 The radical, fundamental principles of freedom, rational self-interest, and individual rights. This is The Iran Book Show. All right, everybody. Welcome to Iran Book Show on this Saturday night. We're having a great weekend. I spent the day at the beach. It's I'm exhausted, I have to admit. It was fun, beautiful day, usual day in Puerto Rico. It was hot, sunny. Ocean was a little rough. Ocean was a little rough. Got a little bit of exercise battling the waves. That was fun. So that was good. And yeah, today we have a bunch of show. We're going to be talking about the role of the military in a free society. And this is a great opportunity if you have any questions on foreign policy, on military, on wars, on history, to the extent that I know. On current situations in the Middle East, Afghanistan, China, Russia, whatever. This is a good day to ask the questions. So obviously, military is the role of the military and free society is most of the foreign policy of a free society is centered around the military in a truly free society and certainly in an objectivist world. And so we will broaden this in some sense to a discussion of foreign policy, although I will start with a talk specifically about the military. The show today sponsored by John. John's here. So it's great to thank you, John, for sponsoring this. And again, if you, John, or if anybody has specific questions, you know how to ask them. We've got the super chat open. Ali is still with no electricity from what I hear. So she is not available to kind of cheer lead the super chat section. But feel free to use the super chat questions. And of course, questions with $20 or more get priority. So go ahead with that. Before we get to the topic, just something quick from the news, something we'll talk about again probably next week once I have more information data. But as we speak right now, there is an important conference going on in Washington DC. I think it's in Washington. And that is the Nationalist Conservative Conference. That is the Nationalist Conservative Movement Conference is happening in Washington DC. As we speak, some of the featured speakers from politics, Josh Hawley and Ted Cruz, and from the world of academia, Danine, who is a big anti-liberal in the positive sense, classical liberal, conservative, pro- and big-time nationalist is speaking, Yoram Chazoni, who is the organizer of the conference and the founder of a new think tank called the Edmund Book Society. Edmund Book Society is a speaker there and organizer of the conference and putting on the conference to the sponsors. I think some of you know this. I will be debating Yoram Chazoni in Austin, Texas on December 8th on the topic of conservatism versus individualism. And that's great because usually if I debate conservatives, they will argue about whether conservatism is consistent with individualism. At least we've got that off the side. He's acknowledged that it's not now the question really is what's better, collectivism or individualism. So it's a fundamental basic debate. So I'm looking forward to that debate on December 8th. Hopefully some of you will attend if you're in Austin, if you're in the area, or if you want to just come and see a debate and come to the new hub of objectivism in Austin, Texas, please do so. That'll be December 8th. And as I get more information for you, I will get it out there. This conference is a little different than last time. It is trying. And I think Yoram Chazoni told me this. I speak to him. And this conference is definitely trying to build a bigger tent. Last year's nationalists kind of national conservative conference was very nationalist and very, very, very outside of kind of the old line mainstream conservative movement. This time they've tried to bring a few people in that are a little better and a little bit less nationalist. So you know, but Ayan Hussie Ali, for example, who's mixed? Ayan Hussie Ali, as much as I admire her, as much as I respect her, is very mixed philosophically. But she'll be there. There will be some other people who are fairly good, who will be there, but they will still be in the minority. Most of the people there are going to be pretty bad people from my perspective, collectivists. And that really is the theme. It is an attempt to divorce conservatism from individualism and to establish conservatism clearly unequivocally as a collectivist movement. So it's the future of the liberty movement. The future of the liberty movement is anti-liberty. Yes, that'll work. Contradictions don't work. National conservatism is not liberty. National conservatism is anti-liberty. If liberty is individual liberty, individual freedom, nationalist conservatism is anti-individual, as the debate conservatism versus individualism suggests. That's a title that Yoram Khazoni suggested. He acknowledges that. So no, it might be the future of the anti-left movement, but it certainly is not the future of the liberty movement. There is no liberty in the national conservative movement. It's anti-liberty. It's just anti-liberty that's not leftist anti-liberty. All right, so let's talk about the world of the military in a free society. Michael, thank you for the first question and a good one instead of yesterday was 10 questions, $5 each, at least. And then a couple of 20. But today you start off with $50. That's fantastic. Thank you, Michael. I appreciate that. So I'll get to your question after we have a discussion about the military. And given that it's about force, I think your question is going to be relevant to that. So let's start with a discussion of what a free society looks like and what a free society is focused on and what the world of the government is in a free society. And then we need to think about, OK, well, within that context of the role of government in a free society, what role specifically? What is the specific purpose of a military? And then how should a military function? How should it be funded? You know, how do they find troops? Where do they get arms and technologies? And in what circumstances they're deployed and what purpose do they serve? So what is a free society? Well, a free society is a society in which the government, the institution of government, is there to protect individual rights. It's not to pursue other agendas. It's not to enhance the well-being of their so-called common good. It's not to bring about different projects to improve a lot of these people or those people or to have industrial policy or to protect American trade or to protect American business from competition. It's not to control, to regulate. It is the job of the government is to help define the procedures of objective law, to help define the way in which property rights get applied. And then it's there to protect those property rights by the use of an objective procedure, which is necessary. The law has to present an objective way of criminal law finding evidence in civil law, defining what a contract is and what a contract violation A lot of that is on the books today. There's a lot of good law on the books today. And there's a lot of probably more bad law than there's good law anymore, but there used to be a lot. There is good law on the books. A lot of that law, defining the process, defining the objectivity, defining property rights, all of this is part of the role of government in a free society. All in the aim of one cause. And that is the protection of individual rights. And what does that mean? Just a quick refresher. What that means is the protection of your mind, all of our freedom as individuals, to use our mind in pursuit of our values, to pursue rational values in pursuit of our happiness. That's the purpose of government. It's to protect our actions. From what? From coercion, from force, from the intervention of others. It's to protect us. But to protect us, it has to have a whole legal system. It's not just a bunch of policemen running around, a military running around. There have to be laws and procedures and process, an objective process by which those laws are implemented. And I get to that in relation to the military because this is crucial to the military as well. It's not just that there's an army. The libertarians like to think, oh, it's just a bunch of police forces. They're just a bunch of militaries. And they figure out what to do. Oh, there has to be an objective process and how they act. What is the scope of their actions and how we define their actions and in what circumstances they act? And in this context, it is up to a legislature to define in a free society under what circumstances the military will be used. So for example, why do we have a military and not just police forces? Well, the primary role of a military is to protect us from external threats, from threats of other militaries. Militaries tend to have a lot of people. They have to have big guns. It is not something a police force can engage in. It requires a different type of weapon, different type of training. It often involves the projection of force outside of our own borders. Indeed, that is the ideal for a military not to fight a war within our borders because we've been invaded, but to project it outwards and to fight it on other people's land. Lot less damage to your own people if that is done. So the role of the military is the protection of the individual rights and property of American citizens if we're talking about America. It's the use of the kind of force only a military can master in order to protect it from threats that