Episode 687 Scott Adams: Kurds and South Park

Date: 2019-10-08 | Duration: 54:47

Topics

My new book LOSERTHINK goes on sale 11/5. Pre-order: https://bit.ly/2NRammu South Park’s brutal China episode…and South Park’s apology A LOT of people just found out about China Matt Gaetz brilliant “divorce” framed tweet for Syria pullout AOC wants a conversation about abolishing prisons How exactly, do people know President Trump acted impulsively? Ukraine transcript proves BOTH sides are correct? What conservative critics of the President don’t understand Elizabeth Warren’s latest “Corn Pop” moment Joel Stein’s new Book: In Defense of Elitism Lengthy, factually inaccurate chapters about me

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> [!note] Rough Transcript
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> This is an auto-generated transcript and may contain errors.

## Transcript

[0:07]

I'm open pom pom pom pom hey everybody come on in here that's my printer you hear printing off my notes now I know why you here yeah I do yeah it's for the simultaneous up you came to the right place you don't need much Tyler hey Arlene John good to see you all and if you're prepared you may already have a cup of Megara glass inside the chalice decorate thermos flask canteen and Grail convict a vessel of any kind of filling with your favorite liquid I like coffee join me now for the unparalleled pleasure that don't mean yet the thing that makes everything better the simultaneous ED go oh one of the best ones ever now do you have a thing at your home or workplace called a printer a printer where things from the

[1:11]

printer a printer where things from the Internet can be put on paper and then you can look at them I've got one of those and I almost throw it off my second-floor balcony every time I use it and this is just about every printer I've ever owned I want to throw them all off the second-floor balcony because I've never been able to get a printer that would print out paper and then I could pick it up where it was printed and then I could use it I've never been able to do that in years and years all the two things happen one is that the printer is in a place where somebody else will place something in front of the paper output and then the paper will bunch up because there's something in the way or I'll do it I'll move it and it'll bunch up you know all stick or there's a second possibility if you don't have your printer where the printer will come and go bunch up and not be able to print anything you have

[2:11]

not be able to print anything you have to do method two which is what I've moved to you can see here where you print it so that it all falls on the floor now that looks do you like a mistake it's not to print something is on to the floor because every other way it'll bunch up it'll catch on something and will catch on the other paper so I actually have my printer my printers all print on the floor and if you don't mind I'll have to pick them up off the floor now because these are my notes for the show I'm pretty sure this somebody should invent a printer that would have print and then put the paper near the printer in some way that's not all bolt up in the ball all right that's enough of that and CVS receipts people keep sending names of people doing ridiculous things with their 601 CVS receipts which is pretty much did you all see the apology from

[3:14]

much did you all see the apology from from South Park to China so South Park did an episode mocking in China and I gotta tell you I saw the episode it was brutal it was really brutal and so China has banned to South Park from from China now when I watched the episode I said to myself I think I'm watching the last episode that the Chinese will sing because it was pretty obvious if you saw the episode and by the way you absolutely should watch the episode even even if you don't care about South Park it's I think it's one of the latest ones maybe it was last week's you should see her for its political significance you should you should see it for its importance you know its actual political global significance because there are a lot of people who found out about China

[4:14]

lot of people who found out about China for the first time from South Park and South Park they did not hold back they as is their way they did not let's say they did not moderate their opinions so they were freaking brutal yeah here's their apology so China bans was South Park so Trey Parker and Matt Stone the creators of South Park they issued an official apology and it says quote like the NBA we welcome the Chinese censors into our homes and into our hearts we too love money more than freedom and democracy out there just taking the NBA and just throwing them under the bus and like back up forward back up forward we do love money more than freedom and
democracy she president she doesn't look just like doesn't look just like Winnie the Pooh

[5:16]

doesn't look just like Winnie the Pooh at all so if you don't know that reference apparently there's some unflattering comparison of the way Winnie the Pooh looks just physically to the way President Sheen looks so much so the Winnie the Pooh was banned in China so that's part of what the South Park episode is about is Winnie the Pooh had it's pretty hilarious so she doesn't look like Winnie the Pooh at all tune in to our 300th episode this Wednesday at N so they're using their apology to promote their 300th episode everything about this is right long live the great Communist Party of China made this autumns sorghum harvest be bountiful we good now China we good now China so I wouldn't be looking for South Park to be playing in China anytime soon what will

