 Fundamental principles of freedom, rational self-interest, and individual rights. This is the Iran Book Show. Hi everybody, welcome to Iran Book Show on this Saturday, October 28th. I am doing the show today from Portugal, from Lisbon, Portugal, beautiful Lisbon, Portugal. One of my favorites in Europe, I really like this city. Although I'm not going to have any chance to really see it. I flew in this afternoon, went, did my talk, went to dinner, came to my hotel, went to sleep, wake up, get on a plane, fly. But that means I will be in London tomorrow with my wife and that'll be great. So I'm looking forward to that. And yesterday I did a debate in London. I said I'm going back to London tomorrow, but I did debate in London on the NHS. And yes, the video of that, there was video created of that and we will be uploading that once that is all processed and ready to go. So expect that to be released in the future. Okay, what else do we have? What do we want to talk about today? Yeah, so that was a quick update on where I am. I will be in the UK until Wednesday. Wednesday I fly back. So sometime Wednesday night I'll be home. Okay, let's see. A lot going on. A lot going on, but the focus is still. Israel and the war with Hamas. This is dragging on as I expected it to. It's dragging on with no ended sight. That shouldn't surprise anybody. I mean, what's surprising is that they're doing anything and what they're doing is not much, or it's certainly not as much as anywhere near as it should be. Yesterday night Israel started commenced a ground operation within Gaza. Again, not the full scale ground operation yet, but more prep preparation, knocking down barriers, preparing kind of roads for access for tanks in the future. Supposedly for the ultimate ground operation. Netanyahu again, supposedly yesterday again vetoed a ground operation, the immediate expansion of the ground operation to full scale operation saying the IDF was not ready yet counter to what the IDF itself is saying. At the same time Israel did start using a much bigger bombs yesterday. So yesterday they started using, last night as far as I can tell, they started using bunker busting bombs. These are bombs that have the capacity to destroy the tunnel system under Gaza. Again, they're being very cautious. They're bombing only certain sites. They're trying to mend my civilian casualties. They are constantly asking Gazans to move south to an area that has been defined as a safe area and to allow so that there are casualties of Israel's operations in the north. So Israel is doing this slowly and cautiously. And one would argue about how effective it is. It doesn't seem particularly effective, but it's hard to tell. It's hard to tell what the damage is to the Hamas infrastructure. They did kill another one of Hamas leaders, one of the planners of the October 7th terrorist attack. So that's good. But again, limited, slow, hesitant. And not particularly strategic is Israel's response. Every time there is an attack in the north, bombs are lobbed, anti-tank missiles are launched. Israel goes in there and shoots a bunch of stuff and bombs have jumped to places. But what there isn't is Israel taking the threats in the north seriously and launching a preemptive strike that would really debilitate Hamas, and really struck a blow to everything that they do. So things are developing. Things are moving. It's not to say that nothing is changing. Stuff is changing. Stuff is happening. Israel is advancing. But super slow, super careful, super sensitive to world opinion and American public opinion and super cautious in terms of collateral damage. They don't get it that they're going to be blamed for all their deaths anyway. Might as well get it over with and might as well win this thing rather than just dragging it out indefinitely and ultimately not winning it. Which is I think the path that Israel is on right now. Let's see. A few other things relating to the war which I think are important. You might have heard that Israel is part of the ground invasion or the ground assault. It's part of its preparation for the ultimate ground invasion. It has cut off all communications. That is they cut all internet or phone or cellular service to the Gaza Strip. So they're trying to isolate the Gaza Strip completely and also disrupt the operational capabilities of Hamas who use encrypted cell phones, who use the internet, who use a variety of different means to communicate among themselves but who also use it to spread propaganda all over the world. Israel cut all internet access into the Gaza Strip including again cell phone and other means of communication. Of course the left in the United States is in an uproar. How dare Israel do so as AOC, I know your favorite leftist, writes on Twitter cutting off communication to a population of 2.2 million is unacceptable. Journalists, medical professionals, humanitarian efforts and innocents are all endangered. I do not know how such an act can be defended. The United States has historically denounced this practice. Yes, it's denounced it and of course the United States has not won a war in a long, long time. It's as if there is a right to the internet, a right to telecommunications. There is no realization of how these technologies are being used by Hamas to launch missiles to organize against Israel and ultimately to kill Israelis. But in trying to destroy Hamas as an act of self-defense by Israel, of course it has every right, indeed, responsibility to disrupt Hamas's ability to destroy it and civilians in Gaza don't have a right to communicate. Note that it wouldn't be surprising at all to me that the internet passes through Israel that its cell phone towers are connected to Israeli cell phone towers and to fiber optics cables that run through Israel. Just like Israel has every right to cut off electricity, cut off water, cut off food supplies coming in from Israel. It