emanate from outside the border of the United States. Now, for example, here is a question that a legislature would have to deal with and you would have to think objectively about how to structure it. Is there ever a role for the military inside the borders of a country? Is there ever a role for the military in bolstering the police, for example, in dealing with terrorist threats inside a country? Should terrorist threats inside a country be dealt with by special units of the police, special SWAT teams that are trained to deal with terrorist threats? Or should it be by special forces, SEAL teams from the military? Under what conditions, if you say the military can handle it, under what conditions would a military be appropriate? The size of the problem, the sophistication of the terrorists, I would argue the military should not be involved inside the country, with one exception we'll get to it. You know, the police is responsible for problems inside the country, including threats, including terrorism, kidnappings, hijackings. If it's inside the borders of the United States, that is not a military issue. What about mass uprisings? Like we saw last year with Antifa and BLM, riots in the streets, is there a role for the military in circumstances like that? And I think here it's very tricky and it's very dangerous. And one would have to put together if one wanted to use the military. One would have to put together a very careful process by which one could deploy the military inside one's own borders. Because again, the military is not equipped, not trained to do things like due process. There's no such thing as due process at war. Rules of evidence, rules of engagement are very different, particularly in the military. In a rational place, should a military be used domestically? I think it would have to be super unusual. It would have to have congressional support. It would have to have the president's support. And one could argue that maybe, given how unusual it was, it might actually have to have support from the Supreme Court in terms of, is it consistent with the Constitution? Because it's so easy to use the military as a power grab. It's so easy to use the military internally because of the kind of force, the kind of power the military projects. It is too dangerous to give that kind of power to any branch of government. And maybe to use the military within the borders of the United States, you would need all three branches of government to give it a thumbs up. But these are the kind of issues that in a truly free society, you would have to work through. And even in the United States today, there is a law that allows the president to deploy the military under certain circumstances. I fear, like most of our laws today, it's not particularly good. Now, the United States has the National Guard, which is an unusual kind of mechanism. The National Guard is deployed often. And the National Guard is associated with the states. It's almost like a state militia. But it's actually functions, at least in its deployments overseas, under the authority of the military. And you can imagine such a thing as the National Guard to deal with riots and get out of hand or massive crime waves that the police somehow get overrun by. But then the National Guard, if that is the case, that you could use the National Guard for something like that, then the National Guard would have to get the right kind of training basically in police, in policing. Again, you don't treat your domestic criminals the same way you treat an external force, somebody in another country. Why? Why is an American, I don't know, throwing a firebomb at a local restaurant or rioting, throwing rocks at police? Why is that different than the way you treat a military force that you're fighting or even a terrorist force that you're fighting? What's the difference? I mean, the difference should be, the difference is that the role of the federal government is to protect the individual rights of Americans. And if somebody is an American throwing a rock or doing whatever, there is due process. There's still American citizens under American law. They still need to be treated based on American law. You are not responsible for the citizens of other countries. You're not responsible for protecting their rights. You don't want to violate their rights. But you're not responsible for protection of their rights. The responsibility for the protection of their rights is their government. The US government is responsible for protection of American rights. The police can arrest. The police have a whole process of arresting. They have a process of getting evidence. They have a process of bringing somebody to trial. The military is not trained in any of that. So if one lives, and hopefully when we get to a free society, when we get to a free society, we will live in a world in which people are not rioting in the streets. People are not burning down stuff. People are not behaving like barbarians. I don't think we could have a free society if we lived in a world where there was a significant number of people like that. But so generally, I think in a free society, the military, it would be very, very rare that the military would be deployed domestically. And I think the only circumstances where that would be appropriate was if there was a risk of a civil war, if there was a risk of an uprising, if there was a risk that the threat brewing out there was going to overthrow the government. Only then I think should the military be deployed. Again, in a free society today, it's a complete mess. But I think the laws would have clear categories, clear distinctions, clear distinctions between who deals with law and order inside the United States and who deals with that outside. And this is true as well for the intelligence agencies associated with the military, the CIA, military intelligence, the national, all the various intelligence agencies. Their focus is outside. Their focus is not to monitor Americans. When it comes to suspicious Americans, people who are you worried about, people who might commit crimes within America, the role there is for the FBI. The role there is for the police. And the police would have to develop their own intelligence capabilities to deal with internal threats. And of course, there would have to be coordination between the FBI and the CIA and whatever other intelligence agencies vis-a-vis threats that are domestic, that are inspired or motivated or funded or supported or planned by foreign entities. Yes, the NSA, thank you for reminding me. So first thing to say about the military is that its focus, 99.9% of its effort, is focused on outside the United States, focused on eliminating threats to the lives and property, objective threats to the lives and property of Americans, defending those rights, protecting those rights, and making sure that Americans are not threatened outside, from forces outside the country. Outside the country. That means the military must engage in military action, in wars, in special ops, in whatever it takes to destroy those who would harm the life and property of Americans, but primarily to protect the nation from people who would invade and would terrorize, kill Americans. Now, how does that play out? How does that play out? And let me say, a military is subject to the authority of the civilian government. The military is a branch of government. It's not a separate entity. John, I'll get to that question, promise. So it is dependent on the executive branch and on Congress. But for example, it's very clear in the Constitution, and I think true in a free society, that Congress is the one to declare war. Congress is to dictate military's action. You know, the president, once Congress declares war, it is the president who is the commander-in-chief, who now is responsible for the strategy, is now responsible for the execution of that war. But the declaration of war, the choice of the target, the aim, the goal is Congresses. And the decision about when have Americans' rights been violated by a foreign entity? When is something considered an act of war? Who is responsible for a terrorist attack? Who should be penalized? Who should we go after? Is not a decision made by the military. The military, through its intelligence branches, supplies information. But it is, at least originally, the job of Congress to make the decision about which wars and how to define that war. I think it is incumbent on Congress to define not only the enemy, but to define what success victory means. Endless wars cannot exist, should not exist, should never be engaged in. There has to be a metric for success that defines when the military can come home. So in a rational society, 9-11 would have happened. Congress would have met. They would have gotten information from, you know, of course, the president would have the authority to do what was necessary on the spur of the moment to defend Americans. But immediately, as soon as it was feasible, Congress would meet. They would hear testimony from the executive branch, from the military, about who the enemy was, who attacked us, who is responsible. They would declare war. They would provide the president with the authority to manage that war. And they would clearly articulate what victory means. So for example, 9-11, a rational Congress would meet, declare war on all the supporters of Islamic totalitarianism, on radical Islam. They would have made a clear list, authorize the president to attack all organizations, all