Episode 1035 Scott Adams: Let’s Talk About Bolton and Stuff

Date: 2020-06-22 | Duration: 57:18

Topics

Find my “extra” content on Locals: https://ScottAdams.Locals.com

Rough Transcript

This is an auto-generated transcript and may contain errors.

Transcript

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• Attacking statues

• Ivy league colleges with strong connection to racism, slavery

• CNN Fake News starving for gripe worthy topics

• John Bolton doesn’t seem smart

• Boltism jargon review

If you would like to enjoy this same content plus bonus content from Scott Adams, including micro-lessons on lots of useful topics to build your talent stack, please see scottadams.locals.com for full access to that secret treasure.
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[0:06]

bum-bum-bum bum-bum-bum bum-bum-bum bum-bum-bum
hey everybody come on in can somebody tell me what the hell time it is serious question there's no joke here I don't know what time it is can somebody tell me is it
seriously what time is it alright well I thought I had another hour but I'm having a bit of eight apparently the time is not different in Arizona I've been here for you know half a day got here yesterday so I'm in the the free state of Arizona oh my god alright so true story I got here yesterday and Christina said you know

[1:06]

yesterday and Christina said you know it's a the time is it how we're different and I thought really it's an hour difference I thought I didn't know that but turns out it's not a now we're different the things I don't know all right well I don't have my cheat sheet with me to do the proper toast but I'm gonna do the and believe it or not I've not memorized it I can't memorize things but I would like to join you in the simultaneous it will you join me in the simultaneous sip all you need is well you know I need cup mug glass all that stuff go
you know if it wasn't for a message from Joe Manukau and/or manic Joe on Twitter

[2:09]

Joe Manukau and/or manic Joe on Twitter I wouldn't know that I was supposed to to be on here now it's it's not exactly my honeymoon for some of you who know I was supposed to get married in May but of course that wasn't really a good time to get married so both our honeymoon and our marriage plans keep changing so we're just gonna I think we're gonna go asynchronous so so I'm wearing the ring and we just decided to were married so yesterday we just looked at each other and said why we just say we're married we've got a marriage license if you have a marriage license and you have rings and you've agreed to get married you know what exactly does the ceremony do we're still gonna have a ceremony but we're still still figuring out where it went yes as somebody who's answering in

[3:10]

went yes as somebody who's answering in the in the comments I I did drag Li have it in my mind there is oh there was only half of the year they had a time zone change and I didn't know if I was into half however let's talk about the news that's why you're here you know you're so are you as amused as I am by the statue stuff you know on one on one and you're probably alarmed because you know these statues are coming down and all that but on some level does this not remind you of a Star Trek episode so think about the statue stuff and think about the fact that the the country is in something like a civil war between roughly the left and the right sort of but not really so we've got this sort of weird virtual Civ war but instead of attacking each other the left is attacking statues and you

[4:14]

the left is attacking statues and you know that the right is going to attack some statues eventually right you know that you know that somebody on the right is going to treat this like a chess game and they're going to say hey the left is taking all our pieces they they took our or Washington or Jefferson or our Teddy Roosevelt and they're going to say well what statute could we take so this morning I tweeted that don't be surprised if the right treats this like a chess game just like the left is and goes to take one of their pieces and it won't be a person it'll be a statue now I cheekily said that the right would be coming for their King and I capitalized King I capitalized King and people still didn't understand what I was talking about now as somebody said hey Martin Luther King was actually a Republican or whatever none of that

[5:15]

Republican or whatever none of that matters no that matters and by the way I'm not recommending any statues being taken down I am I am opposed to offensive statues but I'm also opposed to taking them down by mob rule instead of some more civilized way but I also recognize that if the civilized way wasn't working well they are just statues in the end you know if somebody tears down the statue that half of the country is deeply offended by and they couldn't get it done in some other mechanism and they tried I don't know if anybody tried but if they tried the other mechanisms and they didn't work it's just a statue it's not there's nothing L I'm gonna die on but you know that the country is always worried about the slippery slope and if they take down the statue or they'll take down this and they'll take down that I'm pretty sure that eventually people associated with the right or not even on the right it might be just

