Episode 798 Scott Adams: Clearview AI app that Identifies Criminals, With David Scalzo, Impeachment

Date: 2020-01-25 | Duration: 1:00:07

Topics

My new book LOSERTHINK, available now on Amazon https://tinyurl.com/rqmjc2a Special guest: Clearview.ai investor David Scalzo A search engine for faces, used by law enforcement There should be a cost for attempting to impeach and failing Adam Schiff claims and harm to national interest Adam Schiff and future crimes of the imagination The challenge of cartooning with diversity

If you would like my channel to have a wider audience and higher production quality, please donate via my startup (Whenhub.com) at this link: https://interface.my/ScottAdamsSays

> [!note] Rough Transcript
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## Transcript

[0:08]

pom pom pom pom pom um hey everybody come on in we got a good one today it's gonna be it's gonna be lit it's gonna be off the hook it's gonna be amazing today we're gonna have a special guest which I'll introduce in a moment but first things first right that's right first things first and I think you know what's coming up first we're a little low on followers for some reason so let me see if there is I think I've got a bug here I'm gonna tweet going live live now oh I'm gonna tweet that out because I think the notification failed or something well happy weekend and I think I know why you're here at least part of the reason you're here yes I do it's because you'd like to be here for the simultaneous up I usually wait for a

[1:08]

simultaneous up I usually wait for a thousand people but is everybody watching the AAP or watching the impeachment or something somebody says I didn't get a notification yeah I think there's something wrong with the notifications and it might have something to do with having a guest on so I don't know exactly but we're gonna find out anyway first first if you'd like to participate in simultaneous if all you need is a cup of marker glass the tanker chalices die and the canteen jug replies the vessel of any kind fill it with your favorite liquid I like coffee and join me now for the unparalleled pleasure the dopamine's here the day the thing makes everything better simultaneous it go
yeah yeah that's a good one yep just as good as I thought now if technology is working and I believe it is I'm gonna activate my guests and give you a little see you know my guests and

[2:20]

we're going to be talking to David Scalzo founder and managing partner of Kirin nego I hope I am pronouncing it correctly if you're wondering why we're gonna be talking to David Scalzo it's because he's an investor in a company called Clearview AI which is all over the news front page of New York Times controversy everywhere it's the app that allows law enforcement at the moment law enforcement is using it to take a picture of anybody could be a dead body a John Doe a person on the street that they've stopped and it will tell you tell the police who it is it will give the identification from us photograph scary we'll find out David can you hear me I can hear you good morning how are you doing I'm doing great good morning now I'm correct that your investor in Clearview a yeah absolutely yeah we're uh we're venture capitalists the name of our firm is Pierre Naga actually Japanese name

[3:21]

Pierre Naga actually Japanese name Japanese term but before we get started I just want to say you know I'm an engineer by training and when you're an engineer by training you know there's two people in the world you have a man crush on one is Elon Musk and the other Scott Adams so you know I I really appreciate that I'm able to be here with you today well well thank you I did notice from your biography that you've got two degrees in engineering engineering and then engineering management and then you've got a an MBA from a top school in the country so you're sort of an example of what I talk about in terms of talents tax you know you've you've combined different skills together so that you've just got a greater view of the world which brings us to clear view ai you put money into that your firm did tell tell us well first describe what the app is doing today so that we can get a little bit of context here absolutely so there is an explosion of digital information out in the world more and more people are being are

[4:22]

more and more people are being are connecting to the internet and everyone or a lot of people are posting information it could be information on academic journals it could be videos of it could be people doing tick-tocks it could be philosophy sports religion charity everything people are putting on and some of the most powerful tools for humans to improve ourselves to be give happier healthier life is using things like search engines like Google for instance to search for words and find where those certain keywords come up on the Internet so what Clear View does is something very similar you take a picture a photo of a person and then it directs you to links essentially all across the internet showing where that person shows up in various contexts so it is so in short it's a search engine for faces so that you can put in identification with the face absolutely which is now let's talk about the the social implications but but tell us

[5:24]

social implications but but tell us where it's being used how many people are using it who is using it who has access to it is it the public or is it just police force yes right now it's a start up then whenever you do is start up you know start up 101 whether you're at Harvard northwestern Stanford Business School is you target a specific industry vertical someone who is a super user and where they're using right now is law enforcement so there's over a thousand independent law enforcement agencies and so this is everything from the federal government all the alphabet agencies to state police departments to County sheriff's who are elected directly by voters to local municipal police officers and there's independent decisions to use Clearview now is there it's not limited to the United States right well right now it is but you know the technology is definitely powerful enough and broadly enough to to be used elsewhere as well all right so how to give us some use cases tell us what crimes are solved why