entities, and all governments that supported, funded Islamic totalitarianism. They would have listed Iran and Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan as primary targets. But given the president authority to come back to them with some subsidiary targets, they would have listed Al-Qaeda and a variety of other Islamic organizations from the Muslim Brotherhood to Islamic Jihad to Hamas to Hezbollah as all enemies of the United States, therefore all included in this war. And they would guide the president basically to destroy the capacity of these countries, to deploy, to engage in war against the United States, to destroy the capacity of these terrorists, to engage in war against the United States. They would ask the president or the demand for the president to do this quickly, efficiently, as cheaply in human lives, American human lives as possible, and leave it up to him in terms of the strategy and the implementation and all of that. The United States then would have basically crushed the Taliban in Afghanistan, crushed Al-Qaeda, killed bin Laden within days, killed Mullah Omar in the entire leadership of the Taliban, left whatever troops had been on the ground. Not many would have left. It would have then presented automatums to the governments of Saudi Arabia and the government of Iran. And at the same time, given a green light it's allies like Israel to do whatever was necessary to destroy whatever elements of Islamism they could deal with, and that would be it. Oh, they'd have to deal with Saudi Arabia probably through threats and intimidation, probably through, and that would be that would be what the military would do and they would come home, wouldn't leave troops in Afghanistan, on Iraq, never would have gone to Iraq, join Iran, crush the enemy, come home. The actual strategy of the military would have been designed by the general, approved by the president, and executed. In a rational society, the military is encouraged to deploy whatever resources they have in order to win the war quickly, effectively, and at minimal casualties to one own side. In that world, there is no such thing as just war theory or any other type of restraint on military power. The military's job is not to build countries, it's not to bring democracy to the world, it's not to be the policeman of the world. The military should not be deployed as a police force in the United States, it should not be deployed as a police force outside the United States. The United States military should be deployed to crush its enemies and come home. The military could be small, but super lethal, super effective at destroying stuff. You don't need lawyers, psychologists, political theorists, because you're not trying to build anything. The role of the military is not to build, the role of the military is not to create, the role of the military is to destroy. It's to flatten, it's to crush. Now that would breed a different type of soldier in terms of the people who would wanna be there, that would be the different type of general, completely different type of general that we have today. But that would be the role of the military and it would be the role of the military guided from the top down, from Congress to the president to the military generals. This is the expectation. It'll be lethal, destructive, and effective at killing and destroying the enemy. And if you do that, by the way, once or twice, nobody will bug you. It's like a bully. If you beat him up once, and by the way, we have the strongest, most powerful military in human history, we could beat anybody. If you beat him up once, thoroughly enough, he'll never come at you again. He'll go pick on some other weak, pathetic person. He's not gonna come after you. So, and your purpose is not to bring peace to the world, although you will, if you do this well, your purpose is not to bring democracy, not to be policemen, your purpose is to protect the lives and property of Americans. That's the role of the military in a free society. It's to crush our enemies, our enemies, real enemies, enemies that threaten the lives of Americans, enemies that threaten the viability of American state. All right, we don't need military bases overseas. We don't need military bases on 120 different countries. What we need is military bases in the United States and maybe a few strategic places in the world where we can deploy the kind of might that is necessary to deter and then defeat whatever enemies we might have. And if you're interested in any particular, particularly countries, particular threats, please ask in the Super Chat. Super Chat is open, is available for you to ask about any of these things. I got about, let's see, how are we doing in Super Chat? Not bad. Not bad for the first half hour, but behind. So, remember our goal is $600. We're probably at about $180, well, close to $200. So there's still $400 to go to achieve our goals and it's too bad that Ali is not here to help me out, help me out, to monitor the Super Chat and to get us all in line. Some of the tricky parts of figuring out when to deploy the military is when does one protect the assets of Americans? What rises to the need for military intervention? For example, when the Iranians nationalized oil for American companies, when the Saudis and others did the same thing, did that require military intervention? Now, I believe the answer is yes. I believe the United States should have, but why is it because oil is so important? Yes. Oil is a strategic commodity owned by American companies and French and English and so on. And it was being stolen not just by individuals, but stolen by the governments. Governments that philosophically, ideologically were never gonna be our allies, not really, not deep down. And therefore it would have been a disgrace. There was a disgrace. To allow them to have these assets. I mean, think about the Middle East today. If the oil in the Middle East was not all of it, but a big chunk of it was owned by American companies, it would completely have changed the Middle East. Imagine an American that was stood up to nationalization. Imagine America that stood up to the taking of its own embassy. I mean, God, I mean, talk about a fiasco. Imagine a government that would have allowed the French and the British to claim for themselves the Suez Canal because it wasn't the Egyptians. Not in the name of colonialism, but in the name of property rights. It wasn't the British government and the French government that owned the Suez Canal, but it was French and British companies. But that is a fascinating alternative universe that unfortunately we did not live through and there's no indication we're going to live through. But that's the kind of idea of protecting property rights. Imagine a government that took seriously its responsibility to protect Americans around the world and not let them be abused by foreign governments. I mean, within reason. Within, imagine a country that didn't allow, this is another function of the military. Part of what the military is there for in terms of outside American borders is to protect the property of Americans. An example of that would be to secure the shipping lanes, to secure the ability of Americans to trade freely with whoever they wanted. This includes ships coming to America, going from America or carrying an American flag. And there would be a lot more ships carrying an American flag if we didn't regulate the industry as much as we do. But imagine, you know, a military then would have the responsibility of being out there on the seas and protecting the shipping lanes. So you remember the Somali pirates that seemed to have lasted years. It could have been dealt with in a day or two. You take whatever, US fleet is in the Indian Ocean, you bring it to the coast of Somalia. You spend two days bombarding the villages on the coast and you basically tell them, if you continue with the piracy, we will continue bombarding your coastline. You stop it and you stop it now. If you're willing to engage with, if the military is deployed properly, threats disappear quickly. And the consequence of that is, the consequence of that is peace. The consequence of that is admiration for you by the rest of the world. Not hatred, but admiration. And ultimately the rest of the world adjusting to your values instead of the world in which we live in today, where America is adjusting, accommodating, compromising with the values of anybody and everybody out there. They are the standard, they are the good guys. We, God forbid, stand out for our own values, for our own rights. Brad, thank you. That's very generous, I appreciate that. Brad, all right, let's see, all right. So I know John had a question here related to the topic. How should a properly trained senior military officer deal with a political leadership that follows just war philosophy and thus puts troops at unnecessary risk? I mean, I think a military officer should resign. I mean, look, he is subordinate. There is a constitution, the constitution clearly places the responsibility on the civilian authority to determine the engagement of wars and how wars will be fought. The authority lies with Congress, the authority lies with the president. It doesn't with the generals. The generals can't ignore Congress. They can speak up, they can try and convince, they can try and change. But at the end of the day, if that all fails, they need to leave. They need to quit. They can't be part of a world in which they are sending their troops whom they