[6:16]

even on the right it might be just people who want this to stop or to say look you can either have it all or you can stop now you see the choice you can either have it all in other words get everything you want which is anybody who has a sketchy background can't have a statue and the right might say let's play by your rules we accept we accept your standard so you would expect that they would take down Martin Luther King statutes now I'm not in favor of that obviously I'm not in favor of any of the statues being taken down by you know citizens acting on their own but it's going to happen and maybe that it'll be enough for people to say whoa maybe we've gone too far but here's the thing if we allow that what's happening is somehow acceptable because of the offence historical offense you're

[7:18]

of the offence historical offense you're going to have to go after the Ivy League colleges because as it turns out as people are saying in the comments I think Yale is named after a slaver a slave trader I think New York is named after a slaver Princeton is named after a dictator literally Harvard was named after a slaver now in what world would it be okay to leave those colleges with their current names stay I think Leland Stanford was a you know that for Stanford University I believe he was a massive racist and I think that's documented I don't think there's any question about it so Harvard Yale Princeton Princeton is different cuz that's a dictator but who likes dictators right now suppose you have two statue to somebody who had been accused incredibly of me to stuff could you keep

[8:22]

incredibly of me to stuff could you keep a statue to somebody who was actually kind of famous for me to him if that's the standard it's got to go it has nothing to do with you know whether you liked or disliked anything else that Martin Luther King did is there anybody who dislikes it I mean if you're talking about the you know the primary message of dr. King I don't think there's anybody on the left or the right who disagrees with the basic philosophy but if we're judging the people in their entirety standard is the standard so we'll see how I think the people maybe more associated with the right are just trying to stay out of it have you ever been more impressed by the political right in this country I've never been more impressed and this is again one of those situations of the dog that isn't barking so here's the dog that isn't barking there's something like 40% of

[9:25]

barking there's something like 40% of the country associates with the political right conservatives conservatives have entirely just stepped back and said let's let's just watch this let it play out see if so the energy will come out of it play it cool you know load you got and clean your gun don't use your gun don't provoke just be ready you know sort of standard conservative thought you know don't do anything crazy but be ready a very conservative thing to do so I'm actually amazed that things have gone as far as they have gone with almost a complete absence of the political right being on the street and when they are they don't seem to cause trouble nor do they seem to be the recipients of trouble I mean maybe some minor skirmishes but nothing nothing important service okay that's

[10:29]

nothing important service okay that's pretty funny somebody said what about the Clinton Library yep yep the Clinton Library it's got to be on the list right again favor of the library being removed or taken down I'm not in favor of any of them being taken them but if you're gonna be consistent you kinda have to go there so let's see if the country wants to go there I'm down for that anyway the reason that this is the Statue Wars is like a it by the way did anybody did anybody else make this connection that the Statue situation is basically a giant chess game because they are just like giant chess pieces they're literally like giant chess pieces there are two teams and they're moving their chess pieces in this case the left is capturing a bunch of pieces from the board and how simulation weird is it

[11:32]

board and how simulation weird is it that the statue you would first think of as being like the the primary the primary respected statue on the left is Martin Luther King and his last name is literally king and that the right almost certainly you should you should just assume that somewhere somebody is planning to take their king they're actually going to take their king now I don't know if it will happen I don't want it to happen but I'd be kind of surprised if somebody didn't take a run at it now here's why it's like a Star Trek episode one of the first original Star Trek's one of the most provocative episodes that just has stayed with me since I was a kid is there was an alien to alien species that the crew of the Star Trek encountered in which they were embroiled in a war but they decided ages

[12:36]

embroiled in a war but they decided ages ago that they didn't want to have a war with real destruction like they didn't want to destroy their cities and their stuff but they knew that you couldn't win or lose a war unless people died so they would fight the war with simulations in just a simulated war and then when there was a result the losing team would have to volunteer here X number of citizens to be to be suicided basically they go into some machine that vaporizes them so that everybody is just sort of civilized agreeing ah Darwin we lost the simulation I guess 40,000 of our people have to go into the into the suicide machine and they decided that you know it was just better than regular war because you couldn't get rid of war people people wouldn't ever let you get rid of war so if you couldn't get rid of that what is the most civilized way you could do it and that's what the Star Trek imagined is a civilized way you can have an actual war and the the reason that is