[6:27]

cases tell us what crimes are solved why do police like using this thing well if you think about a detective any crime show you watch what's the number one thing they want to do they want to generate leads who are possible suspects and then they want to track them down using their skills and they use credit card data and cell phone data and all sorts of other information fingerprints so what Clearview does is it helps them generate leads more quickly so if you have a suspect in a human trafficking Child Exploitation case and you only have a photo of someone you can use clear view clear view the photo and then it will show where that person may be in on the Internet with whether they have a Twitter profile or a Facebook profile or whether they're you know it's some sort of basketball game and that generates leads and ideas for the police officers and detectives where it's exceptionally powerful is when you're working with gangs whether they are terrorist networks whether they're drug cartels whether they're mob games and where you may have an inkling of one person in the

[7:30]

may have an inkling of one person in the game but you may not know that the other five six seven people and so if you take a group photo then what you can do is identify the other people or at least give you some leads and then of course our law enforcement will follow those leads and determine whether they're you know whether the person should be implicated or not all right leads our funds I haven't how many cases have been solved tell us about any happy endings that we know about was so far well the New York Times article specifies one where the Indiana State Police have really talked about where they busted a whole network of unfortunately individuals who were taking advantage of children and so getting those people off the street is very good there was another one and in Florida that they talked about where a person had a certain type of tattoo and that tattoo was then being was able to be matched based on that those are some examples now what's what types of crimes are the ones that are most likely to be

[8:31]

are the ones that are most likely to be usefully salt well it's clearly the most vile crimes out there right it's you know it's the Child Exploitation the human trafficking the domestic violence the the drug the the drug cartels terrorist those are the ones more likely to be solved but it's also you know for shoplifting petty thieves assault subway gropers is one where it's used a lot where you have a grainy photo someone that's you know pickpocketing on the subway those are those are different types of things where Clearview can be use alright I'm watching the audience the audience is going crazy in the comments because they want me to push you on the social risks so let's talk about that so accepting that I would imagine law enforcement would be drooling over this product because it allows them to identify somebody who may not want to identify themselves or it might be in a situation where you're not

[9:33]

might be in a situation where you're not necessarily in a conversation with them but they've also can it be used to identify unless is a dead body that doesn't have identification it would do that right oh it could it could be helpful in that you know what I've talked to paramedics and EMTs people and a lot of times what you have is someone who has had a heart attack or who's fallen ill and there you know unconscious and you who is this person do we have any context and so to be used with paramedics would be great well what if somebody is I just saw a question a really good question go by in the comments what if somebody was an undercut undercover cop and and the bad guys got this app could they find their undercover cops potentially sure absolutely so so there are like every new technology there's going to be the good and the bad now people are asking where did the data come from are you scraping only from public legal sources do you have secret sources where do you get your database of faces from

[10:33]

do you get your database of faces from so we've you know let's start out what I talked about there's an explosion of digital information that people are voluntarily putting up on the Internet right and so there's millions of faces up there and people have public person on Facebook on LinkedIn on tick-tock on Instagram in addition to all the other places that informations put for instance almost every single work employ corporation out there has a public-facing website that has the pictures of for instance all the lawyers in their firm or all the consultants in their firm or their leadership so what we do is we index all that public information and then just connect the dots essentially link it all together so it is only public sources now there are other things that are public sources and that the government wants to get out those informations are like the most wanted list where they you know we we link that together they have the Center for Child Exploitation and trafficking we link those stuff and we link those together but it's all publicly available

[11:34]

together but it's all publicly available information that is helpful to everyone so I I noticed that so story that in New Jersey is that the New Jersey police department decided to not use it to ban it is that do I have that information right so there was a pronouncement by one of the AG's of something to that extent but let's let's take a broader view you know there's autonomous vehicles that are taking photos there's gonna be FedEx that drones flying over our heads that are gonna be taking photos the best thing we can do is get this technology out to everyone because what it does is it increases transparency and when you increase transparency you increase trust with people and when you have trust you increase the opportunity for meaningful relationships now here's what's going on in in New Jersey and you know this is obviously very early so I don't want to sound too hyperbolic on how this happens but let's say they ban this technology and they only allow government to use this what's gonna happen is you're gonna

[12:36]

this what's gonna happen is you're gonna have a two-class you know a Hunger Games type society where the private where the the politicians can live in security and the rest of us wander among thieves and exploiters and so what will happen in New Jersey is more people will move to places where it's safer like North Carolina and Florida and we'll you know that is the dystopian future when it's actually banned if we are to be you freely I creates a better society for all of us alright let me let me let me tell you my personal stake in this in the sense that as a semi-famous person my my reality is that when I go in public people recognize me by face quite often especially since I've been doing the live streaming so pretty much everywhere I go there's gonna be somebody who recognizes me by face but they also know because I'm a public figure they know something they read about me that could be bad usually not true something you know something about my background my education my career so I've lived in