[6:19]

playing in China anytime soon what will this do to the total viewership of this one episode of South Park well if the world works the way I wanted to this will be the most-watched episode of South Park in China because if you want if you want something to be watched try banning it in only your country see how that does to your viewership see what that does so something tells me that there's gonna be a whole lot of viewing of that episode so a good job for the South Park people we're getting closer and closer to decoupling from China because I think it's it's just becoming more and more clear that whatever they got going on over there we don't want any of that so there's this weird situation shaping up where I think there are going to be two planet Earth's there's going to be one planet earth that's everything but China and then there's going to be sort of a

[7:20]

and then there's going to be sort of a Chinese bubble where China probably has the resources and the will to literally seal up China so that the Chinese don't know what's happening in the rest of the world and maybe we don't know what's happening in China there we may actually end up having to just wall it off in other words they would wall themselves off because they wouldn't be able to control their population if the population that had access to information yeah China might not survive access to information think about that in order for China to survive they have to cut off their population from information that's like North Korea same thing all right what did I tell you about the situation with removing troops from Syria near the border of Turkey so the president announced he was going to

[8:21]

the president announced he was going to let Turkey handle this border region that we had some troops and and what did the world do the world did something like this yeah what did I say I said fog of war wait 48 hours this probably isn't what you think it is there's probably more information what happened within 48 hours story totally changed all right now when I say totally changed I mean there were some significant facts that we didn't go before number one there's only 50 people 50 people that was the total number of troops we were talking about let me ask you this were those 50 people protecting that entire area from the army of Turkey well not exactly I mean it probably

[9:22]

well not exactly I mean it probably helped because Turkey wouldn't want to kill any of our troops and if they were there maybe that maybe that was a little bit of that of a gaming factor but I don't feel as though the story is the same when you say there were 50 people does it feel the same as when you thought we were withdrawing you know some major fighting force what were the 50 people doing anyway they weren't fighting much right well I don't know how much is fighting what we're doing but 50 people can't do that much in terms of you know being an army so that was the first thing we learned the second thing we learned fairly quickly is it the President had said he said it on Twitter so that Turkey could hear it and I'm sure Turkey had already heard it that if they did something that crossed the line using the president's language that he would quote obliterate their economy the president threatened to obliterated any

[10:25]

president threatened to obliterated any of Turkey and then he said he's done it before and he has he has actually obliterated the economy of Turkey when he was trying to get back the pastor whoever it was he actually crashed their economy fairly quickly and they and they they gave up their uh their hostage or prisoner or political prisoner or whatever it was I forget his name he was the religious guy anyway I thought those were the two things needed to know there's only 50 people and then he had threatened Turkey that if they cross the line meaning do something horrible against the Kurds etc that he would crash your economy is that enough well here's the thing if you if you see people on TV who have somebody asked me if my polyps are recurring I went off my meds yesterday so yes so yes you're seeing me getting allergy

[11:25]

you're seeing me getting allergy symptoms that are not actually allergy there it's something it's another story I don't want to get into that anyway
so here's my here's my thing about the situation it didn't look like you thought it did coincidentally the same day that that story happened was when my article in The Wall Street Journal came out and the Wall Street Journal article I said there one of the things you should do to avoid loser thing is to wait 24 to 48 hours after a story like that breaks to see if you have all the facts because you almost never do sure enough the the simulation served up exactly exactly the story type that my article was about and it and I showed the model as clearly as you can see the model that your first reaction was completely lacking and important details now I wanted to show you one of the best

[12:26]

now I wanted to show you one of the best tweets about this that I'm sure I print it out oh man and I not print that out what is wrong with me oh here it is this is from representative Matt gates so you probably know Matt gates and it's spelled GA etz Matt gates so you see him often defending the president he's on the news on Fox News all the time so he's one of the most visible politicians who are pro Trump I would also say I'm gonna have to say that I've been watching him now for a few years and he has he has become probably the most effective politician who's on the right and and that you see often yeah of the people that you see on TV and set are the ones that you're aware of I think he's become the most effective one and here's a good example

