, there's ways to be pregnant now without sperm. There's really interesting innovations happening there. Yes, there is. What? Yes, 100%. It's really, I'm doing, my next book is on all these things.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And so men can't actually create life and they can't sustain it to birth. Mm-hmm. AI is so they can make life. They want to make bots. They want to create beings. They want to create beings. It's their way of being pregnant. I know it sounds crazy, but I think about it. But is it also about the control? That's correct.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
But there certainly was a, if you were gay, even if you were out, it was a problem. And you couldn't be out. I mean, it was ridiculous. The whole thing is set up for ridiculousness.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
So when you have a baby or you're raising a child, you don't have control, really. You do a modicum of control, but you don't. You don't know how they're going to end up. Yeah, yeah. What they're going to do, they're the most random shit. Kids do the most random shit. And you don't know what's going to happen.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
My son had to take off his coat four times yesterday morning because he didn't like this. No, I want to do this. You don't know what's happening. And you don't know why. And that's good. That's the friction, like I'm saying. And you can't guess it. You just can't guess what's going to happen next or which way they're going to go. And with AI, you can control it. Although now they can't sometimes.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
They can, but they can't. And so they are giving birth. That's why they like it, right? So why is it? So I just find it just, I'm thinking a lot around why is AI so popular with men? And it is. There's just study after study after study. And I believe it's them being pregnant, which is the greatest thing you can do, really. Creating life is really the top level. I think space is about that.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I think going to, you know, their penis rockets and everything else. Yeah, yeah. I do. I'm like, everything is about creating life, which they absolutely cannot do. They cannot.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
That would be it. You know? Maybe. Maybe. My kids being really young, I guess, again, my older kids being young, I really am enjoying. Doing it the second time with the age difference, I think I didn't relish it quite as much as I should have. And relish them as much as, I mean, I spent a lot of time with them now. We're very close. So I don't feel like I did a bad job.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I just wish I could go back to that. Go back in time and re-experience things. I'd love a time machine.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Yes. Right. Not just that. There was all kinds of ideas that gay people couldn't keep a secret. It was stupid. It was so stupid. Just the same thing. They couldn't be married. They couldn't have kids. All that stuff. Which is, again, gone now. But, you know. Yeah. For now. We'll see. As you said. We certainly can go back. Easily. Terrifying. They want it to go back.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
It's part of the many issues of rage these particular certain Republicans have over what's happened. And that's right up there.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Sure. So one of the things I did when I was younger is I really, really wanted to work at the Washington Post, where I ended up working. But I went to Columbia Journalism School. And again, because I was gay, I didn't want to move to the South. That's where a lot of the jobs at newspapers were at the time. And I thought, I'm not going to. live a furtive life.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I just hated that idea because it's so debilitating to lie, right? Everybody knows that. It's the most debilitating thing. And lie to yourself, most of all. And so I was like, oh, I guess I'll start at the top of the Washington Post, but I couldn't get a job. And so the job I got at the time during the Reagan administration was John McLaughlin. Now, I am very liberal, although... Different.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I have different opinions about it because I want to be in the military. I want to serve. I'm quite patriotic.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
That's why it's so ridiculous to put people in these. Libertarian in others. It's so dumb to put people in boxes the way we've done now, unfortunately, to all of our detriments. And, and so I, I wanted to get into the media. And so I was offered this job at the McLaughlin Group. And he was this very, he started Screamy Cable Television, who was the, the god, the original. Yeah, I remember.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
And it was a very popular show. And so he needed someone to write his column. He had a column that he wrote for, I forget, one of the magazines. And I ghost wrote it for him, essentially. And then he would sign off on it and add different flourishes. And so I worked also on the show, on the insults. Like, you know, on a scale of 1 to 10, 10 being nuclear Armageddon or just different things.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I was good with words and I was good with insults. And so I wrote those. And during the time there, it turned out he was a really significant sexual harasser. Of the old school. Yeah. The chase around the desk type, kind of the obvious one. Not the Pete Hegseth type, who was more rapey and creeper kind of thing.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
This guy was a creeper too, but much more of the old school, like, hey, honey, give me a kiss, that kind of thing. And very aggressive in that room, big guy. And he was that, and he was bothering a woman in the office, which I witnessed and testified against him later. But while I was there, he was also into controlling, whether it was where you were in the office or
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