[13:38]

education my career so I've lived in this world you know 20 years ahead of the rest of you for a long time and so you're probably wondering what would it be like if every time I went out in public well you know we're going to assume that this technology creeps into the public because it's inevitable wouldn't you say it's inevitable that the public will have this tool while Peter Diamandis says there's going to be a billion Internet connected sensors in the next five years which means we're going to know everything at anytime in anywhere and so it is inevitable that this digital information will be out there yeah so let's just complete the thought so if you're wondering those of you watching this you're wondering about yourself right you're thinking okay what does this mean to me you know what would happen to me how would it feel what's life like if every time I went out anybody who saw my face could know also my biography and the answer is that's my life that's exactly my life every time I

[14:39]

life that's exactly my life every time I go outside people recognize me I don't recognize that and they know my whole biography and they and they can treat me differently if they if they choose to I'm sure some people discriminate against me because they think oh you said good things about the president that one time I you know I've got to be mean to him so I've lived in that world and I got to tell you it doesn't make much difference so here's here's the weird thing about it if I could snap my fingers and change it and make all of my privacy come back I don't know if I'd care you know but believe it or not if you had asked me would I choose this I probably would said no I want my privacy because everybody let's everybody's first reaction right there's nobody who wants to give up privacy if you ask them but nobody asked me I just lost my privacy because I let life choices and it didn't make any difference I can tell you I go through life and it makes absolutely no difference now if let's say I had a

[15:40]

difference now if let's say I had a criminal record would it make a difference to me if people I interacted with and knew I had a criminal record but I saved my time I'm clean with society what do you say about that world where somebody who really has paid their debt followed the rules but now it's going to follow follow them around in a way that it couldn't just before what about that person what do you say to that yes so those so that the question is whether information should be hidden from people and then the second part is whether it's relevant to decision making or being left alone and so we're against discrimination it's very simple so we have laws in this country for instance that have statues of limitations for instance Oh let me let me stop it right there nobody cares about the laws in the real world people are going to react the way they react and they don't give a about the law so you know people are either gonna kick you out of the restaurant or not or or b.a.p bad service and dirty

[16:42]

not or or b.a.p bad service and dirty looks or or not hire you but they won't say it's because of your criminal record although what is the law in that is the current law that if you have a criminal record you have to disclose it or you you can choose not to what is the law on that well I'm not an expert in here and and very much depends on context let's say you're applying for a job if you're applying for a job can the employer ask that question I don't know what the current laws on that well David Koch and Charles Koch of Koch Industries very famously have an initiative called ban the box where they want to make it illegal for employers to ask that question because they want to encourage people who have had felonies or prison sentences and have formed to be able to be on a level playing field and get hired based on their skills and and and you know initiative rather than being discriminated against because they have to disclose something that maybe was what if their crime was let's say a sex

[17:42]

what if their crime was let's say a sex crime you know let's say they had raped somebody don't you think that the other I'm putting this on you like you have to solve all of the world's moral and ethical dilemmas but would the employees of that company have a right to be to know there's somebody who had a history of let's say sexual assault which is unique it's not like anything else should they have a right to know that hey Scott I'll just say these are very complex issues that a lot of people need to think about but I'll put it this way you know based on your writing that humans are biased right that we that we take information and we filter it through our own lens and decide how to interact so the question is do we hide what people concede we try to manipulate their bias so they act a certain way or do you give them all the information all the data points so that they can have a better sense of how they want to make a decision and we're of the belief that transparency is better for everyone then

[18:44]

transparency is better for everyone then trying to manipulate people by hiding information so so let me let me do what I always caution people to do which is to show both sides because typically these conversations want somebody's an advocate for one thing or the other so they're just going to say the costs are just going to say the benefits so if I can list the benefits it would be massive improvement I mean really substantial improvement in law enforcement catching people who need to get caught so that would be one benefit another benefit would be more information people would simply have better more information deeper information about other people that could protect the people who get the information it could be bad for the person who's whose privacy has been given up because they might want to hide some things until later but certainly good for the person who who is getting the information that person has benefited as somebody else's expense but and and you make this point which is fascinating and I'm trying to think throughout human history can anybody

[19:45]

throughout human history can anybody come up with an example where more transparency was worse and I think the the worst case scenario which you hinted at is that when somebody has full privacy and somebody does not that that's your very worst situation especially if the people have the privacy or the government and the people who do not are the citizens that's horrible but it's also just as bad if your neighbor knows everything about you but you don't know anything about your neighbor so this is the sort of tool that sort of just opens Pandora's box and allows all of us to know way too much about each other and I've long predicted I'm in writing I have predicted this a number of times that partial privacy is the worst situation where somebody has it that somebody doesn't the best situation which we may never get to people will resist because it's just natural to resist it is where we all know enough about each other that we no longer give a about each

