 The radical, fundamental principles of freedom, rational self-interest, and individual rights. This is The Iran Brookshow. Come to The Iran Brookshow on this Tuesday night. Fourth show in a row. I'm kind of tired. Let's see if I have anything to say. See if we could fill an hour and a half with me talking and you asking questions, given that it's four shows in a row. I don't know. I think we've covered everything already. We're going to be talking State of the Union. I'll, I guess, Biden is giving it in two hours. I'm going to critique it now because I don't need to hear it. I don't intend to hear it. I might read it afterwards, but I certainly don't intend to sit through an hour of Joe Biden reading a boring speech that I can predict exactly what's going to be in it. I will tell you what my State of the Union would be. Pretty short, so don't worry. Mine's not going to be an hour and 20 minutes. I think it was Bill Clinton who gave the longest State of the Union ever. I think it was an hour and 35 minutes of all the same stuff. You know, I'll describe what that stuff is. And then we'll talk about what causes war. Why do we have war? Where does it come from? And I'll answer critical thinkers' questions then. But what, what, why are some periods peaceful? Some periods are filled with violence. Why are some countries peaceful and others violent? Why do we have a major war in the West now? Why not 20 years ago? What is it that brings about war? What are the, you put it in Iran's terminology, from an essay she wrote, what are the roots of war? And how is that relevant to what we're seeing today? So yes, every year the President of the United States, oh, before we get to that, of course, before we get to the State of the Union, don't forget to ask questions. You can use the Super Chat to do that. Super Chat is available right there, right beneath your screen. You can click on that, you can make a contribution to the show, value for value, and you can ask a question. So that always makes it more interesting when we get questions from you. Critical Thinker's already given me two questions to chew on, which is a great way to start the show. So that is great. So please participate, get involved, do it. So Super Chat, we got a goal of 600 bucks. We seem to be hitting it like clockwork recently. So let's see if we get, oh, third question for Critical Thinker. He's really in a role here. So we'll get to all of these questions later on. Critical Thinker, I promise. Let's see. Yes, we have a sponsor for the show. Actually, we have two sponsors for the show, but I'm going to focus on one sponsor today. And then next show we'll focus on the second sponsor. Or maybe we'll do them both. Anyway, we've got sponsors for the first time ever. We've never had sponsors. But one of those sponsors is ExpressVPN. Not VPN Express, ExpressVPN. I use ExpressVPN when I travel. I sometimes use it at home when I'm like doing banking and stuff and shield all. When I want to enter a website that won't let me enter it because I'm in Puerto Rico, I use a VPN and it thinks I'm from the US and it lets me in. Like some of my financial institutions that I have in the US won't let me in because I'm in Puerto Rico. But if I use a VPN, it looks like I'm coming from Miami. Boom, I'm in. So that is another use of VPN. As far as I've been using ExpressVPN for years, I actually knew the CEO of ExpressVPN had met him several times in Hong Kong a long time ago and a good guy. And yeah, if you sign up using the link below, ExpressVPN.com slash Iran, you will get an extra three months free. Free. Who said there's no such thing as free? You'll get an extra three months free when you sign up for ExpressVPN with the link below. So hopefully you will. And the more people sign up, I don't get money for just saying this. I want to get money if you sign up. So we need significant numbers of people to sign up, including all of you people on the podcast and all you people who listen to this not live, you all have to sign up. And then we have a second sponsor, which is Dear to My Heart because this relates to art. It relates to actual reproductions of sculptures, primarily busts, but sculptures from I think most of them antiquity, some of them of the 19th century. It is Fountainheadcasts.com. Fountainheadcasts.com. And you can find the collection there. You know, a lot of beautiful stuff. Not very expensive. So very reasonable. And if you order more than 100 bucks, which yeah, you can get amazing stuff. They ship it free within the United States. If you mentioned me, if you mentioned when you ordered that you heard about this on my show, you get an extra 10% off your order. So this is fountainheadcast.com. Again, the website is down below. You can go there. If you love art, particularly if you like sculpture, these are cast. This is a project or business, a Brooklyn sculptor, Justin Kendall, who is really good. He's a really good sculptor. So you might want to look at his work too and see if you want to buy any of his work. I don't want to promise, but I've got my eye on one of his pieces that when the time comes, when the time comes. All right. Taze, thank you. Jonathan, thank you. Ryan, thank you. And theme-master, I'll get you. Everybody wants to talk about war. Everybody wants to talk about war. I've already got a bunch of questions about war. But I want to talk about the State of the Union only because it's the State of the Union today. And you've got to talk about what's going on in the world. And I'm not going to watch it, as I said. I'll maybe read it afterwards, but it's super boring. And if you read it, you can skip forward. And if you read it, you don't have to listen to Joe Biden's boring, dull, morally-potentious voice saying all these things. So this is the State of the Union in basically 30 seconds. But this is going to be the whole hour plus of his talk. It's going to be this. It's going to be this. There are people out there in America who are needy, who are suffering. There are problems that are needy and suffering. The government will solve this by taking from some people, regulating some people, controlling some people, violating the rights of some people, and fix the problem by doing that. And next year, in the State of the Union address, I promise, I promise that there will be new needy people for which the government will have to do a bunch of other rights violations in order to fix their problems. And of course, I don't guarantee that the existing needy people won't be needy people in a year for now. It might be that these programs are just not enough and we will have to do even more. So that's basically the whole speech. Basically, oh, there's one or two additional caveats. The planet is needy. We're going to destroy the planet. It's all going to die. Everything's going to die. We're heating it up. So the government is going to have to regulate and tax and control and violate a bunch of people's rights in order to make the planet whole. And there is this thing going on in Ukraine and Putin is a very bad man. And the government is going to have to do all these things. And one of the things we're going to have to do in order to reduce Putin's power in the world is build lots and lots and lots of windmills, of windmills. And windmills will protect us from Putin. Windmills will protect us from the bad guys. Windmills would make the world safe for us to take from those who have and give to those who don't. And, you know, in the meantime, we're going to help everybody. And there's no limit to how much we can help and we're just going to help everybody. We're going to give and help and contribute and donate and so on. So, yeah, that's the State of the Union. What else do they say? What have substance? What substance they have beyond that? Here are all the problems. Here's all the things we're going to do to grow government to take care of those problems. That is it. That is your State of the Union. Now, what would I do in the State of the Union? You know, it would be short, 15, 20 minutes max. It would be focused on what I think the role of the president right now, the only role of the president right now should be. And that is to shrink government involvement in our lives as much as possible, as fast as possible. So, for example, in the context of Ukraine, I would declare that the United States is not going to place and is not going to solve the problem of Ukraine by placing an oil embargo on Russia, but it's going to solve the problem by dramatically expanding production in the United States by lifting all restrictions and fracking, all restrictions on production, all restrictions, all not in my backyard and building refineries, all restrictions on drilling, all restrictions on energy production in the United States are going to be lifted. And then the market will produce as much as the market produces. Second, I would submit tomorrow to Congress a bill that would completely eliminate the Jones Act once and for all, wipe it out of existence, eliminate every aspect, every section, every subsection of the Jones Act would be eliminated so that ships, anybody's ship, who cares whose ship, can actually transfer oil from U.S. ports like Houston and Baltimore, oil and LNG, liquefied natural gas, to any ports in the United States that needs it. So, Jones Act is gone within hours of my state of the Union. And then I would propose my three massive bills, three massive bills, the Liberate American Business Act, which would basically eliminate the corporate tax. It would reduce, it would put in a regime that reduced regulation by