 Well, thank you. Yeah, it's good to be back. Good to have you here and good to have you as part of of something sangha or social thought so perhaps the most direct translation, so we're filming this with a live audience and that means that if We're going to take questions at some time. If you want to ask a question, please, please raise your hand and wait for the mic If and present yourself if you don't like to to to to know People to know who you are don't say don't don't raise your hand because this will be this will be filmed and And and and be part of our suffered sangha available at the internet and please any questions ask them questions And and and and and brief but but first we're going to to to to discuss a lot of In a number of topics today, I think our main subject is the morality of capitalism and really, I think too too too many people The main force of capitalism free markets. This is morality It's the ability to produce the wealth and we've had this incredible wealth Indian going on for at least 200 years, but too many people They play the distributional results are not just and So but but you claim that it is the moral aspects of capitalism That is really the major case for capitalism absolutely and and and I think one of the reasons We're losing capitalism that is capitalism. I think is in decline globally in the world all around us is Because its defenders have focused only on the economics and have kind of accepted the morality of its opponents I think capitalism is the only moral system because if if morality as I see it is about human flourishing, it's about individual human flourishing It's about individuals having the ability to make choices for themselves Pursuing their own values using their own mind to figure out what kind of life they want to live and living that life Then capitalism is the system that protects their ability to do that It's not primarily an economic system Capitalism primarily is a political social system, and it's a system that Basically relegates the government to a very narrow job and that narrow job is to protect us protect us from crooks and criminals and terrorists and invaders and fraudsters importantly and other than that leave us alone and then we all Live our lives based on our own mind a pursuit of our own values trying to achieve our own happiness that's what morality to me means is is is Individuals living their life based on their own terms in pursuit of their own happiness that's what morality is and What capitalism is a political system that allows you to do that leaves you free to do that Every other political system wants to impose on you certain values certain standards Tell you what you should or shouldn't be doing with your life And whose happiness you should be pursuing and I think that's morally corrupt I don't think you can impose morality in people. I don't think you should use force and corrosion To to achieve your vision of the world and remember government Government sounds like a nice word and I'm all for government. I'm not an anarchist that might disappoint some of you in the audience I'm not an anarchist Government is force Governors are done Just if you're not sure it try To not follow the law and suddenly again comes out and off you'll go to jail So government is force corrosion law is not optional Once a law is passed no options you have to do it so I Think that morality demands that we not use force against one another Even if we vote for it I Think morality demands that we leave individuals free to pursue their own values don't impose values on them But but a lot of people would see the capitalism Capitalist system as one that's producing a lot of inequality Aputrary income distributions which needs to be fixed even if they accept your point about pursuing your own values They would they would claim the result the income result is not just Why does one apply justice to income? What is the standard and and and again here I think conventional Morality out there says that the standard is some form of equality of outcome Why? Why should people be equal in outcome and There's I don't know any Objective reason for that to happen. I mean you look around this room We're pretty different bunch of people We have different talents different skills different abilities probably different levels of morality Some of us are ambitious and hard-working some of us might be lazy. I don't know. I'm just guessing Why should the outcome be the same for us, and I think it goes to to one of the points you made which is arbitrary distribution of wealth or It's not arbitrary at all You know the the distribution of wealth is determined by what you produce You produce you have stuff. You don't produce. You don't have stuff Seems just to me right it seems just that I get my stuff you get your stuff I don't have a right to take your stuff. You don't have the right to take my stuff You'll produce a little maybe I'll produce a lot or I'll produce a little you produce a lot Why does anybody care? How much it somebody else produces and the beauty of the system is? That the only way for me to make money The only way for me to become rich to become part of that 1% or whatever however we wanted to find it Is my making your lives better There's no other way to do it How did how does how does Apple make money? To biggest company in the world or second because maybe the Saudis are the biggest but how does Apple make money? By selling me a product that I want at the price That I think it's worth it because The iPhone is worth more to me than the thousand dollars. I give up for it. I Celebrate when I buy a new iPhone. I don't oh god I lost a thousand dollars when I lose it in the stock market. I lost a thousand dollars But when I buy an iPhone, I'm like I'm happy I got something that's worth more to me than the thousand dollars I gave up and Apple is happy Because they just made a really nice profit off of me, right? We're both happier the world is better Because Apple made the iPhone and made a profit and traded with me. They got rich. I didn't get richer But I got more Fulfilled they got more potential in my fingertips. I got more music to listen to I got you know Like I got an iPhone which is of value to me I can give a two-hour lecture on why the iPhone is a value to me But put that aside, but it's it it really is otherwise. I wouldn't have given up the money So the only way to Achieve this is to drive everybody up and and indeed that's the history of capitalism to the extent that we've practiced it inequality increases But the poor get richer fast indeed the only system in all of human history to eradicate poverty is capitalism It's it's you know to the extent that we practice it private property and and freedom of contract and people buying and selling stuff based on what they want That is the only way to alleviate poverty there is no other way and what I care about what you should care about is poverty Quality of life standard of living it shouldn't be relative should be Are they poor people? but basically what you're saying is a Markets and transactions are not zero some they have plus some so everybody wins. It's their win-win So is it that that the So many people see the market and other interactions are zero some this are a good explanation of this I Think I think economics professors have done a very bad job explaining it I Think our politicians have an incentive to present it as you or some because they want to play us off of each other And I think that unfortunately Thinking is an achievement and a lot of people never achieve it And the reality is there are a lot of people out there who don't think We we want to think well of our fellow man, but but a lot of people just don't engage in it They have the capacity everybody has the capacity But all they all they have is a you know, there's a perceptual level That You know human beings have that all animals have we see what's happening and what we see is iPhone a thousand dollars and we think the two You know equivalent and then we see apple getting richer and I didn't get richer Because my the value I got from the iPhone is you could argue spiritual is not material and the whole you know how how Piketty measures, you know Piketty is the French economist who wrote the book about think about how he measures inequality, right? He measures inequality by looking my bank account Right. I have X amount of money in my bank account Apple has a lot more money in my in their bank account So they're richer than me And every time I buy an iPhone I get poorer according to Piketty and according to most economists because my bank account goes down by a thousand dollars There's nothing in his equations that includes that the value of the iPhone to me What we call an economics consumer surplus is not captured in the in in it So I just look like I keep consuming stuff and getting poorer and The manufacturers keep getting richer, but that's bizarre and and I'll give you that my favorite example for this is because You know, I don't know and not that many young people here, but how many of you have read Harry Potter I mean a few of you have read well actually some of the older people have read Harry Potter. That's good I mean Harry Potter is terrible because Harry Potter led to J. K. Rawlings becoming a billionaire and I became much poorer because of Harry Potter I don't know about you, but I had to buy three copies of every book because both my sons wanted one and I had to buy one for myself and then there were rides in in you know in the Theme parks and there were the seven nine twelve movies that we had to go see all of them I spent like three thousand dollars on Harry Potter. I got poor poor by three thousand dollars J. K. Rawlings because it became a billionaire. That's not fair and Piketty would say inequality exploded She was went for a welfare recipient to a billionaire. How horrible is that and I got poor and that seems like zero sum Because a lot of us got poor because we all bought the books But how do we measure as economists and this is the challenge that we have? How do we measure? the satisfaction of reading Your children a book or watching your kids in this day and age actually read a book or Going to the movies with your kids or doing all that. How do you measure