[20:45]

that we no longer give a about each other's flaws and I know that's hard it's a hard concept to hold Amen but if you actually know a lot about another person and you know all their flaws and they know a lot about you and they also know your flaws and they still say it's got you want to go to lunch I am so cool with that person I'm as cool with that person as you could possibly be because I know you you know me if you're cool with me and I'm cool with you I'm gonna understand you're a human being you know we've all messed up this is why in part why I have the twenty year rule and the 48 hour rule about forgiving people's past behaviors I'm a real big proponent of judging people by who they are right now not judging people by that thing they did that's this follows them around forever and I feel like we all have to get to that place and this may force us there because if you think about it you wouldn't like anybody if you knew all of

[21:45]

wouldn't like anybody if you knew all of their mistakes you wouldn't like anybody you know it would be the end of friendships the end of hiring the end of marriage everything but if you all know that the other is just as flawed as you are different flaws but it just exposes your humanity you say huh I think I'm okay with that and by the way just tying everything back to President Trump because we do that I think the fact that all of his let's say his personal life peculiarities some would say their flaws are so known that we were kind of comfortable with them there's some things about knowing people's flaws that allows you to get past them it's the not knowing that can be kind of scary so given all that what is the biggest pushback what do you think is the what do you think society is going to gel around to say we don't because you know there's gonna be pushed back what do you think they're gonna focus on is the thing that's the big expense of this well I think the biggest

[22:46]

expense of this well I think the biggest complication is when people say the word privacy it's really split into two things anonymity and autonomy or can you be hidden and can you be free and those can be separated being hidden maybe everyone knows everything about you but the most important thing is is just leave me alone and those are the that's the complication and that's where we work as a society I'm figuring out what the rules are about being hidden which i think is is being eliminated by technology and being left alone which I think as a government as a society we come together and figure out what the rules of engagement are you know we're always afraid of the unknown and one of the things I like to point out is if you could if you could rewind to 20 years ago and I said to any one of you how would you feel if you lost all of your privacy about where you go and what you buy you know all of your transactions and all of your physical location what if what if that was all knowable or known how would you feel and

[23:48]

knowable or known how would you feel and most people would say my god I could not live in that world but we live in that world we live in a world where all of our transactions many of us have our DNA already on some database I do I've got my DNA's in several databases I would think and it doesn't really make much difference I still wake up drink my coffee you have my periscope and unless I'm committing a crime and somebody's looking for me it makes no difference so I think we're approaching a time when crime might just go away because we would give up so much privacy not to every single person but at least to the government and law enforcement should they want to check and I'm looking for the costs you know I keep looking for the tragic societal cost of either me who has no privacy when I go outside people know who I am and the government knows everything i buy and everything they can probably tell everything I browse all that and it doesn't seem to make any difference in my life

[24:49]

make any difference in my life now I don't know how unique that is I guess it's but if I were involved in criminal activity it might make a pretty big difference but I'm not so I think for most of you you would be more afraid than you need to be it's just natural to be afraid of the unknown and it's natural to be afraid of giving up any kind of privacy but what would you say is this the most valid argument by the people who say hey there's some costs coming at us some societal costs what is their best argument on the other side I like to ask this to see how see how unbiased your yeah I think the best argument is always about historical data you know what happens if someone accused me of something I didn't do or was found innocent what happens if it's a long time in the past is that information readily available should it be available what friction is there and then who controls the past right who decides whether data can be erased or not shown and who chose you know who decides what

[25:52]

and who chose you know who decides what can be shown and that is a very difficult question to answer and a and there's there's a cost to to doing it both ways there's a cost to letting people see everything that happened in the past and there's a cost to allowing some group to manipulate the past about what can be shown so there it's not an easy answer for that one so so I'm seeing some good questions going by here in the comments people are saying what if you're not multi-millionaire I assume that's I assume that's directed at me you know and pointing out that I don't have as much to lose so I would imagine if you were trying to you know get a foothold in life gear get a job after some bad situation in these past that would be pretty devastating but well how do you see that evolving do you think there's some people who would just be just totally left by the side of the road by this kind of technology it's just know nobody will nobody will interact with them because of something they did in the past so I have three

[26:54]

they did in the past so I have three teenagers and they upload hundreds of photos every week and they're interacting with hundreds of friends and Instagram and tik-tok and snap and it's interesting that they realize most of the stuff is transitory and even dumb and they do allow their friends to evolve and change positions and they're still friends with them kind of like what you said is that they can be authentic and vulnerable and out there without having long-term biases against these friends and the other thing that people need to understand is most people don't give a crap about you or all your flaws they really don't I mean I think we all like to have this huge ego that I am so important and that anyone knows that I did something wrong ten years ago they're gonna care most people don't care and if someone does beer find a different friends it's like oh yeah let me give you a to two other filters to look through certainly that's that's one of the most important things that people don't care about you so much but let's