[13:26]

effective one and here's a good example of this so here's his tweet defending the president's decision about Syria pulling out the 50 troops then watch how clever this is so Matt Gaetz tweets so the nation with quote no-fault divorce is supposed to stay married to the Syrian Kurds forever I'll talk about this this is just a brilliant opening to a tweet and he says we gave them weapons money and training to run Isis and of their region emphasis on their to run Isis out of their region now we are supposed to entangle ourselves in their four hundred plus year conflict with the Turks do we share values now everything about this tweet is right this is really high level persuasive just really good stuff let me tell you what's good about it first of all it's three questions not three statements if you ask if you make three statements that somebody is primed

[14:28]

three statements that somebody is primed to disagree with and they're primed because they're on the other team so if doesn't matter who says it the other team says you make a statement I say it's false you say a I say a is not true so the first thing he does right is he puts three questions and his tweets instead of three statements and there are three good questions though they have to be the right questions or that's not a smart thing to do here's the first question again so the nation with no-fault divorce is supposed to say married to the Syrian Kurds forever so the frame that most people who were critical of this were putting on this is that the Kurds are allies and you never leave an ally you know they fought on the same team they were helpful they were pro-american they at least in their fighting against Isis and we should not abandon them so that was the frame that the critics were putting on so gates puts this frame on it you know that we don't even stay in marriage forever that's really good because he

[15:30]

forever that's really good because he personalized it because most of you have had some experience with marriage you know if you're old enough to vote you've had at least a flirtation with the idea of being married and then thinking maybe you shouldn't be I personally have a divorce of my history many of you do those of you have not divorced certainly know people who have and should have what's the one thing you think when you get married well I'm not going to get divorced everybody who gets more married thinks it's forever and it's not and we have a we have no-fault divorce because we know things don't last forever even things that we we all seriously and genuinely want to last forever don't last forever so his first question is why is the country with no-fault divorce we don't need to think our relationships last forever why would our relationship why would our relationship with the Kurds last forever it's really clever

[16:32]

Kurds last forever it's really clever flight framing brings it to something you really understand compares it to it in a very clever way and now you're frame because because marriage and divorce are so powerful in your mind they just evaporate the other frame and you just takes you right into this even marriage doesn't last forever why should the Kurds very very clever comparison
then he says that we we help them out so basically that we've done our more than our duty we drove Isis out of their territory it wasn't them doing us a favor it was because we were working together it was like we did them a favor they're doing us a favor but cases framing it as we did them may be a bigger favor because running Isis and of their backyard feels like a bigger deal than it is to us so that's fair - it's fair that they got more out of this than we did this is their

[17:34]

of this than we did this is their backyard and that here's the clever part he says in question form we are now supposed now we were supposed to entangle ourselves who uses word entangle sort of uncritically just if you hear tangle what are you here when you hear the word entangled you want to get out of it right there's no such there's no positive use of the word entangle we got entangled it's never good so rather than say we're partners with them where we've had we've had a productive you know teamwork any of those he says weren't angled good word to just slip in there and uncritically we were supposed to untangle ourselves in there 400-plus conflict 400-plus your conflict with it with the Turks now there you go 400 plus year conflict with the Turks when you hear that they occurs and the Turks have a 400 year conflict does that feel like

[18:36]

400 year conflict does that feel like your problem it suddenly doesn't feel like your problem does it because you can solve a short-term problem just sort of in general generally speaking if there's something that looks like a short-term situation that feels like maybe something you could solve but now I tell you that there's a problem that's been the same for 400 years it doesn't matter what the problem is I tell you the problem has been the same for 400 years now if you said you had a scientific solution I'd listen to that but if it's a political problem essentially this lasted 400 years are you gonna fix it this year no all you have to hear is that as a 400 year problem and you say ah only a sucker would try to solve that only a sucker would try to solve a 400 year problem that's political you know if again if it were scientific and you had invented something sure but

[19:37]

and you had invented something sure but not a political problem because nothing changed there's just not that much that's different there's no it's not going to fix itself I think the president referred to them as natural enemies which is also a good phrase so I would say whether you like it or not a or C is the strongest persuader on the left I think Matt Gaetz has become the most effective communicator I'll say communicator and persuader on the right and honestly if he's not running for president someday I would be really surprised I would be really surprised if you don't see Matt Gaetz you know in the hunt for president in a few years I don't know when so that's my prediction and here I'll double and triple down I predict long-range prediction are you right are you ready someday Matt Gaetz will run for president against AOC and that is gonna

