Real Coffee with Scott Adams - Episode 1256 Scott Adams： Grading the News Networks on HOAX Reporting, Impeachment Trial Fun, and More

00:00:00.980 Hey everybody, come on in, come on in, it's time for Coffee with Scott Adams.

00:00:06.660 I guarantee that this will be the, I don't know, I think I'm safe to say this.

00:00:14.540 This will be the best Coffee with Scott Adams all day, guaranteed.

00:00:22.460 And if you'd like to enjoy it to the maximum potential, what do you need?

00:00:26.000 Well, you need a cup or a mug or a glass, a tank or a chalice or a stein, a canteen jug or a flask, a vessel of any kind.

00:00:32.720 Fill it with your favorite liquid, I like, coffee.

00:00:35.780 And join me now for the unparalleled pleasure, the dopamine hit of the day, the thing that makes everything better.

00:00:41.780 It's called the simultaneous sip, and it happens now.

00:00:45.660 Go.

00:00:50.180 Ah.

00:00:52.980 Yeah, better every time.

00:00:56.000 Well, what's in the news?

00:00:58.240 Shall we look?

00:00:59.840 There's a Gallup poll out that says that the current breakdown of Republicans, Democrats and Independents looks like this.

00:01:08.860 Republicans, only 25% of the public says they are Republicans now.

00:01:15.840 And only 31% say they're Democrats now.

00:01:20.120 What's the big number now?

00:01:23.000 Independents.

00:01:23.720 41% are independents.

00:01:28.040 So it turns out that it's become embarrassing to become a Republican or a Democrat.

00:01:34.800 That's right.

00:01:35.640 It's actually embarrassing to say you're a member of either party, according to these numbers,

00:01:42.360 because it seems that the independents have swelled in size.

00:01:46.820 So only 25% GOP, but 41% independents.

00:01:51.560 Now, of course, the independents are all fake. 0.98

00:01:53.920 You know that, right?

00:01:54.940 There's no such thing as an actual independent.

00:01:57.420 They are actually Republicans, effectively, the way they vote.

00:02:01.680 Or they are actually just Democrats, effectively, the way they vote.

00:02:06.060 So I think this just tells us that we've embarrassed each other to the point where we're no longer willing to say what we are out loud.

00:02:18.000 Or at least 41% of the people would prefer it that way.

00:02:23.840 On the super bad news, we're up to 400,000 deaths from COVID.

00:02:30.720 If you were one of the people who, early on in the pandemic, said,

00:02:35.120 I think this is just the regular flu.

00:02:38.480 Is there anybody out there who said, I think this is just the regular flu?

00:02:42.840 Or no worse than the regular flu?

00:02:46.180 Have any of you changed your minds?

00:02:48.180 Because I'm kind of curious about that.

00:02:51.220 It used to be, every time I went on social media, there would be, you know,

00:02:54.840 one of the biggest categories of topics were people debunking the pandemic because it's not real.

00:03:04.760 But, oh, okay, I'm answering the question I was going to get to.

00:03:09.260 I answered it before I asked it.

00:03:10.680 I was going to ask how many people could look at this now and still think that it's not a real pandemic.

00:03:18.180 And I'm looking in the comments, and there's a tremendous number of you think that it's all still made up.

00:03:25.260 That it's not real.

00:03:28.360 All right.

00:03:29.660 We're in a very bad place, people, when we can't tell if we're in a pandemic or not.

00:03:36.720 I would say that's as bad as you could get in terms of the reliability of your information.

00:03:42.800 Suppose you lived in a country where the news on both sides was actually attempting to be objective.

00:03:51.900 What if both the left and the right told you, oh, it's a real pandemic, this one's real?

00:03:59.260 Would you believe it?

00:04:01.020 I don't know.

00:04:01.740 We're at a point where nobody believes anything in the news anymore.

00:04:04.520 It doesn't matter if your side says it or the other side says it.

00:04:07.000 Somebody says there's no flu this year.

00:04:10.180 Yeah.

00:04:11.260 Now, it could be that there's no apparent flu this year because the social distancing is so good.

00:04:17.940 And maybe the regular flu is not as aerosoled and spready as COVID is.

00:04:23.780 So would that explain it?

00:04:25.120 Or my hypothesis that the regular flu was never killing anybody anyway and that they scare you to take the vaccinations, but you've never met anybody in your whole life who ever died from the regular flu.

00:04:40.860 I'm 63 years old.

00:04:43.060 Never even heard of anybody dying of the flu, the regular flu.

00:04:46.200 But 400,000 people I've heard of dying of this one, and I've heard of real people with real names that, you know, people I know, that people know them, etc., who have died just this year.

00:04:59.500 So I'm pretty sure the pandemic's real, people.

00:05:02.680 If you're still in the camp that this is all an artifact of bad data, I feel like 400,000 reported deaths would be about the time you should change your mind.

00:05:16.200 I don't think you will because that's not how cognitive dissonance works.

00:05:21.000 But, and somebody says, old people die.

00:05:23.080 All right, now let me take the counterpoint to that.

00:05:26.520 There's an estimate out of the UK.

00:05:29.060 I don't know how dependable this is, probably not terribly.

00:05:32.280 But it says that half or two-thirds of the deaths in the UK are people who would have died that year anyway.

00:05:40.080 They would have died that year anyway.

00:05:43.420 Was that going to be a good year for them?

00:05:46.200 Is the final year of your life, is that a good one?

00:05:50.860 Well, you know, that's subjective, of course.

00:05:54.220 But if you're looking at how many people are dying from this, is it fair to say that the ones who are going to die that year anyway

00:06:02.760 don't count as much as somebody dying when they're 15, for example?

00:06:09.220 Now, that's one of those things you're not supposed to say out loud, but we all intuitively think the 15-year-old,

00:06:16.840 you don't want to say is worth more because that's not a place you want to go to.

00:06:21.740 But you could certainly say they have more life left.

00:06:24.140 They have more to contribute, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

00:06:26.860 They may not be loved any more than the 81-year-old.

00:06:31.540 All right.

00:06:32.780 But I think it is fair to consider when you're looking at deaths that not all deaths are the same.

00:06:39.420 And in a very real way, if we were making the decisions ourselves, let's say you had to make a decision for your family members

00:06:49.060 and somebody has to die, the teenager or the 90-year-old.

00:06:54.560 Well, you'd pick the 90-year-old every time, right?

00:06:57.120 So we're all on the same page there.

00:07:00.040 So it's hard to get a number that makes sense for this because 400,000 deaths, what if 300,000 of them were going to die anyway in a year?

00:07:13.040 Could happen.

00:07:14.880 All right.

00:07:16.400 Have you noticed there's always this guy on Twitter?

00:07:20.400 And you're going to recognize this guy as soon as I say it.

00:07:24.100 So this guy, who I'll refer to him generically as just this guy, there's always this guy.

00:07:33.860 If you bring up Lincoln's assassination, there will be a bunch of comments in your thread, but one of them will always be from this guy.

00:07:43.820 And this guy will say, Scott, Lincoln's death was a tragedy to his family.

00:07:51.060 Let's just joke about that, huh?

00:07:54.100 To which I say, no, this guy.

00:07:58.780 There's always this guy who thinks it's too soon.

00:08:02.160 Sometimes there are situations which can be part tragic, but there's a part of it that's not tragic, might even be positive, paired with something tragic.

00:08:12.440 If I say that something tragic happened, say, Lincoln was assassinated, that doesn't mean you need to go into my Twitter feed and tell me that there was some bad news associated with his assassination and that I should consider that a little bit more.

00:08:29.320 We don't need that guy.

00:08:31.080 We don't need that guy.

00:08:32.700 That guy can retire.

00:08:34.400 Because I will take it as a stipulation that should I mention anything which also has a tragedy as part of it, that the tragedy still counts, even if there's something else to talk about.

00:08:48.280 The tragedy part still counts, that guy.

00:08:51.080 So I'm talking to you, that guy.

00:08:54.140 You just don't need to tell me every single tweet that something bad happened too.

00:09:01.540 Don't be that guy.

00:09:02.660 I wonder if controversial police shootings are going to be done for a while.

00:09:10.520 I wonder if a Biden administration will change the nature of what news gets promoted to the top of the pile.

00:09:18.380 Because you know those are individual choices.

00:09:21.620 They're not just because of the news.

00:09:23.860 Sometimes the news is so big that, of course, it's the headline.

00:09:27.660 But most of the time, the news is what the news people decide to talk about.

00:09:32.660 They could be talking about, I'll just pick a topic, the fact that a lot of researchers think that microdosing LSD could be an end to mental illness problems, at least for some large number of people.