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an actual war and the the reason that is stuck with me so long is that it is logically impeccable meaning that the solution these two you know alleged or imaginary alias societies came up with is actually a hundred percent better than regular war there's no doubt about it
it but it's so awful that you can't imagine it which is what makes it a good episode so anyway in a different way it's not a perfect analogy but what I see the left and the right fighting with statues like a giant chessboard it feels it feels to be like that Star Trek episode where we figured out how to fight a civil war without the normal consequences it just feels like that I just can't get that into my head all right see it ends fake news is hilarious today because they don't have much to work with when when the news doesn't serve up

[14:41]

with when when the news doesn't serve up you know good red meat about the president they're gonna take whatever meat they have so if CNN does not have you know prime steak that they can chew on to criticize the president they'll take they'll take care burger if that's all you got and all they had this week was hamburger here's the first one about what half of the stories I think something saturating but by far most of the articles and opinions and stories on cnn.com are about Trump's rally audience size now is there anything less important than that in the whole world is there anything less important then a campaign was hoping that lots of people would show up some people expected that a lot of people would show up but we're in the middle of the pandemic and here's the part that they never mentioned the

[15:43]

the part that they never mentioned the if you whoever you were to anybody mentioned this or is this the first time you'll hear it the original rally was going to be on a Saturday night it got moved to a Sunday how many people who would go out on a Saturday night would not go out on a Sunday night because it's a workmate the answer is a lot not had enough had anything to do with the attendance but it's a pretty big factor I would have gone on a Saturday maybe I had my I had my sitter lined up you know I didn't have any plans on Sunday but Saturday was marked out and then the president says ups that's that's June teeth let's move it to the next day well not everybody has such a flexible schedule that thing it doesn't move it so that's got to be at least part of it and I don't think I've heard anybody say that that's got to be at least 20% of the explanation is that they moved the date you can't move a date and expect all the

[16:43]

you can't move a date and expect all the people to show up anyway so there's no story there whatsoever we're in the middle of a pandemic you didn't get a good attendance at a place that would probably kill you because people wouldn't have baths and their shoulder to shoulder there's just no story there but there they're trying to make something out of it anyway and then the other thing that they're trying to make something in and nothing is when Trump said that we should reduce testing because it's making him look bad now the fact that Trump's advisors and and folks have to tell the media that he wasn't serious no he's not serious that we should plunge the country into a health nightmare the way of which we fully understand so that he can look good temporarily he didn't really ever say that right I mean needed mean it he said that he said

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mean needed mean it he said that he said the words jokingly but the fact that they're making news about something that is obviously a joke and no one else could be so there's that so I was looking through John Bolton's interview transcript yeah because I didn't see a live I just wanted to read it because it'd be faster and he was the dumbest guy I I am actually really shocked that somebody with his level of intellect as comes through on the transcript the mele the only thing I know about John Bolton really is a few public surfacy things a little bit about his resume but I don't really know too much about a bit besides that but when you read a long for interview where he gets to you know actually talk and explain some things my jaw was dropping and it wasn't that I disagreed with him so much it wasn't that my opinion is different it's that

[18:44]

that my opinion is different it's that he doesn't seem smart I don't know if he ever was but when I say smart I don't mean in the book sense you know I'm sure if he you know if we did an a test of who knew the who do the most leaders of the most countries he would smoke me right yeah who would know the history of blah blah blah he would smoke me so I'm not saying he lacks knowledge probably knowledge wise he's one of the more knowledgeable people around so he's very knowledgeable but I'm gonna walk through some of the things he said in the interview to tell you how stupid they're all right so no particular order here we go
here's something that I always joke about this as the creator of the Dilbert cartoon I can't tell you how many comics I've written goes it's quite a few on the subject of there's always that one

[19:44]

the subject of there's always that one dumb bimbo II who says but what's our strategy have you been in that meeting you'll be in the meeting and you're talking about stuff and you know you've made some decisions and then there's that smart dumb person and I think that's what Bouldin is he's a smart dumb person there's I think somebody else has a name for that but the smart dumb person in the room says excuse me excuse me boss what is our strategy and everybody just goes and they don't know how to answer it because the smart dumb person has taken the high ground but it's a fake high ground there's no such thing as strategy strategy is the thing it's a thing we think is the thing that's why the smart dumb people bring it up but the smart people don't the smart people know that the strategy isn't the thing you know there are there's some obvious things that everybody knows you want to do for example does the United States have a strategy well whether you called it a