he'd follow you to the bathroom to keep talking to you. Are you serious? Of course, because he was like, he was crazy. He was like, control was, it's all about control, as you know. And so he would line people up by height and say dust ball, and someone had to get it under the couch. These were all Republicans. I was not, so I never did it.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I was always at the end, though, because of the height thing. And not the tall end, the short end. And so he was just really abusive. And one of the things he did is he made everyone in the office, regardless of who they were, including his chief of staff, a really heinous woman, I will say, make a toast form. He liked white buttered toast. I like white butter toast.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Who doesn't like white butter toast? Well toasted, extra butter. Fine. I get it. But, and I get it if he had a secretary, I guess, fine. I don't have people make toast for me. But he was, he tried to get me to make him toast and it was a thing. And I said, I'm not making you toast. And he goes, everyone in this office makes me toast. And I said, well, not me.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I have a graduate degree in journalism, so I'm not going to do it. And he said, if I ask you to make me toast and you don't do it, I'm going to fire you. And I said, great. Sounds good. And then he goes, okay, just so you know, I go, got it. He never asked me to make him toast. It was really interesting. It was just, he wanted to know that he could. And I was like, I'm fine with that.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Seems like fair. Was that a moment for you where you sort of first saw your ability? No, I had it before. I did it my whole life. I don't know where it comes from. I mean, I walked out of fourth grade. Wow. Why? Because I had read it. I was in the principal's office. My mother came in. She's like, why did you leave? I said, because I already learned that. And I was like, I'm bored.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I need to leave. And I did that from the get-go. My name when I was a baby was Tempesta, which is what they tell women who are... They call you bossy or, you know, all those names for women who know what they want. It's fine. I mean, it's fine. I didn't mind. I liked being the way I was, so it was fine. Probably part of being gay, so I didn't really care what— especially men, thought of me.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
I like men compared to most women. I don't have to sleep with them. Sorry, Monica.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
See, but that was – if I had been a CIA agent, this is what I would have done. I'm a good – it's not that I have a superpower. It's that I'm a good history major, I guess, because you could watch – if you studied communications even for a second, you understood that every major communication system had a weapon-tool kind of dichotomy. And so it was sort of easy.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
You know, it's like putting together a puzzle, which is what I would have done if I was an analyst for the CIA or anything else. You just look at all the facts, and then you're like, here's what I think is going to happen. Right. And I've been more right than wrong. And, you know, just recently with Elon, I said, he's going to be dangerous. He's going to be a Trump supporter.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
He's going to be this. And, you know, at the time, actually last year when I said he's going to, when he was going, I'm a neutral party, blah, blah, blah. I was like, no, no, he's going to back Trump and he's got to pay for it because he's in big trouble if not. And he did. He invested $118 million, and now he's worth $77 billion more. So excellent investment. Wow.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Including Twitter now, which looked like a bad investment, but now looks like a good one because it's not about Twitter. It's about influence and power. Yeah.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Not really. I think he just understands his existential crisis of— Kamala Harris became the president. I think that was something he was quite aware of. Okay. Although I doubt she would have gone after him the way he's going to be going after people. Interesting. Everything these people say, every accusation is a confession with someone like that. Wait, say that again?
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
He was tweeting out, you know, they're going to jail me in the Harris administration. And then right after the election, we're going to jail mayors. We're going to jail—Alzheimer Vindman should be jailed for treason. Their accusations are confessions of what they want to do, often and always. Not just Elon, but Trump and the rest of them. Yeah.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
So I listen to their accusations quite a bit because it means something about them.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
A lot of the same, actually. One, more propaganda to try to control certain populations and convince people that bad things aren't bad and the uses of AI and other manipulative means to do it. Two, the continued coarsening of public dialogue because it works for him. You know, either hope or fear works. And he's the fear guy, right?
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
So I think creating false narratives constantly and using digital means to do so. And eventually, I think tech companies will reign ascendant in this period. He will not pull them back as much as he has a proclivity to want to do that. I think he's going to be influenced by Musk to allow technologists to run the show.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
How do we reclaim social media? What I'm looking at is not so much where we are now, which is social media is bad for all of us because it's partisanship. It creates echo chambers, bullying, everything that goes with it. There are some good parts of it. Yeah, there's some very good parts of it.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
No, I've covered tech for the past 30 years. I was one of the earliest people who covered the internet. I know about the early part, but I've covered the internet, all the big people from Musk to Zuckerberg to Jobs to Gates, stuff like that.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
That was the dream of, say, an AOL. One of my first things in the book is a bunch of quilters who had never met, and they liked quilting in their own community, but then they met and formed friendships, and then they made a quilt. That's a beautiful thing. Often it's not. It's to anger and upset people because one of the things I also say in the book is enragement equals engagement, right?
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
It works better than empathy. Empathy does not equal engagement necessarily. It can. No. But enragement is better.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
Oh, this is lovely. I can easily recall sitting on the bathroom floor under the sink as my father shaved in the mornings. I used to put my cheek up against the pipe because the warmth of the water rushing down, it was comforting to me. The soft hairs of my father's legs trapped bits of water from the steamy air of the bathroom and as he shifted his legs, suddenly releasing the drops as he moved.
