SIO473: A Strange Man Is Inside Our Government

Transcript

This transcript was generated automatically and may contain errors — the audio is the record.

0:00:00 Thomas: Hey, Thomas here. Just want to know another one of those. I'm so upset. I need to talk into the show. That's what this is. Hi, Serious Inquiries Only. Hello. Occurred to me today just now. And I just I can't I can'T NOT express it. Look right now we're trying to figure out how to cover this on Opening Arguments. This is not a law show um but I don't even know how to cover what's happening right now because it's it seems to me I'm not the lawyer but seems to be violating so many laws and principles of the constitution where do you even start what lawyer do you find what expert do you fine to tell you all the ways that that what's happening isn't okay uh we're trying but they're all busy and I don' t even know where to start and it's all short notice and everything's on fire, et cetera, et cetera. But the point is, I don't know all the ins and outs of every law that's being broken right now. But I have to imagine that Elon Musk cannot and should not be allowed to just go take over the entire government. Headline from CNN, we do not know exactly what Elon Musk is doing to the federal government. Gained access to U .S. Treasury accounts that that handle a volume upwards words, of $86 trillion in annual payments for Social Security, Medicare, pension, etc. staff was caught installing hard drives at OPM, GSA, and the U .S. Treasury. I'm just running down a list on Reddit here. I don't know. Again, the point of this is not to perfectly break all this news to you. I am just running down roughly what people think is happening right now. Now, Elon Musk now has full access to Treasury's payment system. What is happening? What what is in what world is this how anything should ever work? I the moment that he's an unelected forget that for what? Pretend we elected him. What is he even doing? I've never heard of electing anyone to then go take over U .S. Treasury payment systems and just decide what's not going to be paid and what is. Spoiler, it's just nothing's going to Be paid other than I'm sure the defense contracts he has with, you know, with the Department of Defense. Those I'm Sure are all going to BE fine. Anything else that might help, you Know, like other people at all, other countries, other people, Americans who are not billionaires, he's just going to go through that. Go through that spreadsheet, check it off, whether or not that still exists. That's not how anything works. I don't need to say this. That's not how everything works at all. I can't, I, the, the impunity of the, like the sense of invincibility that Elon Musk and Donald Trump have. Mean, it's startling. Like Elon Musk is banking really heavily. I mean here's the the thing about Elon Musk? He's an idiot. He's not, I'm sorry, he's not smart. He thinks he can do his power is that he thinks he Can do whatever he wants. That he was in the right place at the right time in the late 90s, when the .com boom happened. And he translated that money that he made being in the right place at the right time to other companies. And I will give him the tiny iota of credit that he has a sense as a narcissist that the rules don't apply to him and he can do whatever he wants. And that actually did help him in a few ways with these companies that he bought. I think it did. That's the best right now. That's the best I can track down of anything good he's ever done, or I won't even say good, any display of ability or intelligence that I've ever seen out of Elon Musk. He's never said anything smart. So I don't, that's not, I can't go based on that. But the point is not to go on a tangent on that, the point is this is so illegal legal he should go to I'm not a lawyer I think this should mean he goes to prison for the rest of his life in a in a real world now we're not in a real world but how certain is elon musk that we're not in the real world he might be just so dumb that he doesn't know all this is illegal I I that might actually be true he might be that dumb he might me that narcissistic that he thinks he gets to do whatever he wants when have when have rules ever applied to him and trump they don't apply can you blame him for thinking the rules don't play when we've never applied the fucking rules

0:04:16 Thomas: So he goes in there and just does what the fuck ever. But imagine being that confident that I'm trying to think of the phrase, not the shit's going to hit the fan, more like the cartoon character is never going to look down. You know, Elon Musk and Trump have been off this cliff. They've been, is it Wile E. Coyote? Is it the Tasmanian Devil? I don't know. I don't. I haven't seen that in a million years, but something like that. And if you don't look down, you don't fall. That's what that's kind of what it is they are so certain that no one's ever going to look down that we're not going to just all of a sudden realize oh wait a minute we do want laws and stuff and government to exist and to still have a country we do want that you're going to jail forever he's that certain that's never going to happen or that even if it does he'll get a pardon or his billions will get him the best lawyers will get them out of whatever and he's probably not wrong, which is the, that's the worst thing. He's probably not wrong. They can do whatever the fuck they want. And now, don't get me wrong. I know that we've said on Opening Arguments and it is true that he can't do literally whatever. Trump can't do literally whatever he wants. There are things that we can get injunctions against. There may be an injunction against this. But if it's anything that's a political question, I'll be very, very clear. If there is anything for which the only remedy is a political remedy, as in