X percent every year so that within the eight years, there would be no regulations on business. That would include the privatization of the banking system, yes, privatizing the banking system, because today they'll basically run by the government. Eliminating all, all subsidies from business, all subsidies, zero them out, and slowly phase out all regulations. So this would be a massive bill, which would have the entire plan laid out, laid out. Yeah, and then, you know, I'd offer a bill to reform entitlements. I would, and I would offer my proposals to dramatically start shrinking all government expenses so that we had a surplus within four years. So, you know, that would just, that would just be, that would just be my first inaugural address, my first state of the Union address. But look, let's be real about the state of the Union. The state of the Union is bad. The United States is in bad shape. The United States is thoroughly divided. It's tribal. People hate each other's guts. There is real discussion and conversation among serious people with real intensity around a civil war. People on the wrong side of the political aisle from where you are are traitors. They're not just mistaken. They're traitors. We are becoming this attitude, this tribalism, this disdain, this disdain for any values, for any values, and for disdain, deep disdain both on the right and on the left for the founding principles of America, for the fathers, for the constitution, for the principles of individual rights. This is the disdain that crosses the aisle. It's one of the reasons I despise Trump as much as I did, to do, because of that disdain. That is undermining the benevolence and the optimism and the attitude of don't tread on me and moving forward on creating, on building, on making stuff that is the American spirit. It is undermining the American sense of life. And that is disastrous for this country. This country is on a path to become, it probably is already Europe and become much worse. It's on a path to authoritarianism or civil war or both. And as such, the only cure is to get rid of the disease. And the disease is collectivism. The disease is tribalism. The disease is statism. The only solution to this disease is to shrink the state. It's to limit government. It's to get government out of our lives. So we're not fighting over the crumbs. We're not fighting over the goodies that government is handing out. Should critical race theory be taught in schools or not? Well, I know you guys all think, no, of course it shouldn't be taught. But why? If parents wanted to be taught in schools, why shouldn't it be taught in schools? Who are you to tell parents and teachers at schools what should or shouldn't be taught? Well, your taxpayers, you say, you pay for this, right? This is why it's an impossible conundrum. The only way to get rid of the conflict around critical race theory is to get government out of education. And then you want to educate your kid with critical race theory. I feel sorry for the kid. You want to give him some crazy Christian education and an education in creationism? Your business, I feel sorry for the kid. But your business, stay out of my business, I'll stay out of your business. But when it's my taxpayer money paying for the schools, or it's my kids going to the school with your kids, because we live in the same neighborhood and we don't have a choice, then of course I care and of course I hate you and of course I want you to be put down. If the US government is handing out goodies and they're giving you more than they're giving me, then I'm going to resent you. If the US government is telling us what drugs we should take and what drugs we shouldn't take, what hygienic precautions we should take or what we shouldn't take, what diseases we should get and what diseases we shouldn't get, I'll listen to my doctor, thank you. I'll do my own research, thank you. But the conflicts between us are because one size fits all, we all have to do what the government tells us. So if you want to solve the divisions in America, the only way to solve the divisions in America is to unite us over the principle of freedom, over the principle of individual liberty, over the principle that each one of us is going to make decisions for ourselves and stay out of our business, that we exchange with one another, that we associate with another on a voluntary basis and if we don't want to, then we don't have to. If you want to come into my store, you have to wear a mask. But it's okay if you don't, you don't have to come into my store. The government shouldn't force you to come in and it shouldn't force me to accept you. The only way to solve the divisions in America today is to go to the heart and the source of those divisions and the heart of the source of those divisions is statism, it's collectivism, it's the government doing our thinking for us. It's the idea that the government should control every aspect of our lives. And yes, the left thinks this, but the right thinks it too, but the right doesn't believe any of this either. But it doesn't matter what the right and what the left think. If these freedoms, if these liberties are protected by a constitution, then fine, you don't have to agree with me about anything. Go and live your life. But that means if I want to have an abortion, not me personally, then it's none of your business right either. If I don't want my kids to pray in school, if I don't want my kids to learn creationism, if I don't want my kids to be instilled with Christian values, then people on the right, it's none of your business either. Right, you guys are such suckers. Sorry, some of you guys on the chat are such suckers. So the only thing that can unify this country is the elimination of state control, the shrinking of the state. And it's not that the status quo is going to survive, because the fact is that things will get worse, not better, unless we're willing to challenge all this. Things will get much worse. Indeed, what is the root of war? It's statism, it's collectivism, it's tribalism. And if we have it here, put aside in Russia, if we have it here in America, the statism, the collectivism, the tribalism, then we are heading towards war. We are heading towards violence, not just violence of the state inflicting on us, which it does every day. But we are heading towards a time where we are going to be violent towards each other, we are heading towards some kind of civil war, or we're heading towards a dictatorship where the state will completely violate our rights and run our lives for us. So stop defending the right, stop just attacking the left. You got to know what you're fighting for, and what you need to fight for is limited government, is individual rights. What you got to fight for is personal freedom, individual liberty, the government getting out of our lives, and not Trump, and not Biden, and not Cruz, and not AOC, stand for that, not one of them, not even close. So they're all the enemy, and until you recognize, until you recognize, I don't know why I'm getting so angry, but I am, until you guys recognize that we have no allies in politics, that we stand alone, and that we have to advocate unprincipled for something radical, for some big change. Only then do we have a chance of winning. Instead of fighting over at the margin, is this a little bit better than that? Is this guy going to violate our rights more than that guy? Who the F cares? I don't want them to violate my rights at all. I want to be able to fight, I want to be able to stand, I want to be able to advocate for no rights violation. And I can't do that. If I'm affiliated with people who want to violate rights just a little bit less than the other guy, you completely undermine your cause. You completely undermine your moral high ground and your ability to stand for an ideal, to stand for what this country really needs, which is freedom, freedom. Not a little bit, freedom. So forget the politics of this. Politics is a distraction. Politics is what they want you to do. Politics is what you're playing right into the hand of the status and the collectives by getting excited about politics. You should be excited about the ideas of freedom, the ideas of liberty, and be willing to go out there and fight for them, fight for them. Before it gets to the point we have to fight with weapons and muscle just to survive, because at that point you won't be fighting for freedom. You'll be fighting to survive. Freedom will be gone, finished, done. Civil war will not result in a free state or any free state. It will result in competing dictatorships. All right. It's not even an election yet. So that would be part of my State of the Union. How about that? That would be the core of my State of the Union. Fight for freedom, fight for liberty. Stop expecting government to bail you out. Stop expecting government to save you. Stop expecting government to win your cultural wars for you. Stop expecting anything or to fight your cultural wars for you. Get government out of the cultural war. Government should have no involvement in the cultural war. Government should be completely neutral when it comes to culture. Completely neutral. All right. That was my State of the Union. The world is not in good shape, guys. Not in good shape. In spite of the fact that the Ukrainians are still holding back to Russians, world is not in good shape and it's heading in the wrong direction and we've got a little blip of a little bit of positivity and optimism here with what's going on in Ukraine, but it won't last for very long. We'll go back