Reclaiming with Monica Lewinsky
Kara Swisher
It amazes me that I can recount those times so easily, but not the last night he said goodbye to me. It's a nice piece. Like, it's funny what you remember, right? You know, in the digital world, everything is remembered. Yeah. And there you have bits and pieces of information. And how old were you? Five. Five. Just turned five when he died.
Search Engine
The New Zuckerberg
Do you feel like you're adequately portrayed? Because I want to wonder about the person who actually created this thing.
The Ben Shapiro Show
Ep. 2134 - Democrats Fear BIG BALLS!
I have no idea. I think there is no vetting whatsoever, as you can see, that's taking place. It took Katie and the really great team. Wired has done an astonishing job here. You know, I could make a joke. That's probably why he was hired for all this ridiculous nonsense and other nefarious things. But, you know, there's an expression in technology. It's not it's it's a feature, not a bug.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
And, you know, Steve Reschetti is a nice guy. And he's like, oh, you know, it's the unions. He should understand. He's a big boy. And I was like, no, he's not a big boy.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Well, the thing is, you know, and Steve's, again, a lovely guy. I actually ran into him at a movie premiere for Wicked, and he goes, guess you were right. I'm like, guess so. You know, the way he takes slights is really strange. So I'd seen it in action, sort of petty anger and slights. And that one really stuck hard. And they kept, the Biden people kept tweaking him.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
And I found that to be, you know, I mean, you could be like, so what? I'm like, why would you do that? He actually does deserve the accolades around Tesla. So why not just give him that? And I never understood why they wouldn't, despite the union stuff.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Like he liked all those memes, dank memes. He loves dank memes.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
It always is. You know, I have experiences with my own son. Like he loves dank memes. Like he always sends me dank memes or whatever. And you can fall down it. And I think that's what attracted him to Twitter for sure. And then it took off into a dark, darker place that the other things impacted it.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
But, you know, he's an addictive personality, clearly, like whether it's to work or hardcore is one of his favorite words, which is I find to be hustle porn, you know, so he's attracted to addiction. And so his Twitter use, you can watch it like you can, you can see it. It's, it's, it's manic and he's a manic person. And I think it's, again, not an excuse, but an explanation.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
I don't think he's good the way my my kids are cringe. They're always like cringe people.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Well, his manic nature, right? It's got a manic addictive quality to it. And he does have a sense of humor. It's not my sense of humor, and people will hate me for saying this, but it can be rather charming, right? Like when he was on Saturday Night Live.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
He was so awkward that it was charming. And other people are going to say Kara loves him. I don't care. Go watch it. It is.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
You brought him. You made him. Oh, yes. Oh, my God. They're so exhausting. I don't— I have to tell you, sometimes the left is so ridiculously censorious. It's kind of like, I don't want to use censorious. That's not, they're just like scoldish. I don't want to use, they're not censoring. But yes, I get a lot of like, you made him, like you didn't know it.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Well, I didn't know how he was treating his kid. I'm sorry. I didn't know that. And had I known, I would have.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
I was covering him as a car manufacturer. Look, Silicon Valley has a million people like him. He was very typical, except he was doing more interesting things than other people.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
So getting back to how he's good at it, I think the people that are very good, and I once wrote a column about in The Times when I was writing for The Times about two people I thought were very good, which is AOC and Trump, right? They're genuine to themselves. Or Kim Kardashian's another person who's like this.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
You don't have to like any of these people, but boy, are they good at channeling themselves as an image online. And it feels genuine. It feels like them doing it, and it is them doing it. It feels like it's their voice, if that makes sense. People love when someone that famous reacts to them, and then it creates a sensation around them, right? And so then you get a lot of acolytes.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Oh my God, Elon Musk responded to me. And he feeds off of that too. And again, he combines humor. He initially combined humor with that or insights, right, to interesting things. And then it very quickly twisted into stuff he doesn't know anything about. And he just pontificates.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
And that's his favorite thing is to say all manner of nonsense and inaccuracies about things he doesn't know what he's talking about.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Well, you know, Kevin Roos did a great thing about that. You know, you go down this rabbit hole. It really is. It can really be, you know, did you know this? Or, you know, everybody is subject to it with the way social media works. And that's a mind of technology people. They're like, this could happen. We could... Go to the moon, right?
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
You have to have that element to you if you're going to do very difficult things. And so you have to start with that personality. And therefore, anything, every single thing is open to question. Why do we do it this way? Why do we do it this way? And it's a personality trait I like.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
But what happens is when you start to get out to Ukraine or vaccines or whatever, they have to question everything and posit themselves. I always joke about it with my wife. Oh, yet another bold truth teller, right? I'm so tired of them. I'm here to boldly tell you the truth without any actual information or reporting.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
And so he's attracted to that idea, like the simulation, like why can't we live on Mars? Not everybody does that. And I think when it starts from that, it starts off from a good place. But often in the social media world, as Kevin correctly put out in that podcast he did, is it goes down into the sort of conspiracy theory avenue really quickly.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
So have a lot of people in Silicon Valley. Let me say, he's not alone. No, he's not. He's got a cut, like this Curtis Yarvin stuff. They've all sort of been taken by these. It's almost religious if you think about it, right? And so one of the things that I think it goes back to, and I hate to say this, is sad little boy, wasn't loved enough as a child, is searching for meaning, right?