impeachment and conviction or oversight by Congress in some other way, if there's anything that is only, that's the only way to stop it, really, then they can do it. And that I don't, again, I'm not the legal expert. I don'T know which things are that. I also know that it's possible the Supreme Court can just decide things or that that shouldn't be. They can just say, well, it's a political question. We're not going to weigh in and just not weigh in. I DON'T know and the important thing is even if he has stopped eventually is the damage done it might be done what if the damage was getting in and just getting access to all this payment system crap I don't know I have no fucking idea I don'T THINK ANYONE KNOWS WHAT HE'S DOING EXACTLY I DON'T THINK IT'S GOOD THOUGH AND I DON'T think it should possibly have been allowed I mean you get these stories of people of government employees trying to keep them out trying barricading doors to try to keep themselves out of these sensitive places and then they get in he's like hi sorry don't you know there are no consequences for me, Elon Musk? Nothing applies to me. I do whatever I want. Didn't you know that? And they're like, 'Oh yeah, I guess that's true. And then they get let in.

0:06:46 Thomas: The point is, even if this can be enjoined or whatever, I don't know, like what happens when they just say no? That's what I want to know. I don't think that can happen, but let's, okay, let's game this out. I haven't done the opening arguments. We haven't recorded on this. I don't know who the expert is. I've got none of that. So I'm just speculating. Let's say we get an injunction that says, Elon Musk, you're actually not the government God King that like that doesn't exist. None of that's real. You must stop what you're doing. And Elon Musk says, no. What happens? Do the court police get him? I mean, maybe, maybe enough of like the government infrastructure that's still there that like Like, whoever is in charge of fucking what, something, security, says, oh, no, I recognize court stuff still. I guess. I don't know how any of this works. Does anyone? Never thought we needed a rule for this, did we? But the thing I thought of that I have to share is, where does that come from? Where does the impunity, the sense of just complete invincibility come from. And I know, I know we all want to get mad at Democrats. Oh, Democrats, why don't they do more with the power we didn't fucking give them? Them. We didn't give them any power. They have no power. Now I get it. They, I think they're starting to finally get it and they are starting to gum up the works. Even those things aren't anything. They're, they're not significant, but they should be doing it. Don't get me wrong. There's a bare minimum. Obviously Democrats should bedoing that. Democratic leaders should be doing the bare minimum, but we haven't given them any real fucking power. And then we want, that's all we've done for the past several years is not give them the actual enough power they need need to do stuff and then yell at them for not doing it and yell at them for us not giving them the power. I get it. It's all, it's all we do online. It's also, it's also all I understand. Oh, but there's legitimate criticisms. This guy. Okay. Yeah, I get It. Sure. I don't fucking care. We need to just make this stop. I don't care anymore about how you or I feel about being morally correct on supporting a Democrat or criticizing a Democrat. I don'' t care. What matters is having the power to stop this. And that required voting for these people that you might not always love anyway that aside that's not the reason they're doing this the reason trump and elon musk have invincibility powers and can do whatever the fuck they want and god knows where this goes god knows where this goes they're just deciding us aid doesn't exist they're deciding the entire things that Congress, federal agencies that Congress authorized or whatever, that's the kind of thing that I don't know that the courts will stop. I don'T know because if the, if they do something, if, if Elon Musk and Donald Trump decide to get rid of a federal agency and they meet some resistance, Congress is like, oh, sure, boss. I'll hear a little, we'll just draft up after the fact, the bill that does that or something like, I DON'T know. But anyway, the reason they can do this is the fucking cowardice of the Republicans. I just have to say this. Don't talk enough about the just crushing cowardice. There's the unparalleled cowardice of Republican leaders. In 2010, when Obama was trying to give people health care in an admittedly flawed way, we have these caveats. Oh, well, it was it was really not so different from what Mitt Romney said. Fucking who cares? He was trying to do the thing. Was tring to make the thing happen. He was tryng to give people health care. And obviously, entrenched power resisted a lot and pharmaceutical companies and everybody else. And Republicans and Fox News and all that shit, they demonized it so completely. I don't know if you were around for this, but they were so good at this that when it came time to pass the ACA, a thing that eventually became just like beloved by everybody, as long as you don't put Obama's name on it, even though it's imperfect, but it's supported by everybody. If you, the polling on it and nobody wants to get rid of it. Take that vote, Democrats in the House, maybe in the Senate, but I think mainly in the house, knew that that was ending their spot. They were losing their house seat by voting for health care for people. Look it up if you want. Patrick Murphy wrote an article about it a few years later, some others. They knew. They literally knew in like terms. It wasn't something they stumbled onto and then were like, oh, shoot. They knew at the time, if I vote for this, I'm going to lose my election.

