 The radical, fundamental principles of freedom, rational self-interest, and individual rights. This is The Iran Brook Show. All right, everybody. Welcome to Iran Brook Show on this Tuesday, February the 13th. Hope everybody's having a great week. And we're going to jump right into the news here. This is an item. I'm just going to add that I didn't list, but it's just too funny, sad, pathetic to ignore. Taka Carlson yesterday, I think, was interviewed as part of what was it, some event in some Arab country, because I could see Arab writing in the background. Anyway, as part of this, as part of the interview, this is the World Government Summit. I have no idea what the World Government Summit is. No idea. But this is a gem. I think if you take this seriously, this is all you have to know about Taka. I don't think after he said this, there's zero reason to ever take the guy seriously again. This is what he said. Quote, this is about his trip to Moscow, interview with Putin and everything. What he said was, quote, what was very shocking, very disturbing was the city of Moscow, where I'd never been. It was so much nicer than any city in my country. So much cleaner and prettier aesthetically. It's architecture. It's food. It's service than any city in the United States. All right, I don't know. I mean, maybe it's just me. I know most of you are probably not being to Moscow. But I have to admit that of all the cities in the world that I've been to, and I have been to many, not all, granted not all, but I have been too many cities around the world. I have to say that Moscow is my least favorite. It reeks of authoritarianism. The drive into the center of Moscow, you're surrounded by the ugliest, most horrible Soviet era apartment blocks complexes. It's clear that Russians are pretty poor by the colors they drive and just the environment. The nicest part of Moscow is indeed Red Square. But hell, it's Red Square with Lenin's, Muslim, and just the whole idea of it's Red Square and everything that represents. Now, it's true there is a mall right next to Red Square. And part of those old functioning government buildings have been turned into fancy hotels and fancy malls and stuff like that. But you cannot escape the sense of authoritarian dread that exists in Russia talking to people that generally, relatively unfriendly, the food, food, food, where does Tucker Carlson live? I mean, Moscow is OK Moscow, but to point out how superior the food is or even worse, it's service. And I won't even get to the architecture. I mean, God, I mean, if you like, I guess if you like Soviet architecture or if you like in the center of Moscow, kind of Russian Orthodox 19th century grand architecture, then it's your style. Well, by the way, in the mall next to Red Square, there was a guy dressed up as Stalin and everybody wanted a picture with him. One of the talks I gave in Moscow was in a basement. Libertarians living in a kind of in a basement felt very avant-garde and underground and secrets and scary. And yeah, we don't want the authorities to know what we're doing kind of sense. I mean, the place is dreary. He was there in February. It's dreary. It's cold. It's, I'll read it again, quote, what was the most shocking, very disturbing, was the city of Moscow where it had never been. It was so much nicer than any city in my country. We're talking about the United States of America. You know, so much cleaner and prettier aesthetically, its architect, its food, its service than any city in the United States. I mean, that tells you what kind of soul, what kind of soul Tucker Carlson has. He has a soul of an authoritarian thug. He has a soul that fits the USSR and not the free spirit of America. Moscow is one of the most oppressive, ugliest, least attractive, least friendly cities in the entire world. And God, I mean, to a lot of cities in the entire world, not much to recommend about Moscow. And of course, gangsters run the country. It's a country run, thank you, somebody in the chat said, it's a country run by gangsters. Yeah. And if you want clean, Singapore is cleaner, nicer, modern, beautiful, exciting. And the other thing about Moscow is the people. It's not exactly energetic, right? And you go to Asia, any city in Asia, super energy. People are moving fast. They've got this look of productive energy, same in New York, right? No, no. In Moscow, they're dreary, just like the weather, just like the building. Everything is dreary. I've never been to Jakarta. Probably never will be. But yeah, amazing, amazing, amazing, everything Just another tidbit about Russia. Because I thought it was, this is a funny one. You know, I guess people really paid attention to the interview with Taka, where Putin basically laid the foundation for his claim on Ukraine, over Ukraine, on history. It's all about history and reuniting the territory and ethnic affiliation and history, history, going back a long time. And a number of Chinese bloggers are making the case that by that standard, much of Eastern Russia really belongs to China. Vladivostok and that whole area was really, only in the 19th century, kind of negotiated away from China in a moment of weakness. And really, all of that territory, there is kind of part of China. And if history is going to be the goal, then maybe that is, maybe there's a claim the Chinese government can make for Putin to return Eastern Russia into Chinese hands. And I have to say that the Mongolians put out a map showing what the Mongolian empire was like at its peak. And they would like really, really all of Russia, all of China, all of Central Asia, parts of Eastern Europe for themselves. So I think the Mongolians are making a historical claim for much of the Eastern world, if you will, based on Genghis Khan and his kids and their great achievements. Now, I made up the Mongolian part, but the Chinese part is in the news. I did read that about Chinese bloggers talking about this. That's where we are with the state of the world. That is what Tucker has brought upon us. All right, let's see. I guess I was the only one who found the Mongolian example funny. I've got to work on my sense of humor. Let's see inflation. There's a topic that's not very funny. All right, inflation numbers came out this morning. The inflation number was mildly higher than what was expected. Inflation for the month of January was 0.3%. Expectations were 0.2 on a 12-year basis. The last 12 years ran at 3.1, which is down from 3.4 in December, but again, higher than expectations, which was somewhere around 2.9 to 3%. Everybody was hoping for better than expectation inflation numbers. That is that