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Is searching for love, searching for, and again, not an excuse because I think he's become a terrible person. And he should get therapy. But when there's easy answers like that, oh, this is why you're so unhappy. Oh, this is why the world is the way it is. These right-wing conspiracies do scratch an itch for these people. It's a religion. It's their answer to the world. It's also a politics.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
I mean, there is that element to a lot of these people. And the same thing with Silicon Valley people. Again, when you merge that with the ideas around Silicon Valley, which is highly male, highly, we have all the answers. Why are these silly people in our way? And with the South African thing, I don't know what happened there that created this group of people.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
But you can you could say that about people who come from Russia or China or, you know, there's an element of a whole bunch of people who emigrated from India. So, you know, they bring with them whatever culture happened there. And in South Africa, you can go one of two ways, right? You can go the Athol Fugard way or you could go in this way of longing for past times, I guess, in some fashion.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Well, I think what was really interesting is a lot of these guys, you know, can I use this in the interchange? Have tiny dick energy. I don't know what else to say. They just, they want to be big swinging dicks and they won't do it, right? They won't go there because they're worried about what people will say or everyone's sort of watching each other. And this guy goes in and just does it.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Like Silicon Valley, the employees run the show. Like they really do. They like to get their lunches. They like to get their cars, their dry cleaning. They like to speak up. And by the way, They started it like Google starting with having the employees talk back every Friday. What do you think was going to happen? Right. They're going to the kids.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Right. They gave power to their employees. And I had a discussion, I don't think it was Mark, where I was like, now they're talking back. I'm like, what did you think they were going to do? You indulge children for long enough and give them sugar all day long, they're going to become terrible people. Like, you know what I mean?
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
And so that they were surprised by this is what happened when they created these cultures, I'm always surprised by. So they have all these employees that annoy them. So they let them say whatever they wanted. And then they said whatever they wanted. And then they were annoyed by them saying whatever they wanted.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
And they found it very hard to push back because talent is at a premium in Silicon Valley. So you have to kind of let everybody be themselves. And it got annoying for a lot of these people because they had effective control over things. But with Musk, when he did it, you could see everybody in Silicon Valley. They already had this... Oh, he gets to do that. I don't get to do that.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
I have to, like, listen to my diversity, equity, inclusion people. Like, oh, I hate those people. Like, you know, but he doesn't have to. He can do whatever he wants. And when he did that and cut people, they wanted to do that, too.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Right. It's sort of the rid me of this annoying priest kind of thing, like rid me of these people. Again, it's like a king thing. The way they set up their companies is a kingship, right? Mark Zuckerberg has complete control. He can't be fired. He's there for life, dictator for life or whatever the joke you want to make. And so they like that.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
But in practice, it doesn't work that way because he's got reporters annoying him, like irritating reporters. He's got his staff. He's got to at least give a nod to diversity or else he gets shamed. And he doesn't have the fortitude that Musk has in that regard. And so they themselves are trying to assert themselves in sort of what they consider a man, right?
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
This is the definition of what a man is. A lot of them... were not considered manly when they were in high school or, you know, sort of Revenge of the Nerds kind of thing. So they are trying to hold on to all these kind of manly cosplaying, I guess. You know, with Mark, it's the stupid chain and the T-shirt, which, good luck, it's fine. I think it looks ridiculous, but fine. He likes it.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Or the MMA, like, I can feel like a man. Like, they hold on, or I'm going to hydrofoil, or I'm going to work out, I'm going to show off my muscles. That's what Bezos is doing. Like, here's my muscles, here's my pretty... fiance kind of thing. They're trying to sort of cosplay a version of a man that I think seems pathetic to me, but I think it gives them great comfort.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Oh, that's because I suggested you do podcasting. You've done rather well.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Well, they don't like women to start with. Come on. They don't like them to start with. So this shouldn't be a surprise. They don't like the ladies kind of thing.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
What's interesting about what you're saying, and it's absolutely true. Sorry, they don't have women in their midst. I wrote a piece once, say, The Men and No Women of Facebook, and Mark got hurt by it. And I was like, what? I'm just putting up pictures of your management. I don't know what to tell you. Like, you hired them. They're very fixated on what a man is and how to behave.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
And what's really interesting, especially Mark Andreessen, I mean, if he could jog like 10 feet, I'd be surprised, right? Talking about the manly virtues. Give me a break. I mean... When he said that, I'm like, I could beat him up in five seconds. Like, I don't even understand where this comes from. Now he's going to challenge me to a fight, whatever.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
So it's a concept of what a man is that is not what a man is, but they've decided it is. Now, of all these people, Elon didn't cosplay a lot like that. Like, he didn't, except now he's starting to wear the cowboy hats and that whole nonsense that he's doing. But he actually didn't as much as they did. And now they sort of take all their cues from his aggression, which is kind of interesting.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Yeah. Zuckerberg is such a beta. He's such a beta. I love saying that.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Well, a little more strongly than the New York Times did. You know, they're sort of treating it like it's an interesting person walking through. I think he's a one-man wrecking ball, really. And he's being used by Trump for that purpose. You know, there's lots of ways you could use metaphors. You could say junkyard dog. He's the one sort of taking all the flack, going in and breaking things. But...