that? There's no measure But that's the win on my side. The win is the spiritual satisfaction of reading Harry Potter And she won as well good for J. K. Rawlings. I mean that's wonderful so We have a challenge of explaining that because it's not perceptual The benefit I get and this is why I think Harry Potter example is a good example because everybody's read it and Understands the value they got but they never think of it in terms of economics But it's all part of it and Piketty and those economists pull one over on us because they show us statistics Which is missing the most important feature What I got out of all the stuff that I've bought I have you know if you buy artwork and you get in warmest spiritual value artwork you got poor I tell you and you go what note now really Not if you count my spiritual well-being and and so the whole inequality debate is bogus There is no issue. There's no problem. There's no reason to discuss it We need to explain the basic economics and how as people get wealthier And if we are participating and it's important because participating means we're working. We're producing something then we all get richer At different speeds. Well, why do you care about how fast somebody else gets rich? So We were talked that we've talked been telling you About the consequences of the market and we can see the beneficial consequences. This is a fairly standard economic approach to make economists at least but you would also talk about the Rights even bodied in the market economy as as right even as perhaps as natural rights and But you would put you would start that from from that point or would you start from the simple benefit of Making mutual exchanges is repeating talking about my views. You have to do both And it's not so much important that you where you start it's it's it's that you cover it all and at the end of the day You know, we all say there's a benefit to these transactions and we're all better off But better off by what standard? But if you hold the morality or a conception of society that says everybody has to be equal then we're not better off Because we're unequal Now you you should then question the morality of why should we all be equal? I? Don't know. I have no idea why we should all be equal. I've never heard an explanation Philosophically why we should all have equal outcomes So, you know, so philosophy is going to drive what the objective function is, right? What am I striving towards? Right now in the United States for example take a very controversial issue, right? The people who say it's not about even equality of outcome. It's about penalizing people whose Forefathers had advantages and benefiting people whose forefathers had disadvantages So if you're white you have to be disadvantaged because you once Oppressed black people and you had an advantage and now we have to give them an advantage, you know, so Why I didn't oppress anybody. Why am I a victim? Right? Why should I be oppressed now? But it's not an individualistic approach. It's a collectivistic approach throughout history a tribalistic approach So that's the level at which we need to challenge it is tribalism good is Collectivism good and if we're for individualism rights individual rights property rights Then our individual rights and individualism good And if we can't make the argument that individualism is good that individual rights is good Then we can make the economic arguments and we're brilliant at that. I mean, we're really good at that and even there It's hard right as we illustrated a minute ago but then they'll just tell us the objective function is different their goal is different and We have to so my view is that the Liberty movement the free market movement has failed to make the more fundamental argument about individualism about About about individual rights and about the more rally you're pursuing your own happiness about self-interest And this is the great contribution of iron rand I think iron rand's real contribution to the movement and to the debate and to the discussion is as a philosopher talking about self-interest, which is at the heart of every capitalist transaction individualism and Individual rights as the individual rights is really the key concepts politically in how you form a government and how you create a Proper moral government of defending the rights of individuals. So Until we realize that the individual is really it It's what matters. It's it's morally the only unit that is relevant We're gonna have a hard time if we buy into collectivism we will lose So how important our ideas? Is it how important isn't that people understand? Yeah, this idea in particular or that they understand the ideas behind the market order in general perhaps in a consequentialist way Compared to Institutions for instance Yeah, I mean I think it's all about ideas because I think at the end of the day our institutions are Reflection of the ideas that we have and not the not the other one now There's a symbiotic relationship if you have bad institutions, it's harder to get the ideas into a culture and Part of getting the ideas into cultures to build the right institutions that reinforce But it starts with ideas And it ends with ideas that is that's drawn the bad side as well That is the the the the antagonists of freedom and free markets I think also starts with ideas and and you can see that in history. You can see how history has been shaped by ideas You know, there's a I ran had this notion that in a sense Civilization has been as well or the history of the West is basically being a struggle between two philosophers two sets of ideas And that's Plato and Aristotle And as you can map out pretty much all of human for all of the West ups and downs from Greece till today By who get who is more dominant? Who is more influential? I mean Plato basically says You live in a cave you don't really see reality, you know really can't be really responsible for yourself You need guidance you need help the philosopher King who sees the actual reality sees the light He needs to guide you he needs to tell you what to do if you read the Republic every aspect of your life should be guided Should be informed by an expert by somebody who actually knows And it's all for your for your own good, right because you're just not able To take care of yourself. This is Plato and think about life in Europe Before the Enlightenment did you choose who to marry? No, somebody decided for you. Did you choose what religion they have? Pretty much not you were born into religion. You stuck with it. That was it, right? And and dare you not question that you're in big trouble, right? I mean big trouble Do you make big new discoveries to change? Well, no I mean because you got to get it you got to get a permission the authorities again You need to get you need it you need them to sign off because you don't want to change You know, they are the authorities the the Pulaski Kings However, you define them did you choose your profession? No, you did what your dad did or again You had to get permission for somebody. It was a permission society Everything had to be by permission by permission of Colin philosopher Kings and What the Enlightenment is this revolution that says No In that sense, it's an Aristotelian revolution says no every individual has the capacity to reason we all can take care of ourselves We have a mind and the entity that reasons is the individual There's no group consciousness. We know reason is a as a collective All that matters is the individual and therefore if the individual can reason it can understand the world out there if if truth does not rely on ancient books and authorities but on observation and science Then we don't need ancient books and authorities We get to decide what's true. We decide what career to pursue we get decide who to marry we get decide who our political leaders are freedom or political freedom and That's the revolution. That's the West. That's what the West is the West is Aristotelian in that sense It's about the individual's capacity to think for himself to take care of himself and therefore it has the political right to be free to do so That's the West and every other force out there that's trying to collectivize us trying to make reasons subservient trying to Enforce authority on us is in that sense anti-western And and belongs to Plato and we should reject Plato Nothing, so it's ideas and then we build just to finish that we build institutions to reflect that so in the enlatement You know the American founders start with what do the American founders start with they start with ideas and then they build Institutions to perpetuate those ideas so today in America. We still have those institutions and somewhat Kinda not exactly But the institutions were so good that they started with that even though today nobody understood including Justices in the Supreme Court in all our politicians every single one of them not a single one of them understand the founders And understand what they intended by creating these institutions They still do a decent job Not a great job, but a decent job even though nobody gets it Because it's just in perpetuate the ideas, but you have to have some ideas in order to build the institutions And and I think America is a good example because they start with ideas and the enlatement generally is a good example Because the enlatement is all about ideas but Especially being both and israeli originally and and and our and american citizens uh, isn't it Isn't it striking to you how important that constitution can be? I mean There's a lot of conflicts political conflict in the u.s. It is seems to be be Reduced by by institutions whereas in israel this as I understand that there's no constitution and there's been a huge conflict between Various levels of conflicts. So so I agree completely. I mean constitution is incredibly important institution is important But it's the right institutions don't create it unless you have the right ideas So in america as I said the founders had the right ideas created the right institutions now We no longer have those ideas the institutions keep us going. We still are relatively free because of the institutions israel Doesn't have a constitution, but why doesn't it have a constitution? because