inflation was getting closer to 2%, which is the Fed target. Why 2% don't ask me as the Fed? But that is their target, 2% inflation, and it's 3%. The consequence of this is now markets are convinced that the Fed reserve will not lower interest rates as quickly and as intensely as they were expecting yesterday, basically. Markets are expecting maybe now you have to put in a factor into your calculations. Maybe inflation is stickier than markets had expected. Maybe inflation is going to stick around for longer and be higher than what markets have expected. And as a consequence, what you saw today is stock markets declining significantly and across the board, bank stocks in particular. But anybody, anything, as you know, as I said, interest rates higher, asset prices lower. And the expectation here, interest rates higher for longer, means asset prices are lower, even though interest rates are not budging, the short-term interest rate is not budging. The two years up, the five and 10 year were up. So basically, market interest rates were all up with the expectation that inflation is higher than what, again, was expected. So it's going to stick around. I'm not surprised. I'm not surprised. I'm not sure what basis people thought that things were going to be hunky-dory all of a sudden. And there were no problems. As far as I can tell, our government remains committed to spending like there's no tomorrow, whether this inflation will manifest itself now in the coming year, in two years, five years, 10 years, how else is government going to get rid of the massive quantities of debt that it is actually taking on if they don't inflate? And it seems so. It seems pretty certain that one way or another, we will get more and more inflation over the decades to come, even if the Fed, on this occasion, manages to get the inflation down to 2%. In the meantime, Biden and the Biden administration is doubling down on the fact that inflation is not a monetary phenomenon or a physical phenomenon. In other words, they are doubling down on the idea that inflation indeed is not caused by government. It's not default. They didn't do it. Please, please, don't blame them. They want to get reelected. Don't blame them. According to the Biden administration now, inflation, they basically adopted wholeheartedly Elizabeth Warren's theory of inflation. And that is that inflation is a corporate greed phenomena. Inflation is caused by corporate greed. And in particular, right now, the particular form in which inflation is taking is shrink inflation. We talked about this a little bit yesterday. But shrink inflation is happening. The prices are not budging, but you're getting less of everything in your package goods. And that is because corporations are greedy not because there's some monetary phenomenon of lots of money in the economy chasing the same number of goods and driving the prices up. No, no, no. That's not it. Governments don't create inflation. It is the corporate world that does. It is corporations, greedy corporations. And in that case, inflation is never going to go away because you're never going to get rid of greed, of greed. One other consequence of inflation, which led us to high interest rates, the high interest rates have now led, which makes it more and more expensive for the government to borrow money. The government has to pay interest on the money it borrows and the higher interest rates, the higher government borrowing becomes so that as a consequence of that, among other things, the deficit for the first four months of 2024, fiscal year 2024, so those are the four months that start in October, November, December, and January, has reached half a trillion dollars, just over half trillion dollars, $532 billion. And that is 16% more than the same period in 2023 in the previous fiscal year. Much of that is a consequence of the interest costs, the amount of money that the government just pays on interest on the federal debt. Indeed, the amount of money paid the interest costs in the four months through January was $357 billion, which is 37% increase, a 37% increase from 2023. So with interest rates staying fairly high and with the inflation number that came out today, which increased interest rates on two years and on five years, you can expect this number to increase. But nobody cares about this. It isn't a fascinating that this isn't in the news. Nobody talks about government deficits. Nobody talks about the interest cost to the Treasury. Nobody talks about the unsustainability of government spending in the way that it is spending. That is not of interest. It hasn't been of interest really since Trump was elected. It's the matter of, what do we spend it on? How much do we spend? But there's no question of cutting government spending, being physically responsible, and thinking about the long-term future and what is possible, given that long-term future. Zilch, nothing with regard to any of that. So MMT begs to disagree. MMT is nonsense, right? Deficits matter, a big part of inflation, expectations, is caused by deficits. And deficits matter a huge amount. And deficits are getting worse by leaps and bounds. And this, of course, bodes ill for the future of the American economy. But everything's just chucking along really nicely right now, so let's keep spending and let's keep pretending everything is fine. All right, true. Only super chat questions. I have it from Michael. Where are you guys? So you can ask questions, shape the show by asking whatever questions you want. You can use the super chat to do that. It's a button down there. Please consider doing that to push the show. And of course, you get your answers. You get your questions answered, not your answers. Anyway, it doesn't matter. We have to talk about this again. It's in the news. What can I say? It's everywhere. Trump submitted yesterday at the last minute, basically submitted to the Supreme Court and asked the Supreme Court basically to review the lower court's decisions about his immunity. So both the low court and the appellate court have ruled that a trial, his trial, should go on and that he is not immune from all prosecution. Trump team is asking the Supreme Court to basically freeze the court proceedings while the Supreme Court takes up the case of whether he is immune or not. So he is appealing to the Supreme Court the whole immunity issue and at the same time asking for an injunction, whereas the court proceedings against him are frozen. Chief Justice Roberts today asked just an hour ago, I think asked the prosecutor, that is Jack Smith, to respond. He's got until next Tuesday at 5 PM to respond