has every right to cut off telecommunications. I mean telecommunications is the new human right according to the left. Well, Elon Musk didn't like the announcement made by Israel. So Elon Musk announced that Starlink will support connectivity to internationally recognized aid organizations in Gaza. So Elon Musk is now dictating who he thinks should have access and who should not have access in Gaza. It's his company, he can certainly do that. I think Israel has every right to knock the satellites out of the sky that are enabling Hamas in the guise of internationally recognized aid organization to communicate. And indeed Israel has announced that it is cutting off all ties with Starlink due to Elon's Musk's willingness to allow Starlink to continue to function in support of, again, aid organizations. There is no such thing as aid organizations who are independent of Hamas. They're operating in Hamas territory. They're being allowed to operate in Hamas territory. And the idea that they will use the internet but Hamas will not. They will use their cell phones but Hamas will not is absurd and ridiculous. Everybody knows that. Elon Musk, of course, knows that, but he doesn't care. He literally doesn't care. Elon Musk, his politics have just descended into the gutter over time. And it is really, really, really, really, really sad to see. It just says, well, on Elon Musk, Elon Musk put out a kind of a tweet with this map. It's a meme, you call this a meme, which has the map of Iran. And then it has both to the east and the west of Iran. It has all these American military bases represented by American flags and Iran at the center. And he said, oh, the irony. The irony is spelled I-R-A-N-Y. Really, really funny. And the map says Iran wants war. Look how close they put their country to our military bases. I mean, what do you do with this stuff? What do you do? I mean, does Elon Musk have to be educated? Does he not know that Iran has been in war with the United States since 1979? Does he not know the history of Iran? Does he not know about the hostage takings, the killings, the murderings, the blowing up? I gave you the whole litany list last time on the last show. Does he not know that Iran has been aggressive from day one? Does he not know that Iran represents an ideology that literally takes seriously the idea of world domination, like a James Bond villain? Does he not know how they treat their own people? Does he not know how evil this regime actually is? No, he has bought into the libertarian alt-right, new-right story. The problem is not Iran. The problem is not Russia. The problem is probably, still in the launch case, not China. The problem is everywhere and always. The problem is the United States of America. It is the villain in the world. Yeah, I mean, I'd like to see all these flags planted inside Iran. That would be better rather than outside. But also the flags are a lie. The United States, for example, does not have bases anymore in Afghanistan. It certainly does not have bases in Pakistan. You know, on the western side, there are more flags there in Iraq that actually exist. This is a very old map of American bases maybe during the height of the war. Is Iran really the victim here? Because that's what this map suggests. Is the villain in geopolitics in the world today the United States? Because that's what Elon Musk is suggesting. And Iran is just another victim and a long line of victims of American foreign policy. Now, I agree that American foreign policy sucks. Lacks strategy, lacks focus, lacks American self-interest. But that doesn't make Iran the victim. And it makes America a villain vis-a-vis America, not vis-a-vis Iran. All right. Excuse me, sorry. Let me just make this quick statement since I was coughing. It reminds me. I really appreciate the emails I'm getting from a lot of you. You're sending emails of support and I really, really appreciate that. Some of you sending emails that I've asked for in the past and it's great to get and telling me how you discovered I ran through my show and all of that fantastic, wonderful. And many of you are also expressing some concern about the impact events in the Middle East are having on me. And I really appreciate that. But I do want to give a little bit of context to this. You mentioned the fact that I seem worn down. I seem to have taken this crisis in particular personally and it seems to have gotten to me more than usual. And there's a truth to that. There's no question that's true. The scale of this, the fact that nobody will do it, the fact that I've been fighting this battle for 20 years and nobody listens, except for you guys, I'm not diminishing the fact that you guys are listening. The fact that, you know, the fact that anti-Semitism is roaring its ugly head in dimensions, on a scope and on a scale that I could not have imagined would happen in the United States and in Europe. All of that is definitely troubling me and wearing me down and it's making things difficult. There's no question about that. But I also want you to take into account one of the factor that might make me see more down than I really am. And that is that I'm doing these shows very late at night and much later than, you know, actually usually during bedtime when it would be in the United States. So right now, it is quarter to 11 p.m. and 11 p.m., you know, it's going to be 11 soon and yeah, it's late and I'm tired and I've given a speech. I've flown an airplane today flying with you out, speaking on a stage with you out and it's just late. So combine all that together. So I appreciate the concern. That's just me trying to explain it a little bit. Fizzled on the chat said Scott Horton was on Tim Poole's show last night. No wonder I went called Libertarian Secret of the Right. Scott Horton is an abomination, I mean he really is horrific. His, him being an apologist for every authoritarian dictatorial regime