[20:45]

strategy well whether you called it a strategy or not would we all agree that the United States wants to be prosperous wants to have good trade deals what's peace wants to influence other countries doesn't want to be in big Wars all right I could go that list it would be a pretty long list and you would say yeah yeah that's that's what we want those are all the things we want and then you say well how do you get them well here's the thing if this if the environment is changing every day in every moment what's your strategy you can't have a strategy when things are changing all the time every moment there are some basic things you can do that after the fact you could label them the strategy for example the United States is has a pretty high priority on education we think it could be even more but wouldn't you say the United States tries to educate its population is that a strategy kind of kind of you

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is that a strategy kind of kind of you could say that's a strategy but since everybody agrees and it's obvious do you call it a strategy or is it just something that's obviously good to do the problem with the people who say you have no strategy is they're smart enough there's no such thing as a strategy and if you had one it would either be so obvious that it would be you know not worth saying or it would change every five minutes so you'd have to rewrite your strategy all right all right we just found out was something new about North Korea I guess you know change your strategy so all the smart dumb people say my boss had no strategy and what else does he say here and here are the different ways that he says it so these are quotes for emboldened from his interview there really isn't any guiding principle like a strategy basically there isn't any guiding principle that I was able to discern other than what's good for Donald Trump's re-election now

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good for Donald Trump's re-election now let me ask you this do you think there's ever been in the history of the United States I'm just speculating has there ever been anybody who said a Democratic president doesn't matter which one pick your Democratic president who has ever said I don't think that president has a guiding principle or a strategy probably every single time probably every time my guess is there's no such thing as any prominent leader who does not have people saying there's no strategy there's there's no guiding principle there's no strategy it's like it's like saying air exists there's air it just doesn't mean anything then here's another quote from Bolton I don't think the president fully understood all of the implications of what he was doing number one does anybody understand all

[23:47]

number one does anybody understand all of the implications of what they are doing no no nobody understands all of the implications of what they're doing what kind of what kind of events you know what kind of a criticism as that how about you how about you there in the comments do you understand the implications of everything you're doing and if you don't what's your strategy what kind of guiding principle do you have for your life again these are all nonsense words that you can literally just say about anybody in every situation all right and it's mind-reading so the the bigger problem is that Bolton says I don't think the president fully understood all the implications well it's mind draining on top of the fact that is something that nobody could do understand all of the implications of what they're doing
and then he says bull says and I think when it choses a couple of things number

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when it choses a couple of things number one that foreign policy and defense policy are not motivated by philosophy grand strategy or policy isn't that just sort of true all the time well why is this special to trump well let's look at this again do you think that our foreign policy and defense strategy have ever been motivated by philosophy grand strategy or policy okay let's take them apart have our defense policy ever been motivated by philosophy no no what well philosophy the philosophy that you need a strong defense so people don't mess with you like what what kind of philosophy are we talking about is there any country in the world who wouldn't like a strong defense if they had the option no how much strategy do you need to talk

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no how much strategy do you need to talk about to decide whether you want a strong military what kind of philosophy is that or how about the grand strategy is a grand strategy different than a strategy and is a grand strategy different than a philosophy is a grand strategy different than a philosophy that's different than a guiding principle yeah it's all jargon if you didn't know how the world really works in other words if you had not sort of lived in the corporate world you'd never been in government you would easily read Bolton's words and say whoa this is a guy who knows what he's talking about he's talking about philosophies grand strategies policies these are things the president Trump never even he can't even conceive he can't even conceive of these smarter dudes but indeed Trump is clearly the smarter person in the room all right and then I wouldn't die on that hill by the way I would die on the hill then if you

[26:54]

way I would die on the hill then if you looked at street smarts sort of general decision-making ability to understand people and the world the ability to look at complexity and figure out how much you really need to work with et cetera I don't think bolton is anywhere in the category of Trump say what you will about Trump he is he's easily used several levels above what is indicated in this transcript you know if you take out rums jokes and hyperbole and stuff you end up with a solid decision-making but you don't get that here from Bolton all right and then then the other thing he says that philosophy grand strategy or policy is our defense policy not motivated by policy this is actually his sentence if you break down the sentence he's actually saying he doesn't think our foreign policy and defense policy are motivated by policy what no what that isn't even anything you can't even