to this emergency application from the Trump lawyers. Basically, the court can do a number of things. After Jack Smith applies, it can basically say we're upholding whatever the appellate court held. We're basically not taking the case. And the case can continue. The case can continue against Trump in federal court. They can say, I think they can say, the case can continue. And maybe not. Or they can say, the case should not continue. But we're going to hear arguments about this case and make a decision about the base of the case. We're going to make a decision on that quickly. We'll accelerate that, which is what they did with the Colorado case about his eligibility on the ballot. And it looks like they're going to rule that he is eligible. And then the third thing they could do is they can freeze it and say, we're just going to take it as a regular course of business. I think that's unlikely. So those are the three options I think they have. I'm not sure if there's a fourth option, but those are the three options they have. I'd like for me to say what to expect. I think there's a chance that they don't take the case, that they just let the appellate court's ruling stand. This idea of immunity does seem a little, or maybe a lot, ridiculous. And it could very well be that the court says, yeah, no, we're not taking this. Just the three court panel from the appellate court in Washington is fine. And we're going to uphold that. So it's going to be interesting to see how they choose. And if they choose to hear the case, I do expect them to do it to expedite the process. I mean, the reality is that Trump is not only appealing to Supreme Court, but he's also probably going to appeal the district court ruling. There was a three judge panel to the entire 11. I mean, Trump basically, in this case, I don't think he expects to win, but is basically doing everything that he can to delay. So this case, more than anything else, I think, is a delay tactics. So that this case, which is related to the January 6th, gets delayed until after the elections. And I think he has a shot at achieving that, unless the Supreme Court shuts it down and just gets the proceedings to start up and happen. All right, that is something we will continue to watch. Let's see. Oh, yeah, the aid package. So the Senate, in a vote, I think, 7029 voted for the aid package. The aid to Ukraine, Israel, Taiwan, and $10 billion, just to throw it in there. What the hell? It's not their money for rebuilding Gaza. Yep, that definitely serves American self-interest. So they've got rebuilding Gaza. So 7029, yes, $95 billion. I guess you don't care when you're talking about trillions in federal spending and half a trillion in a deficit over just half a trillion deficit, what's another $100 million? So the next deficit will be $600 million. Doesn't matter. We'll just borrow more. Markets seem to be willing to lend to the US government. Anyway, $95 billion. Now, I'm all for aid to Ukraine, but this is ridiculous, the way they're doing it and what they're throwing into it and how they're packaging it. And so $95 billion, the House has already said, Johnson at the House has said, we're not even going to take it up. We're not even going to discuss it. We're not even going to put it to vote. And the reality is that if it goes to vote in the House, I think the House will almost certainly pass it because most Democrats will vote for it and a few Republicans vote for it and it won't pass. But Johnson, as Speaker of the House, has a lot of sway in terms of what actually goes in front of the House. And it won't even come to the House. It won't even be presented in front of the House. Now, what's funny is Johnson is saying, we wanted a bill that also had immigration. We would give you the $95 billion to spend on Ukraine, Israel, and all the sudden if you had combined it with an immigration bill. But when the Senate brought forward an immigration bill, the House said, I don't know, not that one. And of course, the immigration bill would have moved towards the Republicans' goal. It wouldn't have given them everything they wanted, but it would have given them some of what they wanted, but it wouldn't have given everything. But the reason they rejected the immigration and the reason now Republicans don't want to vote on this is because primarily the immigration stuff would have taken an issue away from Trump. It would have probably made the southern border more sane, would have reduced the pressure on the southern border, and that would have taken away an election item. So, you know, Scott Byes, Republican propaganda, hook, like, and sink line and sinker, it's truly amazing. And he blames me, but it's stunning. This is 100% and Republicans admitted this. 100%, they didn't want to take away a major issue, which they have the advantage with American electorate over. They didn't want to get Biden a win. Same reason they won't vote for the Ukraine package. They do not want to give Biden a win. This is all electoral politics. It has zero nada, nothing to do with the well-being of the American people, but even more, but less than that, it doesn't even have to do with what Republicans actually believe or don't believe. It has everything to do with what they expect or don't expect in terms of what is a winning or losing issue in the election and how can they help the guy Trump versus the other guy Biden in this election? And I'm not saying Democrats wouldn't do it as well, but in this case, it's just obvious. And, you know, Trump basically said it, right? He basically said it, and so did a number of House Republicans implied it strongly, but it's obvious. Because while this wouldn't have been perfect, it would have certainly moved the goalpost closer to what they want, then Trump could have become president, and then they would have moved the goalpost even further. They didn't take even partial movement because they don't want to give Democrats a win, and they certainly don't want a quiet southern border. Indeed, I wouldn't be surprised if they agitate to make the southern border even more problematic before the election, because that is their strong suit. There's no question. That is the one issue Americans claim to trust the Republicans and Trump on more than anything else, and one issue that Americans seem to be worried and afraid of, irrationally in my view, but worried and afraid of none the less. All right, finally, negotiations continue or are restarted in Egypt over a ceasefire. It is fascinating to see how the whole ceasefire debate is framed. Biden is constantly accusing Netanyahu and Israel for not having a