00:09:46.040 That's a really big story.

00:09:48.460 But it's nothing but a tweet and a minor story today because the people who make the news have decided that's not a story.

00:09:55.840 To me, if I were the one making the news and I got to decide what you talked about, that'd be right near the top of the list.

00:10:03.820 Imagine that there's an existing chemical, widely available, basically close to free.

00:10:10.820 It's so cheap to make, LSD.

00:10:13.260 And that it might solve most of the mental health problems in this country.

00:10:17.660 That's actually what's being talked about by people who are looking into it.

00:10:22.820 That it's so powerful, it might be one of the most amazing miracle cures, actual cure, of some of the biggest problems in the country.

00:10:33.500 Not even news.

00:10:35.140 It's an article.

00:10:37.040 That's it.

00:10:37.900 Just an article.

00:10:38.740 But if somebody dies in a police shooting that has some ambiguity, boom, it's a headline.

00:10:44.720 It's a big thing.

00:10:45.760 So always understand that the news is not because the news is necessarily the important stuff.

00:10:51.300 It's the stuff that the people who bring you the news have decided they want to be front and center in your brain.

00:10:58.100 So it's a programming decision, not of...

00:11:01.040 You ever hear this word, programming?

00:11:02.620 When they talk about TV schedules and what segments are in those schedules, they talk about that as programming.

00:11:12.060 Well, you thought that they were programming their show, and in a sense they are.

00:11:16.980 But they're actually programming your brain.

00:11:19.320 Because what they put in the front of your brain, figuratively speaking, the front,

00:11:23.520 the thing that you think about the most becomes your reality.

00:11:28.140 Things that you don't think about are not your reality, even though they are your reality.

00:11:32.060 They're not part of your subjective reality.

00:11:34.520 You're not thinking about them.

00:11:36.260 So the news is programming you, directly and intentionally.

00:11:43.760 It's not an accident.

00:11:45.420 When they say this will be your top story, they're saying,

00:11:48.800 I'm going to put that in the top of your brains, 0.99

00:11:51.100 and I'm going to make everybody in the country think about this.

00:11:54.060 That's just programming.

00:11:55.640 That's programming of your brain.

00:11:57.340 It changes the actual physical structure, just like every experience does, of your brain.

00:12:02.920 And they do that intentionally and daily, and in a way that affects billions.

00:12:10.160 So I'm wondering if the number of controversial police shootings might be exactly the same,

00:12:18.780 because I don't know that anything has really changed, right?

00:12:21.300 We haven't come up with any great ideas for making questionable shootings go away.

00:12:26.860 That hasn't happened.

00:12:28.160 So if we see a great reduction in the apparent number of them,

00:12:33.440 that would be another clue that your news industry is really a propaganda industry.

00:12:38.620 So look for that.

00:12:40.660 Unless there's something you can identify that's different about how the police forces are handling situations,

00:12:47.700 which also might be the case.

00:12:49.560 But if you hear that nothing big is different in terms of police work,

00:12:54.560 but the number of weird shootings and controversial ones goes down,

00:12:59.880 that's probably because the propaganda engine made a decision.

00:13:03.360 Just keep an eye on that.

00:13:04.400 Senator Graham, Lindsey Graham, has called on Chuck Schumer to dismiss the impeachment articles

00:13:11.820 against Trump in the Senate so that they wouldn't have a Senate trial.

00:13:16.740 And Lindsey Graham says, because it will, quote, incite further division.

00:13:21.440 Now, when you say incite further division, is that much different than inciting violence?

00:13:27.520 Well, it is, you know, it's tactically different.

00:13:31.220 Inciting division is not exactly the same as inciting violence.

00:13:36.300 But is there any adult who thinks that if you were to incite further division,

00:13:43.760 in our current environment, that it would not likely cause, just common sense,

00:13:50.300 likely cause a higher risk of death and or violence?

00:13:54.560 Of course. Of course. Of course they are related, if not exactly the same.

00:13:59.900 So inciting division isn't inciting violence, but in our current environment,

00:14:04.660 it's going to end up being the same.

00:14:06.520 Would you agree that that's a fair statement?

00:14:08.960 Now, we don't know. It's not guaranteed that there will be any violence.

00:14:14.400 But if you've lived in the real world, it would be reasonable to expect there would be.

00:14:18.700 How is what Schumer is doing today any different than what President Trump did

00:14:25.500 when the Capitol was being assaulted in terms of his rhetoric and not saying enough to stop it?

00:14:34.260 Is it functionally different? Because I don't see it as different.

00:14:37.680 What I see right now is Schumer and the rest of the Senate, the Democrats in the Senate,

00:14:46.040 doing actively right now, like right now, as I'm talking,

00:14:52.560 are committing the crime or offense, if you will,

00:14:55.900 the offense that they want to impeach the president for.

00:15:01.020 Actually doing the same offense right now while I'm talking.

00:15:06.380 And nobody wants to sort of bring up the obvious that,

00:15:12.660 Schumer, you're doing the impeachable offense right now.

00:15:19.360 How do you argue against that?

00:15:22.320 Is there anybody who's a Democrat who's going to say,

00:15:26.140 no, Scott, no.

00:15:28.000 Doing things that even both sides would agree would be divisive.

00:15:33.380 That doing these things that we all agree are divisive during a moment when there's a match

00:15:39.460 and a bunch of gasoline all gathering in Washington, D.C.,

00:15:43.200 immediately after we saw that same situation escalate out of control

00:15:47.700 so we don't have to wonder if it could, because it just did.

00:15:51.800 How in the world does Schumer justify this?

00:15:58.540 I think he has to be impeached if he goes ahead with it and there's any violence.

00:16:03.520 And I think the Republicans should tell them that up front.

00:16:07.780 They should say, look, you have every right to pursue this.

00:16:11.660 The Constitution allows it.

00:16:13.380 But we're telling you with complete confidence this will lead to violence.

00:16:17.940 Do you accept that responsibility?

00:16:21.980 Now, of course, they'll say, no, and we have to do this anyway, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

00:16:27.440 But it's the same standard.

00:16:29.460 If the Republicans don't nail them to the floor to make them stick to their own standard,

00:16:35.720 which means impeaching Schumer the moment he's done, or actually the moment he starts.

00:16:40.360 The moment Schumer starts the impeachment, Lindsey Graham should introduce, or whoever, 1.00

00:16:47.160 should, in the House, I guess, introduce articles of impeachment.

00:16:51.360 And they should be dead serious about it.

00:16:53.880 And they should play it like they are not kidding.

00:16:56.440 Because if the standard is that Trump's rhetoric caused incitement of violence,

00:17:02.420 and I think it's a reasonable argument, in my opinion,

00:17:06.240 then you just have to use the same standard, or you've got to treat them the same.

00:17:11.020 That won't happen, but it should happen.

00:17:16.820 So the Democrats have a new slogan.

00:17:18.720 It's not really as catchy.

00:17:21.400 Make America Great Again, pretty good.

00:17:24.680 Because it's short enough, and it's catchy, makes a good acronym, MAGA.

00:17:30.140 President Trump really knew how to do branding.

00:17:32.740 But Biden's new slogan, I don't know.

00:17:35.160 I think it needs a little work.

00:17:36.260 I'll tell you what it is, and then you see.

00:17:38.260 Maybe we could tighten this up a little bit.

00:17:39.820 But his new slogan goes like this.

00:17:42.040 America first, except when getting revenge on Republicans,

00:17:45.980 or if, let's say, China wants something.

00:17:50.100 So it's a little longer.

00:17:51.720 Four words for Make America Great Again.

00:17:53.840 That feels like about the maximum number of words you want in a slogan.

00:17:57.900 But, I mean, this is something to work with.

00:18:00.860 America first, except when getting revenge on Republicans,

00:18:03.320 or if, let's say, China wants something.

00:18:08.040 I don't think he has the X factor.

00:18:10.560 I feel like they should work on that a little bit more.

00:18:14.680 Build back better?

00:18:17.440 Not any better than this, really.

00:18:19.100 All right.

00:18:23.480 Jake Tapper refers to the doubts about the election as the big lie.

00:18:28.380 It's the big lie that the election was stolen.

00:18:33.140 That would be Jake Tapper's call on it.

00:18:35.960 But here's the thing.

00:18:37.920 If the news people who are not just reporting and giving you their opinion,

00:18:43.120 but they're offended, if you look at Jake Tapper,

00:18:46.540 he looks like he is personally bothered by this stuff.

00:18:49.700 He's offended.