they never had the ideas Israel was a mishmash created by disparate people with various ideas who came together not over an ideological vision for the future but over an ethnic You could argue self-defense Necessity they jews were being killed still are Everywhere in and and the sense was and this is if you go back to the founder of zionism Hutzel his sense he was an assimilated jew from vienna Completely assimilated didn't consider himself jewish until the drifus trial And then drifus trial was a famous trial of a of a french Colonel I think who has tried for treason, but it was all driven by anti-semitism hutzel observed that Said will never be safe jews will never be safe in europe even though i don't consider myself with you They consider me one We need our own place and and when the british offered uganda to the jews Hutzel voted for it. He wasn't even attached any particular land He just wanted a place where jews could protect themselves because everybody hates them So That was the vision of israel and now if you have an ethnocentric state What institutions do you build? And you know the one institution you build is is maybe a right of a turn right which israel has But you don't you don't know how to build a constitution because what principles the founders of israel ben guion And the other founders of israel basically were former communists Who had moderated to be just regular socialists, but committed once real socialists And they had a team up with religious political parties just like they do today Because they represented an important constituency And with a right a nationalist right wing You know and they had a somehow the socialist and the religionist the social atheists Ben guion was an atheist and they had a team up with the religionists and the nationalist somehow How could you write a constitution and indeed they recognized that they couldn't write a constitution early on and they and uh They muddle through and israel's still in terms of Judiciary and in terms of the system of government and everything else still muddles through and it's it's a tragedy But in that sense america is very unique america's the only country in history created around an idea Most countries just just are there But america was created with a particular idea in mind and a particular system of government a particular constitution later on countries created constitutions, but they weren't created around a An institution or an idea. Yeah, and and a history of conflict conflict with within the british empire and So so And a unique moment in time because if you think about the enlightenment as being the 18th century america's kind of the the peak the the crowning achievement politically at least of the enlightenment And all these people were trained with the enlightenment. They had enlightenment ideas. They were all reading. I mean if you if you look at What who they cite in the federalist papers and when they're talking to one another I mean, they're citing the french falter and particularly monistec you they cite a lot That they're obviously citing john lock and the scottish enlightenment. These are real intellectuals How often do we get politicians who are real intellectuals who real thinkers real innovators and original? And who care who really care about freedom and liberty and creating the right kind of institutions that will survive generations So here you had a very unique point in history And it's why I think there's a sense in which Everybody should celebrate kind of american independence Because everybody's benefited from that unique combination because those ideas Spread then to the rest of the world and a lot of other countries Emulated to one extent or another The the the ideas and therefore the institutions of of of the united states But israel israel would have been worse off if they had tried to to start out writing a constitution It could it make sense if it's sort of starting out a new country Uh, I think they would have been worse off because the compromises they would have made would have been horrific and so Uh, you have an element which is a minority in israel of religionists who Want to impose religion on everybody? um And and it's bad. I mean really bad not, you know, these are not moderate religionists these uh um On a secular society israel is a secular society and was a secular society And yet they wouldn't sign up for the constitution unless they had got there I don't know no work on sabbath and you can't drive a car and was I don't know all the all the stuff that they would want And then what do you do about the socialists? I mean there's a sense in which i'm glad been guru and didn't write the constitution Because I don't think israel would be israel today, right? So israel is start-up nation It has the you know more entrepreneurs than any place in the world except silicon valley per capita it it it has massive gdp growth out of technology and innovation Would a socialist constitution protect that or would it crush that and I feel would crush it now It would be nice if today they could sit down and write a constitution But you have the same you don't have socialists anymore israel. There's no left in israel There's no real left in israel. Everybody's a center There's no real capitalism either, but everybody's kind of in the center and in most of the disagreements in israeli politics Almost all the disagreements in israeli politics are about personalities. They're not about ideas. They're basically idea and big picture They all agree except for religion Which is a separate thing and personalities So it'd be nice if today they could do it and marginalize the religionists and and there's probably is a majority They could do that, but they you know, they don't have The guts and they don't have and they don't have the moral authority to marginalize religion and as long as religion Is an overlay How do you write a constitution with you know, judeism like You know, maybe more like islam than in christianity Judaism the core of the judeism is a lack of separation of church and state that you know church and state are one And and the religionists Secular is where you don't think that but the religion is one Power political power and it's it's a challenge. So I don't expect to see a constitution in israel I I expect to see this fighting going on and it's any all made up massive political mistake by taking by Doing judicial reform Instead of doing kind of moderate reform everybody agreed that the judiciary was screwed up and it needed reform but he went all the way And you know, they could have there was easily easily could have been a compromise there, but uh for political reasons They never achieved it and and I think I think how much the advantage of that. Okay, maybe we should uh the Explain to our listeners just a little bit about the conflict in israel Uh, um, the the conflict between the the the government and the just the judiciary. So Yeah, so quickly, um Because israel has no constitution, you know, the the the wall of the supreme court in israel is ambiguous it it's determined by in a sense that the judiciary the Legislature is going to decide by law what the wall of the supreme court But so in and there's a sense that so israel passed a few years ago A couple of decades ago it passed basic laws, which is kind of a pseudo constitution, but not really everything's kind of implicit nothing's actually explicit and What has happened over the last 20 years is given that basic law And given the political constant political fighting in israel. It's a coalition governments like you have and in a sense a lack of Separation between the executive branch the government and the Legislative branch because coalition governments, you don't really have that separation in america There's a clear separation between executive and legislature The judiciary in israel has evolved over the last 20 years to have a bigger and bigger and bigger role role in in You know eliminating laws saying laws are they can't say they're not constitutional So then against the basic law, they're against human rights. So they're you know, they have A certain view which is the wall of the judiciary in a properly functioning Market the problem the fundamental problem is Who is the judiciary does not reflect who is in the government or does not reflect who that the israeli people are voting for So the judiciary is the only part of israeli society which the left really dominates Because the judiciary is elected by the judiciary They vote themselves their own replacements and then they can overtone the law Based on their interpretation of the basic laws And the the legislation the an executive can't do anything about it and they can't Appoint different judges when there's a change political change in the country like in the united states republicans appoint judges that lean more republican and democrat In israel, you can't do that because the judiciary controls itself So you get a bunch of leftists to begin with they just perpetuate leftism In the judiciary, so what netanyahu tried to do Was to try to counter that this latest government and the way to keep the way they wanted to counter it is to give all the power to the government So to eliminate any kind of so instead of saying, okay We need to come up with a better way to choose judges maybe maybe the Maybe the legislator will the legislature should choose judges by A majority vote or even a super majority vote in in in the united states for many years You needed 60 senators to appoint a supreme court judge no more. There was eliminated Now it's 51 but it used to be 60 maybe maybe something like that some kind of super majority So you get judges that that that reflect more kind of the the politics But no they didn't do that They basically gave the government not even the legislature the government the authority to appoint judges And everybody says well, wait a minute, then we have like Now we don't have any separation of powers. We have the government running everything They said, okay, the supreme court can never overrule a law So if they do overrule a law the the legislature by one vote can overturn what the supreme court did Well, then what exactly is the point of having the supreme court look at laws if If they can be just