ceasefire, even though there was a round of negotiations in Paris in which Israel, and Egypt, and Qatar, and the Americans sat down, made a proposal for a ceasefire, which Hamas rejected. Now, you don't see the UN and Biden and Arab world and everybody else saying, come on, Hamas. We offered something reasonable. Why aren't you accepting the ceasefire? All they do, all they do is blame Israel. Now, a ceasefire would be a massive mistake, and I think Israel should not do it, and I think Israel should tell the world to go to hell, and they should drive into Rafa, the sooner the better, and get this over with the sooner the better. They delay, delay, delay. But everybody, everybody basically lays the blame for not having a ceasefire on Israel, which is, just on its face, bizarre, stupid, not true. And the fact that the Americans are doing this in spite of the fact that the Americans are being a part of negotiations and had a proposal given to Hamas that everybody thought was fair, which in my view was horrible and suicidal, it's just disgusting. And Israel is back in the negotiating table, back in Cairo. The CIA chief is there, the Mossad chief is there, the Hamas leadership from Qatar is there, and they are negotiating. I mean, Israel has Hamas. They have Hamas. They have Hamas cornered. They know exactly where they are. It's now a matter of weeks before they could really eliminate them. And instead of doing it, they're going to cut a deal. There's no question in my mind that the level of pressure now in Israel, the level of angst is such that they're likely to cave, even though I give you this, the Israeli public is not interested in caving. Israeli public is still committed to the complete destruction and defeat of Hamas. But negotiations continue because that is what the West believes in. It's like everybody's saying right now, oh no, you have to stop supporting the war in Ukraine. I mean, Ukrainians are dying. We feel for the Ukrainians. Ukrainians are dying because they're fighting for their homes. Ukrainians are choosing to die. They're not doing it because Biden is telling them to. But everything today must be negotiated, even if it's negotiating with the devil, even if it's negotiating with evil, even if the negotiations mean giving up liberty, giving up freedom, and letting the bad guys win in the world. That's OK as long as we have negotiations. It is despicable and disgusting. All right. That is what I had for you today in terms of the news, in terms of the news that we have. So let's we'll turn to your questions. A few reminders for everybody, a number of announcements, I guess, that I have. Reminder, I will be doing a public speaking seminar workshop in Amsterdam right after the INRAN conference in Amsterdam, which I hope some of you are coming to. If you're interested in attending the workshop, you don't have to attend the conference. You can just attend the workshop. So for example, if you're listening and you live in Amsterdam, it's right there. I'm right there. It'll be a small group under 10, a lot of personal attention. And I've already got five signed up or basically expressed strong interest. So I think we've got five signed up. But please consider if you'd like to join us for that, particularly if you live in the Netherlands or in a neighboring country. It's cheap and easy for you to get to it. From 10 to 5, Monday, March 11th, we'll be doing a public speaking seminar. It'll be a lot of fun. And you guys will have homework. You'll have to present and I'll critique it and so on. I'm also planning to do something like that before OKON or after OKON, either just before or just after OKON, probably before. So in the US, if you're coming to OKON in particular, but even if not, and you're interested in a public speaking workshop, and you're not going to come to Europe for it, but you fly to California for it, or you're coming to OKON anyway, please, all you have to do right now is just drop me an email saying, I'm interested. And I will put your email aside. And once I get ready and have the infrastructure everything ready, I will let you know. And we can get it going. Both the workshops are going to be $750 for the day per person. And again, the one in California, my plan is to have 10 people or less. So that should be good. Let's see, what else in terms of announcements? Yes, I want to remind you all of the Austin INRAN conference that is coming up that the Institute is putting on with Jason and Greg and Tara and Ben, who are going to be the faculty. It should be fabulous. It should be super interesting. INRAN.org-slash-start here, where you can find all the information. And for those of you interested in studying objectivism or seriously, lots of great, lots of great, what did I? Yeah, great opportunity to get a scholarship. So you can apply for a scholarship. INRAN.org-slash-start here. Anything else I need to be reminding you guys of? Yeah, the super chat. And membership, don't forget to become a member. Please become a member. It's really easy and cool. Subscribe, subscribe to the Iran book channel. That is huge. And then, of course, like the show before you leave, helps the algorithm. Everything becomes better if you subscribe. You can support the show monthly on Patreon and also on your onbookshow.com-slash-membership and on Patreon. And finally, if you're here live, you can use the super chat to ask questions and support the show and get your questions answered two in one. And we're going to turn to the super chat questions. We're almost at target already for the show. So thank you for all the super chatters so far. And we had some stickers. I have to get the stickers. Gail, thank you. Sylvanus, $50.00 in a sticker. Thank you, Sylvanus. Mary-Aline, thank you. And I think that's it. All right. Yeah, and we've made our target. All right, so let me take the $50.00 question first, which is Dan's question. Dan says, whoops. He says, based on a trader principle, is it possible to engage in a trust relationship with a narcissist? Moreover, is it possible to ever consider such an individual a friend? I mean, this is a better question for a psychologist than for me, but I suspect that the answer long term is no. But it does depend on how much of a narcissist that person is, my senses, that narcissism comes in degrees. And I would say the more than our statistic person is, the more they are completely focused on self in kind of a gratuitous way, not a long term rational way, the more they're focused on how other people view themselves and their image more than anything else, the less opportunity there is to have any kind of friendship