00:18:50.600 He's outraged.

00:18:51.820 And you can see the emotion on his face.

00:18:54.900 And when he talks about people doubting the election integrity as the big lie,

00:18:59.980 it sounds like something he cares about quite a bit,

00:19:02.280 because he does talk about it a lot,

00:19:04.460 and he puts a lot of emotion into it, or at least apparent emotion.

00:19:08.300 I can't read his mind, but it looks like emotion.

00:19:10.680 So he cares about this issue a lot.

00:19:14.860 You know what he doesn't mention?

00:19:17.520 Improving election transparency for next time.

00:19:21.020 It's weirdly missing, don't you think?

00:19:22.920 Because somebody who cares this much about this topic,

00:19:26.380 of people doubting the election outcome,

00:19:29.320 you would feel that that same person who really thinks this is a big, big issue,

00:19:33.540 and it is, it is,

00:19:35.160 would also be roughly equally as interested

00:19:38.640 in making sure it didn't happen again.

00:19:42.240 And yet, everything we know about our current system

00:19:44.940 guarantees it will happen again,

00:19:47.280 because it still isn't transparent,

00:19:49.760 and I don't see any big effort to make it so.

00:19:52.860 So,

00:19:53.560 it's interesting that you'd be offended by something you don't want to fix,

00:19:58.240 or at least don't talk about fixing.

00:20:00.980 It's just missing,

00:20:02.060 is all I'm saying.

00:20:02.880 Morning Joe has decided to go after Facebook.

00:20:08.000 So I guess Mika and Joe were,

00:20:10.260 they were screeching at Mark Zuckerberg on the show today,

00:20:13.620 and I think Mika said,

00:20:15.300 you need to be, 1.00

00:20:16.240 you are pathetic, 1.00

00:20:17.520 talking about Zuckerberg, 1.00

00:20:19.040 talking about him,

00:20:20.420 not to him. 0.98

00:20:21.180 You need to be shut down,

00:20:22.240 nobody needs what you have to offer, 0.91

00:20:24.020 you have destroyed this country.

00:20:25.640 Now here's the most interesting part.

00:20:28.020 Nobody needs what you have to offer.

00:20:29.800 That feels like a true statement.

00:20:33.880 When was the last time you went to Facebook

00:20:35.640 and got something you needed?

00:20:38.300 I can't think of any time.

00:20:40.720 Because,

00:20:41.640 you know,

00:20:43.580 I can put pictures in a lot of different places,

00:20:46.640 and I can share them a lot of different ways.

00:20:51.200 I just don't know what Facebook is for.

00:20:54.420 And I would say most of my Facebook friends

00:20:56.460 have unfriended me since the age of Trump.

00:20:58.960 So I only have,

00:21:00.640 you know,

00:21:00.880 like,

00:21:01.680 I'll go to check to see if something about my stepdaughter is there,

00:21:05.240 or see if Christina posted anything,

00:21:08.240 and see if there's any comments.

00:21:09.900 But otherwise,

00:21:10.520 I don't even know what the point of Facebook is.

00:21:13.000 Like,

00:21:13.300 every day I wake up and I say,

00:21:15.420 is there a reason for me to use Facebook?

00:21:17.480 A billion people are using it.

00:21:18.840 I feel as though,

00:21:19.720 I feel as though if a billion people are using something every day,

00:21:23.740 I feel like I ought to be using that.

00:21:25.440 And I can't think of any reason.

00:21:26.540 Now,

00:21:27.860 I can think of good reasons to use Twitter.

00:21:30.940 Twitter,

00:21:31.680 you know,

00:21:32.020 has a,

00:21:33.320 you know,

00:21:33.560 can get you exposure if you're in the political world.

00:21:37.040 Your opinion can be spread,

00:21:38.920 et cetera.

00:21:40.900 But if you want to do those things,

00:21:42.820 do you need Facebook?

00:21:44.520 I mean,

00:21:44.840 using a,

00:21:45.580 a photo album for your political conversation just feels like the wrong tool anyway.

00:21:51.500 At least Twitter feels like exactly the right tool for this stuff.

00:21:56.700 So when I go to Twitter or anything like Twitter,

00:21:59.620 it feels like at least I'm doing something useful.

00:22:02.340 In fact,

00:22:02.900 you know,

00:22:03.120 or potentially.

00:22:04.760 But it's interesting to see the left go off on Facebook.

00:22:08.100 And Facebook is one of the few things that I have not invested in that have a monopoly position.

00:22:14.100 Because I can't really understand Facebook.

00:22:17.060 I just,

00:22:17.320 I just don't get it.

00:22:18.640 To me,

00:22:19.020 Facebook is like,

00:22:21.060 do you remember the derivatives,

00:22:24.060 what was it,

00:22:25.840 a bubble,

00:22:27.000 the big derivatives bubble that took out 2009's economy?

00:22:31.880 Remember,

00:22:32.480 Warren Buffett would look at the derivatives and he'd say,

00:22:34.820 I don't get why anybody would own these things.

00:22:38.200 These look dangerous.

00:22:39.960 So he didn't do it.

00:22:42.240 It's to say,

00:22:42.680 I just don't understand why people use Facebook other than they're sort of addicted,

00:22:46.400 I guess.

00:22:47.340 Looks like Biden's going to shut the Keystone project down.

00:22:51.260 Here's the question I would ask,

00:22:52.720 and you should look for this.

00:22:54.680 Do you think you'll see any reporting on the left about the number of jobs that will be lost?

00:23:01.340 But not.

00:23:02.100 Do you think you'll see any reporting on the left about the impact of making a deal with your most trusted international trading partner and then just breaking it?

00:23:13.200 Because we have a deal with Canada.

00:23:15.080 And Canada spent a whole bunch of money to get ready for their end of the Keystone project, as I understand it.

00:23:22.060 And now that they're all worked up and excited about it, we're going to yank it away from them?

00:23:27.440 Even if you think we should yank it away from them for environmental reasons,

00:23:32.100 that's a tough decision.

00:23:35.160 If you want to be that country who can make a deal and then just cancel it on your closest trading partner, Canada?

00:23:43.380 That's,

00:23:44.700 you've got to really know that you want this to do that.

00:23:47.160 I saw somebody comment on this and saying,

00:23:50.840 yeah, it's bad in the short run with jobs and whatnot,

00:23:53.880 but in the long run, it will save people hardships.

00:23:57.960 To which I think,

00:23:59.240 and I think the larger point was fossil fuels,

00:24:02.180 if you reduce them,

00:24:03.420 you'll save people hardships in the long run.

00:24:05.840 To which I say,

00:24:07.000 even the Green New Deal people don't say that.

00:24:10.000 The most official UN-sanctioned prediction of what will happen if we don't reduce our fossil fuels

00:24:18.280 is that our rate of growth will be a little less than spectacular.

00:24:24.160 Our rate of growth will still be spectacular over the next 80 years,

00:24:28.060 but it will be a little less than it could have been.

00:24:30.560 That's the official number.

00:24:31.820 So anybody who is reading the news and thinks that fossil fuels will lead to greater hardship

00:24:37.940 doesn't even know what the official Green New Deal friendly people are saying.

00:24:43.520 They're not saying anything even remotely like that.

00:24:46.260 They're saying things will be terrific in the future no matter what,

00:24:49.720 but a little less terrific than they could have been economically.

00:24:55.200 That's the official thing.

00:24:56.560 And by the way,

00:24:57.340 if you're hearing that and saying,

00:24:59.320 what?

00:24:59.580 I thought everybody said it's going to be the end of the world in 12 years.

00:25:03.640 Nobody official said that.

00:25:05.940 You know,

00:25:06.160 you've heard it reported in the news,

00:25:07.700 but there are no official bodies working on any of this full of experts who say anything like that.

00:25:13.040 The only officials who are experts in the Green New Deal,

00:25:17.920 even the ones who say it's the worst case scenario,

00:25:20.720 are saying it's just that's a little difference in 80 years.

00:25:23.700 You'll hardly notice it.

00:25:24.760 Actually,

00:25:25.080 you wouldn't notice it.

00:25:26.300 Not hardly notice it.

00:25:27.420 You wouldn't notice it at all.

00:25:28.580 Based on the actual projections,

00:25:30.820 the official ones.

00:25:32.440 But we still need to take it seriously.

00:25:34.780 My opinion on climate change,

00:25:36.540 if you haven't heard it before,

00:25:37.640 is that there's probably something real there that we do need to pay attention to.

00:25:42.600 But I think we are.

00:25:44.800 And we're paying enough attention to it that over 80 years will be fine.