[20:38]

president against AOC and that is gonna be fun that is gonna be a good time let me tell you speaking of a or C she cannot not make news all right AMC doesn't know how to stay out of the news and I mean that a good way she knows how to keep her name in front of the news her latest thing was that we only get the exact quote she says America needs to quote have a real conversation about abolishing prisons now if you hear the a or C wants to abolish prisons and we've talked about this before I think Biden said something about but when you hear that that's that's a headline right you can't get that out of your head you're suddenly thinking about abolishing prisons and you're like what how can you do that now she's not talking about violent crimes I think I don't know she doesn't have details but I've said before now when somebody says we have to have a conversation about and it's not real every politician who says

[21:40]

it's not real every politician who says we need to have and they use these words we have to have a conversation about X it means that they know that nobody has an idea for solving it so you don't really need that conversation you would need somebody who has a suggestion for how to do it if you have a joshan then you can look into it but if you don't have a suggestion it doesn't help to say we need to have a conversation about it um you need a suggestion so one of the biggest criticisms about the president now now that the fog of war is cleared about the Syria pelant people are saying it's impulsive the president's impulsive does that word and you've seen that everywhere he's impulsive when you see that the president is being accused of being impulsive why should you say to yourself what should be your immediate reaction to hearing that the critics of the president are starting to settle in

[22:42]

the president are starting to settle in on saying he's impulsive about some specific decisions what's that tell you
it tells you it tells you they don't have anything because impulsivity is a generic statement and almost never true Trump has been talking about pulling out of Syria since he was campaigning it's literally the thing he's thought the most about there's probably nothing he's thought more about how much advice do you think he's gotten about Syria in the three years or so that he's been president and almost present how many times do you think advisors have given their opinion about Syria plus the news plus the pundits this is the least impulsive decision of all time there could be no decision I doubt do you think there's anything the president has thought about more except maybe the wall you know border security I don't think

[23:44]

you know border security I don't think there's anything he's thought about more so when all the enemies are saying it's impulsive the first thing you should say is you don't know that about it another person we never know how much somebody thought of something that's not even a thing hey I saw that you had a sip of coffee this morning being impulsive again are you I don't know that I don't know how you long you plan to be sitting here this morning have your simultaneous it how could I possibly know how much you thought about something just think about that the whole notion that a stranger can know how much the president thought about something is that not the most ridiculous thing you've ever heard you can't know that you know unless he told you I suppose if he said well it never occurred to me until today but I decided to pull out I suppose if he told you you know maybe that would tell you a little bit so even then you wouldn't be sure you'd only know what he told you so

[24:45]

sure you'd only know what he told you so when you start seeing the mind-reading and this is the category of mind-reading because to know how much somebody thought about something is ridiculous it's just ridiculous in its mind-reading all right our to movie situation today is that the there are two versions of reality on one on fox news and one on CN about this whistleblower situation one says that the whistleblower the original whistleblower complaint was debunked by the actual transcript the other says the transcript says exactly what the whistleblower said the two completely different versions of reality one says that we have a document that says the president did something awful and you could read it for yourself the other says we have a document proving the president didn't do anything wrong and in fact his phone call was perfect and all you have to do is read the document

[25:46]

all you have to do is read the document see it for yourself could there be a better example of the two movies on one screen when both of them are saying look at the same same document it's right there look at it with your own eyes look what the whistleblower said comparable they're either the same or they're totally different one of those is true well perhaps neither of them is true because it might be a subjective world we're living in more about that later but it is interesting to me and by the way I think it kind of boils down to more of an opinion than in fact so both of the both sides are reporting in this fact but really it's sort of an opinion you could kind of look at it and say yeah I can kind of see how you would interpret it that way but I could see how you'd interpret it the other way let me tell you what the critics of the President on his side are getting wrong so these are the critics of the president who are Republicans and