0:11:25 Thomas: They did it. So in 2010, Democrats, some Democrats faced a choice of do I vote for this and lose my election or do I not vote for it and maybe have a chance of staying because it's been so successfully demonized by Republicans. And many of them took that vote because it was the right thing to do. And then Republicans wiped us out. Sixty-three House Democrats lost their seats. It's completely reversed the House, changed everything. So that's what some Democrats were willing to do, to try to give people health care in an admittedly imperfect way. Cut to today, and the reason Trump and Elon Musk can do whatever the fuck they want is because there isn't a single, there isn'T a single beyond on maybe one or two, a single Republican in all of the House and Senate that will, are willing to take a fucking risk of losing their seat. That's it. If, if right now, I just, we need to put the fucking blame where the fucking blame is. If right now how, what's the House margin? It's like, I don't know, four or five. If that many House Republicans, or maybe like say, I don' know, know, six, seven. It's, it's somewhere in the single digits. If single digits house Republicans said, Hey, actually, this is too far. What Donald Trump and Elon Musk are doing is too far. I, we will join. We, us single-digit amount of Republicans will join in Democrats. If you want to, if you want impeach them right now, draft articles of impeachment, this is too fast. And that would be a great statement. And then you need 66 senators to actually convict well guess what we have 47 so we spot you 47 and then you need to come up with 19 come up with 19 non -complete fucking cowards who are willing to end this misery I know that's apparently a lot to ask but in the house like come on you can't find single digit amount of republicans in the House who are will to take a single risk and say no there are consequences let's join going together and impeach Donald Trump right now for this. This is way beyond impeachable. Day two, we were unimpeachable, and I mean that in, like, not even, like I'm a lefty progressive terms. Like, I think in actual terms, like unbiased terms, this is way Beyond Impeachables, and they won't do it. Digits number of Republicans in the House is what you would need to get that started.

0:14:00 Thomas: Meanwhile, Democrats in 2010 knowingly walked into the fucking abyss by passing Obamacare and then losing their seats. I'm not trying to make anybody out to be saints. I'm now. But that is such a fundamental and important difference that it has to be pointed out. And here's what's getting me the most. All these Republicans, they're so scared. Oh, well, if we say anything, then we'll be primaried and we'll be gone. So fucking what? What is it they're holding on to right now? What me? That's the thing I thought of today. What is your house seat even worth? What does your Senate seat even worth right now if you're a Republican? You don't get to do what do you do? You do nothing. You do only what Trump wants and nothing else. What is the point, especially in the in the the house like what what are you getting out of this job that you're you're hanging on to so tight -fisted you can't you can'T possibly give up the nothing that you have the pointless do -nothing position you have of yes man or woman to donald trump and nothing else well I might I may lose my nothing if I go against him so I can'T do that and you might say thomas well no the the problem is they agree with him. No, they don't. Agree with him. I will grant you that many agree with him, especially as turnover and elections have happened. It's all been just MAGA, MAGA MAGA. That's all anything. There's single digits in the House who don't agree. And I would go so far as to say there's probably those, however many I said, 19 senators that don't really agree with all this to that extent. They have probably convinced themselves they do. They will probably say they do because that's their way of dealing with it. That's theirway of dealing with the cognitive dissonance involved in your side doing unconscionable crap. They justify it. They say they believe it. They don't agree with it enough of them don't agree with it. There's enough of them that are just too scared to act and and are fine. I just don't care. They find ways cognitively to deal with it all. Well, the left is worse. Oh, well, the whatever they'll find their ways of justifying it, but they're fucking cowards grow a fucking spine it's