00:25:47.780 But we do need to pay attention to it.

00:25:50.140 All right.

00:25:50.900 So somebody else got banned by Twitter,

00:25:53.060 new representative Marjorie Taylor Greene,

00:25:55.680 for saying a bunch of things that Twitter believes not to be true enough, I guess.

00:26:00.680 And violated their terms of service,

00:26:03.420 specifically the election integrity stuff.

00:26:07.560 And I guess anything that would have suggested that he did violence would be a violation of the terms of service.

00:26:13.680 But it's not clear what exactly she said they got her banned.

00:26:16.000 However, this caught my attention.

00:26:20.320 That she's being smeared on CNN for her prior conspiracy theories, according to them.

00:26:27.700 So she was a believer in Pizzagate, apparently, reportedly.

00:26:31.720 So that's not a good look.

00:26:33.260 But she also claimed, according to CNN, incorrectly,

00:26:39.180 that the Charlottesville Fine People rally was an insider job.

00:26:45.140 Some kind of an inside job, false flag kind of thing.

00:26:48.820 Now, there's no reporting to confirm that, right?

00:26:52.300 So that would be a baseless claim.

00:26:55.280 So the way the news reports baseless claims is that they're proven not to be true,

00:27:00.640 which is not what baseless means.

00:27:03.840 Baseless means that you don't have evidence.

00:27:06.320 It doesn't mean you've proven it didn't happen.

00:27:09.260 They're very different things.

00:27:10.980 So let me acknowledge that I'm not aware of any evidence

00:27:13.980 that would suggest the Charlottesville thing was an inside job.

00:27:18.380 But I will give you some context.

00:27:21.580 Take another example of right-leaning people doing something en masse.

00:27:28.260 Let's say the attack on the Capitol.

00:27:30.640 That happened.

00:27:31.260 The assault on the Capitol.

00:27:32.880 What are we watching happen with each of the identities

00:27:35.520 of the people who assaulted the Capitol?

00:27:38.580 Well, we're watching each one of them,

00:27:40.020 because they didn't have masks for the most part.

00:27:42.580 We're watching each one of them being identified easily.

00:27:46.320 Easily identified.

00:27:47.260 And then being ostracized or, you know,

00:27:51.640 there might be some legal ramifications, etc.

00:27:54.000 Do you remember what happened after the Charlottesville fine people march?

00:28:02.260 Do you remember how similar it was with all the facial recognition

00:28:07.860 being used on all the photographs?

00:28:10.240 Because they didn't have masks, remember?

00:28:11.740 They were all just right out there.

00:28:13.380 Do you remember how all of those people who were marching

00:28:15.580 were tracked down, and then there were lots of stories

00:28:19.340 and interviews about their individual cases

00:28:21.260 so that you could see that they were real Americans

00:28:24.760 who just organically got together, with the leaders,

00:28:28.720 but got together and that this was an actual legitimate march?

00:28:33.380 That didn't happen, did it?

00:28:38.920 Interesting.

00:28:39.760 Years later, we don't know anything about any of the people

00:28:43.020 who marched in Charlottesville.

00:28:44.820 And yet, we still have facial recognition software.

00:28:50.800 If you have their photographs,

00:28:52.220 you can just run it against the photograph.

00:28:53.900 It's that easy.

00:28:54.980 And it works.

00:28:56.500 So, why is it we don't know all the names

00:28:59.700 of those Charlottesville people?

00:29:01.320 Now, I'm not saying there's any evidence whatsoever

00:29:03.960 that it's any kind of inside job or anything.

00:29:06.980 I'm just saying that's a big notable difference, isn't it?

00:29:11.400 Now, somebody says there were actors.

00:29:13.900 I don't think there were actors per se.

00:29:16.440 But don't you feel as if one situation,

00:29:21.360 you're digging down to find the actual identities of these people,

00:29:25.360 and the other one, you just don't do any of it?

00:29:29.740 It's kind of a question.

00:29:32.280 Isn't it?

00:29:33.340 I'll just put it out there as a question.

00:29:37.100 All right.

00:29:37.800 A bunch of pardons coming, according to the news.

00:29:40.160 Might be 100 pardons coming,

00:29:41.680 and they're probably all going to make people mad.

00:29:44.780 You know, there's nothing to this pardon story,

00:29:46.780 except if it's legal for the president to do it,

00:29:51.440 it's always going to look sketchy.

00:29:54.040 Now, will Trumps look sketchier than others?

00:29:57.100 Probably.

00:29:58.300 Probably.

00:29:58.900 Because Trump will just take a bigger risk than other people will.

00:30:01.680 He'll go farther.

00:30:02.420 You know, he just takes everything a little bit farther.

00:30:05.260 So yeah, his will be more controversial.

00:30:07.740 I'm not saying I agree with any of them or disagree with any of them,

00:30:10.980 because I'm not going to look into them.

00:30:12.440 But I think we either have to live with it or change that rule that presidents can do it.

00:30:18.280 But complaining about it isn't going to help us too much.

00:30:20.900 Here's another question about the dog not barking.

00:30:27.940 If you believe that the assault on the Capitol was inspired by QAnon, 0.95

00:30:33.040 let's say, conspiracy theory type stuff,

00:30:37.320 why are we not currently obsessed with finding out

00:30:40.260 who was sending the most recent QAnon messages?

00:30:44.140 Let's say recent over the last couple of years.

00:30:46.840 Why don't we want to know who they are?

00:30:49.820 And can you tell me that with our NSA that can track basically any digital communication,

00:30:56.460 are you telling me that our government, our intelligence agencies,

00:30:59.600 don't know who was sending the QAnon messages?

00:31:03.460 Seriously?

00:31:04.500 We don't know who that is?

00:31:06.720 Now, my understanding is that the way Q started was more of a fun hoax. 0.83

00:31:14.780 It was a little bit more for entertainment, a little bit for persuasion,

00:31:18.560 but the people originally involved.

00:31:21.740 Reportedly, I don't know what credibility put on any of the Q stuff, 1.00

00:31:26.120 but reportedly it might be run by different people who originally started it.

00:31:31.120 Don't know.

00:31:32.380 But why in the world are we not even asking that question as the number one question

00:31:38.620 if we believe, as the news has told us,

00:31:42.160 that the two, let's say the two causes of the, or maybe three,

00:31:47.620 three causes of the assault on the Capitol were what the president said,

00:31:52.260 what Q said,

00:31:54.800 and what various news and social media people said.

00:31:58.960 So those were the forces that caused it.

00:32:01.880 We're talking obsessively about what Trump said and should.

00:32:05.920 That's fair conversation.

00:32:08.520 Why aren't we talking about how Q is and how close we are to finding Q?

00:32:15.580 Is that a little bit missing to you?

00:32:18.820 Here's a general statement.

00:32:20.300 Over the long term, you should expect intelligence agencies to get control of anything that matters.

00:32:30.040 That's it, in the long run.

00:32:31.700 In the short run, you can't tell if it's happened yet.

00:32:35.020 But in the long run, it should be 100% predictable

00:32:39.060 that intelligence agencies, either your own country or somebody else's,

00:32:43.380 will get control of anything that's important.

00:32:45.840 Because that's what they do.

00:32:48.220 That's what they do.

00:32:49.320 They get control of anything that's important.

00:32:52.480 Because if they don't, they're not a very good intelligence agency.

00:32:55.920 So one of the things that intelligence agencies would want to control in the past,

00:33:00.760 we know this, is Hollywood movies.

00:33:03.540 So you see a lot of patriotic movies when the intelligence agencies want to

00:33:07.740 beef up the feeling in the United States about who we are and our patriotism, etc.

00:33:14.440 To get people to join the military, etc.

00:33:16.640 So we know that the intelligence agencies want to have control over enough of the media

00:33:22.660 that their messages can get to the top.

00:33:26.860 Why would the intelligence agencies not want to control Q?

00:33:31.680 Why would they not want to control social media?

00:33:35.840 Do you think that social media is not already controlled by intelligence agencies?

00:33:41.920 I'm not saying they are.

00:33:45.100 I'm saying that if they're not, they will be.

00:33:49.120 I don't think there's any way that can not happen in the long run.

00:33:52.620 Now, it just depends how long you wait.

00:33:54.880 Because if you assume that they're all trying to get control, of course they're trying.

00:33:58.620 If we are not trying to get control, meaning our intelligence agencies are not trying to get control

00:34:05.520 of other countries' social media platforms and communication, what are they doing?

00:34:12.580 You know, maybe they should be trying.