[27:54]

don't care about you so much but let's say everybody knew that you were a furry you know you I'm just making this up let's say they do that you like to dress up in animal costumes sure now now your neighbors would immediately say oh I don't know if I can let the kids come over there anymore because you like to dress up in animal costumes but here's the thing people never never think about all the other people who dress up in animal costumes would also be able to identify you and next thing you know your life is ten times better because you don't care too much about your neighbor who doesn't like your habit you just met a hundred friends that you're hanging out with and they're and they all have the same interests so the first thing is if you're the only person they know has some weird you know or let's say unusual I'm not even going to call it weird let's say non-standard practice you can find all the other people like you and suddenly life's actually better not worse the second thing is I'm gonna give you this real-life example my late steps on when he was a I think he was 18 or so I got

[28:57]

he was a I think he was 18 or so I got him one of the greatest jobs you could ever have which is a job at a DJ company he was gonna be an apprentice to be a DJ kind of a cool life etc he lasted one week on the job because somebody sent his boss a picture of somebody else who had taken a photo and put it on snapchat in which use in a room with some marijuana paraphernalia and the boss quite reasonably I don't disagree with the boss at all said I don't want any employees who have this kind of a picture on social media and he fired him there was a great job lesson one weekend got fired now imagine if he also knew what was happening with his other employees what he would have found is he would have had to fire his whole damn staff only one of them got caught every one of them did something that would be you know roughly equivalent to this level of you know bad behavior if you can call it that and I would say that probably my stepson

[29:57]

and I would say that probably my stepson would have kept his job if your technology was ubiquitous I would agree with you I mean what did what did the boss do when he was in college and high school you know what if there is any way because remember the boss did not fire him for his behavior he fired him for being caught in his behavior he was very specific he it wasn't a moral it wasn't anything moral ethical or anything he just said that's that's not the reputation I want associated with my company because we deal with the public he would have soon found out that was pretty standard with all of his employees I think all right so give us give us some wrap up here I've got a few more topics I want to share with my peeps so look I know I know on your show you talk a lot about America and great and and the reason why America is the greatest and the most prosperous is because of our Bill of Rights and the First Amendment right says we do not have to be hidden to be free we do not have to be hidden to say what we want to share ideas to share

[30:59]

what we want to share ideas to share information and to be with people and so if we just embrace that and understand that that's why we're the greatest we don't need anonymity we can be free because of those Bill of Rights and Clearview helps us you know make a happier healthier safer place I would even go so far as that it might help even race relations because you're going to start seeing people for what they do instead of your first impression but that's that's maybe a little little too optimistic so thank you David Skell so tell us again the name of your investment firm here nagas partners spelled ki r e and e ga ga sorry no prior and where can they find you on twitter uh Scalzo underscore David all right thank you so much for joining us and we're gonna talk about some other topics and I'll talk to you later all

[32:00]

topics and I'll talk to you later all right that was fun this this topic fascinates the heck enemy because it's going to change everything but let's talk about some other stuff let's talk about impeachment and Adam Schiff and all that stuff Scott Jennings wrote an interesting piece for CNN in which he notes that Adam Schiff is essentially doing Putin's work because if what if what we were worried about is that Russia was trying to undermined trust in our system and that's what we're worried about right we're worried about those pesky Russians interfering with our elections and undermining our faith in her own system and as Scott Jennings points out is there anybody who's eroding faith in our system faster than Adam Schiff I mean that's all he's doing so we can't really care about eroding faith in our system if we're all engaged in doing exactly that I mean

[33:00]

engaged in doing exactly that I mean even just watching it you're part of that and as Joel Pollock pointed out the Democrats are literally obstructing their own their own election because the Democrats by forcing this impeachment vote have taken several of the people running for president as Democrats off the field and they they basically are seeding Iowa to the people who were not already employed you know Joe Biden and and booney judge so it turns out that being unemployed just turns into a big advantage for running for president if you're a Democrat so I don't think we can claim that there's any kind of moral superiority going on with any of this impeachment stuff because everybody involved is doing nothing but chasing their own political gain you know in lawsuits how if you sue somebody and I don't know if this works in every case but if you sue somebody and it turns out

[34:01]

but if you sue somebody and it turns out that you're wrong and the other the other party wins they can often if not always I don't know how this works but they can often recoup their legal fees so in other words there should be a cost to impeaching and failing you you feel me if you impeach and win then the the side that starts the impeachment wins politically and every other way I guess and but what if they try to impeach and fail what if they fail should there be any blowback any any any cost to that and I think maybe there should be because Tucker Carlson always says this and I swear I probably heard Tucker Carlson say this for a solid year this is one of those things he says regularly and every time I shook my head and I said to myself Tucker Tucker that's crazy you know I agree with a lot of stuff you say but that's crazy and here's what he says he says that every