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
And you could be funny and call it Wreck-It Ralph. I don't think it's particularly funny or the right way to do it or constitutionally sound. But that's the kind of thing. He's going in there like he does with his companies and doing the exact same thing. He's got a series of moves that he makes every single time, and he's doing them writ large on the federal government.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Well, it's changed and morphed over the years, but always drama, always a massive amount of drama centered on him. That tends to be the thing he does. He can be very dramatic in a very, like, poignant way.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
There was a period where he was very worried about the fate of Tesla, if you remember, and he was sleeping on the floor there, and he gave a really... He actually gave an interview to the New York Times where... He seemed to cry. He seemed very emotional.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
And at one point when we were talking, this was, I think, off camera, he said, if Tesla doesn't survive, the human race is doomed, which I felt was a little dramatic, you know, and I thought, wow, this is what, man in his forties who thinks that he's the center of the universe. And so it always has that element of drama. Like it has to be that, and he has to be at the center.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Yes, but they won't. They will not. They will say it is not them. It was we're cleaning up from the previous, right? They will not take control because one, Ezra, you think they care about consequences. One of the messages in my memoir. I think they care about power. They don't care about the consequences of damage. They do not care. They don't anticipate it. You're right about Twitter.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
It's a lesser business. The only way he's getting advertisers is by threatening them. Like they're just doing these lawsuits. And of course, these advertisers are going to go back just to acquiesce to him, right?
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Not a better business. It's a way to pay him off. Tesla's not a better business than what it was because they haven't innovated the cars. That stock may be going up, but the sales are going down because the cars aren't as good. They just aren't. So he doesn't care about the actual thing. These people don't care about the actual thing.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
They care about laying waste to it and then we'll build something better. But I don't know what they're going to build better. If you press them, and a lot of these, like, same thing with the media that goes with it. It's never about solutions, is it? It's about how everything sucks and we have to get rid of it.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
They never tell you what their replacement is for any of it because they don't have a theory of building. They have a theory of destruction. And, you know, Trump just with the water thing, he just, like, we got to get the water flow. What a disaster that was. What he just did, like in California, he's wasting water.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
No reason. And then going on. And then the whole group of people going, mm-hmm, sir, well done. I'm like, are you fucking, like who is not standing there among the media going, are you fucking kidding me with this? Like not going, well, sir, people say. I'd be like, that's why they don't let me in the White House. I'm like, are you fucking kidding me? That was a disaster.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
I think he's greatly informed by video games. And so that's, he's sort of, someone described him to me as ready player one and everybody else is an NPC, which is a non-player character. So he always has to be the hero or the person who matters the most. And sometimes he does, and sometimes he's engineered it.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Oh, it's the best investment he made. Exactly. Except for investing in Trump, that $280 million. Let me tell you, the only person, when he bought it, we were all sort of like, what in the world? Why is he paying so much? What an idiot, right? Everybody was saying that.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
He tried to get out of it. He thought he was stupid. Because he wasn't anticipating what he could use it for, right? He didn't realize he had a really big gun there, right? He thought it was a knife or whatever. The only person who called me was Mark Cuban. And he says, Carrie, he's not buying it. Like, maybe he doesn't know he's doing this.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
But when he goes in a room internationally as the head of Tesla or Starlink... I mean, he gets a meeting just like the head of GM or Lockheed gets, right? And world leaders, et cetera. When he goes in as the owner of Twitter, he has enormous power globally from an influence point of view. He goes, this is not a US play. This is a global play. And I was like, huh? I think Mark was 100% right.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
He bought it and it gave him, he's the Twitter guy and also Tesla and also, but he gets an, no one else has that, right? And maybe back in the day, Rupert Murdoch, right? I guess. Right. And that's what he's done. But like bigger, better, stronger, more influential. Rupert Murdoch would never think of sitting with Trump cutting this stuff.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Murdoch didn't want to be the main character of his own platform. But he is kind of Rupert Murdoch now, right? But except a Rupert Murdoch who likes to do shit.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
You said that right. I thank God you said that because like all the media is like, look at this interesting thing. I'm like, he wants you to know. It's a signature. It's me, Fredo. I know it was you, Fredo. He totally wanted people, everything he does, he wants you to know because again, he is a desperate attention sponge and he just needs constant, constant.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Why would you stay up at night talking to people, you know, named Cat Turd? Why? Why? Like, why? you know, because you have a desperately empty hole in the center of your life that you can never fill, right?