out there in the world, him accusing the United States of, you know, following Rothbard of being the real villain on the international scale. He's shallow, he's superficial, and he's wrong, but worse than wrong. He's, you know, he's morally depraved. But that is part of the course for Big L Libertarian, many of the anarcho-capitalist, certainly the ones associated, affiliated with the misnamed Mises Institute that should be, the should be Rothbard Institute. Don't you find it surprising though, or interesting, that we live in a world, we live in a culture in which, you know, crazy Libertarians, Scott Horton, Dave Smith, Dave Smith, right? You know, people affiliated with the Big L Libertarian movement and anarcho-capitalists, Libertarian party members, get on Tim Poole and get on, what's his name, Rogan, and none of these guys will have somebody like me on. Now granted, I have smaller audiences than they do. The Libertarian movement is much bigger than the Objectives movement. I am a much more radical voice than they are, and I have a lot fewer people supporting me. But it is interesting that their ideas, which should be abhorrent to the mainstream, particularly for those on the right, on the mainstream, are quite willing to give them a platform, give them an opportunity to talk about these ideas. Again, more of me being frustrated, more of the things going on in the world that really frustrate me is the bad ideas get a stage, and good ideas do not. Talking about a stage, I will mention this. It appears, I don't have final confirmation, but it does appear that I will be on Dave Rubin's show with, I think, James Lindsay, which should be interesting. I'm not sure what we're talking about. Dave is at this conference, this Jordan Peterson conference in London, and he has invited me to do a half-hour segment with him and Lindsay. That is me and Lindsay on Dave Rubin's show. I'm not sure exactly what the topic is going to be, but I think that will be fun, and that will be interesting. Dave hasn't had me on in many, many years now, since I think we kind of disagreed about Trump and since he went to the right and started believing in God. But, you know, I'm going to be in a show. It appears. I hope I don't know if it's going to be live. Probably not, because it's 10 in the morning in London time, so there probably won't be anybody who watch it live. But do stay tuned for Dave Rubin. Looking forward to seeing Dave. It's been a long time. I think I saw him last in 2021. It's been a couple of years since I saw him. Yeah, so it'll be nice to catch up. Obviously, we still have a disagreement, and we'll have them, I'm sure, after we get together. Alright, what else? Yes, there was some other stuff I want to say. Yes, a few things about, again, what's happening in Gaza. Note this headline. Senior Israeli officials have stated that humanitarian aid into Gaza Strip will drastically increase over the coming days and weeks as ground invasion makes additional progress. This aid would eventually include up to 100 trucks a day from Egypt that will contain food, water, and medicine. However, fuel will be restricted until the IDF allows it. So in other words, Israel, just like the Bush administration, is quite happy to feed the enemy. And look, oh, this is going to civilians and so on. First of all, let's be clear. There was video of this earlier today. Hamas in those tunnels has huge quantities of food, huge quantities of water, huge quantities of food and emergency generators. They will not share their food with guards and civilians. They would rather the guards and civilians die of starvation as far as they're concerned. They will keep that food in the tunnels to feed their warriors, their terrorists, their monsters in order to be able to fight the Israelis. They cannot one iota about the lives of Palestinians, the lives of the people they are governing. And the idea that 100 trucks a day are going to enter into Gaza and that food and those supplies are not going to end up in the hands of Hamas is, of course, a joke. It's like the internet, only the aid organizations are going to use it. Hamas is not going to touch it. It's a joke. And everybody knows it's a joke. So here Israel is feeding its enemy. Feeding the people who facilitate the enemy. Talk about altruism in war. Talk about self-sacrifice. Talk about placing the war being of your enemy above your own. Talk about turning the other cheek. It truly is insane. Hamas, of course, trying to appeal toward opinion is constantly saying that they're happy to release all the hostages in exchange for 6,000 to 10,000 members of Hamas in Palestinian Islamic jihad which are in prison in Israel. Now Israel wants to release 1,000 Palestinian terrorists for one Israeli soldier. So I guess their ask is not out of line given Israel's past accommodation, appeasement, weakness. By the way, other than Netanyahu administration. All right. Anything else about the war? I don't know. Let's take a quick look. Make sure I'm not missing something. Yeah, I mean, there is heavy bombing going on right now over Gaza. And as we said, Israel is operating underground in the Gaza Strip, in the north. The other piece of news which is actually really, really good news is that last night at least as far as I can tell, as far as official media suggests, or the non-official media on Twitter, Israel took no casualties yesterday with its ground operation in the Gaza Strip and that is great. I hope we have many, many days where that is in use. Israel is operating underground in the Gaza Strip and taking no casualties. That'll be unusual. But so far so good and I'm really, really happy that that is the case. All right. Yeah, I think that is what I wanted to cover with regard to the war. I will say, I do want to say this. I have a lot to say about anti-Semitism and about the prevalence of anti-Semitism, the resurgence of anti-Semitism, the relationship