to usual and you'll see that in Biden's address today to all be back to usual, all be the same nonsense, the same scam ongoing and the same desire and effort to make you even more dependent on the State. Yes, and what we need in the world is more Putin's. That's what we need in the world. More Putin's. Well, just accept that you're not for freedom and not for liberty, then fine. Then fine. Niko Kav is, you know, Trump and Putin are great if you don't believe in liberty. All right. So, that was my little spiel in the State of the Union. Let's move now to the causes of war. Oh, it's exactly the same thing. It's exactly the same spiel. What causes war? Not individuals. The victims of war, as you can see in Russia and Ukraine today are the innocent civilians who are dying, losing their homes, sleeping in arid shelters. It's the Russians losing their livelihood, being, you know, losing their ability to buy anything, watching their wealth to the extent that they had any, be decimated. The people who lose in wars, always the producers, the people who work hard, the people who are trying to make a living, the people who are going about their lives, who benefits from the war, or benefit in quotes are the people who seek power, are the people who seek destruction, and a small class of people associated with government who profit off of warfare. But it's the tiniest of minorities. Well, then one of the questions we have to ask ourselves is, if only the tiniest minorities are interested in war and benefited all from war, and if the vast majority of people actually suffer from war, actually of the victims of war, why do we have wars? Well, you know, the wars instigated not by countries in which the individual has a real voice, wars almost always instigated by countries run by somebody who is there to represent the voice of the people, by somebody who's convinced the people that they are their spokesmen, they are their leader, they are their decision maker, that the voice of the people is meaningless, and that the people as individuals don't matter, they don't count. That's the whole basis of a dictatorship. The whole basis of a dictatorship is the idea that you as an individual don't count. What matters is Russia. What matters is America. Not an individual American, but America, some conceptual, some abstraction, that's what matters. We don't know what's good for America, or we don't know what's good for Russia. We have to have leaders that understand, that commune with the spirit of America, the spirit of Russia, and who can then serve for the greater good of Russia, for the greater good of whatever the country happens to be. And then it's those leaders for the greater good engage in war. They engage in war because they lost power. They engage in war because they want to control more people rather than less. And people go along with them because they barred into the collectivist idea that they don't matter as individuals, that they don't count. That what matters is what's good for Mother Russia. What matters is the great Russian history, or the workers of the world unite, or the Aryan race, or white Americans. God forbid they get replaced. That's what matters. So it's collectivism. It's statism. It's the idea that Putin described on the eve of the war of some Russian spirit, some Russian soul that infected, that was disturbed by Ukraine, but that would be united, that would be embraced, that would bring about wholeness. It was put together. No, Putin is not selfish, not in the objective sense, not in the sense of taking care of self. He's a miserable, pathetic monster. It's nationalism, collectivism, statism, and the granting of the state, the kind of power. And of course statism also leads to a declining economy. I've talked about that with Russia. Russia's gone nowhere in years from an economic growth perspective, from an economic development perspective. It has oil and natural gas, and pretty much that's it. And as a consequence, dictators need to distract the people. They need to rally them around a cause and those causes are usually military adventurism. They rally them around some idea, whether it's communism or fascism or Russianism. How do you convince these kids to go fight? I mean these Russian kids who are dying by the hundreds, maybe by the thousands in Ukraine, do they really know what they're doing? This is the importance of having a volunteer army. These are not volunteers. These are conscripts. They didn't ask for this war. They don't want this war. This is a war being thrust on them by a brutal egomaniac dictator who thinks only a power. He tries to get the wild up, tries to get excited by saying that they're fighting for the motherland. They're fighting not for freedom, not even for their families. Their families are not threatened here. They're fighting for the greatness of Russia. They're fighting for lost generations and the future of a grand Russian empire. They're fighting for the Russian spirit. It's mystical, nonsensical, collectivist tribal beers that has been animating leaders and driving it to war from the beginning of time. That tribe over there is not like us. The world is a zero-sum game, they tell us. So we might take their stuff so that we can get stronger. And then as we get stronger, a mythology around our tribe builds. And then it's about growing the tribe and building that mythology. And who encourages us, because we're the ones who do the fighting? Well, as Ivan described it, Attila and the witch doctor, Attila who commands our forces and the witch doctor provides the ideas, the mythology, the mystical revelations that make it all work, that make it all click. So war is almost always instigated by status, by collectivists, on collectivist grounds, on collectivist basis. There was zero reason for this war in Ukraine. Zero. And let me just take the first question that critical thinker asks, because it's related to this. He says, I mean, he's saying, what are the key historical moments when Putin increased his aggression after the NATO had actually reduced its influence? It's hard to demonstrate the bully principle with NATO map only growing. But NATO is not a bully. NATO is not a threat to Putin. Not if Putin believes in freedom. NATO is only a threat to Putin if Putin wants to expand. NATO is only a threat to Putin's dream of an empire. NATO is not a threat to a free Russia. NATO is not a threat to Russia that respects rights. NATO is not a threat to Russia that respects its neighbors' borders. NATO is only a threat and only can be deemed a threat to somebody who wants war, to somebody who wants power, to somebody who wants to violate people's rights. So there is nothing. There's no reason. Zero, zilch for Russia to go to war with Ukraine. Nothing. No Russian was threatened. No Russian property was threatened. Ukraine was mining their own business. Yeah, Ukraine as a sovereign country, there is such a thing, supposedly a sovereignty. Ukraine as a sovereign country was going to sign maybe one day a treaty with other countries in Europe for mutual defense. Not aggression, mutual defense. How's that a threat against Russia? It's not. It's a threat against Putin's dream of a greater Russia. It's a threat against Putin's dream of reuniting the Soviet Union. But it's not a threat against Russia. It's not a threat against the lives of property of Russians. And therefore, Putin has zero reasons, zero excuse reason, zero justification to go to war, to threaten war. Of course, Putin doesn't care if he has reason or justification. Because Putin doesn't respect the rights of his own people. Putin assassinates people left and right. He kills his opposition. He doesn't respect his own people. He is a gangster and always has been. So, if you don't respect the rights of your own people, how are you ever going to respect the rights of people outside your country? And if you don't respect their rights, if you don't think they have rights, if you think their property is a fagrab, and if you think it's okay to kill them, then, yeah, you're going to go to war. And that's Putin. Now, critical thinker says I misunderstood his questions. The question he says is, he's looking for a demonstration of how bullies like Putin increased their violence as their opposition, in this case, NATO becomes weaker. And that's, look, NATO has been weak for a very long time. Putin has been violent before on a smaller scale. He invaded Georgia. What did NATO do? Nothing. He invaded Ukraine. He took Crimea. He took the Eastern provinces. He went to Syria and did whatever he wanted to do, in spite of the fact that there were American forces there, Israeli forces there. Putin did whatever he wanted to. The West did nothing. I'm not saying they should have done anything, but they did nothing. Putin got every indication over and over again. Oh, he assassinated a, you know, somebody he didn't like. He assassinated in London. And using radioactive stuff, I think, and a Brit died. Well, people got sick. What did the West do? To protect their own people? What did NATO do to protect the Brits from Putin using radioactive stuff in London to kill people? So NATO in the West did nothing but weak, weak, weak, weak, weak. And what has Putin learned? That we'll do nothing. And surprisingly, unsurprisingly, therefore, he invaded, thinking that the response would be weak. Nothing would actually happen. But NATO, the fact that the map grows doesn't mean that NATO's strength is increasing. If the map grows, but their willingness to use force doesn't exist, then they're appeasing a bully. They've been appeasing a