are directly responsible for with rules of engagement that contradict everything they know about how to win wars and what is necessary to win those wars. But let me say this, and I think this is important. Most generals agree with the rules of engagement. Most generals created the rules of engagement. Indeed, to a large extent, the rules of engagement were developed in West Point, not in Congress. Last time I looked at the West Point curriculum, Michael Waltser, who is the philosopher of just war theory, the guy who wrote a book on just war theory, the guy who's advocated, and again, written books about this. He teaches at West Point. He's not some external factor. He is part of the machinery of training future generals. I don't think Patton could exist in the American military today. MacArthur, they wouldn't find a home. Would Sherman be allowed to survive in the American military? Would he want to? Would he resign? I mean, certainly not a Patton. I love, I don't know if you've seen the movie Patton, I highly recommend it. With Jotsie Scott playing Patton, it's a brilliant performance of a portrayal of a brilliant, but crazy guy. Patton was a little crazy. And there's a speech he gives to the troops in the movie. And I think this is tailored on a real speech that Patton made. And one of his, one of the statements in the speeches, it's not your job to die for your country. It's your job to make that other son of a bitch die for his. Now that is true, absolutely true. You do not send troops into battle to die for their country. You send troops into battle to make the other guy die for whatever cause he's fighting for. Your troops are supposed to live. Your troops are supposed to destroy if you're interested in Patton as a warrior. I recommend Victor Davis Hansen's, I forget the name of the book, but there's a book in which he has three great warriors, Sherman, Patton, and a Greek warrior, whose name I forget. But it's an excellent book. Much of, a lot of what I know about military history I know from Victor Davis Hansen. I disagree with Victor Davis Hansen. Emphatically about philosophy and about certainly about his politics today. But in terms of military history, I think it's brilliant. There's another book of his about why the West, why the West won its battles versus the East. And one of the claims he makes is that the West won because the West was willing to engage in total war. The West was willing to eviscerate the enemy. And understood that it wasn't just the soldiers who were part of eviscerating the enemy. So I recommend Victor Davis Hansen's book. I definitely recommend the movie. I think the movie is really good. Yes, it portrays Patton as a bit of a nut, but he probably was a bit of a nut. And no, I don't think the movie portrays Bradley as a hero at all. They are seen after seen after seen where Patton's judgment is for superiority Bradley's judgment or Eisenhower's judgment. Whether it's obvious from the movie that Patton should have led the invasion on D-Day, it's obvious from the movie that Patton should have invaded Czechoslovakia to prevent the communists from going there. Bradley stops them from doing it. It's obvious from the movie the unbelievable ability of Patton to pivot in the middle of his marching towards Germany, to pivot, I think it's northwards in order to save the 101 division, the airborne division who was surrounded by the Nazis and to pivot on a dime, a tank battalion or whatever it was to pivot, to destroy the Germans. I mean, it was just his genius as a military thinker comes across, I think, very well in the movie even if he's made to seem like somewhat of a crook. So if you're not gonna read a lot of books on Patton, the movie is not a bad introduction to him. But I do recommend Victor Davis Hansen. But some of the scenes and reading up a little bit about what Patton did in World War II, Patton's ability to lead, Patton's ability to see strategically, Patton's ability is truly stunning, truly stunning. All right. All right, we're getting some super chat questions here but I'm gonna start with the ones that are relevant to the topic, particularly the ones with the big dollars relevant to the topic. So let me see, yes, from Brad, $100, thank you. For no overseas basis, IC value and NAVA basis in Japan and the Western Pacific to allow us to quickly address issues in that area of AOR, four farm home. Similarly, with our Navy base in Rota, Spain, I know troops in South Korea shouldn't be there but where's the line drawn? I mean, the line is drawn based on military strategy. I mean, the line is, it's not for philosopher, it's not for somebody like me to say where the basis should be. Yes, if you're wanting to protect the shipping lanes, you probably need a base somewhere between Japan or the Philippines, we used to have a base in the Philippines and that was very useful. The shipping lanes get very tight around the South China Sea. There are a lot of islands there, there are a lot of pirates there. Of course, China has claim over much of that sea and China's a real threat in that area but if you're there to protect the shipping lanes you need some presence in the Western Pacific, in the Southwestern Pacific, in either Japan or the Philippines and it's up to you to negotiate that and to find an appropriate ally. You don't want to base, it's not clear that a base in the Philippines if the Philippines is not a true ally is the right thing. We're at a base in Japan where Japan is a free country and an ally is a good idea. I think the same thing in Europe, a base in Spain or a base in Italy or a base in Israel for the Navy are all appropriate because all those countries are allies of the United States. A base in Turkey is not. We have today military bases, we have Air Force bases in Turkey but it's not appropriate because they're not our ally. A base in Australia might be a good idea, right? But you don't need many, right? The point is you don't need many. Not with the ability of the US Army to project force. What with the ability of an aircraft carrier group to be out in the middle of the ocean for very long periods of time because of nuclear power that fuels. Maybe some fueling stations but you don't need that many bases. I'd say again, but this is an issue of strategy, not an issue of philosophy. Something in the Western Pacific and something in Europe. You might need a base in Germany to be able to project force into the Middle East if the Middle East is a problem. You might need a base in Italy if you consider Russia a threat to the United States. I don't think we need troops in Korea but again, we have to decide are we gonna defend Taiwan? If we defend Taiwan, having troops in South Korea is not a bad idea because then it's quick over to Taiwan but maybe it's better to have the troops in Japan which I think, if I remember my geography, is closer to Taiwan and by not having troops in South Korea we don't give the world and the South Koreans the idea that we will defend them because we shouldn't. They can defend themselves. Rich country, North Korea is pathetic. South Koreans should be able to defend themselves. We shouldn't be there. Taiwan, depending on how you view China and depending on what happens with China, Taiwan could be very, very important to containing China. But that depends on where do you view China as a real threat to the United States from a military perspective. Remember, Hein-Ren did not view Japan as a military threat to the United States and was against the embargoes on selling Japanese, this is before World War II, before Pearl Harbor. Steel, I don't think I agree with Hein-Ren on that one. Japan was committing atrocities all over the Pacific. It was clearly an authoritarian regime with expansionist ambitions. I'm not sure I agree with Hein-Ren that we could have stayed out of that and we should have continued to trade with them. At some point you have to draw a line. So exactly where you put troops is hard to tell but for example, today we have troops in 120 different countries. Why do we have troops in Africa? All over Africa. Now, you could argue because they're Muslim terrorists. Okay, but those Islamic terrorists threat to the United States and if they are, then we should have for a while a lot more troops there, destroy them and then come home. But having a bunch of special forces running around Africa, helping local forces or whatever, no, that's not what Americans do. If it's a threat to the US, destroy annihilate the threat. If it's not a threat to the United States, then it's the countries there, it's their problems. Nigeria's problem, it's Kenya and Uganda's problem, it's Tanzania's problem. It's not the problem of the United States. So you would have to define region by region. You'd have to define, look, I don't know, if India developed into a potential threat to the United States, then the US might want some bases in South Asia or in Eastern Africa to be able to monitor, control, be prepared for whatever threat India posed to the United States. So you'd have to think about it strategically, thoughtfully and only have bases with allied countries and only consider allied countries, I think countries that are free. So thank you, Brad. Thanks for the question. Oops, what did I do? Did I delete something? Nope, I didn't. Okay, let's see. We have a $50 question, but that's not on this. Okay, let's just take some questions on the topic. What kind of military assets, technologies, weapons, soldiers, do you think are the most crucial for the