[35:01]

here's what he says he says that every time the Democrats accuse the Republicans of doing something it's because they themselves are doing it and I thought to myself there's no logical reason that's true and I haven't really noticed it and it's sort of a crazy thing to say and then I started paying attention and I don't know what causes it I don't know if there's a cause and effect I don't know if it's a perceptual thing but see am it's consistent we're watching it again it is just time after time after time it is exactly that the Democrats are complaining that Trump has put our system at risk by degrading its your trust and integrity but it's what they're doing they're spending 12 hours a day eroding our trust in our system they've actually just destroyed part of the Constitution while we were watching

[36:02]

the Constitution while we were watching you know that part of the Constitution the said impeachment was a real solemn thing they just took a real solemn tool probably the most one of the most important maybe the most important it could be the most important part of the Constitution that there's a way to remove the top person and they've they've degraded it they've turned it into a joke you can't make a cleaner argument that they're doing actively at this moment the thing they're accusing somebody of doing you've never seen a cleaner example that I wish I could tell why yeah when Tucker says it makes me think that it's actually a strategy he doesn't say that but it but it feels like a strategy even if it isn't just the way it plays out all right and so I ask you this yeah if shifts claim is that the only reason that Trump did what

[37:02]

that the only reason that Trump did what he did with Ukraine asking them for the investigation the claim is that the only reason it was done was for his personal political benefit the only reason now that borders aren't crazy because there's obviously something to be worried about if your next president might have some blackmail material or some corruption entanglement anything that's a problem over in Ukraine so obviously there's a little bit of interest or should be but what is the standard for how much a decision by a government official how much of it is politically motivated in other words personally beneficial versus good for the country what if it's ninety ten what if it's 90 percent for their own good and ten percent for the public can they be impeached what if it's ninety nine and one what if one percent of it is for the public yeah

[38:04]

one percent of it is for the public yeah it's good for the public to and in some trivial way but 99 percent of it is just for me personally is that the standard 50/50 what if it's 49 49 51 the point is there is no rational logical way to make a standard for how much you know what percentage of the reason is personal versus what percentage of the reason is good for the public and certainly with this Biden and Prisma situation it is trivially easy to show that there's some national interest I mean you could argue how big that national interest is but I don't think you can argue it exists it clearly exists let let me prove it to you
you let me prove that there's some national interest in the Bur yzma Biden thing here this is an absolute proof right I'm a citizen of the United States I have an interest and knowing what happened with

[39:06]

interest and knowing what happened with Marissa and Biden I'm not lying absolutely honestly I'm interested in knowing that because I think it could be important if I had to guess probably not that much but I'm interested I would like to eliminate that as a risk now can it be said that there's a national interest yes I just proved it I proved that one and 300 and whatever 60 million Americans is legitimately interested in that question would it matter if there are two of me does it make a difference if there's there are a million people like me at what point can you say you've satisfied the question of national interests because I'm part of the nation I just said I had an interest so there's some percentage this certainly has an interest so my point is you could not create a standard where you're trying to parse out what percentage is national

[40:06]

parse out what percentage is national interest and what percentage is personal and that's the entire case their entire case is that that's a standard which they can recognize and act on and it can't be done it is rationally logically impossible to parse those out now did our founders know that to be the case yes they did they designed a system in which that those those decisions of what percentage was personal and what percentage was for the nation they designed a system where that doesn't matter does not matter because you can vote and you can you can change it to lawyers she said mind-reading is there somebody but I would love this to be true so I'm just so in the comments and I assume that that means that the impeachment defense has started have are you talking about officially as part of the defense did

[41:08]

officially as part of the defense did they blame Schiff of and their side of mind-reading is that what happened I'll have to check on that but it looks like somebody's saying that
I will look for confirmation there anyway so let's see it's a standard that can't be enforced which is what percentage was for your own good let me ask you this there are two things that people say just like it's certainly true and it could be but I'm gonna push back on both on one is that Russia wants to undermine the trust in our system so that's one claim another claim is that China has this strategy of something called total war in which it's not just military but they're in a current war with the United States it goes goes this line of thinking in which they are trying every possible Avenue to damage the United States and lessen us for

[42:09]

the United States and lessen us for their own benefit and that total war would include everything from spying and stealing intellectual property sending us fentanyl you know you name it it's like everything you know messing with our elections just everything it's all on the table so so the the the two claims are that Russia and China are two biggest rivals in terms of military prowess that they're engaged in a current war with us and I say I'm not convinced I'm not convinced now I do believe that all the things we talked about are you know they're probably relatively true Russia probably hacks US China does all the things that it's been said but do they have do they have a some kind of a comprehensive plan or strategy that starts at the top it only counts if it's the leaders of the country who want to do this yet are the

[43:11]

country who want to do this yet are the leaders of the country saying to themselves uh-huh if I can degrade to trust in the United States by 20% Russia's GDP will go up what how do they connect the dots can somebody explain to me what a ration Putin or irrational President Qi what would they actually be thinking in which this would be smart because I can't think of it now if they were really dumb people then you could explain it you'd say oh they're so dumb they think they're gonna put the United States out of business with their clever tricks and then once we're out of business they'll have all our they'll take over and they'll have all our resources and then they'll be richer or something do you think they're thinking that I mean does it doesn't pass any kind of a sniff test we are clearly in a world of abundance meaning that we don't really have shortages of stuff we just have systems