between anti-Semitism and the left, anti-Semitism and Marxism, but even more so anti-Semitism and modern identitarianism, anti-Semitism and the relationship with intersectionality. And I will do a show on that. And also, ultimately, why that kind of anti-Semitism increases the likelihood of anti-Semitism from the right in a sense as a competition for who can hate the Jews more. But I need to be more alert, more alert and more less tired to delve into the depths of that topic. So it might be later this week. It might be when I get back to Puerto Rico. We will see how that goes. All right. Let's see. So yeah, I will do a whole show on anti-Semitism. I know there's some questions in the chat about anti-Semitism, so don't worry. I will cover that topic in greater depth. It's related to my essay on morality of finance. If you've read that, you know, I talk about anti-Semitism there quite a bit. And yeah, it's related to a bunch of different things. I've talked about you, but I did, if you remember, I've done talks, at least twice I've given talks, one in England and one in Los Angeles over the years, on anti-Semitism and anti-capitalism. So I've identified the link between the left and anti-Semitism years and years ago, and I've been pounding that issue for a long, long time. So there's a sense in which what's happening is not surprising. There is a sense in which the scale on which it is happening is surprising, disappointing, and frustrating. All right. We haven't used Speaker of the House. Aren't you guys excited? I mean, the House of Representatives was dysfunctional. Speaker after Speaker, you know, lost or couldn't be appointed or couldn't get the Republicans to rally around them. We had McCarthy. We had Scalise. We had Jordan. We had, you know, I forget the other kind of its name, the guy who dropped out when he was on the show. We had, you know, I forget the other kind of its name, the guy who dropped out when Trump turned against him. And, you know, whether it was the kind of the far-right congressman who vetoing McCarthy and forcing him out or whether it was the more, quote, moderate Republicans stopping Jim Jordan from taking the position. Finally, after all the haggling and all the back-and-forth, we found a man. The Republicans now have a Speaker of the House, a representative for the Republican Party. And I think it is super indicative who they have picked. You know, say every Republican voted for this guy, Representative Mike Johnson from Louisiana. Every Republican voted for him as Speaker of the House. This is a man who is a dedicated religionist. You know, average religionist Republican in the sky is a dedicated religionist. When he celebrated his candidacy, his colleagues circulated an image of him on bended knee praying for divine guidance with other lawmakers, not just anyway, but on the House of Representatives' floor in his first speech from the Chamber of Speaker. Right? He's number three in line for the presidency. He said, quote, I believe God has ordained and allowed each one of us to be brought here for this specific moment. See, he's now ordained by God to be Speaker of the House of Representatives. He has a mission from God. Remember that? From the Blues Brothers, mission from God. He's kind of a mild-mannered but religious fanatic. He is an evangelical. Christianity has been at the center of political life from the beginning. And he is now the most powerful Republican in Washington. You know, he's Deep Roots and the Southern Baptist Convention. And, you know, he is an active anti-abortionist. He is an activist to eliminate the separation of church and state. On top of that, of course, he was part of, you know, part of the Republicans who advocated for the fact that the election was stolen, the last election was stolen. He, you know, in violation of his constitutional responsibility, voted to delay the affirmation of the elected president of the United States. He belonged to that kind of part of the Republican Party that decided to ignore reality. You know, he is very comfortable with authoritarian social control, not particularly interested in individual, in individual liberty or individual freedom. He has stated that, you know, in describing himself, he says, and I'm quoting, I'm a Christian, a husband, a father, a lifelong conservative, constitutional law and in support of criminalizing gay sex. This is the new speak of the House of Representatives. He has, let's see, he thinks prayer is appropriate House of Representatives response to the main shooting. And he is, let's see, yeah, he's worked as an attorney for every conservative religious Christian advocacy group, for a very Christian religious advocacy group. And he, one of his pet peeves is the separation of Christian state. He's really against that. And to put the cherry on the top as a lot of these kind of right-wing, crazy Christian Republicans, he is an adamant opposition to American military aid to Ukraine during its war with Russia. So that is who your House Speaker is. This is who represents Republicans. This is who is the number three in line for the presidency. This is the modern Republican, this is the essence and the nature of the modern Republican Party. It is a religious party. It is an anti-individual rights and anti-freedom party. It is a party dedicated together with its pals on the Democratic side to the eradication of individual liberty in the U.S. I guess we're prepared to explain it to you. No, I don't think I'll be explaining that. I'm just looking. Okay, we've got the usual nutcases on my chat. I don't know. I changed the focus. I wouldn't do that. Let me just see why the focus is going in and out. What do you see right now? I don't know what you guys can see or not see. All right, there we go. I don't think it'll do it now. I think I accidentally changed the setting back to what it was where it did that in and out of focus. I think it's