overturned by one vote again super majorities make sense here Or maybe you can't overturn a supreme court decision. You have to change the law Which is how it's done in america america if the supreme court says our law is unconstitutional You have to change the law you you you all dump it, but you can't just override what the supreme court says um So things like that which gave which concentrated power all in the All in the government so in the legislature which reminds people of poland And of hungry in terms of the the the political control over many of these branches of government, which Is it's not a healthy trend not a healthy trends Oh, I won't comment at them because I don't know but I believe you so So so the idea is if we had a cons if israel had a constitution Then you would explicitly have a wall for the judiciary and then when the judiciary ruled the law was no good It would have a basis to do it. It would have the constitution as a reference point But the constitution has to be good if it's a bad constitution then the wrong laws get overturned and So you have to have a good constitution and my fear My fear is that if it is all got together today to create a constitution would not be a good one My fear is the worst thing you can happen in america today Would be a constitutional convention where they change the constitution I mean a lot of conservatives in america Want to change the constitution they want to have a good constitution convention And have and change the constitution and that to me is the worst possible nightmare Because with all due respect to conservatives in america, they have no conception of the founding fathers founding fathers were not conservative They were radical revolutionaries So uh, uh, the the the the new constitution would be a lot worse than the old one I think unfortunately that that would be true for danmark as well. Uh, is some talk about Rewilding our constitution to have rights for the environment and uh, Climates and so on ridden into the constitution doesn't the european constitution has 320 rights or something like that It just yeah, it's absurd and yeah, I mean Writes are really really important concept and there really is only one right Is one right and that is a right to your life And what that means is That you have the freedom to live your life Based on your judgment in pursuit of your values to achieve your goals And basically as long as you don't use coercion Ford on other people not of anybody's business what you do That's it. That's the only right that exists and everything else is a derivative You have a right to free speech Well, because what does it mean to live if not to express yourself and to write and to to be Intellectually have a right to liberty For the same reason you have a right to property because property is is what you do while living is you you create Wealthy you create, you know build stuff you make stuff. It's yours because you did it But it all derives on the right to life that that one right and uh, this proliferation of rights is absurd Is that that hemmas? used the opportunity Could you briefly go into uh, so to to to your view on on the present crisis and in sure right I know very much think that hemmas timed this Because they did it when they did it for for a number of reasons one is Israel has seen the biggest divisions within israel and the biggest conflict internally in its history I mean these demonstrations were massive Uh, you know a lot of israelis were saying we're not going to the we're not gonna If the reserves call us we're not going right? Unheard of in israel right israel's a israel's a country where people are super patriotic and and and and would always go So so there was a real tear in israeli society and it was clearly israel was weak. It was weak at that point I think second, um There was a lot of conflict artificial conflict created by By this government in the west bank there was probably unnecessary Uh, but that that it was created there which had caused the government to move a lot of its troops to the west bank And in a sense leave god the garrison border relatively unprotected So a lot of those troops were in the west bank and not easily available and third By all accounts is what was about to sign a peace deal with Saudi Arabia Now this is a big deal, right? I mean I have doubts about these peace deals, but from the context of geopolitics. These this is a big deal The you know, Saudi Arabia is a big support of Hamas always has been financially in every other sense morally certainly Uh, uh, you know, it's it's it's the Saudi Arabia is Uh, the holy land in a sense that uh, Mecca and Medina are in Saudi Arabia It is the guardian of the holy sites for them to cut to deal with a Jewish state in in the Middle East is Horrific and and devastating to the Islamists of the world and and people forget Hamas is not just a political entity Hamas is Is part of a widespread Islamic jihadist Movement, it's religious. It's it's it's it's fundamentalist. It's uh, it's not just political This is a theocracy and they run the Gaza Strip as a theocracy So religion is really really crucial to them So They wanted to destroy the peace deal with the Saudis They they wanted to catch Israel at a moment of weakness. They could see fewer troops on the border Now exactly how it happened Exactly why Israel failed to the extent that it did I think we're gonna have to wait months to figure out. I mean the intelligence failure the military failure Um, the failure of the technology, right? Israel was supposed to be able to tell if a mouse moved And never mind a thousand people ramming through a fence The logistics failure on Israel's side of not getting troops in time to the places All of that there'll be commissions. They'll talk about that for years biggest military political failure Intelligence failure in Israel's history. It makes the Yom Kippur war seemed like a Like nothing in comparison to the to the magnitude of this failure And I you know, I served in military intelligence a long long time ago And it's hard for me to What were they doing? It's it's hard for me to get what they were doing A lot of it is the same symptom as Yom Kippur war in 73. They were cocky They they they thought they had it all and they were like too heavily in technology All the sensors the gate the the fences it this is a warning to people who think walls protect you Ask Rome if a wall protected them Ask any castle in Europe if the wall protected them ask Israel if the fence protected them Walls don't protect you. Um, we talk about what does but walls don't Israel felt too secure, but there's a lot of Actual things that happened that will be analyzed, you know, and and then we can talk about the political long term political failure But that that might be a that's a longer story. What's going to happen next? Is this conflict going to spread? So So So I think right now you've got two forces in play That uh, that uh, that that are challenged Israel which is which seems to be Really committed to eliminating Hamas for the first time I'd say 20 years too late but Really 20 years too late and they've had every opportunity every reason to do it way back in the past but And that's the main cause of what happened is is Israel's constant appeasement of Hamas and the Palestinians more broadly for the last 30 plus years but um, so Israel who wants to act and and I think if you interview the soldiers on the border, they're all eager To get it on, you know to to go in and and and and bring justice and um And then you've got the us And the us wants to tell everybody they really want Israel to be strong and really want Israel to go in then But us is much more concerned about a broader conflict The US is concerned about its relationship with Saudi Arabia and their Gulf states And you know All you have to know about the us is this Hey I think this says everything about us foreign policy of the last I don't know since world war two problem But certainly in the middle east over the last 50 years The us has its largest military base in the middle east its largest airfield in the middle east And its command center for the entire middle east and afghanistan in katal in katal Katal is where sent calm or whatever. It's called commands all american forces all over the middle east all the way into south asia Um, and it has the biggest efforts Katal is also A large and active funder of terrorism and has been since the days of al-qaeda Um, and is a home to many of the hamas leadership all the political leadership lives in katal So you literally 10 years ago You had the situation where american airplanes would take off the bomb isis in iraq and in syria And money would flow from the same place katal into the coffers of isis and al-qaeda in iraq and syria So america has no farm policy. It has it has a dyslexic Uh inconsistence completely suicidal Self-destructive farm policy and it's exported that's in a very good job exporting that to israel and Biden went to israel not to show support He went to israel for a photo op And to pretend to show support but he basically went to israel to twist The arms of the israelis to to to make sure they moderated their response and and did it on the timetable that biden would decide So you see negotiations through katal Katal is negotiating with hamas because they have the relationship after all Uh and americans to free the hostages tell the kat Hamas will free some hostages. They will show good will because they will they will play the good guys They will do all that they won't release all of them because it's too too big of a card They have that will be some and they'll pretend to be good guys The united states will delay israel and delay israel and delay israel the more they delay the harder this is going to get Because uh, the more prepared hamas will be The more prepared iran will be the more purpose is bala will be And then the question will be will hamas and his will his bala in iran join in I think the americans the one thing they might do right although i'm not sure it's right but is They're gonna cut a deal with his bala in iran not to join And then in in in exchange for reigning in israelis Um, so I think this will end like every other every other of these kind of crises over the last 30 years