0:16:27 Thomas: Unbelievable they're just they're they're fucking stripping the entire system for parts they're I just saw he's gonna start a sovereign fund or something and it's gonna just be lining the pockets of other bazillionaires what is the point like what are you all getting out of this republicans what are you getting out I'm sure some of them are rich you and are going to profit. But like not all of them, many of them are just useful idiots. Many of them Are just going to support the thing. And then their position, if not already is rendered meaningless. Your house seat is meaningless. It's nothing. The speaker of the house is a guy who has to, he's my fucking Trump's hand is up his ass. His ass. And he just says whatever Trump wants. And that's what you get to do is what he says. What, what kind of fucking forget everything else. We've got kind of job is that that's what you want to do for your job it's unbelievable the fucking zero expectations of decency we put on republicans at all what are you fucking doing so I'm sick of the what are democrats doing I'm fucking sick of it we've given them no power they can do some symbolic things they can du some slowing down things and they should yeah blah blah blah they should yeah great fight for they should be fighting so hard who cares that's once they do that then Then what? The nothing happens and it's not their fucking fault. It's Republicans fucking fault. Are they doing? They're just going to let it be ruined. They're going to ruin the entire fucking system. For what? A meaningless fucking house seat in Montana or whatever, like some nothing where you get to do nothing. You make fundraising phone calls all day. You kiss Trump's fucking ass and then you vote for the things that Trump said to vote for or against the things he said to vote against that's all you do

0:18:28 Thomas: You are you alive do you have sentience you're not even a person what all you are is a fucking arm of him that's like you're one of the fingers on his hand that he gets to say yes to something I'm putting my hand up cool but I get to go along for the ride and like be part of the process of Trump giving me okay for something that's fun here's I know that a lot of times I tend to talk toward a specific group that I witness. And I want to acknowledge that. It's not just far left. I'm not even talking about like, you know, far left Bernie. I'm just talking right now to anyone who still thinks it's a good use of time to go around criticizing Democrats Democrats or going around pointing out their flaws or saying how they didn't do this or they didn't Do that, or actually, I mean, I had, I don't even want to talk about this, because I don't want to risk drawing any attention to this person. But I had a trans person push back at some of my noises I've made on this to this extent, saying, well, the Democrats, Joe Biden passed the first anti LGBTQ legislation of the decade. And Hakeem Jeffries is willing to just give up on trans rights. So I think that I am entitled, this person said, to criticize that. And to which I say, like, first off, you're entitled to say whatever. I'm not saying anyone's not entitled to say something. But what is that doing? And I don't want to pick on this person in particular, but it blew my mind that as Trump has outlawed trans people's existence, they are trying to kill trans people they are literally trying to outlaw their existence prevent trans health care from even being given to anyone at any age it is a trans genocidal attitude they have and then someone's still but like yeah but democrats though I'm just like I don't understand it. Like, are our brains broken? Am I crazy?

0:20:43 Thomas: Is that doing? What are you talking about? Remember a month ago when Biden was still president? Remember how trans people hadn't yet been rendered non -existent by law or by at least executive order? You know, like I don'T, what, what are we doing? What are we doing? I am not asking anyone to love Joe Biden. I don't like Joe Biden. I think he did a remarkable job in many ways, but ultimately it's a failure. And ultimately I don'T, I'm not, I have no loyalty to any politician. I DON'T care. I'm not asking you to swear fealty to the Democratic Party. I'm asking you what is the point of the thing you're doing? Feel like there's a lot of people whose mindset is they'd rather have zero power, but purity in their minds rather than actual power. But then I don't know, like half of the Democratic politicians kind of suck.