or any kind of relationship. I think because they could betray you in an instant. They'll betray you if they get instant gratification somewhere else. If somebody else flatters them more, if somebody else just, if they can get more emotional pleasure in the moment or more reinforcement or more affirmation from somewhere else, it's a quick flip. I don't think there's any sense of loyalty to values. So I don't think one can have a long term relationship with somebody like that, a trusting relationship. One would always be looking on the lookout for a flip against you. Now, some people have narcissism in small doses or smaller doses or only compartmentalized in parts of their lives. I wouldn't rule it out there, but you really have to be careful, generally, because that tendency is a dangerous tendency. And how it manifests itself could be in ways that hurt you. And remember, in your personal relationships, you've got to be super selfish in a sense of don't get into relationships that are going to hurt you. Thank you, Dave. Really appreciate the support. All right, let's see. Michael, first among a few questions. If immoral pathological liars like Trump are miserable, where do they get the energy to keep going? Where does the motivation come from to keep doing the things that make them miserable? Well, I think that the motivation comes from other people. They get their energy from others. They get the energy from the crowd. This is why I think Trump is not Trump without the Trump rally. And it's the Trump rally that really gets him energized, gets him excited, brings out, quote, the best in him. Not, I mean, I would argue, the worst in him. But the best in him in terms of the demagogy, in terms of the appeal to the masses, he feeds off of the energy of the crowd. And then he can try out different things too. He can try different slogans, different ideas, and he sees how they respond. I mean, when Trump said the other day that he told this world leader, I'll encourage Putin to invade you, the crowd went wild. They loved it. I wouldn't be surprised if you see more of that. So he feeds off of that energy and off of that support. And that's where he gets. Narcissists get their energy from others, second-handed people, social metaphysicians, which is Trump is the master of, get their energy from other people. He is, in that sense, a true extrovert. I don't think he's that energetic and positive when he's alone. I think that's when he's miserable. So he tries not to be alone too much. Anyway, that's my theory. Take it for what it's worth. Michael, Mike, Mike Dial. The state shouldn't be involved in education. But do you agree with Florida saying this sociology can no longer be required course of public universities? It doesn't seem like an objective field of study. Neither is theology, right? Neither of a lot of fields of study, certainly from my perspective. Is theology any more legit than sociology? And I don't think sociology is not a legit field of study. I think most modern sociology is probably BS. But I think sociology, the study of societies and how they develop and how they interact and what shapes them and so on, is, I mean, sociology studies society and the interactions within society and outside of it and what shapes, I guess, cultures. But so I know, I mean, somebody has to determine the curriculum of universities. And the further way that is from government to batter, this is why for schools, it's usually school boards. And school boards within a wide range can pretty much do what they want. They can teach evolution or they can teach creationism or they can teach both. And they can decide on the textbook and they can decide on all kinds of things. At universities, there is a board of trustees. There is a whole, even public universities, there's a whole hierarchy built to make these kind of determinations. Once you start politicizing this process, it's very dangerous. It's very dangerous. And there are a lot of things that I don't want government, whether it's DeSantis in Florida or anywhere else, to make decisions about specific curriculum that universities compete. Let students decide, let it happen. And the fact that we're getting crap, yeah, well, maybe we should do something about it. But to do something about it is not use government force in order to change the curriculum, but do something about it. Don't send your kids to study sociology. Don't pay for their education if they do that. Don't pay for their education if they go to certain universities, encourage your kids to go to the universities to teach better stuff, things like that. And again, everybody is upset about woke. Yeah, should be upset about woke. But we should also be upset about religious studies. That's pretty woke. It's just older woke, older nonsense. Fred Harper, I read, quote, who wrote the Bible? And it got me curious about the ultra-orthodox Jews in Israel. Is there a sense of only our nights can be priests or any other tracking of ancient lineage? I don't know if I spelled that right. Yeah, our nights don't exist. But basically, you can tell who the priests are by a person's family name. So the priests all have the family name of Korhen. Korhen means priest. And kind of the subsidiary priests, the second tier priests, or Levi, any Jew who has a name, Levi comes from the clan that were the priests, the secondary priests. So Korhen and Levi are the Jewish priests. Now, to what extent is that practice today in ultra-orthodox Judaism and elsewhere? I don't think it is, but I don't know. I'm not that familiar with ultra-orthodox what they do. And there are no priests today in Judaism, right? There's no temple with no temple, no priests. If the temple was brought back, I expect the ultra-orthodox, if they rebuilt it, then the ultra-orthodox would require that the priests all be from the family of Korhen and that the subsidiary priests all be from the family of Levi. And because they're cultish, they're ethno, whatever you want to call it, crazy, and they would do that. But rabbis are not priests. They're not considered priests in the sense of a temple. And therefore, so the Korhens say certain prayers in the synagogue that others do not. They say the prayers of the priests marked in the thing, Korhens only. And you can see if you go to a synagogue and as they're chanting away, certain chants you're not supposed to say, only those in the congregation who are part of a Korhen can say that, right? Edo Korhen on the chat says, I would be elite in the Iron Age. Yes, and if they ever resurrect the Iron Age by building another temple, you would be the elite again. And even