[26:46]

president who are Republicans and conservatives and are trying to support the President on this whole whistleblower situation but they're doing it poorly and I'm not going to name names but you can you can see them only because I can't remember some of the names not done any other reason but people are saying that sure the President had a good reason to ask about the CrowdStrike stuff you know that was a fair question because I had to do with legitimacy of the 2016 elections and it's an ongoing thing and Ukraine is important to the story so completely legitimate that he asked about CrowdStrike but even the supporters of the president are saying but when he asked about Biden and having Ukraine investigate Biden that's not as easy to defend because that's more clearly just a political thing about his enemy even even the president's supporters are saying that not all of them but some of them here's where they're wrong asking

[27:49]

them here's where they're wrong asking about Biden was the highest priority for the president it was his highest priority and if that's not obvious to you I don't know how it's not because Biden was what it still is he's number one in the poll to be President of the United States and he has an obvious on its face conflict of interest with an important country that probably is also a little too close to Russia even though they don't want to be meaning there anything that Ukraine knows Russia is gonna find out right don't you figure that's true so giving this situation wasn't that his highest priority to find out if the at least in the polling the most likely next president would be Biden according to the polls and according to a lot of experts so finding out if that person is beholden to

[28:50]

out if that person is beholden to Ukraine which would make them very likely beholden to Russia in other words if Russia found out whatever blackmail material or compromising information the Ukraine had and probably already know it by now would we now be in a weakened position with the President Biden same thing with China would it be important to the United States and how high a priority would it be to to have everybody in the United States now that Biden might be a little cozier with China in the past then the voters would be comfortable with how important is that for the public to now and for even the legal system to look into it it's our top priority the people who are defending the the the president on that phone call are totally screwing the pooch on this I mean they're not helping him if they're saying that asking that Biden wasn't the top priority for the President of the United States what was because all the

[29:53]

United States what was because all the other stuff was kind of you know under control like yeah yeah the conversations with their other countries and negotiations are ongoing there the economy is looking good pretty much all the other you know big stuff that presidents do got a plug in my iPad here for a second pretty much all the other big stuff the president does was kind of limited control but find again if you're if you're possible or even probable next president is in the pocket of a foreign country stop telling me that's a low priority stop telling me that the only reason you could do that is for to win an election that's not the only reason you do it how about the reason is it was the most important thing that the president should be finding out if the next presidents in the pocket of a foreign country how in the world is that not it's not priority I just I don't get what his supporters are doing they're totally screwing the pooch on this totally all right

[31:03]

Elizabeth Warren makes news not in a good way so Elizabeth Warren is getting some incoming flack for she is she has some kind of a story in which she was what long long time ago she was working at a school as a teacher when she became visibly pregnant she says the mean old misogynist principal fired her because in those days you just fired women for getting pregnant except that apparently there's some factual counterfactuals to this specifically there's some records that show that she quit and she wasn't fired at all and that they had a very high opinion of her and that they would have definitely hired her back so if you were to look at this in isolation and say oh there's a candidate for president who lied about something on her biography and pumped it up sort of a corn pop situation now is that a story a

[32:06]

corn pop situation now is that a story a big deal well probably not you know a somebody running for president and you know pumping up the resume making a story that wasn't quite the way it happened into something that makes them sound a little bit of heroic or a little bit of a victim or or a little bit understands the voters or something like that is that a big deal I would say no in general a little bit of a small a small inconsistency with your you know with your story and the facts is not really too damaging for a politician because it's so routine we're so used to it then it kind of just rolls off it's like yeah okay they exaggerated that a little bit but here's the trouble it forms a pattern of of being a fake victim one when she was saying this she was a person of color when she said she was Native American and now the second

[33:07]

was Native American and now the second story in which she was claiming to be victimized for being a woman who was pregnant those are two stories that have something very troubling in common that she's a phony nobody likes a phony why what do even the critics of President Trump say is one of his strongest qualifications for president now this I'm talking about President Trump's biggest critics what did they say even his critics say is one of president Trump's best qualities he's authentic even though he fails the fact-checking consistently he does it in a way that you know is hyperbole you know you know what his point is and you're used to it right you're used to the fact that if 10,000 people come to his rally he might say 30,000 that doesn't strike you as inauthentic because he does it every time and you