0:21:49 Thomas: I just the world we live in. This is the thing we all think that we can bad mouth all democrats except the handful that we actually like and that that'll work as though that will win an election as though creating an information environment where universally all sides hate democrats is going to result in electoral victories I literally don't care about anything other than gaining the power to stop evil right now that's it that's all I fucking care about I don't when when I see someone say yeah but I'm entitled to critique them yeah you are but who for what does that do we're putting ourselves into this it's all about what we can say oh but I get to say this and I get to feel justified in saying a thing and I gets to have this feeling of oh no I'm right and I want to be clear I'm not just talking about this one particular person I'm talking talking about of the people creating this atmosphere where the currency is cynicism, where you're so afraid you can't, you can'T look like you just agree with Democrats because then you're dumb. It. You'RE afraid for people to perceive you as an MSNBC liberal. Honestly, I think that's it. And I get it. If you get out there and you're like, rah, rah rah Democrats, they're great. Let's vote for Democrats, Democrats, you feel like you're, you're not signaling enough that, you know, better. Oh no. Someone's going to think I don't know these bad things about Democrats. And then they'll think I'm dumb. So I can't do that. I have to signal. Well, yeah. Okay. But did you know this? Did you know that? Did You know that like, I feel like that's a lot of it. I can'T speak for everybody, but I can 'T explain it. Otherwise, I don 'T know what it's doing. Otherwise. Cause you know what nobody ever talks about that just occurred to me today, literally today, you could just go positive on the ones you like. Like what if all you did, what if you had all the same views? You could just as lefty or whatever it is, whoever this is, all the Same views. But instead of going negative on the ones you didn't like, and for reason, like the Democrats who aren't good examples, imagine Imagine if you instead just went positive on the ones you like and think are good, of which there have to be a handful. Imagine if that's all you contributed and imagine if that'S all everybody on the left mainly contributed rather than this perpetual negativity that seemingly all sides feel for Democrats universally loathed by everyone are Democrats. Apparently imagine if instead you just emphasized the ones you like why is that not an action that I see anyone take why why does almost no one choose that course I mean I guess you could say maybe I don't notice the ones who do so I will say that maybe there are plenty of people taking that course that's the course I try to take um kind of without realizing it I guess now that I I think about it, that is what I try to do, especially before an election. Now, in between elections and in primaries, different story. We want to get the best Democrats we can. It's okay to critique our own. We get it. Once we get toward election time, it's not useful to be trying to hurt our chances of an election, what if you only focused on the positive? Here's the thing, whoever your favorite Democratic politician is, if you have one, they can't do fucking shit if they're not in power. Take your politician. My favorite politician is probably AOC. I mean, Elizabeth Warren, AOC, somewhere in the Bernie is up there somewhere to those are literally Jamie Raskin. I'll throw in, I have a few of them. I think there are some people who are decent, who are trying to do the right thing. They're not always as left as I want, but they're at least like, I know they have principles. Whoever it is. If If, all we guaranteed was that only they won elections and the other Democrats, because I don't like them, didn't win. Well, guess what? Even your favorite politician is now useless because they don't have the numbers to do anything. The only way our favorite politicians will have power is by a bunch of Democrats winning. And you know what Democrats are is a very imperfect coalition of a bunch of people who don't always agree with you and are way too centrist and right leaning for me on immigration, on all kinds of things. But it's just I'm sorry, it's just what we're doing isn't working and we need a different thing. And I know the The main thing I see in the all of the ecosystem is, well, that thing we need is for a better Democratic politician to come along and say all the things. So then they do. That's like the cheat code. Then they'll win all the people support and I don't have to do any work. Honestly, that's what it fucking is. We're all here being like, well. We need the next Obama, but super lefty. They need to have a perfect message and that will appeal to all the People. People. And that way I don't have to lift a finger. They've done it all. And then we win because I did nothing and they had all the perfect messages. And conveniently, the things that I believe are true are also the best messages. That's a super convenient thing that And Then I Don'T Have To Do Any Work. You know, I heard something the other day. I realized there was an SIO I was going to do and didn't. I'm just realizing in the moment that I had another whole thing thatI was goingto do and I didn't have time to do. I heard, I'm pretty sure sure it was on Ezra Klein. I couldn't track it down, but I think it was Ezra Klein. He was interviewing somebody and there was a study that people, there was a study of people and it said like on average, a certain group of people, it's probably like my exact demographic or something, was