[44:13]

shortages of stuff we just have systems that are not optimized to get that stuff to the right people in some cases but we don't really have a shortage of anything and so when you move from the world in which you have shortages of stuff and maybe you need a war because if you don't have food you don't have resources maybe you need a war but if everybody can get everything they want which is our current world if they if they play their systems right and they work their economy right what reason do we have to be anything like an enemy to China or anything like an enemy to Russia and vice versa there simply is no reason there isn't and it seems to me that somebody like a president Trump could change the frame on this and let me suggest a frame I believe that the United States Russia and China have a common enemy maybe more than one and the common enemy is anything that disrupts the system in other words anything that

[45:14]

the system in other words anything that could put any one of the three of us on a business is something that all three of us probably ought to fight against for example how about a major pandemic wouldn't we be on the same side I think so
so don't you think Russia and the United States are gonna fight as hard as we can to help China stop this latest coronavirus thing I think we will we got a common enemy there there's no such thing as one side wins in this thing what about climate change now some of you say it's a hoax bla bla but you can at least agree that you want cleaner environment and cheaper energy so don't we have a common interest there to make sure the planet doesn't get destroyed don't we have a common interest in making sure that a terrorist state doesn't attack any one of us don't we have a common interest in it what if aliens attack we definitely have a common interest there so my point is that we should reframe what Russia China and us care about and we should be on

[46:15]

and us care about and we should be on the same team instead of spending all our money and wasting it being enemies of each other why don't we find some common enemies you know something we can fight on the same team for because there's just no strategic advantage to being enemies and picking in each other like this if it's happening some of it may be fake news I would also like to know what is it the United States is doing through Russia and doing China that we the public don't know about are we poking them just as hard as they're poking us and what's our reason has anybody ever told us our reason is it revenge is it to make sure they don't poke us so hard you will poke you if you focus so that's how we keep you a check what's the reason maybe there's a good one I'm not even saying there's no reason I just I feel like I should know it as a citizen of this country can somebody explain to me why the the countries that absolutely

[47:18]

why the the countries that absolutely should be on our team fighting with us as hard as they can against common challenges why are we at each other just doesn't make any sense I think maybe that'll change maybe maybe we'll rethink that let's talk about chef a little more he's talking about future crimes of the imagination so chef wants to get rid of President Trump according to his eloquent speeches that he's been giving to the Senate he wants to get rid of President Trump not so much because of what he's done because what he's done has no measurable impact so everything he's done so far or is alleged to do everything that ship and team alleges President Trump is done if you added it all together you couldn't you couldn't fill a tablespoon there's no measurable negative and anything the president has already done

[48:19]

anything the president has already done and so the Democrats knowing that and there's no measure build a magenta make the case there's the future somebody says you were kidding no I'm not kidding do you see any measurable harm that has come from the president's actions nobody's even allegedly nobody has made the case nobody who said we lost this money we lost this deal we we got attacked none there's there's zero alleged cost and so they have to make the case that this president is just gonna get worse we're going to encourage him we're going to be encouraging this president to future unspecified bad behavior what could be less Americans is there anything less American than published them trying to remove somebody from a job for the future potential problems I don't think the country is gonna buy

[49:20]

don't think the country is gonna buy that but maybe they will so this is how chef argues it he said quote can you have the least bit of confidence talk about Trump they he'll stand up and protect our national interest over his own you know you can't which makes him dangerous to this country really you don't trust that the president who will be watched more than anybody has ever been watched including when he made the phone call he had all kinds of witnesses and he released the transcript it's the most transparent presidency you've ever had in your life he has already lost all of his all of his privacy essentially so am i are any of you worried about the president doing something so purely personal that it would damage the country because I don't think he has any incentive for that what incentive does

[50:22]

incentive for that what incentive does the president have to do a bad job as president I mean let me frame it that way to show you how a ridiculous it is so Schiff is arguing that in the future the president would be in a position in which he would choose he would rationally choose according to chef what is good for Trump personally and is bad for the country can you see any any imaginary world in which President Trump could even imagine the situation we're doing the worst job you could do as a president would benefit him personally because because he would allegedly be doing this selfish thing how do you even what kind of world is that the president is watched all the time if he did something that was purely for him and had no benefit whatsoever not even one

[51:22]

had no benefit whatsoever not even one that you could argue that would be terrible for his legacy why would he do that it doesn't make any sense all right the funniest thing about it was when Schiff was getting choked up with emotion did and all of the shift shift lovers on CNN and other networks were saying that his his presentation was emotional and passionate and they were saying that that was a positive because he was so passionate and emotional and I looked at it and all I saw was a bad actor trying to act like he was emotionally distraught did any of that look genuine to me yeah he almost cried to me that didn't even look slightly believable now I hope he's better at writing screenplays that he isn't acting but seriously did anybody is there anybody in this country it was so stupid