Israel will go in it'll show force it'll flex muscle It'll do a few things that'll kill hamas leadership. It'll do stuff like that Nothing will fundamentally change on the ground Um, and uh, and then israel will retreats leave Gaza Gaza and Five years from now 10 years from now. We'll have the same conversation About uh, what do we do about hamas and what are we going to do about gaza and wires and israel is going to be tough this time This time they'll do it Whereas I know nobody asked me, but I'll tell you anyway if In my view, this is a great opportunity for uh, the united states to correct its mistakes that it's been made in the middle east Over the last 20 something years This is an up. Well, no actually since I think he's 79 so it's 50 50 years And that is this is the opportunity to deal with the iranians to deal with them harshly to deal with them properly You know and there's enough now civilian population in iran Which is upset at the regime. I don't know how much you follow The gold the the the the the gold revolution in iran, which is I think one of the most In you know one of the courageous and And exciting things to watch people really caring about their freedom and willing. There was just a girl just one of them was just killed yesterday, I think because she she didn't wear the hijab and she you know and and They haven't released the video yet, but it looks like The these these nuts killed her. Anyway, there's a there's a rising demand within the Iranian populations I don't actually think it would be that hard to support them to overthrow the current regime and that would change the middle east Forever really and iran is the problem of the middle east. It always has been It was before 9 11. It was after 9 11. It was you know, it started this holy slumist movement really It's of this modern formation As long as iran exists in its current regime and its current form There will be no peace in the middle east And uh, so it's an opportunity for the united states to take care of you I it's an opportunity for israel to take care of his will and hamas And I wish they would just get out get out Get it done because the longer they wait the harder it's going to be in the future Let's talk a little bit about the u.s. Um In your your book, uh, I think it was 10 10 years ago. It came out. It's a free market revolution You were uh, I had some hope for the tea party movement to become a force of spreading good ideas About freedom and capitalism and so on. You also have some reservations about it and then the book as I recall it And how how do you see now what how what's what's playing out in the in the u.s. Now what's going to happen? In the next election and and and then on Um, well the reservations turn out to be to be more insightful than the whole With regard to the to the tea party or the tea party Tea party if you were involved at all with the tea party in the u.s It had an energy. It had an excitement to it They had the right slogans. They had the right high level kind of ideas Without any grounding without any understanding without any real Commitment and so they would they would do things like we want smaller governments And then and then you would see people sign saying keep your hands off of my medicare Right medicare is the largest welfare program in the united states. It's a massive redistribution of wealth So they wanted that but they wanted to shrink government somehow Medicare will also become by far the largest program the u.s. Go far bigger than defense It'll be the bigger it already is very close But it's going to be could be the largest spending program. So they had no real clue But they had the spirit about and and that's the excitement. That's what I think they had the spirit of of I think hockening back to kind of American individualism kept your hands off me but without any content and the hope was that Some of us who tried could give them the content and help educate them to to to But it but it couldn't be done and and or at least we couldn't do it. We we failed or And and partially it was because it was A superficial movement. It was an emotional movement not a movement of ideas not a movement of reason It was also and not to insult people in the room. It was also a movement of older people It was not a movement of youth And revolutions are revolutions activities of young people You want to change the world you got to get young people into the streets You're not going to get it by getting us all the go people interested We can educate we can help we can advise we can assist But the revolution has to happen with young people that that and to think the left understands that better than any of us and has forever Uh, so it was it was too old And therefore they were fixed in their ways and they couldn't think outside the box and they couldn't they couldn't expand their horizons And then finally They were too religious and they were captured by the religious rights in in the u.s. Um much more Solidly than anything, you know, some of us free market types were trying to trying to get to them and and so basically what happened to the to the they got They they elected some people. I mean you probably know, I don't know Marco Rubio and Ted Cruz and And a few others that they thought were going to change America and yeah You know You know compromises middle of the road is at the end of the day when it comes to what's important. I think to many of us and See they they were disheartened by that They were disheartened by the fact that uh Obama who they hated they despised Obama they were he won in 2012 which was a shock to them It shouldn't have been but was a shock to them And they kind of fizzled away They Focused almost all their energy on anger and frustration They became almost overwhelmingly just angry and frustrated And this was just the perfect mix for Donald Trump I mean it's just it was just it just set it out for him and I think Trump's real capacity Because he's he's not very smart and he's not very able right but the real capacity has Is he's a great marketer? He gets his audience and he knows what to pitch them. He knows what a self And he he got a sense that this was the state of america more so than any of us. I think how angry americans were And he offered them what every 10 part of terrarium offers an angry audience Yeah, he's 10 part fear You remember carnage in the streets of america? At that point when he said that america was the safest it had ever been in terms of motor rates crime rates By every rate possible Everything had declined from from the early 1990s to that point. That was the safest america had ever been But he carnage in the streets of america america industries at this way the economy is lost everything everything is horrible And oh, yeah, because they were angry already. So they yes absolutely everything's horrible And it's not your fault. You're good american people your patriots some your fault It's those mexican It's the it's the chinese and it's the elites And how do we solve this don't worry I can solve I know how to do Now that's the formula of every kind of authoritarian leaning politician ever in all of history right fear The other and in america, you can't say it's The fault of the jews so you won't win so you blame so you blame You know you blame uh south americans and chinese, but it's the same effect, right? It's the other the scary other the successful and it's easy to blame china because they're successful So and and we're losing jobs and they're gaining jobs as if as if that's the cause You know assuming that cause of relationship, which is not true from an economics perspective And he he captured that anger and he got it and and and it it rose up and he won and he won based on that So tea party became the most dedicated trump fans. They are and if you look at trump fans, they tend to be older they're very angry And they were very active in the tea party They used to be shrink government Individual rights constitution now you never hear them talk about the constitution. There's no mention of freeing markets It's all about bashing the left. It's all about the cultural wars. That's all that matters it's getting getting rid of those chinese and mexicans and and And giving trump more power so he can do stuff now. He's incompetent. So when he gets power, he doesn't do anything Although the second time around I think he'll surround himself with better more committed people and you'll be a lot more dangerous You'll be a lot more dangerous So as you can tell I don't like trump What will happen in the next direction? I don't know. I mean, I I never thought trump would have a chance Because he lost in 2020 in spite of what he claims He really did lose and he lost not because people like biden. Nobody likes biden. Nobody's ever like biden I mean biden's run for president many many times and could never get the democratic nomination Well, you know, so somehow he got the nomination because the democrats are so weak Nobody likes biden. They voted against trump I mean and and a lot and if you look at how many people voted in america in 2020 Record numbers. I don't think for a hundred years. Why because they were motivated by hatred of trump And I think justifiably But now biden's in office And he's a disaster And he he you know, it's obvious that he's too old It's obvious. He he he is now granted biden was never very sharp Right, he always used to talk all over the place But now he's really rambling and he really can't keep track of stuff And and the economy is by some measures is doing well But people don't feel because inflation is a as you probably know inflation So I think people really feel so even if though even if they make a little bit more money because wages are going up They still feel like they're worse off because So they don't track real wages, right, right? They don't track the stats. They track their pocketbook People don't like biden and they kind of remember that when trump was around Things were kind of good I don't think because of him, but they were kind of good and um, I think he has a really good chance of of winning Uh, I now the only hope we have is that they lock him up um I think he deserves to be locked up and but but I but I I don't know that he will be we'll see, uh, it's gonna be