spending like two hours a day on quote unquote politics. Might've been more. Was it four? No, that's too much. Two, two? I think It was two. I can't, I'm sorry. I couldn't drag this down. I actually tried to Google it and I just couldn't, but it's, it is something. There was some poll that, you know, some group of people, maybe it was people like me. I don't remember what demographic it is, but spending two hours a day on quote unquote politics. And what they pointed out was what that means is they're just reading the news. They're just following New York. I say reading, watching the tick tock, doing the whatever. They just consuming news for two hours a day, on average. And that's what they consider doing politics. And I recognize right now that if people stop doing doing that, I probably would be out of a job. Now I would hope in an ideal world, there would still be a place for the work I'm doing, but who knows? Set that aside. I realized the potential, I don't know if it's like hypocrisy. I don'T think it's hypocrisy, but just being part of the thing I'm talking about. I realize that. It made me really sad. Like instantly I was just like, oh yeah, what if two hours a day we did what is actually politics? What is actually Especially politics. Like for real. If you ask somebody in 1910, hey, what is politics? I don't know why I picked that year. Some 18 fucking 90, whatever. What's politics? They'd be like, well, it's organizing, it'S voting, it' s electing candidates, it'' s whatever. They wouldn't be like oh, it '' s reading the newspaper. That'' s not, you' re not doing anything. You' re just consuming it. And I don' t blame you. I do it too. I want to be, I do think we have to be informed. I don't think it's an all or nothing thing, but it made me really sad to realize how many people are spending so much time on something that isn't actually politics. It's just being informed and being a consumer of news, which is something you can actually do a lot faster if you choose the right sources. I would hope some of those would include some of my podcasts, but if they don't, then fucking whatever. But like, imagine if we all collectively took that two hours of time and organized in some way. Did a thing that's actually politics. I say this as someone who largely isn't doing this. Right now, I'm kind of just struggling to keep my head above water, to be honest with you. And maybe that's all of us. And maybe our excuse, maybe most of us, our excuse is, well, you know, it's a passive thing I can do. I can listen to these podcasts while I do other stuff. And honestly, that's my excuse. Maybe that's your excuse too. I have tried to organize that. I have organized things. We've done fundraisers in the past. We're, you you know, done different kinds of organizing. I consider what I do advocacy for the causes. And I actually, I do reach people. So that's my excuse. I'm reaching some people. I'll hopefully changing someone's mind. I don't know. Or I'm hopefully at least energizing someone. I guess the point is, I hope I'm having some more immediate effect than just me to hang my hat on. Like, what if we did that? Fully recognizing I'm calling all of us, including me out. Own. Like, what if we found, I don't know what that is. This is not what I'm good at. That's the other problem. I'm not good at that. That is not a thing I am good at, it is just not how my brain works. It sucks. I hate that the thing that we most need to do and the thing I'm advocating that we all do is a thing that I personally suck at. Talking to other people I don t know and like making connections and like doing, like volunteering for shit and like being part of a group of people Like, those are all the worst things for me that, like, I couldn't be worse at all those things. It sucks. But there's got to be a way. There's got be a a way for people to contribute in their own way. And for me, that might mean donating. And that is something I try to do. I donate to the groups that I think are doing a good job. I have done that for a long time. And so that's at least something. Beyond just entertaining my brain or even just informing my brain, to not put it so pejoratively. Because if your brain is super informed, but you're not doing anything with it, then that's nothing. That doesn't do anything. Say all this recognizing that even if we do everything right, I don't know that we have a solution to this at this point in time. Maybe I'm being too

0:31:37 Thomas: But if I'm honest, here's what I think is going to happen. I think Democrats will win a lot of House seats in 2026. I think we'll probably take the House back. Will we take the Senate back? I haven't looked at the map, but I'm going to guess no. But who knows? Maybe this is bad enough that we do. But I think we might be stuck in this pattern forever. This pattern of a bunch of fucking idiot raccoons or corrupt billionaires worm their way into power by demagoguing against trans people, by finding groups of people for everyone to be mad at, and they get everyone all mad, and they get voted in, they ruin things, and if they ruin it enough, then they get voted back out. And then maybe even we get a little bit of time to have a meaningless amount of power, like we did for Biden. We had a meaningless amount of power. I won't say meaningless. In the first two years of Biden, we had a modicum of power that depended on two incredibly centrist senators and then no meaningful power in the two years after that zero meaningful power like almost none and then rinse and repeat. Then get mad at democrats for not fixing everything with the power we didn't give them and then what do you know the fucking raccoons