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
So, you know, just like getting the founder role when he's not actually the founder or rewriting history or using PR to make himself the founder. So he understands the hero's role. kind of thing really rather well. He also, the stakes have to be very high. And if it doesn't work, we're doomed kind of thing. So he uses language like that of doom. And he tends to overstate the problems.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
It's the bottom of bottomless well, this center of need to be loved or, and I hate to break it down like that because I'm not a psychologist, but boy, does he have a big old hole right in the center of himself. And so what I think is very telling about both of these people is they do not have solutions. They only tell us what the problem is and they don't have a vision of,
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Even Ronald Reagan had a vision. Like they all have, what is your vision? What do you want to make except get out of my way and let me do what I want to do? That's really the vision that I can tell. I haven't heard what they want to make at all.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Have you noticed they're all leaking? We don't have control of him.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Utterly. Trump's life is full of those people. And now he's got the greatest one ever. Michael Cohen was that, like the fixer, right? So there's always a fixer in Trump's life who does these things, who's willing to go to the mat for the boss, which he likes to be called apparently. So Musk is that writ large. It's just that he's much more protected because he's so wealthy.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
He has so much means that he almost is more powerful than he's not a minion. He's like a super minion or something.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Well, Donald Trump is like, he has what, three emotions, ABC? Like, I don't think he's very complex in that regard. I did think they were going to fight. And I know he's irritating to Trump. You hear that from a lot of people. And I think it's absolutely true. He probably is irritating. At the same time, Trump loves money. So really, that's at the heart of him.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
I think Donald Trump finds him useful and he is useful to Donald Trump. He's a useful junkyard dog and he has a lot of money. So if he has a cudgel against these senators, he's going to give me money to take you out. Like I've got a bank, a bank that never ends, essentially. He also knows he needs him to hold on to power because what does it look like when they fight? What does that look like?
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
You don't want Elon Musk outside the tent. That's a really bad place for Elon Musk to be and angry. Because he's shown he has an ability to fight back at people. So ultimately, it could go on for a while. And he could do more and more outlandish things and behave in more and more outlandish ways. Trump has an endless capacity for, you know, oh, did he say a racist thing? I don't care.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Most companies have problems, but everything is a disaster here and I'm here to fix it. Or everything sucks and everybody previously is criminal or evil. Pedophile is a word he likes to use a lot, but he uses the terms like evil and evil In one tweet, he called Yoel Roth, who was head of Trust and Save Twitter, who he did like until he quit and then he became evil.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
What could that be? What is he, like detonate a nuclear bomb? You break the government and things are going to break.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
You see, you're operating on the idea that they care about the pain. They don't care. They won't take responsibility for it. Have you heard Mark Zuckerberg take responsibility for any of the problems?
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Right, which is probably what will happen. That's the likeliest scenario here. I mean, one of the things that he's got to keep musk around for that is the money on these things to manipulate things, to really flood the zone with all kinds of money and efforts to win that midterms. But again, they don't care. He has done the damage. As long as he destroys it and you can't come back...
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
is what they're doing. In Musk's mind, my guess is that he thinks this is the only way to do it, is to get rid of everything. They're hoping you focus so much on the destruction that you're not going to notice you're living in a destroyed place.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
And I know you think there's bigger implications, but they'll be so all over the place, it'll be hard to figure out what actually has been destroyed or to feel a sense of anger. What's going to happen is people are going to feel a sense of just nihilism, right? I think that's what's going to happen.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
In one tweet, he called him evil and I was seething with hate, which is really dramatic and ridiculous. I'm not seething with hate. Very Trumpian. Yeah, yeah, that kind of thing. I think he means it, though. I think Trump sometimes is just doing it for show, you know, showman, a reality show kind of thing.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
There's a few people. Reid Hoffman was just on the podcast this week. I sense fear in him. He funded the Eugene Carroll thing. He's a very lovely person, and he's very even-handed all the time, almost to a fault. I don't think he's going to be as aggressive, and he certainly was, but he's got to be thinking, what do I do? I'm very exposed, right?