[27:56]

that isn't even anything you can't even disagree with it doesn't mean anything yeah our policy isn't motivated by policy oh yeah that's probably a good criticism of the president is that our policies are motivated by policy I don't think policy is supposed to be motivated by policy it doesn't work that way all right let's see what else he said Bolton said I could see even before my first day
day when I would go over to talk to Trump and others that this was not like a White House I had never seen before it was not functioning in the same way as any of the three previous presidents I had worked for now this is a form of criticism that I call the my god it's different from what I'm used to and therefore it must be bad is there any criticism in this statement it feels like a criticism right because you you make the leap of assumption that's not present he's simply saying that the

[28:57]

present he's simply saying that the Trump White House operated it different differently than any other White House is that bad I think it's why he was elected I'm pretty sure people voted for Trump to get a White House that didn't operate like any prior White House it's pretty much exactly what they voted for and you'll see this kind of that this is very much a CNN lefty kind of thing actually I take that back the right uses this all the time how often do you see people on the right criticize the left but there's no criticism in the criticism it sounds like this well that's the oddest thing well that's non-standard well I haven't seen that before you know anybody who is criticizing something by its uniqueness or its newness without reference to anything

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newness without reference to anything wrong with it is just not somebody you shouldn't listen to about anything it means they they're not even they're not even having a brushing association with reality or the truth or trying to convince you or persuade you it's just noise all right here's something else that Bolton says the president should read extensively the material he's given it's not clear to me that he read much of anything is this a true statement the president should read extensively the material that he is given would you agree with that statement do you think the president
should read extensively the material he's given and then Bolden went on to complain that the president would talk to advisors outside the little ring of advisors in the White House and he would get external opinions and that Bolton didn't to wear these opinions were coming from so he couldn't kind of you know deal with them or control them or you know it caused chaos who's the idiot

[31:01]

you know it caused chaos who's the idiot in the room so you've just heard this criticism so Bolton says and let's let's accept that this is true because I think this is true the president should read extensively the materials east given it's not clear to me that he's read much of anything I feel like we've heard enough reporting from enough different people that we could agree he does not do a deep dive on the reading okay so let's take that as a fact just for a conversation purposes it's a fact that the president does not do a deep dive on the details of the reading who is the idiot who's the idiot in the room Bolton Bolton do you know why the president should not this is my opinion this is my advice should not do a deep dive on the reading and then ignore his outside sources of information because the people who give him the write-ups are

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people who give him the write-ups are not trying to inform him they're trying to manipulate him you know that right everybody in the White House any white house every white house every corporation every organization the write-ups that are given to the boss whoever the bosses president CEO doesn't matter whoever does the write-up is not trying to inform the boss they're trying to manipulate them they're trying to move them to a certain conclusion now they may now say that they might show both sides but the way things are written is for the purpose of getting the result even if they swear in a Bible that that's not the case nobody can write a long detailed thing without leaving out some things that maybe should have been in there emphasizing some things that maybe they think are kind of special what is the worst thing that a president should do

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worst thing that a president should do to be a good president let me read John Bolton's advice this is the worst thing you should do the dumbest thing you could do if you were the president would be what bulton says which is should read extensively the material he's given if I could give the president that any president any CEO one piece of advice it would be this do not read extensively all the materials you are given it would be the dumbest thing you could do now imagine you're the president you've got a zillion decisions in the most complicated world that you can imagine how much of all the decisions that our president any president needs to make can be kept in in any human beings mind and sort of processed well and the answer is not much right as a percentage of everything a president needs to do you could pick the most genius president let's say Bill Clinton I think Bill

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let's say Bill Clinton I think Bill Clinton and Obama very high IQ people you would say I think you would agree you know Harvard educated whatever that these are smart smart people who can hold a lot of detail did it matter did the amount of detail that Obama could master did that translate directly into better decisions and if so can you point to one can you point to a decision that was better because any president did a deep dive on the reading the reading material and the background and the historical significance no no I don't think he can I doubt that's ever happened in the history of the world the the you didn't look at my right up is what the low-level smart dumb people say in every organization every smart dumb employee of
of every corporation says I tried to tell