and the billionaires are back in government ruining it more are we going to be stuck in this cycle forever what I'm trying to do here's me I don't know fucking I don don't know what we're all doing. Maybe you have your plan. My plan is: things I'm good at are about information and arguments and convincing people. I don't even know who's ever convinced by anything, whoever ventures outside their bubble. I think I'm good at parsing arguments and stuff like that. And I want to contribute I want to contribute the fact that every fucking single anti-woke story ever created is a lie. They're all lies or exaggerations. That's what we're doing on Where There's Woke and it's pretty much everywhere. And I want the pushback because the information environment has been ruined. I don't know how we claw that back, but the information environment is beyond repair. Even so, we can win elections still if people get mad enough at the right, and some people don't show up. Even those elections that we win are not very meaningful. We're not getting a super majority, and may not even win because of how broken things are. And because of even when Trump ruins things, they aren't hearing about it because their information ecosystem is ruined or they hear about it in glowing terms. Wow, Trump actually did something. He threatened those tariffs and then that Mexican lady back down or something and he's amazing isn't he great he's such a man he just bullies people into the nothing that he got you know like and I think a way that the information ecosystem was broken was by a near constant stream of reactionary anti -woke scare stories that I've witnessed as long as I've been a part of this any sort of media environment and they've added up and they've added up and they've added up to where the power involved in just saying, yeah, but those fucking people on the left, those, I mean, come on. You just say any, any, even right, not forget right wing, just like right group of people that like doesn't even follow politics. You can be like, yeah. Fucking, you know, liberal people like lefty people though. And they have all these connotations of things that were made up over the decades. Yeah, they hate free speech. They fucking do this. They do that. They identify 70 genders. All this stuff that's not important, that's either made up or is out of context or doesn't matter or doesn'T actually affect anyone's lives. That's what rules the information environment right now. And I'm trying to do something about that, but it's really hard. But that's what I think. Nobody can solve the whole thing. We're all doing our little part. That's my little part that I'm trying to do. And I hope that it can help. I don't know, but at least I'm fucking trying because I really think that is the key. That's like the linchpin is the fact that the information environment has been so ruined that there's no connection between reality and these people like, and once they've lost the connection to reality, how are you going to convince them? What are you gonna use to convince someone who doesn't hear you? No sounds you can make if they're in the vacuum of fucking outer space. There's no sound you can make that can convince them. It doesn't matter what your argument is. So I don't fucking know, folks. I don' t know. I'd be very surprised if anyone got through this annoying sound of my voice for this long. Apologies. Just I'm so, it's so upsetting. So fucking upsetting that it's, they're ruining it. They're ruining it. Ruining the entire fucking country, imperfect as it was to begin with. If we lose our system, it's just would invite people to realize things can get so much worse. Like, aren't good as humans at realizing how bad things can get. We take so much for granted. Take so much for granted. And all those things, like I skieded the other day, everyone's when panicking because Trump is ruining thing after thing after thing, I have to say who the fuck put those things there? If it's a thing that government was doing to help people, Democrats did it. It's just it's just a fact like or if they didn't do it originally, they're the only reason it was maintained. And we've we just take it for granted. All these things, USAID, all these things we don't even think about. No one fucking thinks about any of it. All this money that's doing real good for people. Look at that as background noise. Ah, fuck the Democrats. They didn't do that lately. They just, you know, continue our system. And already I hear myself saying, yeah, but I wanted them to do more. I want the system to do better. I want to stop harming people. But I just would invite you to realize that not an objective way of looking at it. We got to start looking in terms of much more they can take away and recognize that we have to stop that. However, we can't. And I don't think the answer to how we can stop that is, well, we better criticize Democrats a little more. Because you know what? I'll criticize them into being so good, but then people will like them. I just don't, I don'T see it. I, I just DON'T see IT. There's this thing that would happen, well, from basically from 2016 until this very moment today now, where the exchange is thus. I say a bunch of these noises that I've said about how we ought to just do everything we can to elect elect Democrats in every way. And then someone else says, oh yeah, but these criticisms. And I say, okay, cool. But like then Trump, you know, like we just need to get, I understand that. I don't disagree with your criticisms. I actually entirely agree, but it doesn't matter. And furthermore, contributing that, if all you're contributing right now is just negativity toward