the next year is gonna be the most interesting and fought with horror American politics has ever had It's never been this crazy Because he's literally good four lawsuits Three of which he could land up in jail. One of them is a civil case, but the others three are are criminal lawsuits um, and all three is reasonable reason to think he's guilty all of them and, um We'll see but yeah, but it's also reasonable reason to think that the left is usually is politically Okay, but of course the right is used at political to courts have you been used in America politically for a long time just to ask Rudolph Giuliani Um, he was brilliant at it in the 1980s using the courts for politics So, you know, so it's it's gonna be an interesting year You know, I would like to see one of the other Republicans be the candidate. I think anybody could beat biden And I think pretty much anybody on stage at these debates is better than trump literally every single one of them is better than trump Both can beat biden easier than trump and would be a better president than trump but I don't count But what you're saying basically is that it's it's more important to have a small group of very well-trained uh, young people Who are into ideas and have a large popular new movement like the tea party was even if they can nominate presidents and maybe if they can Set the agenda, um I think the most important thing to have is the intellectual the the the intellectual And the intellectuals are mainly speaking to young people. I think again old people we get set in our ways It's hard to change your mind after I don't 30 40 50 at some point. It's really hard to change your mind about important things You get into certain thinking habits and for most people um, so The real change is happening with young people And they're impacted by their professors and they're impacted by the media and the media is not the separate entity The media is basically driven by the intellectuals by the people who advise them and by the people they interview and by the people So changing the world is an intellectual endeavor. It's all about intellectuals and the left dominates that field. The right is Defaulted on it has forever, you know talented, um You know the story in america is talented conservatives go into business and make a lot of money And talented left-leaning people go into academia and become professors And yet the people go into academia are the ones who dominate the world in the end And you can see that right on american campuses that the sterics that are going on american campuses right now are just uh, just stunning, um In terms of the hamas, but but but also woke and and everything else is and it dominates the culture It dominates everything. So what you really need of the is the intellectual high ground You need to dominate the intellectual sphere. You need to dominate universities think tanks and And uh and media and every way way to let where ideas are discussed and presented That's what you have to have a voice and again the reality is the left overwhelms Everybody else and the the people I don't like to use left right anymore because I don't think I don't I don't consider myself right, uh, even though Yeah, so you know, but people are free market or people who care about individual liberty They just know that we don't have a lot of intellectuals and the intellectuals we have all economists And we need more than economists. We really do You know, we we need historians and political scientists and and uh, And in every realm we need we need people philosophers and sociologists and all this stuff We need we need people and we don't have them. We just don't have the numbers And as a consequence, our voice is is becoming muted and what scares me over the last I'd say over the last Yeah, really since covet But really since trump it really started with trump And that is that a lot of young people who traditionally would have gone the free market route Are now going the ultra right route And we're talking not just about the crazy kid in his mother's basement who's playing video games and Tweeting ultra right nonsense or racist nonsense We're talking about PhD students political science students. We're talking about it, you know, some of the state we're talking about Institutions that used to represent America's founders and and kind of conservatism and they're now representing Really bizarre forms of right wing nationalism and and religiosity and things like that claim on institute comes to mind if you read the claim on review books It used to be a really respectable really interesting And now it's become this You know rag of a right wing nuts Uh, and uh, and with no regard to individual liberty and no regard for economics now The right wants political power to impose there that they figured the left uses political power to impose their Values on us now they want to impose their values on us But those of us who believe in liberty don't want anybody to impose their values on us. So, uh, um, that is a rare breed And that really was me the rise of this alternative right in america national conservatism You see that in europe as well and arise even further to the right of, um Integrationalists, I don't know if you have that in europe There's a big movement in america of integrationists are almost all catholics Who don't believe in separation of state and church and they want to they want to bring religion into politics in america in a way that I think would be Traditionally has been on hold of patrick the neen and there's a bunch of them. Um, uh, so he's a hub omari Um, all converts to catholicism. None of them were born catholic. They all became catholics And and now uh, Integrationalism is the integration of religion the pot Okay, I think we'll take a few questions From the from the floor. Um, I think you've He's had his pen up for a long time very long time. So, uh I'm pleased to present yourself first for sure. Uh, I earn, uh, I'm uh I'm a 23 year old, uh, want to be a politician just starting out in sweden I'm looking around in a Danish room and if you think it's an uphill battle here. It's a little bit worse in sweden um One of the First I wanted also to thank you for all of these talks that have been Happening around the world for the young here that have not produced enough to be able to travel to these conferences everything being on youtube is fantastic and um my question to you is My biggest difficulty that i'm experiencing Is very much this that opened my eyes In in atlas drugs, which was the the mixture of food and poison the that the the mixed system keeps the bad parts alive and to offer a third a thirsty man Water with poison in it and then mixing it around and trying to take out the poison by hand. It's Very much a difficult battle. Um, trying to Start a party in sweden, uh, because of the right parties there just having been Very much seeding the moral ground that you talked about, uh, that they are almost apologizing for capitalist and being like It it's it seems to work, but we don't we we they're very much seeding moral grounds My question is would you like uh, would you talk to the point of When I try to talk to young people how How I would go about it When it seems that every institution every philosophy department Everything i'm talked to has this mixed bag mixed system view of it and they would love to They they all say that it's it's been seeming to work to drink out of this mixed glass this whole time Yeah, so the mixed glass, you know, he's talking about the mixed economy. Let me just say something about the cost of travel um, so we're doing a conference in, um March in amsterdam not far from here Um, uh, 23 year olds. We give a lot of scholarships out. Uh, so including travel and everything else They are flyers for the conference back there. You can look at the barcode It'll be a deep dive into kind of vinevans ideas of philosophy and so on so I encourage Everybody to come and for the young people here To apply for scholarships, uh, we're eager to get people there and that'll be a march I'll be there and so will a bunch of other people. Um Yeah, so the mixed economy, uh, the mixed economy is it makes things really really really hard for us to advocate for kind of a laissez-faire capitalism partially because The mixed economy particularly as it's practiced in in europe and in the united states does a mildly okay job So that most people are kind of comfortable And why be radical if you're comfortable? I mean you're asking them to Change the world and to advocate for something everybody's gonna hate them for And to and and to take a risk because there's always risk in something new and they're comfortable And you know and so it's it's a challenge. It's a challenge To say let's get rid of all the regulations. Well, but but but but but things are running They could be a thousand times better. Oh, yeah, right. That's your imagination, right? Um You'd think they get it because the examples are kind of obvious and we get it and it's not that hard But it's very very difficult for most people to engage with radical ideas Particularly from a point of comfort. That's why I think a lot of these radical ideas are more popular in places that don't have it so good I found eastern europe particularly In the past much more open to these ideas because they a remember communism And and it wasn't that good there or south america They've tried everything fascism communism mixed everything and nothing works So they're open to something new what the hell why not try it and you'll see there's a there's a candidate in argentina Who's uh, who's this libertarian little nuts, but he's But he's got this platform. That's amazing right and and he's he's likely to win It'll be the first time a libertarian gets to run a country now He doesn't have the parliament with him So it's it's going to be difficult to pass the kind of legislation he needs But why is he winning in argentina because argentina is a libertarian country? No He's winning in argentina because argentinas are so fed up with everything They're willing to take a huge gamble on some crazy nut who yells in the radio. I don't know if you've seen this guy He yells he screams. He swears. I mean he's he's he's one of these radio personalities. He's crazy