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every corporation says I tried to tell the CEO but he wouldn't listen I couldn't get his attention he seems motivated by his own career as far as I can tell he doesn't even have an interest in strategy every smart dumb worthless employee says that about every leader the only way you could survive the president's job and I have I have the least little will say an opening into that world in other words they're probably only a few of you here percentage-wise there might be a lot in numbers but percentage-wise very few of you were watching have had a career or a job that I would say would be as complex as the president's or even as complex his mind because at any given moment I've got you know three careers running simultaneously and all of them have you know thousands of variables so I live in a world they're so unbelievably complicated that the only way that I can

[36:07]

complicated that the only way that I can navigate that which I do successfully I think is that I pay attention to the least about amount of information I can so the the way to survive immensely complicated situations that are just ever ever complicated they don't ever simplify and you've got it you've got to find a way to navigate through this all the time and make the important decisions you really have to find the smallest bit of information that can get you to a good decision so it could be bring my two advisers in who have different points of view give me give me ten minutes arguing and you listen to him and he go uh-uh so let's say you're the leader you're listening to them and one is get a pen I'm gonna pick two people randomly you don't have to agree that these are good characterizations but just just go with me here two people two advisers come into the room one is Peter Navarro who I think is kind of

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Peter Navarro who I think is kind of brilliant actually if you listen to him talk that you don't think he's smart dumb when you you're Peter de Navarra talk you think I think he's smart smart smart book wise smarter streetwise smart reality wise so Peter Navarro is smarter smart so he comes into the office with John Bolton who is smart dumb and the president sitting there and Navarro and let's say it's there on different sides of some topic and Navarro says here's my argument ba-ba-ba-ba-bom here are the three things you need to know two of them are really important mr. president focus on these two things the other things are important but not nearly as important he's two things can the president hold two things in his head sure sure Peter Navarro just broke it down for him Peter Navarro did the deep dive Peter Navarro in this example told them what the two important things were and that he wants to check this so he asked

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that he wants to check this so he asked Bolton all right Bolton says nope totally disagree here are my reasons blah blah blah my reasons and here are my two reasons or three reasons why I think Peter Navarro is wrong now what's the president do he's got two opinions and they're opposites they're opposites well does the president say let me go with a smart dumb guy or let me go in the smart smart guy how hard is it to agree with the smart smart guy if the alternative is the smart dumb guy it's not hard right you listen to me borrow submarines you go okay that's what I need to know all right and how do i frame this alright got it that's about as deep as you can go if you're the president now the bigger the issue the more time you want to spend and more people you want to talk so I highly simplified it but if you think being president is a process of reading all

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president is a process of reading all the materials you've never lived in any kind of a complicated world because reading the materials will mislead you and take way too much time you need people to break it down for you to give you the argument the way the news will make it to give you the argument the way President Xi might see it you know you can break these things down into pretty simple elements and while I do think it matters some of the context you know so you know what the other side is thinking why can't your advisers just tell you that suppose you've got Bolton coming in saying ah the president he doesn't read my materials and so he doesn't know that I'll just pick a random example that he doesn't know that North Korea traditionally says X but then does why well why can't he just tell them you're in the room just tell them that say you know presidents historically they say X but then they do why they've done seven

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but then they do why they've done seven times why do you have to read that who needs to read that you don't have to read that all right what else does mold say he said the Bolden said quote I thought that that it was almost impossible to sustain a consistent coherent policy over time do you know what do you know our situation makes it impossible to have a consistent coherent policy over time every situation every situation nobody has a consistent policy over time they always change it changes with the facts that changes with a better argument I don't know you should always be waking up every day and saying did the policy that we were doing yesterday is that still makes sense today did anything change

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doot-doot-doot here's something that bolton claims in his book so the interviewer asked you say in the book that Trump asked General John Kelly if Finland was part of Russia or thought Venezuela is really part of the United States come on the president did not ask anybody if Venezuela is part of the United States if you're dumb enough to believe that you're dumb enough to believe anything else in this book which would be a strategic mistake so can we agree that there isn't the slightest chance really zero you know there aren't too many things I would give a zero percent chance to being true somebody says are you sure yeah so what I'm saying is most thing most things I say well you know 90% chance it's true 95% 98% if I'm really really sure or something I might say ninety-nine percent but let me break