00:34:15.660 Because I feel like that's pretty basic to the job, is controlling the message and the communication.

00:34:20.360 So I have no reason to believe that Q is controlled by any intelligence agencies.

00:34:27.240 I'm just saying that if Q continued on for, let's say, a few decades, it would happen guaranteed.

00:34:33.980 You just don't know which intelligence agency would do it.

00:34:37.480 You'd hope it would be your own.

00:34:39.500 All right.

00:34:42.620 So apparently the Pentagon's fearing there could be an insider attack at the Biden inauguration.

00:34:47.620 In other words, somebody involved with the police or the National Guard, who maybe is

00:34:53.540 not there to just guard things, but might be a bad actor who gets inside.

00:34:58.460 And apparently, at least, you know, we've seen some ex-military people who are part of the

00:35:02.640 capital assault, and at least one National Guard reservist who had some, sounded like some

00:35:10.580 coup-like intentions.

00:35:13.480 So I would say this is a reasonable fear.

00:35:15.960 But here's the fear on top of the fear.

00:35:20.320 Do you know how you end up with a secret army like the Revolutionary Guard?

00:35:25.680 It's this way.

00:35:27.660 This is the path toward some kind of a dictatorship.

00:35:34.440 And I don't think Biden is necessarily intending to be a dictator.

00:35:38.240 I'm just saying that if you had a dictator, and they wanted to become like a dictator for

00:35:44.440 life, the number one thing you do is say, you know, the people guarding me are not as

00:35:49.880 loyal as they should be.

00:35:52.180 That's how it starts.

00:35:54.600 And then what do you do?

00:35:56.420 Well, how about I select a hand-picked group of people that will be my more immediate protection,

00:36:04.820 let's say just in Washington, D.C.

00:36:08.000 And then how big does that group end up getting?

00:36:10.860 Because they would have, the group guarding the president would have to have more power

00:36:16.320 than the military, at least in terms of, you know, who's got control of a certain situation.

00:36:21.440 Because otherwise they couldn't guard the president, right?

00:36:24.300 The hardest, the highest priority is guarding the president.

00:36:27.580 So they would have to have more authority than any other military over them.

00:36:32.600 So that's how you get to a secret army.

00:36:35.520 And that's how you end up with a dictatorship.

00:36:39.160 You can't have a coup unless you also have that loyal, loyal core army, right?

00:36:45.600 Like, Castro could take over Cuba because he brought an army with him that was loyal to him.

00:36:52.660 You know, George Washington can take over the country because he brought an army with him

00:36:57.160 that was loyal to him.

00:36:59.520 So without that loyal army, you can't really stage a coup.

00:37:04.080 And as soon as I hear the beginning of, well, maybe we should only have Democrats in our,

00:37:10.560 in our guarding the Capitol if there's a Democrat president.

00:37:13.900 Like, every, every little alarm goes off in my head.

00:37:18.180 It's like, ah, the minute you're, you're being that selective about who's guarding the president,

00:37:23.960 that's a big problem.

00:37:26.380 But on the other hand, it could be that since the National Guard will never really

00:37:31.240 morph into any kind of a, you know, I don't see the National Guard ever morphing into a

00:37:37.040 Revolutionary Guard situation.

00:37:40.140 So I don't think it's a big risk at the moment.

00:37:42.600 But just talking about that sort of opens the door for that secret army situation, some

00:37:50.040 president in the future.

00:37:51.500 I'd worry about the future, not so much now.

00:37:54.260 All right.

00:37:54.520 I guess Parler is the competitor, or wannabe competitor to Twitter, got shut down because

00:38:04.680 their servers got turned off by Amazon because, and then Apple dropped them from the App Store,

00:38:09.760 et cetera.

00:38:10.500 They think they're, they have a plan to get back online, but I don't know.

00:38:15.100 But apparently, here's what's interesting.

00:38:16.920 There's a conservative-leaning, they call it right-wing, web hosting firm called Epic, E-P-I-K.

00:38:27.000 And Parler is apparently going to move their hosting to this right-wing hosting place, to

00:38:32.820 which I say to myself, okay, great, now we're going to have two internets.

00:38:36.780 We're going to have two internets, one for the right and one for the left.

00:38:42.460 Terrific.

00:38:44.980 What could be less uniting than two internets?

00:38:49.420 Because we're heading in that direction.

00:38:51.920 But isn't it nice to know that the free market has delivered an alternative to Amazon?

00:38:57.460 And if Epic turns out to be, you know, a solid company and dependable, why would you ever

00:39:05.000 put your content anywhere else?

00:39:08.120 Because they do have a pretty massive competitive advantage if the only thing they're offering

00:39:13.380 is we won't ban you from the service.

00:39:16.360 That is a real good competitive advantage in a world in which at least a third of the country

00:39:22.020 or so is worried about getting banned.

00:39:24.500 And you don't want to have to redo your whole hosting situation.

00:39:28.720 It's a mess.

00:39:30.680 So Epic might be an amazing situation.

00:39:34.540 I don't know if they're a public company.

00:39:37.460 But if they're not, maybe they will be soon.

00:39:41.000 I said on Twitter earlier, and this requires some explanation, I said that you'll get farther

00:39:46.420 in life by learning to spot bullshit than you will by learning to spot opportunity.

00:39:51.860 You'll get further learning to identify other people's lies than you will identifying opportunities 0.85

00:40:02.740 for yourself.

00:40:04.080 Here's why.

00:40:05.920 Opportunities are everywhere.

00:40:08.080 If you miss one, there'll be another one.

00:40:10.300 We live in a world in which there are tons of opportunities.

00:40:14.240 You know, tons.

00:40:15.240 If you build your talent stack wisely, you can manage your abilities, your skills to have

00:40:22.880 lots of opportunities.

00:40:24.400 But if you do something that blows up on you and just sets you back for years, you're in

00:40:31.060 bad trouble.

00:40:32.360 So learning to not fall for other people's lies can keep you safe while opportunities are

00:40:41.340 coming by all the time.

00:40:42.360 So you don't need to be an expert at spotting opportunities.

00:40:45.700 There'll be plenty of them.

00:40:47.400 But you do need to be good at not falling into a hole you can't get out of.

00:40:51.780 And that's the part about spotting the bad ideas.

00:40:55.420 You know, the bad investments, the worst of the worst.

00:40:58.820 So that's my take.

00:41:00.460 You can think about that for a while.

00:41:02.420 But learn to spot BS as your sort of a base skill.

00:41:06.760 If you want to be better at it, you should look at my book, Loser Think, which helps you

00:41:12.900 do that.

00:41:14.340 All right.

00:41:15.920 CNN is tweeting, Oliver Darcy at CNN is tweeting about somebody else on the air, Alex Stamos,

00:41:23.040 who was saying, quote, we're going to have to figure out the OAN and Newsmax problem.

00:41:27.900 What?

00:41:30.900 Did you know there was an OAN and Newsmax problem?

00:41:35.640 Well, the problem, according to CNN and Alex Stamos, is that they're reporting fake news,

00:41:43.520 basically.

00:41:44.000 And he says, these companies have freedom of speech, but I'm not sure we need Verizon,

00:41:48.240 AT&T, and Comcast and such bringing them into tens of millions of homes.

00:41:53.060 So he's questioning, you know, if you didn't know this, these entities travel over, you

00:42:00.160 know, public networks, et cetera.

00:42:01.560 And he's saying maybe they shouldn't.

00:42:04.020 And then Darcy says in his tweet, just a reminder that neither Verizon or AT&T nor Comcast have

00:42:10.160 answered any questions about why they beam channels like OAN and Newsmax into millions

00:42:16.640 of homes.

00:42:17.580 Do they have any second thoughts about distributing these channels given their election denialism

00:42:23.040 content?

00:42:24.220 They won't say.

00:42:26.380 So CNN is actually reporting with a straight face that maybe their competition, OAN and

00:42:32.880 Newsmax, should be banned from the internet for having said something that CNN believes

00:42:39.140 is not true.

00:42:41.320 There's a good standard for you.

00:42:43.780 What would be more opposite of free speech than this?

00:42:48.460 And so I suggest a hoax off.

00:42:53.360 Let's have a whole national conversation about which news entities have promoted the most hoaxes.

00:43:01.260 And then, of course, you're going to have to rank the hoaxes because they're not all equal,

00:43:04.460 right? 1.00

00:43:04.980 Some are sort of minor, stupid things. 1.00

00:43:07.700 Some can move the whole, you know, nature of the country. 0.99

00:43:11.080 So shouldn't we have a hoax off?