He's shocked personnel You know some so But you know taking a step back So I don't have any particular advice in terms of what to say to people other than everything that I say Right my talks and all of that But I would say this and this is not meant to discourage you but Maybe it is It's way too soon for politics It's just you you're bashing your head against the brick wall It the culture is not not ready for this, you know, I'm a pretty charismatic guy I can go up on a stage and get people excited and so on people always ask me in america. Why don't you run for president? Because I'd lose in a landslide. It wouldn't even be close Because nobody wants what we have to it's not that we don't market ourselves well It's not that we don't ever charismatic enough leader. It's not the one of funny It's not the one out. We don't if only we had short videos that I get told by donors short videos If you had a few short videos the world would change It doesn't work like that I mean This is real work and it's going to take time and most of the work is in the trenches In a sense of trying to change the culture which means trying to change the way people think And the only way to do that is one person at a time one individual at a time And it takes a long time. It's it takes work and you need a lot of people so the intellectual work And and politics can serve that as a as an educational platform if that's how you view it Rather than as a oh, I have to get because once you start focusing on getting the votes You'll see how how you'll start smoothing the edges and making it a peerless radical and being more friendly And I know you've had some parties here in Denmark that have done that and and it it they they haven't lasted In terms of real change in real reform because they can't So hard work Hello, Jörn, um What are your thoughts about uh, the Danish society? It's a little bit leftist leaning in my view They are proud on paying uh taxes and you know going after the environment What are your thoughts? Yeah, I mean, I think Danish society is is is pretty typical of in that sense in europe and and uh In much of what we call the west because The left has the mall high ground. It has the mall high ground. It has the the intellectual high ground It has the political high ground And you whatever right there is is always playing defense It's not playing offense. The right has no vision. The right has no idea to the extent that ever vision. It's scary So the right has no real vision It has no solutions on uh that they're appealing that are interesting that are particularly young people I mean, uh, so it Denmark is A product of its intellectuals a product of of the history of that intellectual movement And look that it's not like There have been a lot of intellectuals on our side. There have been a lot of good economists on our side But other than economists How many intellectuals have been on outside on the side of again individual liberty and elastic capitalism? Not many. I I read being one and I read is super controversial um, and even when people read it they often don't understand her And uh, but I think her ideas are crucial to this battle. I I don't think we To the extent that we all shared a goal can win without her because She's the one who challenges these fundamental beliefs that need to be challenged that the left relies on It relies on the idea of your happiness is not what matters. It's the group that matters They rely on the idea that sacrifice is good You know, they tell you the greater good of the planet Is more important than your ability to fly to the united states or what band flights to the united states Nobody will be able to fly a long distance and everybody goes. Yeah. Well sacrifice, you know, sometimes you have to sacrifice And I'm like no I don't believe in sacrifice But who believes that? Me and five other people, right? So it's it's It's it's this is why you know the again It's it's it's more fundamental and it's not surprising where they are and climate change. Look It's an ideal topic It's got all the trappings of religion every single trapping of religion And you can gain power and you can get control In what who came up with this genius, right? Of everything now So even if it's happening or let's assume it's happening the catastrophizing of it. It's just Perfect if you want to take control of people and capture the imagination. I mean you couldn't have invented Greta I mean, she's a work of marketing genius And she's she she she's articulate just in the right way As to get people excited. She appeals to idealism, right? She's talking about compromise She's against compromise Shut it down tomorrow. She doesn't care That appeals to young people. It's about time we talk like that Let's shut it down tomorrow. Yeah, we we need to capture that idealism. We need to project This is the thing that they're that we have not done well and again I think why iron man is like because she you know Among some of us because of the novels the novels project an ideal. We need ideals We need an image of what the future looked like. We need solutions. We need big ideas Just saying let's deregulate this a little bit that doesn't capture the imagination of the young people You need to talk about a grand vision of the future, which the left is very good at And it goes back to Marx who had this beautiful utopia never told us how we get there Or how many tens of millions of people they have to kill in order to get there But if they all remember the utopia where you I mean, it's a it's a beautiful thing You you do exactly what you want all your material needs are taken care of how it happens how it works blank out But you've got that ideal we we need something like Thank you My name is mess strange. I'm a political advisor for the danish party liberale yangse And i'm also a candidate myself for next year's election to the european parliament so one of the um intellectual ideas that has Been very influential in the last couple of years is you know, wokeness or leftist identity politics How do you think i and rand would Approach wokeness if she was alive today and a quick follow-up follow-up question Uh, is it your assessment that we'll see more or less wokeness in the next 10 years? I mean she would be horrified by it I mean it much of it makes you know how a lot of people read out the shrug Then they say well, this is a caricature. Nobody talks like this Well, wokeness makes what she writes in all the shrugs. She moderate as compared to how crazy some of these people are um And and this is the tricky thing about wokeness. They've taken real issues real problems um racism a real problem trans a real issue Sexuality all these things are real issues And real issues that we need to do some thinking about we need we need to solve we need to think about how to do it And they've and they've dominated it and of course the right has no answers to it So they kind of dominate these issues. The right answer is tradition It's not very appealing or inspiring or true Right because tradition is also when we had slavery. So you can't go backwards. You have to look forward and you have to find solution So so wokeness has capitalized on all real problems and presented these tribalistic You know anti individualistic and an anti reason emotional driven and and really solutions or ideas based on The you know, the kind of adoration of the victim the the the the Raising the victim to modern status again very much like religion So so all the leftists have studied religion and they keep creating these things that are very similar, right? You have original sin Color of your skin is your original sin, right? And you you you have a waiter of it to you know to you go to uh Um, what do you call it to confessional? Yes, I'm bad. I'm because I'm because I was born this way, right? I mean, they've got all the trappings of religion So, uh, I think she would be horrified by how we descended into such an insane Low point, but she maybe she wouldn't be surprised. It is just an extension of kind of uh Your continental philosophy, I mean you could you could trace woke back to Conn Hago Schopenhauer mocks and ultimately the post-moderns and and and it's just post-modernism is applied to some of this other stuff And it all goes back to to the continental philosophers Uh, what about in the next 10 years? I I don't think they'll be woke in the next 10 years It'll definitely have a different name The name woke will be gone Um, they'll change labels But a lot of and and some of the excesses of it some of the really absurd stuff Will dissipate But some of it will be institutionalized talk about institution, right de i, you know de i diversity equity inclusion That will become part of the corporate landscape or just be there. Nobody will think twice about it Nobody all the quotas will just be there. That'll be institutionalized They might not call them de i we might not call it woke, but it'll just be part of life another piece that the left is just You know, it's like the welfare state nobody questions the welfare state You say oh, it should be a little less should be a little more We should give them a little more benefits a little less benefits. How about zero? Yeah, I know you laugh because it's a little uncomfortable But I'm for zero welfare But you can't do that anymore because they slowly have taken over with of course this So they'll of course be de i would get rid of that. That's impossible. Can't even imagine that can't comprehend that So woke will enter into our culture to become a part of our life We won't even notice it to the point where we won't even notice it But we will have compromised reality for it, right? Um and not in every realm some realms are too ridiculous To to to contemplate but but but some and it'll happen definitely different countries Certainly america will be continue to be at the forefront of these Wonderful evolutionary Hello, my name is john. I'm a local capitalist You mentioned that as long as the us does not correct its mistakes There can be no peace in the middle east for example. Yeah, and that This is cost or the root of it Is due to the double standards and the double standards seem to be enabled and supported by good old american capitalism Because the money has no smell. It's it