[52:23]

in this country it was so stupid that they would watch those days of presentations and at the end see that little fake emotional thing and imagine that that was real could anybody imagine that was real oh my god I don't think so
I would like to defend myself from the future problems I'm going to have I have a I have a crime in progress right now crime against humanity let's see if I can show it to you it's better as a visual so in order to understand this what you have to know is that I after the Dilbert comics are drawn they are sent off to my syndication company who has I think it's a third party party that they hire and the third party as the color so you can see that the strip well you can't see it but let me see if I can lower the temperature on this so you can see it take it way down so all

[53:26]

you can see it take it way down so all the characters are filled in with color as you can sort of see here so I actually don't see the the colored version until it runs so the first time I see it colorized is when it runs in on the internet and in papers and I was tweeting the sound today and I noticed that whoever adds the color had decided that the character who's talking to Dilbert should you know display some diversity because most of the characters are generic white people except for a shook the in turn and they decided to add a little diversity now I think to myself good choice you know especially when I have you know one of the non regular characters let's let's have that character as you know somebody who's not a generic white guy show a little flavor in the strip that's good idea right X the person they decided to add the darker-skinned color to is the character

[54:29]

darker-skinned color to is the character that I had decided to depict as an idiot that's right so my decision was that the second character would be the idiot and Dilbert would call him out for being an idiot or reading the comic so the character comes up behind Dilbert and says this data can only can mean only one thing and then Dilbert says actually it could mean any one of about 17 things and then the other character says and why can I only think of one and Dilber says please don't make me answer that now of course you may find some correlation with current events in this but I promise you I was not the one who decided that the dumb guy would have the darker skin can we put that on the record not me all right so I have accidentally been turned into a racist by somebody I don't know who decided to colorize that comic so there you go the simultaneous

[55:31]

comic so there you go the simultaneous simultaneous it did happen but I'm sorry there's some of you missed it
why are why are we using leftist framing yeah well I'm just telling you what the public is gonna say alright it's alright no big deal well those of you say it's no big deal don't know the history that cartoonist experienced when I introduced shook the in term so if you follow the Dilber strip you know that the intern is named Ashok yes okay which is the less common spelling it's usually a sa SH okay but I knew somebody I worked with who spelled it differently a s okay so I named my character after that and now shook was born in India but he's an American citizen in the East strip and as soon as

[56:33]

citizen in the East strip and as soon as I introduced that character what do you think happened that's right the african-american community attacked the newspapers and said why is this why is this African American character so stupid when all of the other characters you know are smarter now first of all it wasn't and isn't an African American character so the the basis of the complaint was wrong it was a somebody born in India who's an American citizen now secondly it's not the dumb character in the strip I make a comic strip in which all of the characters are acting dumb on different days sometimes they're all acting dumb it's only a comic about dumb people it's that's all it is everybody in the comic except Dawg were I guess it was not even a human is dumb it's a whole comic about dumb people now what do I do I introduce one character who's got brown or skin who's an Indian

[57:38]

who's got brown or skin who's an Indian American and the african-american community tries to get me canceled or not even talking about them in any way whatsoever now many people have asked and actually a lot of a lot of black fans of the strip say can you add can you add an african-american character I would love to I would love to do you think that I'm perfectly happy having a comic strip with a whole bunch of white people in it in 2020 absolutely not I am not happy with that it isn't because the strip is designed to sort of you know mirror civilization and it doesn't you know if you go to Silicon Valley or you can see a bunch of only white faces and then the technical staff no you are not you're not gonna see only a bunch of white faces you can see you see the whole world represented there so my strip is completely out of touch with the real world on diversity I would love

[58:38]

the real world on diversity I would love to fix that can i no we don't live in a world in which I can introduce a character easily who would be an african-american regular character and have any bad flaws because to him to make a comic character interesting they have to have flaws it's the flaws that make it a comic you know Dilbert is is socially inept and he's you know he's a little too trusting he's gullible you know he's got his flaws Alice is angry and competitive and Wally's lazy and I shook I tried to give a shook the interim the least objectionable flaw I'm it's the the least smallest little flaw human can have inexperience because he's young that's it Oh shucks only flaw is he he's not yet very experienced because he's young and still I almost got canceled for that little flaw so imagine

[59:38]

canceled for that little flaw so imagine me introducing a a black character into the strip and I just think I'm gonna have a good time I'm adding a little diversity trying to give people what they want and the first time that black character exhibits any kind of a flaw doesn't matter what it is I'm canceled that's it so that's the world we live in you could have your diversity or you can have your outrage but you can't both I can't give you both that's all for today talk to you tomorrow