today, if you go into a synagogue and you're praying, you get to pray more than the rest of us because you are more important than God listens to you in ways he doesn't listen to us. That is the story. Anyway, all right, Michael, every single bit of chaos is being created on purpose. Every last nonsensical bit of it, the purpose is for when the time comes, you will be begging for order, their order. Yeah, you give them too much credit, too much power. I keep arguing against these ideas. It's not on purpose. Most of it's just sheer incompetence. They don't really know what they're doing. There's no grand scheme. There's no plan of taking order one day. There's no big conspiracy. It's just a bunch of incompetence on the left and the right. And the mayhem, the chaos that they create, somebody will exploit. But it won't be because it was consciously created in order for them to exploit. They're not that smart. They're not that sophisticated. They're not that competent. They're just not. Most of it is just, they don't know any better. This is all they can do. So yeah, evil is impotent. They are impotent at the end of the day. And that's why they can't really plan. They're incredibly destructive. Incredibly destructive, but impotent at the same time. All they can do is destroy, not build. That's why they can't really conspire even. Not really, not in the long run. Not something that's really doable. Anamika says, can't they just sack Mike Johnson and form a coalition of responsible right and logical left? P.S. Gaza must be destroyed. No, I mean, there is no responsible right. And in the logical, on this issue, there's probably more logical left than there's a responsible right. But there just isn't a big enough group of responsible right. They're not going to sack Mike Johnson. If they do, who are they going to put in the chairmanship instead of him? There's nobody else to take in support, unless it's a Democrat. They would never do that, because then Trump would get angry with them, and that's not good. The better Republicans are retiring from Congress, the more responsible Republicans are leaving. They don't want to be around. Because the party has become the party of mega, the party of irrational, irresponsible, cult worship of Donald Trump. Ben Shapiro is sometimes reasonable when he forgets about Trump. But now that Trump is, it looks like Trump is going to be, for certain, the nominee of the Republican Party, you will see Ben Shapiro fall into line and almost never questioned Donald Trump. And that's not reasonable. So Ben Shapiro can't be reasonable if he's willing to be himself, if he's willing to actually say what he believes. But he doesn't. The only issue in which Ben Shapiro will stand up to Trump, I mean, this is a reality, sadly. But the only issue in which Ben Shapiro will stand up to Trump is Israel. If Trump turns against Israel, Ben Shapiro will turn against Trump. But I don't know of any other issue where Ben Shapiro would do that. Shali, beyond personal and intellectual differences, what's your opinion of Stephen Hicks' works? His work on postmodernism, while it's had lacking in some of the best out there, he's also delved into how Nietzsche led to the Nazis. Yeah, I mean, I think that his work on postmodernism is good. I mean, I don't know of anybody who's done better work in terms of analyzing the postmodernists. I'm not enough of a philosopher to be able to say he's wrong in any particular section. I think the stuff I've seen of him doing in Nietzsche is good. I mean, of course, I think Leonard Picoff's work on understanding the Nazis is superior. But what Hicks has done is focus on Nietzsche, and that's fine. But yeah, I mean, I have no qualms about the non-objectivist work that Stephen Hicks does in kind of intellectual history. And I'm also not particularly in a position to judge it in terms of my knowledge. Andrew, how is this essentialization of one of your views? Fear becomes rampant in society. To the extent society devalues reason. Absolutely. Also, if you would explain why, I think it's worth repeating, is fear is driving much of politics. Yes. Once you devalue reason, you are left blind in front of the challenges that the world presents before you. You are left blind to judge what is going on out there in the world. Because the only tool you really have to judge and to understand and to know is reason. As a consequence, when you look out to the world and you see the chaos, the insanity, the rationality, everything, you have no explanation for it. You can't. You can't. You know, it just seems it's all scary. And this is not just about politics. This is about your own personal life. This is about everything around you. Without the ability of reason, without the ability to think, without the ability to rationally figure stuff out, you as a human being are impotent. And you're facing the world without the tool that allows you to survive. That is necessary to survive. And what is the emotion that you are going to get facing this scary, bewildering, unintelligible world? It's fear. It's fear. The more we reject reason, the more we become emotion centric, the more afraid we will be. Because the less we will have the capacity to handle reality, to handle what's going on in the world. Michael says, how long should patents last? Where in objective reality can we determine this? Well, you never determine things in objective reality as if the abstract concepts in objective reality as if the number 30 is out there somewhere and I need to discover it. It's a matter of thinking through the question. What is the purpose of patents? Why are they there? Who should be the beneficiary of the patents? Does it make sense for them to be in perpetuity? If not, what is a reasonable estimate of how long they should be in place? There is no magic number that one can draw from reality. That's not objective. Objective is to figure out what facts in reality suggest would be the right answer. And I don't know what that is. You'd have to be an expert on patents. I think that the patent system for the most part is pretty good in the United States. Maybe medical patents should be a little longer. It seems that they'd be shortened, particularly by the fact that they start when trials start, now when the drug is approved and stuff. So they tend to be pretty short. But that needs to be an area of expertise that philosophers of law need to think about and come up with something. Again, being objective doesn't mean if I'm going to be objective about beauty, you have to find beauty in the thing. No, you have to conceptualize what does beauty mean, what is