bully forever. He kills people on your sovereign soil. You do nothing. He invades your neighbors. You do nothing. Not even condemnation. Not even real sanctions. So the bully learns. I can keep going. So NATO has expanded. What difference does it make? NATO's a paper tiger. It's big. It's got a lot of countries. It covers a lot of geography. But what difference does that make when it's not doing anything? And then, you know, when Trump tried to nudge the Germans to increase spending on defense a little bit, the German said, nah, we're not going to do that. Oh, that Putin heard that. Okay. Now, one of the interesting things about the invasion now, one of the interesting things about Ukraine, one of the reasons I said Putin's already lost the war, no matter what happens in Ukraine, is symbolized by the fact that Germany just announced that they would spend the GDP on defense moving forward. That's pretty stunning for pacifist Germany. The fact that Germany is supplying Ukrainians with weapons. And the fact that Sweden and Finland, who weren't even remotely considering joining NATO, are suddenly thinking maybe they should. So war is a completely collectivistic endeavor. And the way so many people think about war is collectivism. So here's Johan Khazoni, who I debated at UT. He says, he's generally supportive of Ukraine, but he says, standing that so many intellectuals talking about Ukraine have no interesting questions like, should rival powers share a border? What is this should? What is this rival powers? This is a statist, collectivist perspective. The role of government, i.e. powers, is to protect individual rights and they do that in their own countries and they allow their people to be free in their own countries and they allow people to trade with people anywhere in the world from their own countries. Why shouldn't they share a border? The only context in which sharing a border is a problem is if they're not rights respecting. If they're collectivistic and they have motivations to expand. If they're ruled by dictators or authoritarians of some kind. Then, yeah, you don't want to share a border, but then I'm going to show a border's matter given that after Russia takes Ukraine, they'll still share a border. So the whole thinking here is the normalization, which is what the whole idea of nationalism does and Johan Khazoni's view of nationalism does. It's the justification, it's the just accept that states are there to violate rights, that some states, maybe many states will be ruled by authoritarians, that's okay. We just need to have buffers between them. We don't want to put them side by side. I mean, shouldn't we be striving to a world in which people are free, in which trade flows freely, individuals move freely, in which economic and other interests are shared, and in which the incentive for war is zero? Because ultimately decision making is almost all at the individual level. And individuals don't go to war, individuals want to trade, individuals want a work, individuals want to make money, individuals want to take care of their family, individuals want to produce, create, build, make. But the whole nationalist project is a rejection of individualism, it's a rejection of the imports of the individual . It's a rejection of the sanctity of the individual. It's the promotion of the state, of a group, of a collective. However you want to put borders around it. Rejection of individualism and the promotion of the state Yochazani goes on to say what are neutral states for? Well neutral about what? if they're neutral among an authoritarian brute and free-loving countries then their neutrality is immoral and It's no accident that Ukraine doesn't want to be neutral Ukraine said we want to join NATO. We want to join the EU. We want the good guys. We don't want the bad guys and And there is such a thing as good guys and bad guys again Yochazani denies that because he says if Russia Chose Putin and Putin is right for Russia as if they chose him But they haven't rejected him yet But no, it's never right for an authoritarian rule. It's never right for a dictator rule. They're never the good guys never So if a neutral country wants to choose the good guys the relative freedom of the European Union is compared to thuggery of Russia Who are you to tell them? No, who is anybody to tell them? No, what kinds of actions are historically provoked escalation weakness? trying to play politics with powers instead of defending liberty and defending freedom and standing up for it and not tolerating the collectivists and Those that would be would subjugate us. All right, so the enemy is collectivism The enemy is statism and the solution is liberty the solution is individualism The solution is governments focused on protecting the individual not for some greater so-called good But because the individuals liberty is the good The solution is leaving individuals to live their lives in Freedom to choose their values based on their mind based on their Rational decisions, but war has been a part of mankind from the beginning Wars being a part of mankind for all of history and It's no accident that we have worn now in what you'd considered the civilized world Because over the last 20 years Over the last 20 years. We've seen a dramatic escalation of collectivism and tribalism Even in the United States of America The bastion that's supposed to be better. I don't need to learn Russian history to know what's going on This is not a question of Russian history and Russian history is dominated by mysticism and collectivism and Russia needs to change Russia needs to thoroughly systematically root out its thuggish nature its thuggish culture and that means a Rejection of its mysticism and a rejection of its collectivism and it's hard But every culture's had to do that. I mean you think the West was any better if you go back six seven 800 years go back before the Renaissance Or even after the Renaissance to think about the 30 year war maybe the bloodiest war in human history Why because they're Protestants and I'm a Catholic or he's a Catholic and I'm a Protestant And we should slaughter each other for that. Maybe the bloodiest war per capita ever history is only relevant to To Identifying the problem and trying to figure out the path out of it History is not the solution history is the problem The history of Russia Ukraine Belarus and Poland is the problem and it doesn't matter here It doesn't matter here one iota What matters is today Are these governments respecting rights are on thing? Are they aggressing against their people and against other people or aren't they? Are they for freedom or they against freedom? That's all that matters and if they're against freedom then they need a change and I don't care what the history is They need to undo the history But this is the problem with Europe Europe is and Eastern Europe now more than ever But Western Europe has this problem too They're stuck in history They're not willing to change. They're not willing to grow. They're not willing to evolve Now not willing to bring on new ideas and junk the ideas that have brought them nothing but pain and suffering Over millennia Remember, it's only in the last 200 years 250 years that people have had a life Before that life sucked short Brutish and something short Brutish and something I forget what Hobbes said So no, I don't buy this. Oh, there's a lot of history here. Well, stop it. Get rid of it You don't live in the past you live in the present it is simplistic it is simplistic because Being stuck in the past is barbaric collectivist being stuck in the past is why you get wars and bloodshed and destruction and I'm not saying it's easy to change But that's what needs to happen Russia needs to grow up and if it needs to get very very poor Poor within already is it's very very poor ready In order to grow up in order to get the shock to the system Then maybe that's what happened now It won't grow up because I we know I know some of you know that the only way things changes through ideas And the fact is that ideas in Russia is rotten as they've ever been But that nasty British and short. Thank you nasty British and short. That is the Short British and nasty. I think it's nasty British and short. I think that that was off the tongue better But look life was always I mean every country in the world had a history. There was anti-individualism Anti-freedom and the question is how do you overcome that history with good ideas? With good ideas You have to piss on the past in order to move forward That's exactly what you need to do. You know piss on the past Because the past is holding you back. This is true in life too as an individual my mother locked me in the closet I get it get over it. Yeah, you might need therapy to get over it Get the therapy and get over it move on and if you don't who suffers you do And if a country like Russia doesn't piss on the past who suffers they do now So do the Ukrainians and that's a tragedy of it Somebody who murdered my relatives should be hung But that doesn't mean all their relatives should be hung But that's what you're talking about because it's previous generations. Do I hate Germany? Do I want to flatten Germany because they killed my ancestors? No no if I held it against German individuals today and What the Nazis did to my relatives then I'd be just as irrational as these Russians Poles Yeah, Eastern Europe is particularly mystical and they need to get over it and if they don't they suffer the consequence And again, you know culture is difficult to change culture is deeply rooted and it takes