Democrats, then that will contribute to Republicans winning, to which they always do this moral shift where they say, well, it'll be the Democrats' fault. It'll be my fault for pointing out valid criticisms. It's their fault. They ought to be better. And then I won't criticize them. Revealed in that is the truth that I believe it's not about better outcomes. It's about a feeling of being justified. Our politics now. Really I worry about this. This, cliche to say, but social media has ruined it. I think we all think in terms of what will look really good if it was in like a tweet or something, what will Look really good. What, what statement, what short pithy statement will just look awesome. Would I look great saying, you know, if I would own, I'll own someone else, I 'LL tell them something they don't know. And that it's like, I just think we're all thinking in those terms. I Think too many people think in in the terms of what will give me the feeling of being revered in some way by some anonymous group of people online or something. Or if not directly that, they're thinking, what kinds of things have I seen people say online in tweets and memes and TikToks or whatever that people react well to? And then they think, I want to say those things. And those things are never, hey guys, let's, we need to vote for Democrats. Hey, go Democrats. Yay. They're never that. Rarely. I just think for too many of us, it's all about us. It's just all about how we look, how we'll be perceived. And it's not about actually making a difference. It'S not about fixing anything or changing anyone's lives or making things better. And what's revealed is in that trick where they go, well, it won't be my fault. It'll be their fault. I always imagine like, like if I have this hypothetical, apologies, it's a little dark, but what it makes me think of is if something happened to one of my kids, like, I were taking care of my kids and Lydia was away and something happened and let's say it wasn'T my fault, but I didn'T do what I could about it. You know, like it wasn 'T my fault but I I didn't do enough about it. Comfort is it for me to say to her? But it wasn't my fault. Meaningless would that be? I call Lydia and say something happened to one of the kids and I, I could have stopped it in this way. I didn'T, but it wasn'T my fault, like the first thing happened and it was someone else'S fault. What meaning Does that have when talking about actual life and death situations, which I we can't act like it all the time because it'd be too exhausting. But politics is that, you is like there's lives at stake all the Time and sometimes more than other times. To me, I don't care if I get to say, yeah, well, it wasn't my fault. What does that do? The only thing now in my hypothetical of something happening to one of my kids, obviously nothing. Really matters, honestly. But if anything could matter, it would be I did everything the fuck I could. I did every thing I could.

0:41:51 Thomas: That is the only utterance. If any would have any meaning, which it might not at that point if something happened to one of my kids. If any utterance had any fucking meaning, it could be I I did everything I could. I did everything I could. Know politics can't and shouldn't feel like that level of thing all the time for everybody. It's already too exhausting as is. But you're somebody who is devoting time to it, are you devoting time where you're doing all you can or are you devoting time where you're not doing anything meaningful? Is what you're doing for? Thing you're doing, You listening when you are doing, quote unquote, politics, let's say, who is it for? Because for me, I think about I mean, it's really easy nowadays. I think, OK, it'S about people who need reproductive health care. It's about people Who need any kind of gender affirming care. It's about people in this country who have suffered systemic injustices for we've never made any proper accounting or recompense of any kind. It's people who don't have healthcare. It's People are literally dying from not being able to afford their medication. It's honestly, it's people Who are taking their kids to our border to try to make a better life. About that a lot. Think about how desperate people are in the world and that we have the capacity to help them we don't. Maybe you do as well. Maybe that's how you approach it. It might be. I think there are a lot of people, a lot, a lot of who think they're doing that. What they're really doing is, ooh, it's going to look really good when I say this. Yes. Ooh, it's going to look really good when I insult this person for believing in Democrats, for being a fucking neoliberal. Ooh. I'm going to look smarter than this, but Ooh, I'm gonna look like I care more than this dumb person. Like it's, it's about you for so many people. And I don't think they'll ever admit it. Well, shit. I thought I was ending 20 minutes ago or whatever. I wouldn't, I kept going. I don't know if anyone got through this, uh, if it was valuable, uh appreciate it, appreciate you listening, appreciate support, um, just, I am the same all the time, I just told someone that today, Iam the same person all the time, for better or worse, and I cannot take this anymore, like I cannot understand how many people are just putting on a little show for them, the little them show, they just want to do a little thing they think is entertaining and they'll be looked at as so witty or whatever, ever. It's like, I'm just so done with, I was so fucking done with it. I just want outcomes, man. I just want outcomes. How do we get there? Tell me how we get there. Right. Thanks for listening. If this is published, I'll see you soon.