bad. It should be now. All right, let's see. Oh, yes, last topic. Do you remember one before last? Do you remember a few days ago, a week ago, I don't know when it was, I did a segment on the show about Mark Andreessen's manifesto, his pro-technology. Technology will make the future better. Technology is great. Technology is wonderful. Technology is amazing. And this optimistic manifesto, I was excited by it. I thought it was wonderful. Mark Andreessen has written a lot of really, really good stuff lately. And he had this techno-optimism manifesto. And I thought it was terrific and consistent with a lot of the things I believe and I think many of you believe. Anyway, it turns out that the press, in particular the tech press, he did his manifesto. Take a magazine like Wyatt. Now, Wyatt used to be like, yes to progress. We love progress. We love tech. We love the future's great. Startups are great. I mean, it used to be, it used to reflect this sense of optimism and positivism and excitement that Silicon Valley presented. But Wyatt, I think with some in Silicon Valley, has taken a bizarre turn. A bizarre turn. So when describing Mark Andreessen's essay, and I've commented on this in the past with other essays in Wyatt Magazine, I used to read Wyatt in the 90s and 2000s. It was an exciting magazine to read. So it accuses Mark of being a merchant of progress. Now, what's the deal with merchant of progress? Merchant of progress are people who make money off of progress. How dare they? It, you know, writes favorably about technology smashing, you know, Luddites. You know, it ran a story in October 22nd, just a week ago. Everyone is a Luddite now. A new history of the Luddites argues that 19th century fears about technology are still relevant today. It's the latest in a long line of attempts to reclaim the label. Yeah, they give it a very positive review. They even ran a story about Gaza being a hub, a tech hub. This is the headline. Palestinians growing tech industry has been literally blown apart by the war between Israel and Hamas. I mean, I laugh, I shouldn't laugh, but it's pretty ridiculous, you know, really budding, you know, this thriving tech industry that doesn't really exist. So, Stephen Levy in the pages of Wired refer to Mark Andreessen's exuberance along with all the industry's top venture firms as examples of late stage capitalism. This is the death of capitalism, the end. To quote, you know, the purpose of Mark's manifesto, according to this author, was to quote, take your money, you vote or your soul. That's what venture capitalists about, taking your money, you vote and your soul. And that's what the manifesto is about, this techno-optimism, it's about your soul, it's about getting you. Another magazine, Gizmodo, the tech-optimism manifesto was a quote, Unabomber-style manifesto. And another author wrote, quote, Mark Andreessen openly embraces this violent right-wing, right-wing machismo that he calls techno-optimism. So now, techno-optimism, to be optimistic about the future and about tech, is right-wing and machismo. And violent, by the way, it's violent to be optimistic about technology. That's inflicting violence on people. Fast company, Financial Times, San Francisco Standard, Business Insider, Washington Post, all were just furious about how did a capitalist actually express his view that the future is good if only we allow technology to help us grow our economies. He is a venture capitalist, after all, and that is what venture capitalists do. They express that sense of optimism in the investment that they make every single day. TechCrunch, again, one of these bastions of pro-technology, pro-future, maybe 10, 15, 20 years ago, no more. TechCrunch, quote, when was the last time I could recently talk to a pro-person? Really? That's relevant. Actually, sorry, the Gaza Strip story was actually written in TechCrunch, not in other places. So in other words, today, to be optimistic about technology, to be optimistic about the future, to believe in progress, to want economic growth is violent, right-wing. It is exploitative. It is a way to control people's souls. It's a way to extract money from them. It's a way to exploit them. Having those views, writing them out, investing in the future, these people will kill, will kill. These economies to the extent that they get their way. They are, you know, anti-humanity. They express views that are anti-human flourishing, exactly the opposite of what Morale demands. They are destructive to human life. And the fact that this exists in Silicon Valley, the fact that these are technology writers, the fact that these are people supported by, supported by the tech industry is really a sign that we are, indeed, in a kind of late-stage capitalism. We're towards the end of this amazing run that the United States and the West have had. You can see that in Ukraine, in their weak, pathetic response of the West. You can see that in Gaza, with the model equivalency and the turning against Israel that has happened. And I have one other story about that. And you can see it in the fact, in Greta, and in the, all the insanity, the complete insanity of climate change, catastrophism, and the demands that they make, the anti-human demands that they are making. And you can see it here in Silicon Valley, in the heart of what actually drives the U.S. economy forward. Without Silicon Valley, the U.S. economy is shrinking. Without Silicon Valley, the U.S. economy is nothing. Without Silicon Valley, whatever economic progress we've made over the last 30, 40 years would not exist. And in that, what used to be the epicenter of optimism, excitement, the thrill of producing, of creating, of building a beautiful future, if in that, in the heart of that, this is the attitude. I just don't see how we get out of it. I just don't see how we're not, not in a place of steady, slow, but really almost impossible to reverse a decline. Truly horrific. Truly horrific. All right, so I wanted to comment on this. I wanted to, once again, let me see if I can find this. Oh, here it is. You have to go to El Jazeera to find the news. It's pretty pathetic. So there was a, there was today at the United Nations a resolution calling for the immediate humanitarian truce between Israel and Hamas. The United Nations has not denounced what Hamas has done in any of its propositions, including here, but they demanded that aid be provided to Gaza and that Israel stop all aggression towards the Gaza Strip and Hamas. Canada tried to insert into this a provision that condemned Hamas for its October 7 terrorist attacks, but that was voted down. So available to the United Nations was a resolution calling for immediate truce, humanitarian truce. 