00:43:13.640 See which networks reported which hoaxes.

00:43:16.560 Let me get started here on a partial list.

00:43:19.900 And by the way, I'm deadly serious about this.

00:43:22.240 We do need, completely seriously, a list of each news network and which hoaxes they promoted

00:43:29.620 for the past, let's say, the past five years, right?

00:43:33.280 You could pick whatever time frame.

00:43:34.900 I'll say five years.

00:43:36.520 Wouldn't you like to know that?

00:43:38.600 Now, of course, it would be difficult to find an independent observer who could rank these

00:43:43.380 hoaxes, so maybe there would be multiple ones or the ones that have some ambiguity could

00:43:48.780 be marked as, well, this is a claim, but, you know, the other side says it's not true.

00:43:53.500 But wouldn't you like to see how long the list is and to see what's on it?

00:43:57.980 Let me give you a brief example of what would be on it.

00:44:04.280 And I'm going to start with the hoaxes on the right.

00:44:06.400 Some of you are not going to like this, but you'll hang in there.

00:44:12.740 So from the right, we've seen some wild election-fraught claims, such as the Venezuela, Hugo Chavez,

00:44:20.800 and the Italian stuff, etc.

00:44:24.680 Now, assuming that those all, you know, in the fullness of time, let's say that we decide

00:44:30.680 that none of those are true, and I think that's where it's heading, that those would be hoaxes

00:44:35.340 associated with the right.

00:44:37.940 You've got your Pizzagate associated with the right. 0.96

00:44:40.800 You've got your QAnon stuff associated with the right.

00:44:44.920 But are they really reported?

00:44:47.120 Does, you know, are OAN and Newsmax and Fox News and Breitbart, are they reporting

00:44:54.180 what Q is saying as like it's news?

00:44:57.700 I don't think so.

00:44:58.400 So although there are some conspiracy theories on the right, I don't see the news reporting them.

00:45:06.960 Do you?

00:45:07.680 Do you remember any time at which Fox News had the news people as opposed to the opinion people?

00:45:15.020 All right, we're going to make a distinction between the news people and the opinion people.

00:45:19.760 Did any of the news people ever report that Pizzagate was real?

00:45:24.520 I don't remember that.

00:45:25.780 I mean, it could have happened, so fact check me on that.

00:45:28.880 But I remember the opinion people noodling about it, but I don't remember any fact people,

00:45:34.520 any news people.

00:45:35.660 Did Brett Baier ever say Pizzagate was real?

00:45:38.960 I don't think so, right?

00:45:41.620 And same with OAN and Newsmax.

00:45:45.200 Do you think any of them ever reported that Pizzagate was real?

00:45:47.780 Or that QAnon is telling you real things?

00:45:50.560 I don't think so.

00:45:51.880 I don't think they're reporting these things as real.

00:45:55.700 But some opinion people, of course.

00:45:59.400 The news on the right has reported that maybe the pandemic isn't so real.

00:46:04.840 That the pandemic is nothing more than the flu.

00:46:08.480 But was it the news people who reported that on the right?

00:46:12.960 Or was it the opinion people?

00:46:16.040 Because I don't remember any news people.

00:46:18.720 Now, I haven't watched all of these networks every day, so I can't say for certain.

00:46:23.500 But I don't know if any news people on the right said the pandemic is probably fake.

00:46:28.580 Did they?

00:46:29.020 Opinion people did.

00:46:33.720 And then, of course, there was masks don't work.

00:46:37.300 I guess we can argue about that forever.

00:46:39.560 So you could make a list of things which were definitely conspiracy theories on the right.

00:46:46.420 But how many of them were actually reported by the news on the right?

00:46:51.380 I'm not sure I remember any of them being reported by the news.

00:46:55.380 But let's go to the left's list.

00:46:57.600 And the left, they're a little bit less clear about who's an opinion person and who's the news.

00:47:03.100 Is Jake Tapper an opinion person?

00:47:05.720 Or is he a news person?

00:47:08.780 I don't know.

00:47:10.300 I mean, I know him personally.

00:47:12.740 I've had a number of conversations with Jake Tapper.

00:47:16.120 And even I don't know.

00:47:17.840 Is he supposed to be the news?

00:47:20.300 Or is he an opinion person?

00:47:22.980 How about Anderson Cooper?

00:47:24.660 I don't actually know.

00:47:27.600 I don't know if he's the news or if he's an opinion person.

00:47:30.940 Because it's not branded that clearly, is it?

00:47:34.060 Now, Don Lemon is an opinion person.

00:47:37.220 When you say that that's branded clearly enough,

00:47:40.580 that you're not really confused about Don Lemon, right?

00:47:43.760 Chris Cuomo, opinion person.

00:47:47.800 You know, I would put him in with the Hannity's and the Tucker's, Tucker Carlson's as opinion people.

00:47:54.780 But because CNN blurs that line, and the people I think are anchors,

00:47:59.640 report the opinion the same as the news quite often,

00:48:03.140 here's what's on their list.

00:48:05.100 You got the find people hoax, which is the biggest one of all time.

00:48:09.160 The most destructive hoax of all time is the Charlottesville find people hoax.

00:48:14.220 You got the Jussie Smollett, the Covington kids hoax, the drinking bleach,

00:48:18.300 the Russia collusion hoax, which then they tried to change into Russian interference.

00:48:23.660 Oh, why are you saying, Scott, that there was no Russia collusion,

00:48:27.380 when in fact they had those several Facebook advertisements and memes?

00:48:31.920 So they tried to change that from collusion into interference.

00:48:36.560 There's the Hunter Biden has no issue.

00:48:38.740 Well, maybe he does with Ukraine and China, etc.

00:48:45.180 They've reported that election systems basically can't be hacked.

00:48:49.440 Now, I have no evidence that they were,

00:48:52.240 but the left reports it like it can't happen.

00:48:56.060 Is that true?

00:48:58.220 It might be.

00:48:59.220 I'd love to see more information about that.

00:49:01.820 And by the way, I would be delighted if that were true.

00:49:04.820 Can't be hacked.

00:49:06.060 Can't be hacked in any way that wouldn't be detected.

00:49:09.800 That'd be great if that were true.

00:49:11.380 But they sort of report that as true.

00:49:14.800 Let's see.

00:49:15.820 They report climate change being an economic disaster,

00:49:20.020 when even the UN says the opposite, right?

00:49:24.920 Here's one that would be on your list, but not mine.

00:49:27.380 I know if you were making this list,

00:49:30.040 you would say something like,

00:49:31.740 oh, the left believes that there are multiple genders.

00:49:35.360 And then you would get into this whole gender thing. 1.00

00:49:37.420 I don't have that conversation.

00:49:39.580 Number one, I'm more respectful to that entire situation

00:49:43.080 than many of my audience.

00:49:45.620 But number two, I think that's just a definition thing.

00:49:48.980 That's not about the news.

00:49:50.540 If you want to call somebody a man or a woman

00:49:52.980 and somebody else wants to call them a different word,

00:49:55.940 that's just definitions.

00:49:57.640 We're not talking about different things.

00:50:00.200 There was the Russian bounty on American soldiers hoax,

00:50:04.280 the feeding koi fish in Japan hoax,

00:50:06.940 and the list goes on.

00:50:08.840 Now, suppose you took the list of hoaxes

00:50:11.320 that are reported on the left and the ones on the right,

00:50:14.720 and now subtract out the ones that are just opinion people.

00:50:18.780 So you subtract out Hannity,

00:50:21.080 subtract out Don Lemon,

00:50:22.300 and the other opinion people.

00:50:24.460 And then you've got,

00:50:25.760 I think it would be fair to say,

00:50:28.180 but I'm open to an argument on this,

00:50:30.860 that your Jake Tappers and your other hosts,

00:50:33.620 your Anderson Coopers,

00:50:35.140 they have to stay on the list

00:50:37.320 because you don't know if they're opinion or not.

00:50:40.820 So which of these lists would be more damning?

00:50:45.160 I actually don't know.

00:50:49.680 If you ask me which would the right or the left

00:50:53.100 have more hoaxes reported by their so-called legitimate news sources,

00:50:58.860 I actually don't know.

00:51:00.160 And if you were to count the number of them,

00:51:02.360 would that tell you anything?

00:51:03.800 Or should you also look at the importance of them?

00:51:06.420 Because some hoaxes cause the capital to be attacked,

00:51:10.260 and some hoaxes like the fine people thing

00:51:14.440 cause riots in the street,

00:51:16.640 or at least as part of it.

00:51:18.500 So you can't really say that all the hoaxes are the same value, right?