[42:19]

say ninety-nine percent but let me break with tradition for a moment let me Drayton break with tradition the president 100% did not ask if Venezuela is part of the United States and if you think there's any chance that happened you should not watch my periscopes because because you're not going to understand anything there's no chance that happened so if you know it's in the same sentence with with Trump asking if Finland was part of Russia now how do you feel about the Finland one now if the Finland one had been by itself in that been the only allegation he asked if Finland was part of Russia here's what I would have assumed I would have assumed that he was asking if Finland was sort of under the you know maybe virtual sway of Russia he may have asked

[43:23]

virtual sway of Russia he may have asked something like that you know are they a part of the circle or you know something like that now I could see that being possible but did that did Trump actually asked if Finland was like you know officially a part of Russia no no no I won't put a hundred percent on that so I'm gonna be consistent can I say with a hundred percent certainty the president did not say hey is Finland part of Russia he may have said this sentence book that doesn't mean that he meant it literally part of Russia as in Putin is the head of Finland as well you could have been you know are they on their team on this particular question are they in the are they a satellite of influence which by the way I don't know the answer are there is Finland in the circle of influence from Russia I don't know that

[44:23]

influence from Russia I don't know that do you okay buddy answer that question I actually don't know the answer somebody says many Finns speak Russian but dislike Russia right I think you'll see in the somebody says was he being sarcastic well we don't have any evidence of that but you can easily imagine him saying something like this rhetorically so imagine if somebody say is we yeah we could do this in this country oh no we can't do this in this country you know because because Russia has too much control that another country but we could put a you know we could put let's say a missile defense in this country yeah but we can't do it in Finland well okay here's here's a hypothetical I'm not assuming anything like this happened it's for your imagination to imagine something that could have happened that would sound like this but was different all right so it's just hypothetical just for imagination imagine they were talking about where to put a missile defense

[45:25]

about where to put a missile defense thing and they some people are tossing out some countries well how about put it in Czechoslovakia you know blah blah blah yes or no not chuckles lock you but Czech Republic whatever it is there and then let's say somebody said Finland and then it was rejected alright so you the president you're listening to people will debate what country and somebody says I vote how about Finland and then somebody said no no he can't do Finland can you imagine the president saying rhetorically what is Finland part of Russia see it what is Finland part of Russia in other words it would be rhetorical to say why couldn't we put a minute you know talk to Finland about taking it you know our a missile defense or a NATO base or whatever the they were talking about right so you can imagine lots of ways it could have been you know interpreted differently all right but we

[46:29]

interpreted differently all right but we weren't there so we don't know that bolt says but there was an unwillingness on the part of the president I think to do systemic learnings and so they could make the most informed decisions it was John Bolton actually inside the president's brain and he could he could find out that he was unwilling to do systematic learning maybe he thought that systemic learning was not the way to go so he might have been unwilling to do it systematically now what does systemic mean in this context in this context it means that John Bolton wanted to manage the president he wanted to be the one who gave the president materials that were approved by John Bolton which of course would support inside and what the president has spent a lot of time looking at the materials that John Bolton gave him the president decided not spent a lot of time every day

[47:29]

not spent a lot of time every day looking at materials that John Bolton gave him is that because the president is defective could be that's one interpretation that's John Bolton's here's another interpretation the president didn't think that systematically looking at materials from John Bolton would help anything and he might have been right and then the interviewer says but are you saying that all the decisions the president made were driven by reelection here's a bold set I didn't see anything where that wasn't the major factor that wasn't the major factor now how often is the president's actions disconnected from his reelection or his even his legacy how often does

[48:33]

or his even his legacy how often does the president do something then is clearly bad for re-election but good for the country you can please name all the examples in the comments I'd like to see in the comments all the examples historically where a president did something that was clearly bad for re-election but good for the country go
crickets crickets crickets crickets somebody says Lincoln that's a deed that's a little more complicated I think Lee Lincoln had a game plan with everything he did yeah the atomic bomb no that was good for reelection economic shutdown know the the the alternative was worse there there basically is no situation Obamacare no I don't think so the lockdown you can I think every single decision is compatible in the