beauty, and then see how that matches up to reality. And you do that by you conceptualize beauty from looking at reality. The same here. You look at the role patents play or the fact of invention, the fact of what would happen without patents, who benefits from those inventions, and so on. And the same, exactly the same is true with forgot of copyrights. It's the same logic. Michael, did you hear Netanyahu speak to Mele about free markets? I think if Mele is successful, conservative politicians will want to sigh to write his coattails. I mean, you guys are just, I mean, you take to literally what these people say. If Netanyahu speaks to a free market guy, he's going to say amazing free market things. And if Netanyahu speaks to a statist, and he wants to impress the statist, he will say statist things. When politicians talk to each other, they're not honest, particularly if there's a microphone in the room. I mean, politicians are basically never honest. They're certainly not honest with us, but they're not honest with one another. Not the kind of politicians we have today, founding fathers, with different breed of politicians. So if Mele is successful, some people will, whether they're conservative or not, I don't know. A lot of their free market reforms that happened starting in the 1980s were instituted by people on the left, not people on the right. Yeah, I mean, he will have a positive impact on the world. There's no question about that. So far, as of today, most of his initiatives are basically being killed by Congress, and we'll see what his next step is going to be. This is a long slog to get what he wants passed and approved in Argentina. Big worm, I agree we have to deal with Russia, but I feel like we are just another funding, just another funding the meat grinder, not winning. What would you want them to do with it to win, and how do you define winning? I define winning, kicking the Russians out of Ukrainian soil. And look, I have no, you know, if the Ukrainians decide that peace is worth giving up Crimea for, fine. I have no problem with that. But winning means that all the territory certainly taken since 2022 is recaptured by Ukraine. Ukraine proves to the Russians that they are capable of defending themselves. They minimize or dramatically reduce the incentive of Russia to do this ever again because Russia has not seen that Ukrainian can fight back. That's what needs to happen. If they cut a deal today, then in two years, Russia will invade and take more. I mean, there's no question about this. There's, you know, this is so far in relations war 101. If the enemy invades and then you negotiate a peace and they've taken part of that peace as them occupying your territory, then nothing prevents them from two years later them invading you again and taking another piece of property. Particularly when we know exactly what Putin wants. So I think if the Biden administration had given them the weapons they wanted in day one, tanks and airplanes, I think they would have already kicked the Russians out. They didn't. The airplanes are still not there. Hopefully they come over the next couple of months. The tanks finally got there. But oh, I don't know if the Abrams tanks are there. I don't even know if they have Abrams tanks yet. They were supposed to arrive in the late fall. But I haven't seen any reports that the Abrams tanks have arrived, so America still hasn't given them tax, maybe. And you know, but if they have the tanks, they have the airplanes. If they have the technology necessary to upset kind of the Russian, what do you call it, electronics that they're using right now, then they have the potential to beat down the Russians and to drive them out of Ukraine. And that would be victory. And then they can negotiate. And you know, if the Ukrainians want to give up Ukraine, fine. They don't let them keep fighting. I have no problem. Again, Ukraine is fighting for Ukraine, not for America. And they're not fighting because we told them to fight. They're fighting because they don't want to be occupied by Putin. They don't want to be occupied by Russia. I mean, and from my perspective, you know, Zelensky has been an amazing president for Ukraine. He's not a president of America. He's president of Ukraine. For Ukraine, he's been an amazing president and good for him. And he's shown courage, determination, like very few political leaders show. He's being screwed by the West, by the Biden administration. Okay, so be it. But I don't agree we should deal with Russia at all other than from a position of strength and dealing with them right now. Places, it places Ukrainians in a position of weakness. And all you have to do is watch Putin's interview. You can see the type of person he is. Zelensky is an amazing person, how he's handled this war. And you know, the right is committed and dedicated to hating on Zelensky. And it's one of the many reasons I cannot think of myself as right anymore, that it is truly despicable and disgusting. How the right has become fawning over any aggressive dictator. Started with Obann now, it's Putin and Xi. They just love these guys. Anyway, as soon as I start thinking about these things, I get, it gets very depressing very quickly. Apollos is, which party will win the impeding, pending UK election? I think the Labour Party will win. I think that's pretty much a done deal. That Labour will win. The Conservatives could lose by an historic margin. I mean, there's so unpopular, but I don't know that that will happen, but it could, but I'm pretty sure that Labour will win that election. Frank, what is the concept of right of return which addresses do Palestinians return to? Do they go to homes owned by other people sitting on their land? Yes, I mean, the right of return is the idea that all Palestinian refugees should be a lot back into what is today Israel. They should be able to occupy their old homes, recapture their old land. If the land is not used for something else, they should gain some kind of ownership or at least be financially compensated for that. You know, again, the Mongolians can demand the right of, you know, to be compensated for all the land. They landed up losing in the war with everybody, I guess. You know, Palestinians lost a war. They left their homes. They ran away. Some of them were kicked out for good reasons. Some of them might have been kicked out for bad reasons. I'd say the people who were kicked out for bad reasons Israel should allow them to make a claim for their property and be compensated. Everybody else, tough, resettle. And by the way, if they agree, if that happens, then Iraq and Morocco