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
You have a Mark Cuban, who I think presents a different alternate. He claims to me he doesn't want to run for president. I think he has a real opening of like, oh, come on, this is not the way we are. And I don't think everyone's moved there. I think there's these loudmouths like Musk and David Sachs and that gang. And even Peter's not that loudmouth these days, which is interesting.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
I find interesting. But you have the loudmouths. But I don't think everyone is on this ticket. Like, if you noticed, you didn't see Tim Cook in the front row with the greatest feast of engineering in history was somehow he didn't have to be in that picture, right? I have never thought Silicon Valley was liberal. I thought they were utilitarian, I guess.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
I thought they sort of were tolerant socially, but didn't really care, didn't think about it much. I think these people just want to do their business. I don't think they support Trump. I think it's like a VIG, right? Whether you're Bob Iger or whether you're anybody, you got to pay the VIG or you don't have a choice right now. I don't think there's a deep well of support for Trump.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
I think it's just there's a bunch of loudmouths that have that. And everyone else just shakes their head for this. So when that's the case, there tends to be a countervailing force of these guys are shakedown artists, right? When, as you say, disaster will come and this will be a big fucking mess. they will line up in that direction because it's good for them and for their shareholders.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
So whatever it takes for shareholders to do better, if Trump tanks the stock market, if Trump tanks this, they'll be on the opposite side instantly because they have no real values. They just don't. Elon has more values than most of them in a weird way, even though they're warped and twisted. So I think they'll just go whatever way the financial markets go. That's my feeling.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Oh, God, interesting. I can't, one of them, I can't say. Well, there's a memoir coming out from a very well-known media person that once it's published, as you should read, I'm reading it right now and I can't say who it is because he gave it to me on the sly. I think it's wonderful.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
I love the book Northwoods by Daniel Mason, which came out last year, which is about a house, the history of a house and the people who lived in it. And it's haunting me. I think it's the most beautiful book. And I love Daniel Mason. I'm reading The Piano Tuner right now. I'm reading all his stuff. But this book, it's about one of the things that comforts me in this very difficult time.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
You know, I have four kids. I'm a gay person. It's nerve wracking right now. I thought this was all over and here we are again. But it gives me comfort that we're all going to be dead someday. I know it sounds crazy, but life goes on over the period. And so I really like that book. And then I recently interviewed him, and I think he's terrific, Tim Snyder.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
I think he's a really important person talking about where tyranny goes and stuff like that. I read a lot more nonfiction. I should read more fiction. And I'm sorry, I'm going to give one more. Geraldine Brooks, who is a wonderful writer. She won, I think, the Pulitzer or whatever. Her book, she's mostly done fiction. She's written a book about the death of her husband that is incredible.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Tony Horowitz, who is a friend of mine. Geraldine's a friend of mine. He wrote Confederates in the Attic. And it's a beautiful rumination on mortality and history. I don't know, just a wonderful book.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Well, He has people around him that are just enablers. They're sort of, all these Silicon Valley people do. All his minions, and they're minions, they're all lesser than he is in some fashion, and they all look up to him. They're typically younger. They laugh at his jokes. You know, sometimes when he apologizes for a joke, which is not very often. He said people around me thought it was funny.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Well, they all do because they're like, to be in the room is to watch it happen. I was, when he was being interviewed at Code once, he had a couple of them there and he's told a really bad joke and they all went like that. And I was like, that's not funny. I was like, I'm sorry, did I miss the joke? You know, they looked at me like I had three heads.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
And what they do is, it's not that hard to figure out choke points, right? This is where we need to be. And then they go into it in this way that is, you know, violating of typical rules. And I don't mean necessarily laws, although I suspect many laws may have been broken here, but not caring about breaking laws. And so they go in sort of full force and question, let me see your code.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Why can't we get in? We're getting in. We have the law. We have federal marshals. Let's see what they'll do. And that is a really big quality that he has. Let's say things and wait for them to sue us or wait for them to stop us. They won't stop us. And again, very much like Trump, the people don't stop you.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
We just operate on a set of, you know, polite rules in society and they just barrel right through them.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
Yeah, it is. I mean, and if he gets caught, he's willing to pay, right? Like he's willing to go toe-to-toe legally. And I think what a lot of people are is, I don't want to fight this guy. He has unlimited money, right? Like, you have to think twice if you're going. I mean, you know, journalists have to think twice. You know, it's very similar to these media companies settling.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
You know, CBS has done nothing wrong in this Kamala Harris situation, and yet they're going to pay. It's pretty clear that Meta did nothing wrong with Trump, and yet they're going to pay. You do it to make it go away, or you don't do it at all. because of the exhaustion. And he understands that. He understands that he can wear them down. And so it is true.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
If you blow lights, you mostly get away with it, right? Like you don't always get caught or if you don't pay bills or in his business life, let's blow up 90 rockets because the 91st will work. And that's his attitude towards pretty much everything I can tell.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