[49:37]

single decision is compatible in the sense that the presidency is pretty transparent if the president did something that was just clearly not for the country I think we would have noticed that so it's a ridiculous thing all right here's something else Bolton says oh
here here you go he continues on it was not something that started with a strategy of how do we want to see the threats from China to Russia result on arms control for example what does that sentence mean like like what does that actually mean it's just jargon isn't it we didn't start with a strategy on how do we want to see the threats from China and Russia resolved on arms control for example well I'm no expert on control bow let me throw out some assumptions we would like them to build

[50:38]

assumptions we would like them to build fewer weapons that could kill us did am i close what is that the whole strategy because I think the strategy of arms control is that we negotiate and try to have fewer weapons is there is it deeper than that am I missing something if the president tries to negotiate with another country for arms control is that said no obvious what the strategy is all right then Bolton says the president over and over again seems to think that a good personal relationship with a Xi Jinping the Vladimir Putin King kim jonghwan the ayatollahs air Dewan of turkey was equivalent to a good relationship between the United States and their respective countries and you know what Trump's right Trump is right now Boulton used the word equivalent which

[51:39]

Boulton used the word equivalent which nobody would use and of course the President does not think they're equivalent because nobody would to imagine that the president is the only person in the world have 7 billion who would have this opinion because you know nobody else would nobody else in the world would think a personal relationship with anybody even the dictator was equivalent to you know a good relationship between two countries nobody would think that so but boldness is alleging that the president is the only person who would think that maybe but pretty unlikely but here's what I would say about that I think the president has been proven right not in terms of them being you know identically equivalent to the country's relationship but there is no doubt that the president's let's say respect for she allowed him to negotiate harder now he realizes that that didn't work but it was certainly worth working on if you're

[52:41]

was certainly worth working on if you're going to negotiate with somebody hard first you make them your friend because you can go harder that way if you're gonna push somebody on trade or push somebody on you know weapons or anything else first treat them with respect so they don't have an irrational reason to hate you so the president is smart enough about negotiations that he wants to remove the personal reasons to say no is that equivalent to a relationship between two countries of course not nobody thinks that not the president nobody would think that but can you do a good negotiation until you've set some boundaries of respect so you don't want President Xi to be over there negotiating and thinking to himself you don't want him thinking to himself I can't make this deal because I need to save face right you can't have Putin say

[53:42]

save face right you can't have Putin say I can't I can't give Trump what he wants because it's gonna make me you know look like I gave in to this guy who's pushing me right but you could imagine the president XI or Putin or anybody else they could make a deal that looked good for their country it was good for us and what didn't get in the way is any personal animosity between the leaders because that would just be a distraction so for Bolton not to understand the importance and I think Trump is I really maybe he'll be the only president who will ever do this but he is just smarter about human beings it is way smarter to treat somebody with a respect if you're gonna push him hard in fact if you choose somebody without respect and push him hard you should expect to get your ass kicked in some fashion virtually or actually all right is netflix going to

[54:48]

actually all right is netflix going to make a movie based on the Bolden book well who knows
Thank You Becca so I've been to Arizona right now and it's it's pretty freaky because you know everything's open here there are their masks everywhere but everything's open so it's a whole new did a whole different world by just looking at your comments here is Hollywood done I don't know what was the last time you enjoyed a movie that wasn't a biography I just think movies are dead so you forgetting about the political correctness aspect of movies

[55:50]

political correctness aspect of movies you know that's that's a small pressure on some of the classic movies etc but
yeah I'm not playing golf sorry I just lost my train of thought Pascal says a digital thing is coming what's a digital thing alright any statues taken down in Arizona I don't think that's gonna happen to me Arizona it's a pretty well armed state so we'll see somebody says Hollywood is done I think Hollywood might be done you know if you look at the me towing I don't know how Hollywood could survive all the all that me to stuff somebody says they like Marvel movies you know I did like the the super super powers types of

[56:51]

the the super super powers types of movies but they're kind of kind of old
and by writing another book or your wedding vows you know most of my extra energy is going into the low goals platform so I'm putting my extra extra energy and content there and there'll be more overtime I'm just sort of working it down over there what that's going to be all right that's all for now and I'll talk to you tomorrow