a long time And it takes ideas, but you're not gonna change the culture If you respect it The way to change the culture is to disrespect it Certain cultures don't deserve respect certain history and a clean history doesn't deserve respect it should be ridiculed because It's bad I'm not a multiculturalist I'm not a multiculturalist. I do not believe all cultures are equal. I don't believe all cultures are equal Not even all European cultures are equal some cultures suck and they need to change But that's okay, you know So we need ideas. We need ideas. We need a better ideas. We need to replace Dugan's ideas. Is that how you pronounce his name Dugan the the the Russian Theocratic a philosopher we need to change him And we do replace him with another Russian philosopher. Her name is Einwand all right, let's see theme-master Did Europe sanction Hitler when he started invading small countries like they are now with prudent? No, not really. I mean they sanctioned him. You mean You know in both sanctions on him. I don't think they did because When he took Czechoslovakia Basically the British and the French signed off on it. There was a deal. They basically gave him Czechoslovakia He didn't have to invade Czechoslovakia So it was much much worse Indeed the the the response of European countries To what Putin is doing is a dramatic improvement Over what was done under Hitler dramatic improvement. I'm actually impressed by what europe and the united states are doing Relative to what I would have expected and whether relative to what they've done in the past Let's see if I copied over all the questions See more 20 dollar questions Untopic Jordan Peterson recently said there's going to be a population implosion We will never get over 9 billion people because educated women have too few kids too few kids by whose standard I mean, he's such a collectivist. Sometimes he claims to be a defender of individualism, but he's such a collectivist sometimes By whose standards too few The only person who can decide whether a woman is having too few or too many kids or just the right number is her And maybe her husband Is this because western educational institutions promote anti-humanism? No, why should the population of the earth grow beyond 9 billion? Why should it not shrink? What is the right number? Should it always grow? By what standard? Who decides Now I think generally if if We we were less nihilistic if we were more optimistic about the future I think people would have more kids but Maybe they wouldn't and that would be good too The point is that the only people who have a right to Decide how many kids they have and the only people who should worry About how many kids they have other people having the kids Yom Khazani in the debate also said Ooh, if you if you don't worry about how many kids you have then you're you know You're irresponsible. Who why? I mean, I agree to an extent that I think having few kids is a sign of pessimism Of not believing in the future. I think So let's change the culture and let's see how many kids people have but whatever many kids they have they have and It's fantastic because only they can decide again values are personal. There's not such things collective values There's not such thing as jewish values. There's no such thing as russian values There's no such thing as american values as an abstraction divorce from anything else america doesn't have values americans have values and the American state has a value and the value is freedom individual rights. That's it But that's only because it goes back to the individual the whole point of individual rights is to leave values to the individual So the american government should never subsidize kids or not subsidize kids That's why you'd never have a position on abortion one way the other Government should have no view of abortion You don't like abortion don't have one Harper cambal always mentions Pareto distribution 80 percent of the wealth in the hands of 20 percent of the population 80 percent of mass in the universe and 20 percent of the stars Is there something that 80 20 ruler is it pseudoscience? It's pseudoscience I mean, there's something to it. It's often a phenomena It often occurs But there's no as far as I can tell fundamental metaphysical Physical rule that it has to It doesn't have to and who says it's 80 20. Maybe it's 90 10. Maybe it's 73 27 And that's not Pareto optimum. Well Pareto distribution Yeah, it's it's it's pseudoscience It's just made up stuff that he comes up with I agree with him that there would be inequality in a free society any society We're not all the same We're never all the same so we will be different outcomes will be different always But how they're distributed in what ways That is not determined by some formula that is determined by The state of the culture productivity, I mean people are saying inequality in the US is increasing So it's what's it moved from the 80 20 to the 90 10 that no, it's there's no rule there There's no right or wrong there Oh, Dave, I forgot you had a hundred dollar question should have started with that Dave says the leftist collectivist because they think everything is engineered All leftist collectivists because they think everything is engineered No, I don't think so Crying poverty wealth all structures applying pressure on different segments of the masses The concept of individuals acting autonomously doesn't register to most intellectual as possible Yeah, I mean that is all right, but I don't think it's about it engineered. I think to them Individuals don't matter They have no standing in the universe. It's only groups that matter and then It's what those groups Do or don't do and since groups are mind-less groups can't make decisions because there is no collective consciousness Somebody has to make those decisions for them and because people generally in those groups don't know what's good for them as a group Somebody has to make decisions for them. Somebody has to decide what's good for them. Somebody has to decide what values they should pursue so They it's their job to do it And if need is the basis on which we should structure society Then everybody has some needs and what you do is you create Gangs you create constant pressure groups you create Gangs who are fighting over the crumbs who are fighting over what's being redistributed But the idea of yes ideas of individuals acting autonomously using their mind pursuing their values being rational And knowing what's good for them is not something that registers For these leftist intellectuals. They can't comprehend it Tom says when does a parent's treatment of a child require state intervention particularly with psychological abuse? Given a child's religious epistemology and ethics is terribly Damaging to them, but we obviously don't prevent that. Yeah. I mean I I don't think you can The state should never Intervene in the realm of ideas So it can't tell what the parents teach the kid or not I think the whole idea of psychological abuse is dangerous so maybe But only the state should only to mean if that psychological abuse Involves physical abuse as well So I think it's the physical abuse that the state protects us from just like We have You know free speech where we can't punch somebody now. It's true. Our speech can hurt people Our speech can damage people It can make people sad. It can maybe confused. It could hurt the feelings. It can do a lot of things But the state has no business in it The state is only interested in physical action. It's only interested in action It's protecting action, right? It's protecting your freedom of action, which is what protecting rights is And it's protecting you from action And that's true of children as well. So I don't think the state should ever get involved in Now, you know, you could make the case that certain psychological abuse. Maybe is Maybe I'm not I don't know enough about it But I doubt if such psychological abuse would count unless it was also involved and included some physical abuse Michael asks Peter made a good point last show the internet may speed up your decline Rather than reverse it. There's no substitute for taking up a stages academic institutions youtube podcasts and twitter Can't replace harvard. I've never said they can But I think harvard is weaker today than it was before. I think jordan peterson, for example, has had a huge impact on a lot of people Some who even went to harvard I think youtube can magnify the voices of some professors some educators Some points of view Way beyond what they will get at harvard so Yes, you still have to go after the educational institutions. I also i'm not sure that harvard will be harvard in 30 years They might be universities online that are that are more important than harvard, but The independent scholar the independent intellectual has a huge role to play. I mean look um, it wasn't the universities that Ultimately shaped the renaissance or the universities choir universities that shaped the enlightenment A lot of it was intellectual scholars writing and working and doing stuff and writing books and getting it out there and giving talks and and scientific societies like The the the british academy um That that got wood out there. It's only In the last maybe 200 years that universities have been the center. I mean Kant Was not a university professor. That wasn't what he did Primarily his books he wrote books and he had a small circle of people of influence They went to universities and influenced others. So there are kinds of ways To influence and the internet has opened up even more ways