defense of the United States? I think the most crucial asset is a nuclear deterrent. We need to have sophisticated, stealthy, in other words, missiles that cannot be intercepted and pointed in all directions to every potential enemy possible. So what we need primarily is a nuclear arsenal that is modern, sophisticated and to a large extent invisible and protectable for our enemies. Beyond that, what we need are, I think in the world in which we live today, where we're probably not getting engaged in large scale ground operations. What I think we need is the ability to deploy rapid force troops quickly and effectively to areas where they're needed. We need to provide them with the kind of weapons and technology that can destroy the enemy quickly and effectively, whether that is big bombs, precision bombs, whether that is bombs that destroy the electronic capabilities of the enemy, whether, again, a lot of that is specific to the military and specific to the times. Different types are gonna require the military to be constructed in different ways. So I did wanna talk a little bit about the funding of the military and where the military gets its weapons. So let's talk about where the military gets its weapons. To me, this is the trickiest issue, trying to project kind of an ideal free society. Where does the military get its weapons? Who develops the weapons for the military? You could argue that the military should develop its own weapons because it's not clear how you create an industry and how you create an industry where there's competition because that's what you ideally want is competition for the deployment of the weapons. So do you have competition to develop nuclear weapons or technologies that guide nuclear missiles or missiles? But then who else is the buyer except the US military? Who do you allow these companies to sell the weapons to? Again, the tricky questions. I think you would allow them to be sold to allies and one of the jobs that the US government would be to define what weapons can be sold to whom. Again, libertarians don't like this because libertarians say these companies should be allowed to sell weapons whoever they want. They should develop whatever weapons they want, sell them to whoever they want. Set individuals, private police forces, private militaries, governments of any country that can afford to buy them. I say absolutely not. That, again, is a violation of the principle that the goal of the government is the protection of Americans' individual rights. Selling weapons to an enemy of the United States is a violation of that. Us selling weapons to Saudi Arabia. Us selling weapons and what is us, American companies selling to these places? No, so to me it's an equivocal. The government has a crucial role in defining to whom weapons can be sold. This is part of what Congress would have to do. What kind of weapons can be sold to American citizens? And then what kind of weapons can be sold outside of America and to whom? American government shouldn't be financing those weapons for other countries. And then at least you can envision a competitive industry evolving. Try not just to sell to the American government having one customer but having multiple customers. But it would have to be only the best of allies and the most solid of allies. And then in terms of funding, funding for the military would primarily be voluntary. It'd primarily through contributions, voluntary taxes if you will. So it would be people writing checks to the government to support the military because they wanted the protection because they thought it was valuable because they valued the protection of their own individual rights. I don't think there would ever be a problem to raise enough money to fund a military. Particularly again, not a military, not involved in democracy building, not involved in CRT within the military, not involved in, but involved with one clear unequivocal goal, the protection of individual rights, the destruction of the enemies, and that's it. A military like that is a lot cheaper than the military is today, a lot cheaper. And also a military that has to abide by rules of engagement of a modern military by just war theory, by tying its own soldiers' arms behind their backs, much more expensive. Many more troops die, many more sophisticated weapons have to be designed to facilitate just war theory. But if you believe in using whatever force is necessary to defeat the enemy, weapons could be a lot simpler and a lot cheaper. Can you explain the difference between a military court and a civil court? Jennifer asks. I mean there are two, I mean, I'm not an expert on this, but there are two separate issues revolving about a military court. One is the trying of non-American, what they call foreign combatants. People who are threat to the United States that you have captured, and now you have to decide what to do with them. And a military court has different standards of evidence than it should because a battle scene is very different than a crime scene. And it has different procedures and it has a different way of dealing and dealing with those prisoners. Prisoners of war do not have the same status as criminals. They do not have the same civil rights as criminals. They're not civil citizens of the United States. They're not protected by the laws of the United States. You still treat them by some standard, which has to be defined, but that is defined separately. And this is another thing Congress would have to do. You would have to define what military courts do, what's their jurisdiction, how do they treat enemy combatants? How do they treat prisoners of war? You don't wanna do that through treaties. You wanna have a legal standard within your own countries. There need to be laws written for this. There's another sense and that is that military courts deal with criminals within the military, whether they're criminals because they're just ordinary criminals, but they're servicemen and the crimes have happened between servicemen or they're criminals in the sense that in what they did, they disobeyed orders. They did inappropriate things as part of their responsibilities in action. The jurisdiction is different. And then, to me, it's this one's a difficult one. If you're trying a soldier for different things, to what extent should the law be different than the civilian law? Should the legal system in terms of evidence in terms of should be different? There's a contractual relationship between a, all soldiers should be voluntary. There should be no draft since there are some kind of contractual relationship that articulates what it means to have a military court. I don't know. These are things that have to be worked out. This is what legal philosophers need to think about in this context. And this is again, it's going to require new laws and whether the laws we have in the books today, whether those laws are right, I don't know. I don't know. I doubt it just because none of the other laws we have is very good. Or take another issue, for example, should women serve in combat? Well, there's only one standard by which that decision needs to be made. That is, does it enhance our ability to win? The only standard by which anybody should serve in any unit in the military is, are they an asset? Are they a liability for winning? For doing what is necessary? So, whoops, what did I do? Again, I would, nobody would have any business in terms of, yes, women should be in the military. No, it's a straightforward question. Should women be in the trenches in battle or not? I mean, I think the answer is no, as somebody who served in the Israeli military, somebody who met his wife in the Israeli military, but women in Israel don't serve in combat units, never have, maybe in the war of independence, where there was no option, basically anybody who could hold the rifle served in a combat unit. But women were never part of the Israeli military in combat, and I don't think they should ever should be. But my opinion doesn't matter. The question is, does any specific women add or not? That's it. And then there are the units in the military intelligence, certainly women should serve there, and Ian says, military police, whatever. Women can be in a variety of different roles, but combat, it's a question, do they add? All right, let's see. That's off topic. Is there an objective line where a country that takes away its people's rights should be either ignored or invaded? Yeah, the objective line is, does that country pose an objective threat to you? If it doesn't, it shouldn't be invaded. Not because it has sovereignty. Not because you should be worried about the citizens of that country getting hood because you invade them. Not because you recognize this sovereignty or because you recognize the government or because you, the only reason you wouldn't invade another country is because what about your own soldiers are gonna die? Your soldiers are there, and this is an important point, your soldiers are there for one reason and one reason only, the protection of the individual rights of Americans. If this country does not pose a threat to America, objective threat, a threat provable, then you do not invade it because the treasure, the money that is being voluntarily given to the military through voluntary taxation has been given by people who gave it so that the military can protect them, not to protect the citizens of some other country. So you should never invade a country unless it is a threat to you. Are you