It did, but who else gets to, like, look, and then he insults NASA, which is not allowed to blow up rockets. NASA can't blow up rockets because then they blow up one rocket. That's the end of it, right? And so it's a real advantage to be able to blow up rockets and then keep going. You know that Thomas Edison quote? There's a famous quote that they all quote back to me. I have not failed.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
I've found 10,000 ways that don't work. Whatever. And then you eventually get to it. And so it's very, it's part of the ethos of tech is that there's no such thing as failure. There's only it didn't work that time and I'll get the right one next.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
It's not money. Money is not, I hate to say this, I hate it, but it's not that important to many of them, right? You know that. It's not money. Some of them really like money, that's for sure. But it's not money. It's the power that money brings and it's power to decide. And, you know, I think it started off, I have some good ideas and I'd like to put them into place.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
And now it's, I have all the ideas on every topic and therefore what I say goes. It's a very king-like attitude towards things, right? Or the, you know, that philosopher they like of that we should have a functional CEO running our country that gets to decide everything and screw Congress, screw the courts. We should have a king, essentially a CEO that has unlimited power.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
He also does have a really weird sense of mortality in a way that he wants to be legendary, right? Again, go back to video games. But I think he wants the glory of it. He has those images in his head. And that's not by way of excuse. It's by way of explanation, right? That this is how he looks at himself. It's on a grand journey of the hero. He's not a hero, by the way. Let me be clear.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
You're right. And during Obama, he was supportive. When he joined that, we texted a lot during that period. He was on the Trump thing and he was like, they're trying to do an anti-gay thing. I'm going to get in there and stop them. Like, He was very much, I need to be here to change Trump's mind. Only I can change it kind of thing. He wasn't anti-Trump, but he certainly wasn't pro-Trump.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
I can tell you that. He was very much in the, he's kind of a con man school of thought with him. Around COVID, I saw a lot of changes, you know, around. I talked to him quite a lot and people give me a hard time for having done that. I get it. But he wasn't that off beaten track before. I mean, he was, he was megalomaniacal. He was typical of a tech person, but doing more interesting things.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
But there was a real shift during COVID. I noticed it. He got very upset. He got very like overly upset and overly dramatic. Look, if you think your company is critical for the future of the human race and then California closes it down because of COVID, you get in that mode. That's one. He sort of got very unreasonable. And in one interview I did with him,
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
He started saying only a few thousand people or whatever, I don't remember precisely, were going to die from COVID, and he had read all the studies, and he knew, and I didn't. He's never liked unions or the government or regulation. That goes way back for all these people. And so it became more profound during COVID, this idea.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
I think the issues around his trans daughter seem to have affected him quite profoundly. I've noticed that in a number of tech people who have trans children. The second thing I think the Wall Street Journal has correctly reported on is his use of ketamine and other drugs. So I think that was another thing that seemed to have changed him. But although I, you know, they all use drugs.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
But I think he was doing it himself. He was like the world's expert. It was also staying up late at night. He has this weird proclivity to be up at three in the morning and obsessively. He's got an obsessive personality. You know, we all have that element to us, but he's got it in spades.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
And the one thing that I think I keep saying this to people and I said it at the time when Biden did not invite him to that EV summit and invited Mary Barra instead. and treated him shabbily. He was very upset, like very. I talked to him a lot about it, or he texted me, and other people did too. Other people noticed it too.
The Ezra Klein Show
What Elon Musk Wants
And this was a summit that Biden had, and he couldn't invite him because of the union issues. He was very virulently anti-union. So they didn't invite him and he was very upset, like personally upset, like wounded almost. And I even went as far as to call Steve Reschetti, who works for Biden. And I said, boy, have you made a mistake that you should bear hug this guy? He's really mad.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Shocking New Biden Cognitive Decline Details, Elon's Future, and Cory's Long Speech, with The Fifth Column | Ep. 1040
Right, no, he has to suck up all the oxygen. There's only one other person that needs more attention, it's Donald Trump.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Shocking New Biden Cognitive Decline Details, Elon's Future, and Cory's Long Speech, with The Fifth Column | Ep. 1040
Watch. Whether he was in good health or not, whether he was in good mental health. Obviously, top advisers got blamed for this, the preparation itself, and also not being transparent that he wasn't able to campaign effectively. How do you answer those critics?
The Megyn Kelly Show
Power of Trump 2.0, Why Elon and DOGE are Working, and Independent Media's Impact, with Jason Calacanis and Chamath Palihapitiya of All-In | Ep. 1008
Like they traded it because this is what they want to do. And they were enthusiastically doing it. And we don't have to like them. And just by not liking them, we're not threatening them. So that's fucking nonsense. And either you didn't threaten them in any way. And it's a larger part of the strategy of intimidating journalists. They're trying. He's trying to shut us up.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Power of Trump 2.0, Why Elon and DOGE are Working, and Independent Media's Impact, with Jason Calacanis and Chamath Palihapitiya of All-In | Ep. 1008
Yeah.
The Megyn Kelly Show
Power of Trump 2.0, Why Elon and DOGE are Working, and Independent Media's Impact, with Jason Calacanis and Chamath Palihapitiya of All-In | Ep. 1008
That's what I said.
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