[34:07]

because he does it every time and you know why he's doing it you know the point in it and you expect him to do it next time because that's who he is he tells you he uses hyperbole and then he uses it right in front of you weirdly the president has created a brand quite cleverly I would say too in which he can fail the fact-checking 10,000 times I think 11 thousand times now and his supporters and even his critics will say well he sure is authentic because he is authentic he will sit and and I would expect him to fail the fact-checking maybe 20,000 times and I'm not going to care because every time he does it it's gonna be in the direction that you know okay he's saying this is bigger than it is he's saying this is better than this he's saying he he had more contribution to the success than he did I get that that's who he is that's who he says he is he tells us that indirect language you know you wrote a book about it you know the art of the deal he uses hyperbole and he uses it

[35:08]

hyperbole and he uses it for good effect so you've got one candidate who is probably the most famous authentic person he swears in his tweets the the impulsivity that people accuse him of also comes across as authenticity even when it's not really impulsive it's it comes across as okay that's what he's really thinking the fact that he tweets directly to the people with spelling errors does that make him look like a phony or authentic it makes him look authentic years from now historians and experts are going to look at the president's misspelled tweets and they're good to say to themselves you know back then we thought he should have deleted that tweet and retweeted it with the correct spelling back then we thought he should have had an editor look at every tweet so that before they go out somebody make sure the spelling is right but now we realize that people registered it as just being

[36:08]

that people registered it as just being a real person real people spell stuff wrong on Twitter I think I did it yesterday pretty sure I think I had a spelling error yesterday so how do you run the phoniest candidate we've ever had somebody who's taken on two separate identities that just were not even true against the most the most authentic candidate we've ever had probably probably more authentic than will ever have in his own way you know you know he's a showman you know he uses hyperbole but he's always him trump is never not Trump he never leaves Trump nice there's never a day when he's less Trump Elizabeth Warren she could be whoever you honored to be she could be a Republican oh yeah she was she used to be a Republican now Trump used to be a Democrat but it's not gonna hurt him at all because you know you use just more transparent and people say oh yeah he says he used to be any

[37:09]

say oh yeah he says he used to be any change you know he looks like who he is now but Warren's gonna have a problem with that witha misty and I think that makes her electable for a variety of reasons I'm just an easier it's gonna be really ugly huh
I think it might be a few more in there all right just a few more things I hadn't author come and spend a day with me
me and I guess was over a year ago and there's an author named as Joel Stein you probably heard of him he's very well known a humor writer and he wanted to include me in his new book so his new book is called in defense of elitism so he's he's what you'd call a a classic

[38:09]

he's he's what you'd call a a classic anti-trump er and so of his book at least the part that's about me is sort of an anti-trump er talking to somebody who has a different opinion in that case would be me now one of the things I read about in my book loser think loser think which is available now for pre-order everywhere that you pre-order books wherever you like and in loser think I talked about the the Gallo man effect it's hyphenated gell-mann and gell-mann was a person who made this observation you've heard this before that if you happen to be the subject or or the news is about something you're an expert on you can tell how wrong it is because that happens to be your expertise but if you are not an expert you couldn't help so his point is why is it that every time there's a story where I do know the

[39:10]

time there's a story where I do know the truth I can tell that the news is wrong but then when I read all the other stories I assume it's the news is right and I'm probably wrong about that because I'll bet the people who know about those topics also think the news is wrong every time
so there's a fairly lengthy section over several chapters about me so I got to read Christina and I spent some time last night I'm taking turns reading the chapter about me and we're we're just laughing about how much of it is wrong so essentially what he does is he describes my opinion of one thing or another and then he says why it's bad she's crazy except as I've told you before he never explains my side right so what he does what he's debunking it and say how stupid and crazy I am essentially he's defending his own he's he's arguing against his own

[40:11]

he's arguing against his own misinterpretation of what I said and so he sets me up with all these fake opinions and a lot of the other facts are just like totally wrong he says something about eat right he got listen listen they're wrong mrs. he said that I have proposed a 25% tax on the top one percent for reparations that's in his book so his book says that I have proposed a 25 percent extra tax on the top one percent for reparations slavery reparations do you think I did that that's that's best published as a fact in a book now everybody ariza I think that's the fact now am I going to correct it no because I think it's hilarious it's it's no more or less accurate than all of the other stuff in the book almost everything but there might have been I didn't count but there might have been something like 25