So i'm very optimistic about the internet in spite of what peter said because I think the the internet provides you with new avenues to get knowledge information point of view out there into the world that didn't exist before Still means we have to do the hard work of courses and classes and universities and stuff like that but Not just that Jeffrey writes hey ron. I wanted to ask if governor shrunk down to only basically the military and judicial branches What's to stop money from corporations influencing the few aspects of government that would remain? bribe judges etc well, I think you would have to have laws that Made it possible to have visibility into those kind of things So look bribery is illegal today. It will be illegal then and it would be the job of the police to stop bribery Contributions to political campaigns to you know to judge us anything like that would have to be fully disclosed Much more than they're disclosed today. They would have to be completely visible Um I just don't see it happening. It's it's just One of the things that people don't get And I know this is like people don't believe me when I say this but people don't get That The whole mentality of people the whole cultural attitude The whole attitude that people would have towards the jobs toward production towards justice towards the legal system towards everything Will change in a culture like this. You don't get a culture like that with the people we have around us today Because they will never vote for a culture like that. They'll never advocate for culture. They'll fight for culture like that People's ideas are gonna have to change and when people's ideas change their mentality changes their emotions change their values change The fact is that in a free market the kind of people who succeed in business Don't want to bribe the judge They want to see justice done They want to win fair and square Now are they always going to be bad guys? They're always going to be crooks and that's what the police is there for to catch them So You know, I just don't see it As a major problem. Yeah, it's always going to be there But that's what the police are there to catch them and put them in jail It's against the lord a bribe of a judge. It's pretty straightforward Liam do you think kim porter's 16 month prison sentence was justified for mistaking her gun for a taser and killing that kid Who was resisting arrest typically manslaughter gets 5 to 10 years I don't know. I don't know what the right sentence is. It's it's such a tragedy and I don't know it's it's a it's it's it says something About about the police about training That that that an experienced police officer could mistake a taser for a gun says That the system is failing. It's not systemic racism. It's systemic incompetence So I don't know if she should go over jail for longer than that. I feel sorry for her I suddenly feel sorry for the kid and his family Um, what a horrific thing to happen to you to kill somebody by accident What a horrific thing to happen to you to get killed Nothing good is here, but I I don't know what the right sentence is, but I I think What really should happen is we should commit ourselves to dramatic acceleration of training training training training I mean, what side is your taser? What side of your gun should be second nature to these cops? They should never get a mistake like that never have a mistake like that happen And too many I see too many incompetent police Too many all the time incompetent police You know who don't know how to subdue a suspect who don't know how to do it in a non-lethal way who don't know how to do it While protecting themselves and the people around them and it's absurd and ridiculous And and and there needs to be massive police reform, but that police reform needs to be focused on Dramatically better training get police into shape as I said many times You cannot have a beast police officer. You cannot have out of shape police officer. They should be fired if they're out of shape They should every year have to go a thorough You know a test of their physical capabilities They should be trained like basic training There's not a big difference between cops and Military personnel and they should be trained like military personnel. They you know on different skills that but they should be trained like them in terms of Automatizing this and and and really getting it drilling down Adams says Russia GDP per capita is well below even the poorest state in the United States. Yes The status pot Is what could be the scenario where Russia adopted capitalism and individual rights the quality of life with skyrocket? Yes And if they adopted capitalism and individual rights, and they got rich, and you think they'd invade Ukraine No No, they wouldn't care Hopefully the ukraine would get rich as well But emulated russia and they would trade and people would cross the border and they'd go back and forth And they speak a very similar language most ukrainian speak russian It would be great. There'd be two countries engaged in Peaceful wealth creation and harmony But when one is Both to some extent are pressed one is more pressed When the elitists won't allow them to feed them when they cannot get rich when they're poor when they're miserable and they're cold And they drink vodka all the time, you know Rates of drunkenness in russia are quite high um And they're frustrated Then yeah, then then war Is kind of the solution right it distracts to distraction from all the problems that exist But yes It's it's no accident that russia is a very poor country and it is going the war and that rich countries don't typically do that daniel Is there a level of russian nuclear Posturing that would want america getting involved. Why won't nato destroy russian targets in ukraine and deny responsibility like israel does to iran Well, because you can't i mean Satellites would satellites know what i mean israel denies the responsibility, but everybody knows that it's israel It's just that nobody will stand up for israel because they're afraid of it um But the basic issue is nato should destroy targets in ukraine But nato should be without the united states I very much think that countries like germany and and slavakia and czech republic and poland and lithuanian estonia and latvia have a strong incentive to be to You don't destroy The prudent regime Whether it's by sending in assassins to assassinate prudent or whether it's by using nato forces to destroy the russian military Europeans should be involved in this war. This is war against them America far away. Yeah, not so much. That's why i think nato Is partially ineffectual because i don't think our incentives are the same incentives as the europeans So there should be two separate alliances A european alliance and an american alliance and they shouldn't be the same thing Canada and the u.s should stand on one side europe should nato europe should stand on the other side And it should be a very different Decision process for both. What was the question? Yeah, what level of nuclear posture who i mean It prudent threatened america not europe if you threatened america That would be an act of war. You can't threaten america And the question of course because of nuclear weapons is how do you deal with it? And i don't have an answer to that other to say that Let's hope that the people in charge have contingency plans to To prevent nuclear war to prevent nuclear war Whether that prevention is by crippling the enemy's nuclear capabilities whether it's by Destroying them whatever it happens to be let's hope we we have a way to prevent it I don't think the russians are suicidal So But the united states should not tolerate threats to it and if Putin threatens the united states should put its nuclear Forces on alert and should explain to put in a very calm rational way that You know nobody in russia will survive Nobody in russia will survive and that the united states has the capability to knock many if not most of his missiles out of the sky Well before they reach the united states And maybe through hacking Stop some of the others from ever being launched But yeah, if russia launched its entire Its entire Nuclear capability that could Inhighilate the entire planet, but again, it's unlikely that they would all launch. It's unlikely they would explode It's unlikely they would all most of reach their target. So you can't let fear dominate what you do maryland What should the us be doing? Um, yeah, I mean it should be doing what it's doing It should be Embargoing the extent that it can So the russians I like I like the fact. I don't know if you saw this, but The three biggest shipping companies in the world have said they will not be shipping They will not let their ships be used to either transport goods to to russia or farm china russia So that is private initiative. It's not forced by the governments I think the same sound the tech companies are saying we're not selling products to china To china to russia. We're shutting down a russian Uh deal so a lot of private businesses Are taking the initiative And I think that's a beautiful thing. I think I think that's that's the way it should be Uh, but in terms of the united states militarily Supplying weapons to the Ukrainians is about it Shouldn't put americans on the ground Thomas shabbatem says If the invasion continues to have problems or if putin starts seriously considered nukes I don't think he can consider nukes. I don't think anybody there will let him press the button I mean they're not suicidal Could the general somehow depose putin yes and