120 countries voted in favor of the resolution. 14 countries voted against the resolution. And 45 countries abstained, abstained. No moral position on this. Now, those numbers don't reflect the real horror of this because you think 14 countries voted against this. That's pretty cool. I mean, Israel is one of them. The United States is another. But if you actually look at the countries that voted against this, right, it's, you know, let me find this. I mean, it includes countries like Nauru. I don't even know where Nauru is. Papua New Guinea, Paraguay. Paraguay is a real country, but Tonga. Yeah, I mean, those are the countries that voted. It's interesting to see who voted against it. The only kind of real countries, real countries, significant countries, Fiji voted against it. Fiji, good for the Fijians. My next vacation, we're going to Fiji. But look at this. Austria voted against the proposition. Croatia voted against it. The Czech Republic voted against it. That was surprising. Guatemala voted against it. Hungary voted against it. Trying to reduce the claims that they're anti-Semitic. But of course, Hungary is very anti-Islam. So that drives it. Let's see who else. Marshall Islands. There's a Micronesia. Papua New Guinea, Paraguay. Well, that's about it. Tonga, I said, in the United States. Then I found it interesting to see who voted, who abstained. Which countries don't have an opinion of this, but are not going to abstain about a ceasefire in a war of self-defense by Israel? Countries that abstained. Albania, okay. Australia? Thanks, Australia. Australia. Canada. Really? Canada? I'm skipping. Denmark. Estonia. Finland. Georgia. Germany. Greece. Iceland. I'm just reading the Western countries. Iraq abstained, which is kind of weird. I don't know how Iraq abstained. Anyway, go figure why Iraq abstained. There must be something going on there. Iraq won a part of condemning Israel. It was too soft on Israel. Italy. Japan. Lithuania. Latvia. Netherlands. Northern Macedonia. Korea. South Korea. I wonder what will happen when North Korea invades and the UN demands a ceasefire. I mean, this is a moral travesty. These are all Western countries. These are countries that did not have the guts to say no. Israel should finish this operation. Israel has every right to defend itself. But worse than that are the countries that voted for this. Countries that voted for it. Again, non-Arab countries. Argentina. Belgium. Belgium. Brazil. Well, Brazil is run by the crazy leftists. China, of course. You'd expect that. Chile. The president is a rabid leftist. Colombia. Costa Rica. You'd expect it from Cuba. But would you really expect it from France? Maybe. I guess many of you are saying, well, of course, France. France voted for Israel to stop. Ireland. I'm naming these because it's good to know. It's good to know who your friends and who your enemies are. Liechtenstein. What has Israel done to Liechtenstein? Mexico. Mongolia. Very disappointed Mongolians. New Zealand. God. And they just have kind of a right wing government in New Zealand. What's the deal there? Portugal. I'm in Portugal right now. Ukraine. No, Ukraine was part of the people who abstained as was the United Kingdom. They abstained. Anyway, just disgusting. I mean, again, Israel has every right to defend itself. Cease fire. Cease fire would be an abomination. And it denies again Israel's absolute right to self-defense. Yeah. Hard to beat it. All right. Let's see. All right. So we have, I don't know, 170 people watching live, which is good. We're way short of our goal, but like three bucks from every person watching live right now would get us to the goal. So it would be great if we could get to that. And I will move now to super chat questions for all of you. So please consider supporting the One Book Show, supporting my travel, my talks in all these places. And the shows that I'm doing from the road. All right. Thanks. We got just a little flurry there of stickers. So I really, really appreciate that. All right. Let's start with Wes, who put in 100 and then another 50. So we'll take his $100 question first. Error has been on fire lately. A couple of videos going viral in Elangelo, being interviewed by Marco Schermer. Did you help arrange that interview or did Schermer reach out to Elan? You know, I don't know who reached out to him. I was not involved. I was not involved in that interview. I do think that Michael Schermer doing an interview with me and coming away from that, like, yeah, that went well. These people are reasonable. Makes it possible then for him to reach out to other people at the institute to do interviews with them. My expectation was that Elan probably reached out to Michael to try to facilitate the conversation. But yes, two videos have gone viral. This is viral, I think, for long-form video. One of them, Nikos has talked on Israel that he did at Okan this last summer. It was around 400,000 views, I think. And the other one is well over 400,000 views, which is a conversation between Nikos and Elan. I know about kind of the history of Israel, that Israel steal the land from the