[41:13]

might have been something like 25 factual errors just about me something like 25 of them now let me tell you where that came from I did write a blog post some time ago in which I said this what I said was that for 25 years so the 25 was a reference to years when I was talking about it he turned it into a reference to 25 percent so probably he was working off his old notes and forgot what I actually said and turned 25 years into 25 cents so my proposal was this was more of a thought experiment because I never imagined it could be a practical idea but what I said was that over 25 years so you'd put an end date on it for 25 years you'd do a tax on the top 1% I never put a percentage on it I just said a tax on the top 1% so that anybody who was african-american below a certain level of income could go to college for free

[42:14]

of income could go to college for free but here's the Cape which was also not in what Joel said it would also apply to everybody else who was below that income that's it so it wouldn't be just for black people it would be for anybody who was below a certain income it would be a tax on the 1% and they get to go to college for free for 25 years just to adjust for the fact that some people are starting from so far behind you'd have one generation 25 meters in which everybody would have the same opportunity for a while see if it helps you know even things up and then after 25 years you say ok we're done with the reparations we helped poor black people but we help to poor everybody else at the same time and that was based on sort of the the hawk Newsom idea that the best way to help the black community is to help everybody else who's in the same situation it just makes it easier for everybody and so I was using that now my

[43:16]

everybody and so I was using that now my my thought experiment was that the top 1% of the ones who always gain the most from any improvement in the economy and if you could make a major improvement in the education of the the poorest people in the country that the the boost to the economy would more than make up for for the top 1% because remember every time the economy gets better they get richer and they get richer faster and more than anybody else gets richer that's always that always happens so for them it would be a tax that was wait for it and investment so they're the only only people the top 1% for whom a special tax to help the poorest people get good education z' would act exactly like an investment most taxes are not investments they're just expenses that's what's special about this if it's just the top 1% they gain when the economy goes up and what could it be better for the economy than 25 years of really

[44:19]

the economy than 25 years of really making sure you've educated your best people the smart people no matter what their income was so Joel Stein turned that into I wanted to tax the elite 25% and then left out all the reasons imagine imagine what I just described but without the reasons what's that was batshit crazy without the reasons right now imagine that all the other opinions that he assigned to me were about that bad here's another one he mocked me for saying that experts should not be trusted which I also say in here with more nuance than he said while at the same time I go to a doctor and the doctor key word for example my voice problems and other problems so he said that I was being quite silly and inconsistent those my own words for decrying experts at the same time that I use experts so therefore inconsistent does that sound like me does that sound

[45:22]

does that sound like me does that sound like an accurate representation of my views here's what I actually said when I talked about my voice problem I said several doctors I don't have money let's say half a dozen doctors could not help me and then on my own I hunted down the one doctor good and so if you were to look at experts in general six out of seven it didn't have anything that helped me they were all wrong 107 was right but I didn't know that until actually you know went through the operation and it worked and all that I couldn't be couldn't be sure so what I say is if you know that six out of seven experts can routinely be wrong you know experts were wrong about the nutrition pyramid you know experts were talking about the hole in the ozone that you should not automatically and here's the keyword automatically to assume that the consensus of experts is right that is very different from saying that the experts are always wrong so

[46:26]

that the experts are always wrong so somehow Joel Stein made my very reasonable statement that there are many examples in our own experience in which the majority of experts are wrong they you should go into every expert situation saying okay four hundred five times they could be wrong but I'm going to check into it there there are certainly cases where if you find the right expert and you know you have you want to follow their advice of course so all the nuance take it out of my point about experts and boil down to why do you think experts are wrong at the same time you use experts and then he writes a book about it now imagine that times I don't know ten or something for happened for the rest of the book now here's the point anybody who's not me who reads that book they're not gonna know it's all made up nobody's gonna know that all of my opinions as represent I think all of them well

[47:26]

represent I think all of them well pretty much all of them as represented in the book are not real nobody's gonna know that those things become now part of my permanent record and when I argue with somebody online from the rest of my life for the rest of my life if I argue with people online somebody's gonna say well you said there should be a tax on the top one percent of 25 percent explain that cartoon boy that's why cartoonist should not be involved with anything though I said the other thing he mocked me for in the book was so it was part of the conversation about next verses and he asked me if I thought that I was qualified to be Secretary of State as an example and I said yes except for two qualities which actually do you know make it impossible one is I don't have the energy to fly all over the world all the time I just don't have the energy to do that there's no way I could live with you know jet