establish a military dictatorship and at least doesn't threaten its neighbor. Yes Yes, I I think that's the best outcome of this Is that the failure Causes somebody to Bump putin off and I don't think it'll be the generals because the generals have failed here So the generals are not going to come out of this heroes But maybe it's some other leader That can come about and and depose him so That's the best outcome possible is that somehow Putin is put out of his misery Okay, kathryn. Where are we? Uh, we're 130 short So certainly within striking business. There should be relatively easy I have a bunch of under 20 dollar questions So let's make this the deal no more under 20 dollar questions. So all the questions from now on have to be over 20 dollars Hopefully with that, you know, if we get Six questions We're basically there six questions and then some change We're basically there. So let's uh Let's try to do that and I will I will go over these uh lower dollar uh questions People just call it putin's war with all casualties evil without context What happens when flattening moscow becomes necessary in order to win? Then it becomes necessary in order to win it people have no sense of Of what this war is it's it's it is in many respects putin's wars, but obviously war a lot of people Are cooperating and all the victims all the innocent people in moscow who died As a consequence of flattening moscow will be putin's fault Or it will be the fault of those who facilitated putin which is many people in russia Many many people in russia have not stood up to putin have not challenged his authority have not fought for their own freedom So many of them are guilty So yeah, you're right. It's it's It's psychologically by calling putin's war makes it very difficult to fight the war But of course that's consistent with the whole way in which we believe we should fight wars God forbid you kill a civilian Critical thing it says public speakers explicitly exclude the russian people from being the root cause It's only putin's wars and most russians are poor oppressed and couldn't have done anything about it. Could they? Yes Of course they could have Of course they could have they they they for the most part support putin putin has been super popular um, I think I told you the story that I went to uh I was in saint peter nuts and peas working in moscow ones and I went to the mall right next to Red square. There's a big mall Very luxurious mall and in that mall there was a guy Dressed up as starlin And everybody was getting pictures with him starlin This is the poor simple people of russia Admiring and longing for starlin. So they got what they deserve in a sense So I still think they're innocent victims there that people look at all the demonstrators And there were a lot of russians who were just ignorant And they're being manipulated and take advantage of by people like putin, but at the end of the day they bear responsibility End of the day they bear responsibility By embracing the ideas Of authoritarianism and by collectivism and embracing The you know the authoritarians Embracing the authoritarians All right, 130 bucks somebody to step in and do 130 so we don't have to do six I'm tired. So we don't have to do six twenty dollar questions. That would be even better Um critical thinker says forget about russian oil. Thanks to african's richest man Aliko dangote, nigeria will complete the world's largest single train oil refinery in 2022. That's fantastic um Yeah, I mean there's a huge amount of oil in africa Again, there's massive amounts of natural gas in the Mediterranean Uh, there's massive amount of natural gas in the uk It just needs fracking. There's massive amounts of natural gas In germany and in ukraine So there's no shortage of of oil. There's no sort of gas this whole idea of You know, oh, we're peak oil again You know, I keep hearing now peak oil again every five years. There's peak oil and then we discover even more oil There's plenty and plenty and plenty of oil and natural gas uh tazie says, um She gave me another pound 79 for calling um Joe biden molly potentious. He's got this snarky potentious Down looking down his nose at us attitude Uh, biden will blame inflation and greedy corporations. Of course he will and one of his big proposals. I think he's got the uh, the, um What what do you call it the woman who? The former facebook woman who accused facebook of all that stuff in front of congress He's got her coming to the to the as his guest To the state of the union address because he's going to go after facebook He'll go after big tech He'll blame uh, he'll blame them for many of the problems in america and he'll commit to bake them up And and the republicans will clap Grant says alec epsin has Catastrophizing links label things on social media like twitter and linkedin. Yeah I like this catastrophizing series of tweets. They're very good Very good, and it's it's good to get that concept out there the idea of of people People catastrophizing everything Thinking the world is going to end tomorrow and every day and being wrong over and over and over again Nobody caring about them being wrong. All right. Lori asked a 20 dollar question um If you At your current age had a cabin cabin on the lake And you wanted to move there would you let the fact that the health care was 100 miles away to tour you? No, not at my age Not at my age i'm 60 so no i'm healthy you gotta live you gotta live Yeah, so no i'd buy a fast car So i could get to the hospital quickly, but but no i mean you can't live in fear now if you're 80 85 Maybe or if you're in bad health Maybe but it's 60. Yeah, I've got 20 good years still, right? 20 robust years and I live the equivalent of a cabin by the lake because I live in Puerto Rico We have good doctors here, but I don't know if you want to be in a hospital in Puerto Rico I look younger than that Even with this gray hair. I look younger than that um All right, we're at uh short 110 How you on um Currently reading lena pickups ominous parallels It shocked me that schooling is done in a pragmatic way Where no ideas are held. Yes Omnist parallels is a great book. So I'm glad you're reading it Everybody should read it. It's a it's a it's really a must read and explains So much of what's going on today. It explains this culture of collectivism where it comes from what the You know what the impact of ideas on culture And it explains how you get out of it and that is with better ideas and and you got a piss on the old culture I don't think it better ideas part of embracing better ideas Is is rejecting the culture of old Is it rational to start presenting yourself as an authoritarian who can unite nature christianity and a common good ideas? In order to have a larger impact in the future authoritarian state What kind of an impact? So no no You don't mate. You don't do good by lying You don't do good by thinking you can change it in the system You can be a bit of benevolent authoritarian. You can be the force within to slow it down No, that's all wrong and bad Look what happened allen greenspan at the federal reserve So no no no if you believe in individualism you stand for individualism you fight the authoritarians with every Thing you have you don't embrace them because you think well stealthily You don't keep my values. You won't keep your values. You'll sell out Never in history dying of an example of somebody who did that Who had a real impact by pretending to be an authoritarian While really being an advocate of freedom No, and and and the people who are That kind of authoritarian A truly evil and you you would be completely embracing evil and completely operating with evil Maryland thank you for the support really appreciate it colt says Uh on mark levin show last night He made a condemnation of populace and nationalist He called them losers who are no different than marxists And progressives Is this a good sign? Keep up the good work. Um I think it is Will mark levin admit that trump is one of those Would mark levin admit that that much of the republican base now Is part of that populist? Uh nationalist movement Would he admit that c-pac Is part of it where he just spoke now? I talked about this the other day because I mentioned that mark levin gave this Condemnation of populism at c-pac Which is a lot very courageous, but i'm glad if mark levin is You know come back If he's become better he's become seina is is starting to reject Populism and nationalism if he's starting to reject Donald trump and and his agenda Then that is a good thing because he could he could bring a lot of a lot of people in the republican base with him We'll see how far he's willing to go with that Mark levin sometimes had good ideas Even though he's very religious Gail says Trudeau does not allow rebel news independent media into his press conferences Are there any restrictions for us journalists in a private conference with POTUS? There must be I mean I don't know what the standard is, but it's it's not true that let's say I start a internet magazine and I want to go to the white house press briefings There's no way they'd let me in so I don't know what the standard is Maybe it's whiter looser than in canada, but They can't have a thousand journalists representing a thousand different organizations there So there has to be some mechanism Some mechanism Look trump will be the end of this country the death of this country He really will be and you guys will be responsible for it Not all of you. They're just the just the people who are non-stop Advocating for trump if you didn't learn anything