and Syria and Egypt should allow Jews to sue to get basically all the property that was taken from them when they were kicked out of those countries in the 1950s, paid back to them. It would be a lot more money going from Arab countries to Jews than it would be from Israel to Palestinians, if that was indeed the case. But the whole thing is absurd. The Palestinians lost. The Palestinians lost a war they started. Tough, resettle somewhere else, get a life, move on, enough. Sylvanus, I'm attempting to convert a friend from Anthem, with Anthem. I thought Rand's Bigger Books would be intimidating thoughts. Yeah, it's a good beginning. It's a good beginning, I'm not sure it's enough. You're not gonna actually convert him with him. It's gonna have to be a first step in a process which is probably gonna have to include those bigger, thicker books. Whoops. Andrew, let's see. A conservative comedian joked re-immigration that we should replace the Statue of Liberty's torch with pepper spray. Do you think one has to have allowed nastiness in their soul to find that funny? I don't know. I mean, I hate to generalize over humor. People find all kinds of things funny and I don't wanna judge them too much because I don't completely know how humor works. I'm sure I find some stuff funny that is probably wrong. But anyway, I think they're replacing the Statue of Liberty torch with pepper spray is a pretty good joke making fun of the absurdity of America building walls. So actually, I think it makes complete sense as a joke. On Ukraine again, this is a big one to clarify, men deal with as in fight back, okay? Then I agree with you. I guess my underlying issue is it doesn't seem like we're serious about winning now. Winning needs to be defined by Congress. Well, it doesn't need to be defined by Congress because they're not fighting. All we're doing is supplying weapons, mostly weapons that are in storage and many of them are about to reach expiration date. These are weapons we don't particularly need because it's unlikely the United States is gonna fight a ground war. So it's not like we're writing them a check necessarily and it's not like we are going to fight. I think we should encourage Zelensky to define victory and I think he has, he's defined victory. Kicking the Russians back to pre-2014 borders, that's his definition. Whether he'll achieve that complete victory or not is a different question, but he's defined victory and we're supporting it. So Congress doesn't have to find victory. If American troops on the ground, Congress would have to define victory. And it never does. Look, America is pathetic when it comes to wars. You're tempted to say don't do anything militarily because when you do, you're so pathetic at it, we always lose. But what we as, as I as an intellectual have to advocate for is, right? What I as an intellectual advocate for is fight. This is what you need to fight and you have to do it right. And if they ignore half of what I say, then they've ignored half of what I say. There's nothing I can do about it. Matty says, first time super chat. Thank you, really, really appreciate that. Now with the benefit of high side, how do you feel about the COVID lockdowns? Love the channel, keep it up. I hate the COVID lockdowns. I hated them at the time. I've got long rants, maybe Christian, if you're listening. Maybe we can republish some of my long rants about how evil the lockdowns were and how pathetic Americans were for succumbing to them. I did long rants about that. I thought they were awful. Now I did think and I think I still stand by this. That because of Trump's administration, but primarily Trump himself, sticking his head into the sand and not addressing COVID and not thinking it through and not preparing anybody and not doing anything about it, that New York probably needed a temporary lockdown for a short period of time to deal with the map. And because the hospitals are run by the government, that you would have, there was a huge spike that you needed a short, very short term lockdown just to deal with the spike in hospital admissions and then it should have been released. But you know, and I said that at the time. But that is only because our authoritarian government, in this case run by Trump, so botched the early response to COVID. In a free society, you would almost, you know, a lockdown would never, certainly not a city-wide, statewide, country-wide lockdown, never, ever, ever legitimate. And I thought the lockdowns were horrible at the time. And there still are. The biggest violation of individual rights in America in a short period of time. I thought it funny that people got so upset about masks and mask mandates when they accepted lockdowns. It's part of my critique at the time. You guys are pissed off at masks when you just were forced into your home and you didn't say a word. Quinn says, US-ruined relationship with Iran in 53 when CIA installed their government. I hear this all the time. What is the short answer? The short answer is that the CIA did help. It wasn't, didn't do it single-handedly. It was Iranians who did it. The CIA helped depose a socialist government in Iran. And it was replaced by a Shah, by a king, who turned out to be pretty good for the Iranian people in the sense of westernizing their country. But also, as most dictators are, even so-called benevolent ones, are pretty brutal and resulted in great oppression. But the idea that anybody in Iran is motivated by what happened in 53 is bizarre and untrue. And the reality is that the biggest victims of the Iranian regime today are the Iranians. And that has nothing to do with 53. That has everything to do with the Islamic jihadist totalitarian, not authoritarian regime that is there. And you can pretend it's all America's fault. People love doing that. But that's just bullshit. You know, again, Mongolia wants its empire back. How far back are you gonna go? The reality is that for 40 years, Iran has been ruled by boots. And indeed, if you ask many of those girls who took off the hijab and displayed their hair in the streets of Tehran, so incredibly bravely, do they hate America? Because of 53, they won't even know what you're talking about. And they certainly don't hate America. Quite the contrary. But they hate other mullahs. That's what's relevant. That's what's relevant. All right, thank you. I will see you all. When will I see you? Tonight, 7 p.m. East Coast time. We will have one of our long shows, topic to be determined, 7 p.m. East Coast time, so what, four hours, less than four hours, three hours, three hours and 20 minutes. See you then. Bye everybody.