Palestinians. So those two videos have gone viral, which is fantastic and terrific. I don't think we've ever had a long-form video go viral like that at the institute. I think some of my videos, long-form videos, have done that. But also, not this quickly, nowhere near this quickly. I think my debate on inequality from Yale University from years ago has more views than that, but it took it a lot longer to get those views. So I'm excited for the institute. I'm excited for Elan and for Nikos for having that success. It turns out to half a million views now. So it's well over 400,000 or minus half a million views. Mine has half a million views. If you look, it's the most watched video on the Federalist Society's YouTube channel that they taped it. And then it's also highly watched on my channel as well. So if you add the two up, it's more than half a million. All right. Thank you, Wes. Where are those half million? Why aren't they subscribing to my show? They shouldn't be subscribers. Why aren't you subscribers, people? All right. Wes Ossis says, how did the NHS debate go? Was the audience receptive to the idea of privatizing it? Yeah, because the audience was mainly objective. It wasn't a great event because the audience wasn't great. The audience was primarily objective. It was very disappointing. It was a small audience. It was an audience of people who already agreed with me to a logic stand, which is not my favorite audiences, I think many of you know. And it was, yeah, I think the debate itself went fine. You'll watch it soon and you'll be able to let me know what you think. But I just think it's just not going to have any impact because I don't know how many people will see it on video, but live it was too small of a group and too large. And I'm surprised because a great topic. The guy who I debated is being a member of British Parliament. He's been an advisor to the Prime Minister, being a member of the government. And it just shocks me that, you know, that didn't draw a bigger audience. Let's see. Tessa, thank you. Barry, thank you. John, thank you. Paul, thank you. Thank you. Fendt Harper, Mary, Mary-Elene, Catherine. These are all the stickers. Fizzle, WCZN, I assume that's from New Zealand. Mary-Elene again. Barry, did I go? I must have started over, okay, because we have Barry at Tessa again. But yes, thank you all of you guys for the stickers and for the support. All right, back to the questions. William says, other rumors over the decades of Iran counterfeiting U.S. currency in order to destroy the economy, true. I don't know. I suspect that they are in a sense of an effort to counterfeit U.S. currency, but it strikes me that they haven't been that successful. And the U.S. has really, really good technology to keep on top of this and to try to prevent that or to catch the fraudsters. So the efforts have gone to null. Matthew, looking at the guess that trigonometry have had on, it amazes me that you haven't been yet. They are in desperate need of philosophical help. Anyway, keep up the good work. Yeah, thank you, Matthew. And I'd really appreciate if you could let them know that it would be great to have me on. I think they are hesitant because I don't think they like Iran or Objectivism. I've communicated with them. I've offered myself, but they don't seem enthusiastic at all. So I think the only way that it will happen is if they hear from you guys and you guys tell them on this issue, on that issue, whatever, Iran would be a great guest and you should have them on. So please, that's a great way to support the show is by trying to get me on. I'll be on Dave Rubin's show soon, or I'm doing it on Monday, but I'm not sure when it will go up on his channel. Also with James Lindsay, so that should be a good conversation. On the Leroy says, is the greatest threat to the United States internal or external? By far, it's not even close. The greatest threat is internal. Now, that might manifest itself an external. That is, the internal might be weakness. We actually get bombed externally, but the threat is internal. It's all internal. Jennifer, keep your chin up, Iran. You know you have my ending support. So appreciate all that you do for hard work. Thank you, Jennifer. Really, really appreciate that. Yeah, don't worry. I mean, part of the voice and lack of energy is just being tired. Tessa, thank you. Jacob, supporting the channel, really appreciate that. Jacob, thank you. All right, we're down to our last two questions. We're still about $250 short. So anything you guys can do to help bridge that gap would be terrific. We still got about 170 people watching live. So please feel free to jump in with support if you're so inclined. Oh, and don't forget, please, here's something as important as supporting almost. Like we have 170 people watching live. Probably had 600 people dropping in and out of the show. But we only have 82 likes. And now maybe you don't like the show. And that's fine. If you don't like the show, please don't like it. But please, before you leave, if you do like the show, if you do think this add value, if you did enjoy something, then please like the show. It doesn't cost you anything. It doesn't require any particular effort. Just click on that button that likes the show. It is what allows, it enhances the positioning of the show vis-a-vis the algorithms. It exposes the show to a lot more people. It really, really helps us grow. And also, if you're not a subscriber yet, if you listen to show and you haven't subscribed for whatever reason, please click on that subscribe button. You'll find out whenever we go live, whether you're watching this live now or you're watching it afterwards. Please like it and subscribe. Like and subscribe. And of course, and I know this is a big ask, sharing is fantastic. Sharing is wonderful. But liking and subscribing don't cost you anything. And of course, ultimately, please, some of you, those