from his First four years as a loser and if you want to lose as president again You know there's nothing much that can be said I don't care what the dem say it's it's reality Sometimes the dems are right Somebody who's a dem doesn't make them automatically wrong Ed Kelski says I've decided if you definitely do a show on the lawn muskiff So have you decided a date? I will I haven't decided on a date yet But maybe next week maybe next week So this is the thing about march I'm gonna be traveling a huge amount and I don't know How exactly i'm gonna do shows and i'm gonna rely on you guys to We're gonna have Fewer shows i'm gonna rely on you guys to Contribute more i'm hoping during march per show so that we can have a decent month because I'm traveling from the 12th of march till the end of the month I'm gonna be in all kinds of countries every night in a different country. I don't know how i'm gonna do shows this week I'm in austin texas Um, so that's why I did four shows in a row because I don't know if i'm gonna do any shows the rest of the week I'll try but I don't know um I don't know how March and then i'm traveling in april and then i'm traveling in may i don't know how the next two and a half months are going to go Um, it would be nice if we started march with 600 bucks for the show with 530 Just saying we've got two questions left. So if you're gonna help get us to 600 dollars now is the time If not, they're not that's fine um sacred order of the nightly vala valla asks is there a connection between biden's threat to withhold a billion dollar loan to ukraine His son's investigation by ukraine trumps leaked phone calls to zaminski biden's week's response Yeah, they were all pathetic That is trump was pathetic Uh, his phone call to zaminski was treasonous And and uh, he should have been impeached for that. I was completely for impeaching him for that phone call um You know, I think biden is weak. I don't think it has anything to do with his son's investigation in ukraine I think he's just weak. I think trump was Uh potty in in putin's hands Uh, and and completely uninterested in in uh, ukraine was willing To not send weapons that ukrainians are now using to ukraine unless the ukrainians gave him dirt on biden The whole thing i mean when we when when trump ran he said he was gonna he was gonna He was gonna empty he was gonna clean the swamp Right get rid of the swamp animals instead what we got is Different animals same swamp different animals Trump's swamp animals instead of democratic swamp animals, but still swamp animals and it's so Disappointing that not everybody can see this Not anybody can see how Swampy How disgusting how um narcissistic Trump was is How He was he was gonna drain the swamp drain was the word I was looking for drain the swamp and how he just made the swamp bigger And used it for his whatever for his political goals And they all do it. I'm not saying but he was more explicit than anybody So and more shameless than anybody carolina. Thank you really appreciate that Um No, he wasn't better than biden not in terms of draining the swamp No, not in terms of america's future. He made america's future worse than biden will make america's future on policies some policies he was better some policies he was worse Don't forget. It was trump who got to deal with the taliban That's much worse than what biden did in afghanistan Trump signed a peace deal with the taliban. That's how it doesn't get any worse than that In every respect trump was worse than biden anyway I've talked about this forever And I will talk about it more because trump is running for president so that we know and Of of me explaining to you how bad trump really was and it's shocking shocking That that you can't see how bad he was Now isis was primarily knocked out by the russians Um, and he didn't build up our military not much not much at all And uh, do we did we really need more budget for the military? He didn't get a troop out of Syria or iraq. He didn't get the troops out of afghanistan I would cut military spending while focusing the spending on the things that matter which trump did not do Um, trump is bold in putin He boldens Pretty much everybody, you know, he killed one iranian general and he thought he was tough Yeah, no He did nothing he cut copper taxes Didn't get rid of obama care Didn't pass one deregulatory bill through congress I don't understand it. I don't understand it. All right, richard says I think capitalism is only an economic system not a political system Politics corrupt capitalism when influence is for sale We should start by abolishing of lobbying. What do you think? No, why should we abolish lobby? Why should every other sector of the economy be able to influence politics and businessman not unions lobby um You know Intellectuals lobby they try to influence if lobbying is trying to influence intellectuals lobby Why should business are not be allowed to lobby? Capitalism is the economic system that deprives politician from power over business And therefore eliminates the need for them to lobby The need for them to lobby So no capitalism is where Government has no power over business and therefore business doesn't lobby now because it's banned but because what for they have no power over me anyway Yeah, richard said his taxes went up Yeah, some people's taxes went up when trump cut taxes because he took away some deductions To penalize also politics to penalize red states um Bit critical thinker says if eastward expansion towards russia Positioning approves deterrence, etc. Still means nato is weak What are the concrete ways in which nato used to be stronger in the past than it is today? What are its past actions? I don't know. I'm not saying nato was ever strong I don't think it was the soviet union um Suppressed revolutions in hungary and in Czechoslovakia and nato did nothing So nato's never been strong. I don't know. I guess i'm not sure what you're looking for nato's never been strong Putin has just been slowly testing the waters Slowly checking the response Slowly building up his military so he could expand to establish a greater russia And he decided this was a good time to do it Not because nato was weak or nato was strong because generally nato's weak nato's never been strong. So he felt he felt he could do it I don't I don't think nato's ever been strong. I mean, I'm trying to think of anything nato did that was strong Ian says how are we doing on the uh, I think we're like short 25 bucks 25 bucks to make 600 Somebody should step in and do 25 bucks Ian says I've been enjoying the gilded asian hb on max with a surprisingly positive portrayal Of a robber baron made me think we need a prestige tv version of we the living Yeah, we need a prestige tv show of olivine rand's books Including outlaw shrugged So nothing nato did indicates any trend in its behavior. I don't know. I I mean, I'm trying to think I mean Maybe they're a burlin alef, but that's pre nato. Um No, I mean nato's just been there I think really the issue is not so much nato's strength or weakness it's america America is nato america makes decisions for nato And I think uh america's perceived as weak It's been perceived as weak for for for the last Certainly since the fiascos of uh, uaq in afghanistan. So the last 10 years Under obama under trump and under biden america seemed weak So Maybe that's why The uh, you know, maybe that's what you're getting at But I don't think it has anything to do with um It's got to do with america If america was strong if america were powerful if people actually got a sense That america would respond would do something Would stand up even morally Then the thugs of the world would Go away It would be ineffectual All right, ian. Sorry. Uh, yeah, I'm glad you're enjoying the gilded age. I haven't seen it I'll probably start watching it sometimes soon because I'm curious to see how it portrays everything um Let's see jakep. Thank you. Hugh. Thank you mel and thank you. I think we made it to 600. Did we Catherine are you updating this? It's definitely more than 579 just because hugh gave over 20 american dollars. So, uh, we should be at We should be at 600 so thanks everybody. Um, I appreciate it. I'm not sure when the next show will be There'll definitely be a show on sunday I'll try to do a couple of shows from austin Um in the next few days. I'm not sure exactly which days it depends on kind of the schedule of what's going on I'm attending a seminar there But definitely on sunday, I'll try to do something thursday or friday um Yeah, we we did get over 600. That's great. Um, and I will see you all then and then remember the 12th I'm going for like three weeks. I'm gone Traveling non-stop every day at a different place. It's gonna be insane So definitely the shows will not be at the usual time even the ones in austin I'm not gonna be in the usual time. It might be quite a bit later Or quite a bit earlier Thank you. Katharine. Thank you for all the superchatters. Thanks for everybody Thanks for Getting us to 600 dollars Uh, don't forget you can support the show on your on book show dot com star support and patreon and subscribe star We've got 180 what people watching live right now 138 likes. Don't forget to like the show before you leave. We should be at 200 likes Uh, and it helps the algorithm. It's really good And, um If you live in europe, i'm coming So, uh, try to come to one of my talks. Don't forget to come if you live in europe or in america for that matter To ironman conference in london. I will be there. We'd love to meet many of you and, uh I will see you all