familiar with the public's reaction to the stealing of the oil at the time? I am not, actually. I don't know what the public's reaction. My guess is it was basically very little reaction, but I'm not sure. Let's see, James asked, why does America subsidize other nations' militaries? Do you think America will ever win a war again? How can economics be used to win wars? I don't think America should subsidize other militaries other than if it wants to buy technology from them or if it wants to test out its own military systems with them. So let's say America hasn't been in a war in a long time. It hasn't used this new tank that it's developed in a long time. And let's say Israel gets into war periodically, less so with tanks these days, but let's say it did, you could say, okay, Israel, we're gonna subsidize your tanks. And then when you go to war using our tanks, we want the data. We want you to tell us what worked, what didn't work, what was good, what was not good about them so that we can improve our own tanks. So you could imagine something like that, but there would have to be a clear and direct incentive for the United States if it was subsidizing another nation's military or another nation was an ally to the United States and it was at the front fighting the wars. So for example, you could imagine in World War II subsidizing the British because they were fighting the same enemy we were, they didn't have the money to do it, we had to help them out. But it was basically helping us. Do you think America will ever win a war again? Ever is a long time, but there's no indication that Americans can win a war anytime soon, no matter who the president is. How can economics be used to win wars? It cannot. Economics can not be used to win wars, not hot wars and cold wars all you could, all you do is be successful and the bad guys will not be successful. They will collapse. James writes, Jack Tran's video, China master plan for world domination shows that the US is its greatest enemy. Based on the video, how do you handle an enemy that only attracts attacks in the shadow? How are media and psychological warfare used in a free society? So I'm skeptical of videos like this. I haven't watched Jack Tran's video. I'll try and watch it now that you pointed it out, but I'm skeptical. I don't think China has a master plan for world domination. I think China has a master plan for dominating its region. I think China has a master plan for becoming rich and successful. But I don't know that China wants world domination. And a lot of the stories you hear about, it's what it does in Africa and in Asia and all these places. It's a mixture of truth and falsehood. So I, you know, you should, don't believe everything you read. Don't believe everything you see in video, including on this one. China, the best way to fight China is to be free and rich. The best way to control China is to let them, you know, implode, which I think they will. Because China, as it becomes more authoritarian, will become less rich. I'm not worried about China. So I think the best thing we can do about China is ignore it. And now I've said already, we need to bring our ambassador back. We need to shut down the embassy. We should not have internet relations with them. We should send the UN packing to Caracas or to Beijing. We should completely separate from China as a political entity. And I think if we do that, our economic interests will dissolve as well. Companies will not want to be in China without the protection of American diplomacy. Companies will then move to other countries, hopefully not back to the US, but hopefully to other countries that are more friendly, maybe India, maybe Thailand, maybe other, who knows? Maybe the Philippines, maybe Malaysia, maybe, hard to tell, right? But China's in big trouble. Anybody who looks at China has to acknowledge that the Chinese economy's growth has slowed dramatically. They've still got hundreds of millions of people in poverty. They can't bring them out of poverty with the economy not growing as fast as it used to. China has a shrinking population. They are gonna suffer significantly in the next few decades from their one child only policy. But even their new two, three, four children policy, Chinese women do not wanna have more than one child now. So they've got a shrinking demographic as do many advanced countries in the world. They've got a lot of minority groups inside China who don't like the haunts necessarily. They are much more likely to see elements that want to secede from China than the United States. So China's got a lot of problems internally. They've got a huge amount of debt. They've printed a massive amount of yuan's. They're holding the value of their currency up if they actually floated it or linked it to gold or something the currency would be worth a lot less. There's a lot of zombie companies in China. So China's not in great shape. And you need to deal with them when they are threat on the things that they are threat on. So for example, if China hacks American computers and you know it's the Chinese government doing this, then the United States need to figure out a way to hack into the Chinese government's computers and shut them down for as long of a period as possible. And every time they bring them up, shut them down again. That is, if China wants to play that kind of game, we need to be a hundred times better than them at that. So just shut them down. So if they attack American interests, counter attack, make it clear to them that this will not be tolerated. Make it clear to them that they will suffer the consequence of their actions. So it's, you know, America in combating China, for example, could have a balanced budget, could start paying off its debt and therefore not need the Chinese to be constantly buying our debt. If the Chinese stopped buying our debt and stopped bringing money into the United States, the trade deficit would go away as well. So the US just has to have a much bigger, more substantial strategy vis-à-vis China. We have no strategy today. We have nothing. We have no clue what to do with China. But that's because we think in conventional terms. And we think trade is a problem. Trade is not the problem. Everything else is the problem. Trade is the one thing that's not a problem. James continues, I guess, the book is Stealth War, How China Took Over While America's Elite Slept by Robert Spaulding. Again, I think all of that is exaggerated. China has not taken over, you know, if the United States actually had a foreign policy. And I'm completely on board with criticizing American foreign policy. But it over-specifies the significance of China and it over-emphasizes what they do in foreign countries. And it underestimates America's capacity if America had a foreign policy. But America's never, since World War II, America's had no consistent principle of foreign policy. None whatsoever. Not at any administration. Not Trump, not Obama, not Bush, not Eisenhower, not even Reagan. There's not being a consistent foreign policy for the United States of America if we had one. And we engaged with the world with one. China wouldn't have a chance. China wouldn't have a chance. But China's not the problem. I keep telling you that China's not the problem. We are the problem. I know, Trump told us that China's the problem, immigrants are the problem, Mexicans are the problem. And all these writers leverage off of that, of fear. But the people we should really be afraid of are our university professors and our politicians and our intellectuals and our people demonstrating and rioting in the streets. And our regulatory agencies, we are the problem. And until we are willing to face ourselves and to face the problem we represent, nothing will change, nothing's gonna be any better. My dean says that I'm wrong about the Israeli military. There are plenty of mixed battalions and artillery tanks and even foot soldiers battalions just for women. Maybe that's true today. It's news to me. I was in the tank corps. There were no women in the tank corps. They taught us how to use tanks. They were in the school, in training. But they were never in combat. Never in Israeli history has a woman gone in a tank into combat, as far as I know. They weren't in our units on the border. They were training us in units back home. They never went on real training drills, live fire training drills with us out in the desert, out up in the Golan Heights, at least not in my days. And that was true back then for artillery, for tanks. And there were never, in those days, there were never, they're pretty ones, they're pretty good. I don't know if they're pretty good. I don't know, and I don't know if anybody knows, because I don't know if we can get objective information because everything is tilted to presenting them as good because men and women are supposed to be equal. So, but they're not, they're just not. I don't believe women broadly, they might be individual women, but women broadly make good soldiers or should be in combat because I also don't think they have a good effect on men. Women have the effect on men that men want to protect them. And that's not good in combat. So it could be that the Israeli military has changed, but not in my day. Not a single woman in combat. I thought maybe they had helicopter pilots, but I don't think, I didn't know they had ground troops if they do good. I mean, Americans do today as well, but not many. Not many. All right, Frank asks, when watching MASH, you see how