00:51:21.980 You'd have to somehow rank them by importance.

00:51:26.320 So you'd rank them by importance,

00:51:28.160 and then you'd see which news people reported them.

00:51:30.900 How do you think CNN would come out on that?

00:51:33.600 I don't know,

00:51:35.400 because I'm a little too biased

00:51:37.040 to just sort of look at it and know the answer.

00:51:39.460 But I feel as if CNN would be the biggest purveyor of hoaxes

00:51:44.040 compared to the news that they think should be taken off the air.

00:51:48.180 I think so.

00:51:49.300 But I would be open to that not being the case

00:51:51.700 if somebody had a better list of hoaxes.

00:51:55.400 Here's a topic I've wanted to talk about,

00:51:57.640 but I keep forgetting, 0.82

00:51:58.580 which is that people like Trump are energy monsters.

00:52:03.660 And you could think of this as being sort of the third dimension,

00:52:09.020 you know, the three-dimensional chess

00:52:10.840 that I always talk about

00:52:11.800 and four-dimensional chess and all that.

00:52:14.140 And I think that has to do with

00:52:15.940 moving emotions, which are really energy.

00:52:21.220 When Trump looks at a situation,

00:52:23.160 I observe,

00:52:24.280 can't read his mind,

00:52:25.480 but just I observe,

00:52:27.080 that he seems to be energy-centric.

00:52:29.660 So when he talked about Jeb Bush,

00:52:31.120 he said you have low energy.

00:52:32.700 When he talks about the size of his crowds at his rallies,

00:52:36.420 it's not just bragging,

00:52:38.180 it's that too,

00:52:39.400 but it's talking about the energy

00:52:40.940 and making sure there is energy.

00:52:42.360 When he tries to get the economy moving,

00:52:44.520 he's moving the energy of the economy.

00:52:47.000 When he tries to get the energy,

00:52:49.020 literally the energy,

00:52:49.960 like oil and stuff,

00:52:52.180 when he tries to make the United States

00:52:54.000 energy independent,

00:52:56.140 again, it's energy.

00:52:57.120 So whether it's human energy

00:52:59.180 or physical energy,

00:53:01.080 Trump seems to simply have

00:53:03.360 a superior understanding,

00:53:05.440 and I'm going to say that unambiguously,

00:53:08.080 Trump has a superior understanding

00:53:10.480 of reality.

00:53:13.420 Weird, right?

00:53:14.600 Because he's failed the fact-checking

00:53:17.440 more than anybody ever has,

00:53:19.200 and maybe anybody ever will.

00:53:21.560 Even I agree with that.

00:53:23.500 That statement's just true. 0.85

00:53:25.100 But he doesn't deal in that realm.

00:53:29.140 He's not dealing with the specific accuracy of claims.

00:53:33.060 He's dealing with energy.

00:53:34.540 He's moving energy where it needs to be,

00:53:36.580 and that has worked.

00:53:38.120 It made him president,

00:53:39.940 and many would claim that he got a lot done

00:53:42.480 that they like,

00:53:43.180 even if there's some parts that they don't like,

00:53:45.700 especially recently.

00:53:47.300 Now here's the fun part of that.

00:53:49.840 What the Congress has done,

00:53:51.700 and what the Democrats have done,

00:53:52.980 is they've created this situation

00:53:54.880 where first they took

00:53:56.740 all of Trump's energy away from him.

00:54:00.120 So he won't be the second-term president,

00:54:03.240 so that takes away a lot of energy.

00:54:06.080 He's kicked off Twitter

00:54:07.440 and other social media,

00:54:08.960 so that takes out a lot of his energy.

00:54:11.720 So they finally figured out

00:54:13.280 the right way to attack Trump.

00:54:15.380 It wasn't on the details.

00:54:18.800 It was on his energy.

00:54:20.660 So they went after the energy and succeeded,

00:54:23.360 because they cut off all of his paths

00:54:26.140 for expressing energy.

00:54:28.940 And then they made this one little mistake.

00:54:32.900 I think it's a mistake.

00:54:35.180 We don't know yet.

00:54:36.160 But I would say it's a strategic opening for Trump

00:54:39.820 that is just a giant pile of free money

00:54:44.720 laying on a table,

00:54:45.780 and they just left it there for him.

00:54:47.580 And it's in the form of this Senate trial

00:54:51.780 that may or may not happen,

00:54:53.980 because I saw Jonathan Turley,

00:54:56.500 one of your smarter, most independent thinkers,

00:54:59.740 saying something about

00:55:00.740 Trump should just skip it

00:55:02.180 and just not even put it on a defense,

00:55:04.280 because it doesn't matter.

00:55:05.500 He'll be out of office anyway.

00:55:07.460 Now, I'm not sure if it doesn't matter to Trump.

00:55:09.300 He might have other reasons to do it,

00:55:11.700 which would be fine.

00:55:13.440 But here's my point.

00:55:16.020 The Senate trial,

00:55:17.500 if Trump decides to put on a defense,

00:55:21.200 will return his energy.

00:55:24.900 Now, we don't know how he'd use that energy,

00:55:27.380 and it would be used through

00:55:28.640 whoever he puts there

00:55:30.760 to be his representatives,

00:55:32.420 because I don't think he would make the case

00:55:34.200 himself.

00:55:36.540 But he could.

00:55:38.580 He could.

00:55:41.380 Now, here would be the mistake,

00:55:43.700 and here would be the right way to play it,

00:55:46.060 in my opinion.

00:55:48.340 Correct me if I'm wrong.

00:55:49.880 If you're putting on a defense

00:55:51.320 in the context of the Senate,

00:55:53.800 there is not going to be a judge

00:55:55.840 telling you that you're off topic.

00:55:58.640 Is that true?

00:55:59.920 Would it be true that

00:56:01.040 in the Senate trial,

00:56:02.180 you have your time,

00:56:03.920 and as long as you don't say anything,

00:56:05.960 I don't know,

00:56:06.620 expressing violence or something,

00:56:08.340 I suppose you can use your time

00:56:09.960 to talk about anything you want.

00:56:11.760 So I need a fact check on that.

00:56:13.820 That would be the case, right?

00:56:15.360 So would it be the case

00:56:16.680 that Trump and his representatives

00:56:19.000 would have an opportunity

00:56:20.940 in front of the whole country,

00:56:22.360 because it would be nationally televised,

00:56:24.340 to say whatever they want to say?

00:56:29.020 Right?

00:56:29.680 Now, I think it has to be

00:56:30.700 a little bit on topic,

00:56:32.800 but kind of they can say

00:56:34.220 anything they want to say.

00:56:35.180 I think that's true,

00:56:36.040 but I need a fact check on that.

00:56:37.760 Now,

00:56:39.000 what could Trump do?

00:56:42.500 Well,

00:56:43.300 if he wants to completely

00:56:44.800 destroy his legacy,

00:56:46.520 what he could do

00:56:47.240 is repeat all of the

00:56:48.720 the least credible election fraud claims.

00:56:53.620 And then, you know,

00:56:54.360 legacy is gone forever, basically.

00:56:56.800 No recovery from that.

00:56:59.780 What he could do

00:57:00.940 is send in the lawyers

00:57:02.480 to technically argue

00:57:04.020 whether this was incitement or not.

00:57:07.180 How does that work for Trump?

00:57:09.680 Probably doesn't work for him,

00:57:11.260 because his argument is a technical one.

00:57:13.200 Well, technically,

00:57:14.780 it's free speech,

00:57:15.520 it's not incitement,

00:57:16.840 blah, blah, blah.

00:57:17.240 They might even

00:57:18.640 make a great argument.

00:57:21.080 But what a downer

00:57:22.140 that is for energy, right?

00:57:24.060 Ah, technically,

00:57:25.180 technically it's not a crime,

00:57:26.700 so let's just move along.

00:57:28.820 No energy.

00:57:31.200 Now,

00:57:32.000 what would be something

00:57:33.040 that Trump could do

00:57:34.360 that would be

00:57:35.960 positive for his legacy,

00:57:38.540 would bring tons of energy,

00:57:42.300 would be good for the country,

00:57:44.440 and could redeem him

00:57:47.920 partially, right?

00:57:51.180 There's some things

00:57:51.920 that just live forever

00:57:53.300 on your permanent record,

00:57:54.900 but what could he do?

00:57:57.040 Oh, here's an interesting idea.

00:57:58.980 Somebody says apologize.

00:58:01.840 I hadn't even thought of that.

00:58:03.780 It's funny,

00:58:04.180 because you don't even think of that

00:58:05.180 as the option set.