of you who really do like the show, please consider becoming a monthly supporter on Patreon or urunbrookshow.com. Okay, Lee says, European media often talk of inciting hatred. Is this term synonymous with inciting violence or pretext of sensory speech? Speech, which is not coming out of my mouth. I need to get to bed. It's a pretext of sensory speech. No question about it. You know, sure you incite hatred, but that should be completely legal. What shouldn't be legal is inciting action. And that means violence. Those two are two different things. But in Europe, where you don't have free speech, in Europe, where it is, where hate speech and all kinds of other forms of restrictions of speech do exist and are growing, the term inciting hatred is just a way for them to make you think, to bring up the context of inciting violence and then ban it, ban that speech. And you're seeing that. Fabs 006 says, Germany bragged about abstaining because it was a clear stance. Oh, Germany is a great disappointment. You would think that Germany would have some understanding of what Israel is fighting for. Rob says, maybe interacting more with Konstantin Kissen on acts would get them to think of you for trigonometry. I've interacted with him a little bit and we talked a little bit. But I just don't think he's interested. I think he's very suspicious of the Iron Man thing. I think he's a very suspicious sort of objectivist and I haven't been able to get on his better side in any kind of way for whatever reason. They are based in London. I'm always in London often. So if they wanted to have me on, it wouldn't be hard to arrange for me to be on. And I've told them that. I've told them, I'm in London. Let's do a show. They know I'm eager to do it. It's up to them. I can't harass them, but you can harass them. Phil 25, after listening to Dr. Benny Morris and Yusuf Munaya's account of the history of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict conducted by Coleman, it seems like they are talking about two different histories. I mean, it's interesting because Benny Morris used to be, I don't know who these people, I know Benny Morris. Benny Morris used to be a post, what do you call it, post-Zionist or post-modernist. And he basically made up history to make Israel look really, really bad. I don't know who Yusuf is. Is he pro-Israeli? But yeah, people make up stuff. People make up history. They invent history. Or they elevate trivial aspects of history and make them significant and substantial. And it's very hard to differentiate. It's very hard to differentiate. That's what you need to do. You know, I don't usually recommend anything by Alan Dussowich. I'm not a particular fan of Alan Dussowich, but his book on Israel is pretty good. That's a good summary of the history and it's got good citations. And I would definitely look at that if you're interested. Thank you, Jacob. Phil also has a flea, not flea. Yili, I don't know how to pronounce it. He says, a friend of mine does not agree with my support of Israel and is not an objectivist. Can you recommend some good educational materials on the history of the conflict? Well, I think my favorite is Elan Juno's What Justice Demands. It's on Amazon. You can get it. What Justice Demands by Elan Juno. So that is my favorite. But Alan Dussowich's book on Israel is not bad. It's got some stuff I disagree with. So don't take it. But some of the history there is pretty good. But I'd recommend Elan Juno. And then, of course, I've given talks on Israel, a moral case for the state of Israel. I've given talks on the rise and decline of the state of Israel. I've given a talk, I've given the history of the Middle East where there's a section on Israel, a history of Islamism, which is in a sense a section on Hamas. So there's a ton of content. I think I've got a playlist that has my courses. And just look at the courses I've done on the Middle East. Those will give you a lot of educational material about the history of what's going on in this region. All right. I am off to bed. I'm kind of exhausted. I have to admit I don't always feel this exhausted, but I am. Thank you to all the superchatters. Really, really, really appreciate it. What Justice Demands is reselling for $100, really? But there's new versions. I think they're in print again for a lot less than $100. So please go buy it. Please go buy it. So Thought Criminal says there's a good interview with Benny Morris. So Benny Morris has now retracted his postmodernism and is now much better. I'll have to look that up because, look, I wouldn't trust anything. Benny Morris says, even if it turns out that he's right, just because he was in the past, explicitly a postmodernist, invented history, he later retracted some of that history. But I wonder, I wonder to what extent has he really retracted it? I wonder to what extent is he committed to objectivity? I just don't know. But it looks like Benny Morris here has a lot of, yeah, it looks like he's changed his colors. He used to be really anti-Israel, really, really anti-Israel. So it's good. It's good. Changing minds is good. All right. I'll talk about kidney donations next time. Joe, thank you. Really appreciate the support. Joe just did $50, which got us a lot closer to our goal. I guess time is changing, so I will get an extra hour of sleep. I do have to get up early to catch the plane to London. But thank you, Luca. Really appreciate that. And yeah, thanks, guys. And I appreciate all the support. And don't forget before you leave to like the show and subscribe. Bye, everybody. I will see you all, I don't know when. Sometime next few days, I go back to Puerto Rico on Wednesday, so there'll be no show on Wednesday, but then Thursday we'll go to a semi-regular schedule because then the following week I'm traveling within the US. But I will keep on top of the news and keep you guys updated. See you soon, guys. Bye, everybody.