Hawkeye and others felt the Vietnam War was useless. Did Americans need to be in the Korean War? What did Rand say about it? She said that we should not have been there. I say we should not have been there. It wasn't our war. It was a war. We were there under the banner of the UN. America should never fight in a war under the banner of the UN. But we should never gone. Should never gone. Korea should have never been a war, neither should Vietnam. Korea was not a threat to the United States of America. Let me say it again. Korea and Vietnam, neither one of them, were a threat to the rights of Americans. They were not a threat to the United States of America. Therefore we should not have fought in them. And I and Rand thought that both Vietnam and Korea were wrong wars. For America to be involved in. Once we were in, we should have won. But we shouldn't have been in them. All right. If you guys have any other military related questions, now is the time to ask them. What are we up in terms of super chat questions? Anybody keeping track? What, 400 and something dollars? Okay, so we're kind of short 200 bucks. So if anybody wants to step in and do 200 bucks and get us over the line, that'd be great. You can ask questions. You can ask $10, $20 questions. You can ask $450 questions. You can ask $1, $200 questions up to you. But we're about $185 short. It would be nice if we got to our target in spite of the fact that Ali is not here. So go for it. If you want military questions, that's fine. I'm gonna shift to other topics, but feel free to go back to the military or to move to other politics. John, if you have any questions that I did not cover, feel free to list them. And I'm happy to deal with them if there are any other issues relating to military force that you have, John, since this was a show you sponsored. Feel free to just list them here in the chat or in the super chat. All right, unrelated questions. Michael asks, objectivism claims you cannot control man's mind. But history has shown there are systems that have controlled man's minds. Look at Nazism, communism, religion. History shows most people are dumb and can't be controlled for long periods of time. What does it mean to control somebody else's mind? Certainly, objectivism believes that you can influence somebody else's mind. Certainly, objectivism believes that bad ideas control people's minds. But those ideas have to be chosen by the individual or defaulted on by an individual. That is, adopted by an individual because he chose not to reject them. But they're not ideas forced on the individual. They're ideas the individual chose to embrace. That's true of Nazism, communism, religion. Now, you can control people. For example, I don't know how many of the Germans were Nazis. I don't know how many of them were active Nazis, believed in it, how many of them just went along. How many of them opposed Nazism deep in their mind and still went along, how many of them went opposition completely and rejected and many of those were killed. But yeah, there's no question that ideas control people's minds and people easily adopt bad ideas. But objectivism doesn't claim that you can't control man's. You know, that's not controlling man's mind. You can't literally get, I mean, you could, I guess, if you ever watched Clockwood Orange. I mean, you can brainwash somebody and in that sense control somebody's mind. But most of these people were brainwashed. They just accepted bad ideas and ideas control man's mind. And if you accept bad ideas, you're gonna do bad things. Lee asks, just a question related to military which will get priority. Lee says, when a military trained dolphin attacks a mine, attaches a mine to an enemy ship and return for food, does this suggest even smallest of rational faculties? No, I mean, dogs do this. You can train a dog to do all kinds of tricks for a little bit of food. So they are behavioral, you know, animals, these kind of animals are behavioral. That is, they can be trained to do particular actions. An amoeba cannot be trained. A dog can be trained. So they can't just, I was, for some sophistication. But I wouldn't call it rational faculty because I don't think they have free will. I don't know that they have no free will completely but I don't think they have free will. But it's not, it's not a rational faculty. They're not conceptualizing. They're repeating a certain thing that they were taught and there's a reward. All right, that wasn't really a military question. Using a military example to sneak in a question about cognition. Okay, let's see. Matthew asks, $50 question. Love your ESG talk. Wondering what effect this is having on targeted companies. How does this affect Exxon-Achelle? Also, how are the pressure to adopt ESG applied? Like why would BlackRock push this? Why would they push this? I talked about that a little bit in the ESG talk. BlackRock pushes it because they want a virtue signal because the CEO of BlackRock wants to be invited to the cool parties. BlackRock pushes it because the CEO of BlackRock agrees with it, believes in it, sees it as a moral responsibility to push it. That's why they go for it. The rest of the question is, how has this affected it? Well, you can tell now, we're living through right now an energy shortage. Prices of oil and gas are going through the roof. And yet we're not seeing a huge rush to increase capacity, even in the United States where we could increase capacity. And I think a big reason for that is ESG. That is we're not seeing people being willing to invest and encourage Exxon and Shell and other oil companies to drill for more. We're seeing ESG over the last few years motivate these companies to invest in solar and wind technology and under invest, not invest enough resources in developing new technologies related to oil and gas. Exxon just had three anti-oil and gas people, activists elected to its board, elected to the board of directors of Exxon by ESG activists. And I think they will advocate on the board of directors of Exxon that Exxon should be divesting its oil and gas resources and investing more in alternative energy. You're seeing ESG asking companies the question of, how many minorities do you have? How many minorities do you have in the board of directors? How many minorities do you have in management? So you're seeing hiring decisions changing even at the top levels based on ESG. So I think ESG has a huge pressure. And the pressure is we won't provide you with capital unless you do this. We'll vote against you and board meetings unless you do this or shareholder meetings unless you do this. We'll put people on the board of directors or your enemies unless you do these things. So ESG is gaining traction. Now, so far that traction hasn't been that great partially because a lot of people view ESG primarily as a form of virtue signaling, not as a form of actually doing anything virtuous. But it's growing and it's gonna have more and more and more of an impact in the years to come. That's the sad thing. And it's already had a profound impact in my view on the oil and gas business and on businesses related to energy. And it's also had a profound impact on hiring. It's changed the base of hiring. We don't hire people anymore based on ability. All right, let's see, are there any $20 questions? Yes, Shelly asks, off topic. Could you explain what BlackRock is and why it wouldn't exist in a free market economy? Thanks and keep up the good work. BlackRock is a money manager. They manage money for others. So for example, you put your money into a fork 1K. That 401K, 401K is a tax deferred saving plan that usually your employer sets up for you and you put in money and often the employer will match that money. Well, somebody has to manage that 401K program. They have to make investments. They have to manage it administratively. That's what BlackRock does. More than that, there are pension plans out there. Pensions are not like 401Ks. Pensions are where the company promises you a certain cash return in the future. No matter what the stock market does, no matter how much money this money is earning in the marketplace. You've promised X amount of dollars in the future and that's what you're gonna get. Now, what makes BlackRock so large and I believe why it wouldn't exist in a free market is that many of these things are products of regulation. Like, there are no 401Ks in a free market. 