[48:28]

no way I could live with you know jet lag all day secondly I have a poor memory so these are the two things that I said to Joel that he reported I have a poor memory and if you're gonna do if you're gonna be the Secretary of State you have to remember all these heads of states and their ambassador and you've got to memorize their capital in their cities and you got to know a little bit about their history etc and so he mocked me for thinking that except for those two things I could be such an expert I could be a Secretary of State to which I say have you ever looked at all the other secretaries of state are they experts is Mike Pompeo an expert on foreign countries before he was you know in the CIA and before he did this now everybody learned their job sort of on the job the nature of those jobs is that their political yeah Hillary was Hillary an expert in foreign countries was John Kerry an expert in foreign countries so

[49:33]

without putting if he didn't put that context in the book that essentially all new secretaries of state were at least many of them are not experts they learn it on the job they have experts who work for them those experts tell them to lay of the land for any particular decision and then they make their decision so it is you know was I was President Trump an expert at being president no the most normal thing in the world is for people who are not experts to have those jobs it's the same same thing I said about 1-hundred Biden and you probably didn't like it when I said about him how unusual is it for someone who doesn't know anything about the oil business to be on the board of directors of an oil company it's typical that's actually normal it's completely normal when people reach a certain level of executive executives influence that they're not experts that's actually how it works that's most typical way these jobs work and so

[50:37]

most typical way these jobs work and so Joel Stein mocks me for saying that just because I'm a smart adult that I could be Secretary of State but it's not about me I'm pretty sure anybody who had let's say a college degree and a master's degree most people who could get through a good college you know I went to Berkeley so that gives me a little bit of credential right it's hard to get into Berkeley I got my MBA there I would say anybody who's going to a college of at least that level of that level of filter meaning that it's hard to get into them pretty much any of those people could have done a reasonably good job as Secretary of State in my opinion so it wasn't really a question that a statement about me that I could be Secretary of State it was more about it doesn't take that much you don't have to

[51:38]

doesn't take that much you don't have to be born magic you don't have to be a genius you just have to be an adult who's seen enough of the world it would help to be a certain age just to see it enough but yeah I could be Secretary of State absolutely I would say that they're probably quite a few people on this periscope right now who if they were look at their own educational credentials maybe their own success in life they know how to communicate you could probably find quite a few secretaries of states watching this periscope right now literally and that's not even an exaggeration probably quite a few people who could do that job all right and keep in mind that a lot of people who do that job don't do it well yeah Tillerson didn't last that long was Tillerson qualified because he was the he was a CEO of Exxon does that make you qualified to be Secretary of State I don't know all right that's all I got for now and I will talk to you all

[52:42]

for now and I will talk to you all tomorrow make sure the order lose think if you'd like to support these periscopes by the way patreon has largely you know shrunk to nothing so I used to get funded through patreon and but patreon D platform so people also conservatives stop giving money into patreon so my so patreon is no longer very relevant I get a little bit from that and then YouTube D monetize almost all of the videos now some of them automatically they just D monetize them on arrival so I thought that I could get monetized through YouTube but I can't they put a cap on that and that will never be a significant number no matter how many subscribers I have so the subscribers the subscribers keep increasing but the monetary the ad revenue goes down so the ad revenues go down every month lately while the well the number of subscribers and the watch time goes up it's just

[53:43]

and the watch time goes up it's just total thanks so that leaves me with exactly one way that it can be worthwhile to me to do this now I do it honestly I would probably still do this if there was no monetary benefit because I love it I actually it's so often the highlight of my day is doing this I just love this interaction there's something about the comments and the fact that it's interactive the fact that we meet here every day that does make this kind of special both ways I don't do it just because I've got something we have larger ambition I do it because I really enjoy it I think he can tell and it would do me a great favor if you pre-ordered it because that gives it a bomb to start and then if it makes it bestseller list it sells itself so if you really want to help me out and you were thinking of buying it later it would really help me if you preorder it on Amazon or wherever you do it and that

[54:44]

on Amazon or wherever you do it and that is all I'm going to say about that and