can be described as simple individual transactions Money for fuel for the ground for and and who cares where the money goes afterwards it could go to hamas or somewhere else so the question is if these If capitalism is unable to correct itself by enabling and supporting double standards Are we doomed to eternal war in the middle east? well, um So I disagree with some of your assumptions there And I still need to disagree with the what we're dealing with capitalism here I don't think we have capitalism in the world. There is no capitalism. We have mixed economies We have state intervention in everything. We have state controls of everything and the one thing governments are supposed to do Protect us. They don't do So You can't blame this in capitalism because there is no capitalism The current system is a fraud It's corrupt It's a disaster on every front and we're experiencing some of the consequence of that Don't blame capitalism and I certainly wouldn't blame money because I don't think it's driven by money. I don't think money drives it I think cowardice drives it I think power drives it Money is the least problem right So what you know, what are the cause going on? Well start with the fact that america just Has no farm boss It has no farm boss. It doesn't know what it's doing It it's it's floundering in the world and has been floundering in the world since the end of world war two It went on some kind of You know a couple of anti-communist wars in korea and in vietnam. Why nobody can tell you Nobody can explain how america ended up in vietnam was a french war wasn't a american war And it somehow they ended up there and it's not about money because america lost much more money than it gained Nobody benefited from the vietnam war a few weapons manufacturers But in the in the in total in terms of who one and who lost their gain Is tiny as compared to all the losses in other industries and other professions and other parts of the us economy War is a lose lose proposition Nobody wins in a war Not economically not money-wise If if money ruled the world there would be no wars Hmm It went into war in vietnam and then you know it was attacked in 9 11 and and Well, its embassy got taken in 1979 in iran right 50 americans were held hostage I don't know if you remember this 4th of november 1979 Americans got to get held hostage in the u.s. Embassy in tehran. What does america do? I mean Cowards right that's an act of war That's an act of war Should have I mean it should have resulted in immediate military response Your job as a government is to protect the lives of your citizen America didn't do that And then I told chomeini this is relevant for denmark, right? I told chomeini then issues of fatwa in 1980 something eight I think against salam and rushdie and um And uh, you know against free speech. We believe in free speech. Yeah, rushdie wrote a book And his publishers attacked in the united states Stores that carry salam and rushdie's books are firebomb What does the us president say? You know, you really shouldn't write books that are that are anti-religion and any one you shouldn't do that anymore Defending individual rights of americans And and just go on and on and on like the government's not doing what it's supposed to do protect us And and then you get the danish cartoons and you know, I couldn't you couldn't show the danish cartoons Nobody had the courage to show the cartoons in in in america because the government wouldn't protect them They didn't protect the publishers in the salam and rushdie case By the way, salam and rushdie was attacked recently and almost died You know, and there's no You know, there's an origin for this there's a cause for this and we won't deal with the cause And we won't even talk about it So 9 11 happens and what does american do? It it goes to one of gunny stunts tries to build them democracy I mean you get killed so you bring democracy to the world as if democracy could just be landed like this It wasn't about money It was about a a fantasy that a bunch of intellectuals in washington had that they could go there and they could build Governments and institutions. This is my other thing Institutions are meaningless if you don't have the ideas and the culture for them And they did that if kind of said, okay, well, we can really make a difference if we do it in iraq And I know a lot of people think iraq is about the oil But it's really bizarre that if iraq was about the oil, how come america never got any of the oil American companies don't know the oil in iraq. It's iraqi oil companies america doesn't Get any of the revenue from the oil it's iraqi oil companies America doesn't own the shares in those iraqi oil companies And if you were running a war in order to get the oil wouldn't you protect the oil fields first? And take control of them and tell with the rest of the country Now it was really I mean it's hard to believe but it was really about being democracy to the middle east And the one party that actually has responsibility for what's going on in the world On the negative iran because Saddam Hussein was just a thug I mean an evil evil evil thug, but he wasn't really harming the us us that much Iran was then you leave alone. You don't touch that And The one thing you don't do is name your enemy God forbid you actually say who who attacked you on 9 11 and who the enemy is terrorism That's a coward's explanation Not islamic terrorism Not jihadi terrorism Not islamic totalitarian. You don't find the word islamo fastest You don't want to you don't want to paint all islam with the same brush Absolutely because not all muslims are terrorists right not all muslims are violent But something to illustrate that this is an ideology derived from a particular religion That is using force and wants to dominate the world. How can you find an enemy you're afraid to name? By the way Hamas right now same enemy Same war that we've been fighting for a long time said at least since 79 We're still afraid to name them. You almost see no reports about the religious origins Of Hamas the fact that they were the basically The muslim brotherhood The military wing of the muslim brotherhood in in in you don't hear religion doesn't come up Particularly not in america because in america religion is can't talk about religion negative Just not acceptable So america's weak in every sense and that's philosophy and that's ideas. It's not capitalism that's a problem A proper rights respecting government would have eliminated the threat and gone on with life And that's what should be done. You eliminate the threat. You don't have to build democracies You don't have to stay there for 20 years. You eliminate the threat You make sure it never happens again and you come home and you promote free trade and you promote human prosperity You don't go to wars that don't you can't win in the last forever I think we have time for just one quick question. Thank you. My name is Thomas Derby I'm active in the conservative part in danmark But you said that that before enlightenment the world was ruled by guilds and permissions. I think you called it So why why are we now 250 years after enlightenment came starting to do exactly the same building up new Permission societies I I think that is the great mystery that we need to solve and and absolutely so we're reverting to a pre-enlightenment world We're reverting to a pre-enlightened world where we ask permission Where play dough is again reigning supreme in a sense that We don't believe at the welfare state assumes you can't take care of yourself You know, you it assumes that you need Other people to to be forced to cause to help you, right? We don't even trust that voluntarily they would help you Uh, so we've imposed the philosophy kings on us. We still we pretend we have democracy I mean, we have democracy in a sense But democracy is not That great right because democracy is allow the majority to oppress the minority What we really needs is a rights Protecting democracy where the majority can't vote on a lot of things most things they can't vote on So I can't take my money even if 99% like free speech to understand even if 90 well, maybe not in denmark Certainly not in sweden and certainly not in england in america still because we have a constitution right um Everybody understands in america that even if 99% of americans vote to silence me It the supreme court will say unconstitutional can't do it Uh, the same should be true of our economic liberties and our social liberties and everything else Democracy should only apply to very very narrow things But for that We need what we need today is to resurrect the spirit of the enlightenment The spirit of individualism and a reason and not the kind of you know, so a lot of Conservatives criticize reason of saying well, didn't the soviet use reason to to oppress any scientific socialism No, that wasn't reason No reason is something attached to reality and really where you evaluate what works and what doesn't fact evidence logic No, that was just that was just their attempt to to again very similar to a form of religion communism is uh So what we need is to resurrect the idea of Of reason and a proper respect of proper respects of the individual and his right to his own life And a proper respect for freedom and capitalism But and that means a resurrection of the enlightenment We need to bring back the the teaching of the enlightenment thinkers primarily the anglo-saxon thinkers They were the they were the dominant ones Uh, and and and I would like to see iron ran be in that mix because I think she is the She is the inheritor of that intellectual tradition She she she's the continuation of that intellectual tradition and I think she completes it in some sense. So, uh That those are the kind of Yeah, if if the the battle right now whether we whether we acknowledge it or not the battle right now in the world is between the enlightenment And the anti-light it's between the enlightenment and the pre-enlightment and uh You know The good is the enlightenment and and the more positive trends in our world today technology innovation Those are all products of of enlightenment thinking A New enlightenment what a great note to end to end on uh, jaren brooks. Thanks my pleasure. Thanks for having me