401Ks are tax deferred. Why would anything be tax deferred in a free market? Let's say there was no taxes or let's say there was some taxes, they were flat, simple. Why would any income be deferred? Everything should be taxed exactly the same if it's gonna be taxed at all. There would be no 401Ks. There would be no big aggregators of savings, which is what BlackRock is, it's the aggregators of our saving. I don't think there would be big pension plans like there are today because the biggest pension plans today are all government employees but there wouldn't be a lot of government employees in a free society. So they wouldn't have large pensions and those large pensions wouldn't give the money to BlackRock and those large pensions wouldn't be pursuing a politically correct ESG agenda. So it's just the concentration is a consequence of the consolidation of these financial management around pension plans and products that are a result of regulations that just wouldn't exist in a free market. Oh, Jeff, thank you, wow. That's huge. Really appreciate the support. Let's see, that's $100. Canadian dollars, but it's close to 100 U.S. He writes, I posted a tweet that Elon Musk tweeted about the national debt and stated the taxing the rich at 100% would only make a dent. So the rest might come from the general public. My sister responded, debt is different than deficit. Elon knows this, can you briefly comment? Yeah, I mean, the, God, what's the confusion here? The deficit is the amount of debt when accumulates in every particular year. And the debt, the total debt that the government has is a product of the sum of all past deficits. So it's true that debt isn't the same as deficit. I mean, total debt, but the deficit is exactly debt. How do you close the deficit? Let's say you spend, let's say you raise in taxes, $10 and you spend 15, where does the other five come from? That's the deficit, where does it come from? Debt, you have to get the money from something and you get it through debt. So absolutely debt is, or the deficit, summed over all years where there are deficits, is total debt. You'd have to sum the surpluses as well. So the net of that is total debt. And Elon Musk is absolutely right. The rich would pay 100%, it wouldn't make a dent in the thing. The only way to pay off the debt and to close the deficit is to dramatically cut spending, and tax more people. Only taxing the rich doesn't get you when you need to go. You have to have broad-based taxation if you have to pay this all back. And that's what European countries do, they have very broad-based taxation. Okay, theme has to ask for $20, 20 pounds. Is pragmatism a result of evasion or misunderstanding or something else? Well, it depends for something else. Well, it depends. For some people, I think pragmatism is a result of evasion. They evade principles, they evade their existence, they evade their consequences, they don't want to acknowledge them. But it could be a misunderstanding. I just don't get it. Why should I think of principle? And I think people can. So it's very difficult to answer questions that are so broad because they relate to people because people have different motivations, people have different reasons. I think the older you are, the more it becomes an issue of evasion because the more you should see it doesn't work. But I think it's evasion and or misunderstanding, depends. A moral panic asks, I was hoping that the end of the Afghan war would be a catalyst for disbanding the TSA. Yeah, right. Do they have a legitimate role in national security during peacetime? No. I don't think the TSA has a legitimate role during wartime. Airports should hire security people to protect the airports because the airport could be sued if somebody brought in a gun and shut people up and the airport didn't, government is not responsible for protecting, for, put it this way, you're innocent until proven guilty vis-a-vis the government. The government has no job in providing security for private in advance, for private events. Government does not preempt. In a sense, it doesn't just have security in all the airports, it has to have legitimate cause to stop you to security points, to run you through a, what do you call it, a body scanner. Now, private groups can because it's a private property. So the appropriate way to do security is not to have a TSA but to have private enterprise to it. If it's needed at all. I mean, we always are fighting the previous war. So we had a version of TSA but they got through and bombed the towers in 9-11, right? So we beefed up the TSA. Terrorists haven't gotten through yet ever. We still keep them. Again, is there intelligence that they're gonna come through any day now? I don't know. Then we had a shoe bomber who tried to smuggle in a bomb in a shoe. So you have to scan your shoes now. We had a guy try to smuggle in, try to put a bomb in a computer. So we have to take a computer zone. But that was years and years ago. We still have to do it. They never take it back. Some terrorists try to bring a bomb in and it's underway. So we're gonna ban underwear. It's not the right approach to security. First of all, you go out and you find the terrorist and you kill them in there where they live. But secondly, you don't, just like lockdowns. You don't lock down. You don't mandate a one size fit all. Airport security, every airport should decide its own security agenda. Its own security standards. So no, the TSA is a travesty. It's an immoral organization. It should not exist to not exist, including in wartime. Whew, okay, where are we? About 580, so about 100 short. Well no, I'm sorry, 600 is the goal, not 790. 20 dollars short, somebody come in, do 20 dollars. We reach 600, make everybody's day. All right, Michael asks, do people negotiate with evil because evil isn't obvious to identify? No, evil is very obvious to identify. Evil is easy to identify. People negotiate with evil because they're cowards. People negotiate with evil because they're idiots. People negotiate with evil because they're pragmatists. Pragmatists don't believe in thinking long term. Pragmatists don't believe in thinking in principle. Pragmatists, and so a principle like don't negotiate with evil. Well, but this time it'll work. This time it's different. That's pragmatism. You don't know all the people who supported Trump talking, hugging, kissing, being the best friend of the brutal dictator of North Korea. That's pragmatism. You can't be an objectivist and support that. That's pragmatism. We know what the principle is. You don't negotiate with evil. And it was shocking to me, the number of people supported Trump's behavior towards the dictator of North Korea. Just astounding, astounding. John, thank you. Appreciate the topic. Glad you enjoyed it. And thank you for getting us over the 600 bump. So it's pragmatism that drives us. Short-term, unprincipled thinking. Michael also asks, you notice governments couldn't shut down Uber. It may be the same with Bitcoin. It's too popular to completely eliminate when hyperinflation hits the next few years, Bitcoin will explode. Maybe, I mean, generally I hope you're right. In a sense that government can't shut it down. Never underestimate the ability of physical force and the ability of governments to do damage. And if governments really wanted to shut down Uber, they would have. Uber's not a threat to them. Bitcoin is. If Bitcoin becomes money, it is. Because a big chunk of government's control over us comes from its fiat currency. If the fiat currency suddenly is irrelevant, then that's a real threat to governments. Thank you, Jeff. Appreciate it. Now we're definitely over the $600 goal. Great. Apollo. Rand said she only respected linear thinkers. How does this reconcile with reality with non-linear geniuses? I don't know where I, Rand, said that. I don't know what is meant by linear or non-linear thinking. Objectivism is non-linear. Objectivism is spiral. Leonard Peacock talks about this. Objectivism is a spiral of knowledge. You're constantly going back. You're constantly reinforcing. You're constantly going back to the same issue and reinforcing it, learning more about it, integrating it more completely into more observations, into more concrete. So, I don't know why she would say that in what context and what it even really means. Given that objectivism itself is not linear. Matthew, by the way, thanks for all the amazing econofinance contact. I work in investments and your talks are better for a share. I love your formal lectures on those subjects. Better than I got in college. Thank you. I appreciate that. And having taught in college, yes. You're not gonna get, it's not that it's better. You're just not gonna get the stuff in college. Corey, Flores. Corey. I think this is the last question. I always loved Ayn Rand's take on the old formulation, keeping an open mind and turned it into having an active mind. Just one of a ton of beautiful ways she demonstrated being a unique thinker. Absolutely. Have an active mind. Think for yourself. Think always. Integrate always. Bring in new observations. Think about them. Integrate them into your existing knowledge. All right, guys. Thank you. I appreciate us getting to $600 again. I mean, it's been an amazing month. You guys have met, I think, that $600 target, I think, every show this month, which is pretty amazing. Pretty amazing. So thank you. We didn't do as many shows this month. But we've raised through Super Chat a good amount of money, and that is fantastic. Let me remind everybody that you can support the show monthly, and I particularly value that on locals, Subscribestar, and uranbrookshow.com. Those of you who can afford it, it would be great if you increased your monthly support. I'm still trying to reach a particular number there on the monthly support, and still hasn't gotten there. Those of you who get value and appreciate it and can afford to increase your support, that would be terrific. I'd really appreciate that. But tomorrow we'll be on at three o'clock. It'll be AMA with $100 supporters and of course, Super Chat questions. And then I'll be out next week, Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. I'll be giving talks at four different universities going out there and into the Lions Den, combating, you know, facing the enemy where they live. I'll be at Cornell, Michigan State, at Northwood, North, something like that in Michigan, and at Xavier University in Cincinnati. So if you're in the area of any of those would love to meet you. You can find out details about these talks on uranbrookshow.com. So, thanks everybody.