00:58:07.180 He could apologize.

00:58:09.420 Now, that's not going to happen,

00:58:10.720 so don't expect that.

00:58:12.380 But that was an interesting suggestion.

00:58:14.440 Here's what I suggest.

00:58:16.600 If he complains about the election fraud,

00:58:19.900 he loses,

00:58:20.960 worse than he's already lost.

00:58:23.220 But here's what he could do.

00:58:25.320 He could make a call

00:58:26.700 for election transparency

00:58:29.240 and use the entire time

00:58:31.840 to argue

00:58:32.420 that while nobody

00:58:34.680 can determine

00:58:35.640 whether fraud happened

00:58:36.740 or did not,

00:58:38.040 we can all agree

00:58:39.040 that the citizenry,

00:58:42.380 the voters,

00:58:43.140 are not satisfied

00:58:44.040 with the amount

00:58:45.080 of transparency.

00:58:47.340 Now, who argues with that?

00:58:50.240 Does CNN say,

00:58:51.660 the president is claiming

00:58:52.800 that a lot of the public

00:58:54.800 wants more transparency

00:58:56.280 in the next election?

00:58:58.120 What do you say about that?

00:59:01.320 No, we're not going to have

00:59:02.500 that transparency.

00:59:04.700 No.

00:59:05.660 Did they say,

00:59:06.580 that's an unreasonable thing

00:59:08.200 to ask for?

00:59:09.940 It isn't.

00:59:11.420 It's completely reasonable.

00:59:13.320 They'd say,

00:59:14.100 that's just good for Republicans.

00:59:17.320 But it isn't.

00:59:18.860 It's good for everybody.

00:59:20.980 What would be

00:59:21.700 the most unifying thing

00:59:25.320 that could come out

00:59:27.140 of the four years

00:59:28.480 of Trump

00:59:28.960 plus the four years

00:59:30.180 we haven't had yet

00:59:31.000 of Biden?

00:59:31.900 What is the single

00:59:33.180 most unifying thing

00:59:34.620 that anybody could do?

00:59:36.480 President,

00:59:37.180 non-president,

00:59:37.760 anybody.

00:59:38.860 The single most unifying thing

00:59:41.020 would be to fix

00:59:42.640 the election

00:59:43.340 for next time.

00:59:45.660 Fix it for next time.

00:59:47.360 Make the entire argument

00:59:48.820 about the lack

00:59:49.800 of transparency.

00:59:50.600 Because if you say to me,

00:59:52.760 there's a whole bunch

00:59:53.660 of fraud

00:59:54.140 and it has to do

00:59:54.780 with Chavez

00:59:55.260 in Venezuela,

00:59:56.360 I say, 1.00

00:59:56.700 get the fuck out of here. 1.00

00:59:58.140 Just get the fuck out of here. 1.00

00:59:59.840 We're kind of done 0.99

01:00:00.660 with that.

01:00:01.240 That didn't happen.

01:00:02.760 Bring us some good claims.

01:00:05.060 Because there are some.

01:00:06.200 There are actually

01:00:06.680 some stronger

01:00:07.400 statistical claims.

01:00:09.060 Probably wouldn't

01:00:09.720 hold up in court,

01:00:10.620 but they'd sound good

01:00:11.420 in public.

01:00:13.400 I think the president

01:00:14.420 could bring some

01:00:15.200 statistical anomalies

01:00:16.480 and say,

01:00:17.460 we don't know

01:00:17.900 if this means anything.

01:00:18.900 But the problem is

01:00:20.500 our system doesn't tell us

01:00:22.020 if for sure

01:00:23.300 it means something

01:00:24.020 or if it doesn't.

01:00:25.520 We don't have

01:00:26.300 the transparency needed.

01:00:28.220 And so I'm going to

01:00:29.060 use my time

01:00:29.840 during this impeachment trial

01:00:31.200 to say,

01:00:32.520 yeah, the situation

01:00:33.320 was caused

01:00:33.900 by a number of bad things

01:00:35.160 and maybe I said

01:00:35.940 the wrong thing

01:00:36.560 or could have done

01:00:37.200 something better.

01:00:38.400 But if we don't

01:00:39.920 fix this for next time,

01:00:41.780 we got nothing

01:00:42.700 out of this.

01:00:44.160 We got nothing

01:00:45.540 out of this

01:00:46.380 if we don't fix it

01:00:47.500 for next time.

01:00:48.900 If my president,

01:00:51.120 President Trump,

01:00:52.000 still my president,

01:00:54.140 if, let's say,

01:00:55.080 after he's out of office,

01:00:56.500 decides to do

01:00:57.380 one more

01:00:58.260 patriotic act

01:00:59.880 for the country

01:01:00.560 because I don't know

01:01:01.620 what else he'll be able

01:01:02.480 to do out of office.

01:01:03.920 He'll be a little bit limited.

01:01:05.780 But he has

01:01:06.500 one more

01:01:07.260 one more mission

01:01:09.240 he can do

01:01:09.840 for the country.

01:01:11.080 And if he

01:01:11.820 if he accomplished

01:01:13.020 only that,

01:01:14.760 if it was the only

01:01:16.000 thing he accomplished

01:01:17.000 in his whole

01:01:18.400 four years

01:01:19.160 and it would be

01:01:20.080 after the four years

01:01:20.980 was to get people

01:01:22.740 serious about

01:01:23.800 election transparency

01:01:25.760 so we're not

01:01:26.620 in this problem again,

01:01:28.240 it would be one

01:01:29.060 of the greatest

01:01:29.540 accomplishments

01:01:30.200 of a president.

01:01:32.020 And it would happen

01:01:32.900 after his end of office.

01:01:34.340 Now,

01:01:34.840 will he take that path?

01:01:36.500 Because he does

01:01:37.500 have a path

01:01:38.180 to partially

01:01:38.860 redeem his

01:01:39.800 reputation.

01:01:40.800 he has a path

01:01:41.860 to be 100%

01:01:43.300 unifying

01:01:44.000 because who's

01:01:45.800 going to argue

01:01:46.260 with transparency?

01:01:47.320 You shouldn't.

01:01:48.900 And

01:01:49.180 and just let

01:01:51.140 the impeachment

01:01:51.680 part just do

01:01:52.480 what it does.

01:01:54.000 If he gets

01:01:54.720 impeached

01:01:55.160 or he doesn't,

01:01:55.720 just forget about it.

01:01:57.020 It's unimportant.

01:01:58.580 And he could just

01:01:59.260 treat the second

01:02:00.320 impeachment

01:02:01.120 as unimportant

01:02:02.240 because it is.

01:02:04.480 So do you think

01:02:05.260 he would do it?

01:02:06.680 Somebody says

01:02:07.380 he could also

01:02:07.840 take on big tech.

01:02:08.940 He could,

01:02:10.360 but what do you

01:02:10.720 do about it?

01:02:12.660 I don't think

01:02:13.680 he has an idea

01:02:14.520 of what to do

01:02:15.240 about it,

01:02:15.960 but we'll see.

01:02:17.220 The best idea

01:02:18.100 that I've heard

01:02:18.760 about what to do

01:02:19.640 about it,

01:02:20.780 about big tech,

01:02:22.380 actually came

01:02:22.980 from Jack Dorsey.

01:02:26.520 So,

01:02:27.620 in our weird

01:02:28.960 upside down world

01:02:29.960 where everything

01:02:30.600 is backwards 0.97

01:02:31.200 half of the time,

01:02:32.960 the only person

01:02:34.080 who's come up

01:02:34.620 with an idea

01:02:35.300 that I've heard

01:02:36.160 for how to fix

01:02:38.240 this censorship

01:02:41.480 by the platforms

01:02:43.100 is to have

01:02:44.560 some kind

01:02:46.140 of an independent

01:02:46.840 platform

01:02:47.380 that holds the data

01:02:48.500 so anything

01:02:50.020 you post

01:02:51.020 is there forever,

01:02:51.980 can never go away,

01:02:53.420 but you've got

01:02:54.100 a competitive

01:02:55.060 situation

01:02:55.860 for picking

01:02:57.040 which filter

01:02:58.220 looks at that data.

01:03:01.000 So,

01:03:01.200 in other words,

01:03:01.780 imagine a Twitter

01:03:02.600 in which you could

01:03:03.500 have a different

01:03:04.120 Twitter interface,

01:03:05.580 one that sees

01:03:06.480 what Twitter

01:03:07.000 wants you to see,

01:03:08.240 because they

01:03:08.920 don't want you

01:03:09.940 to see the

01:03:10.300 violence and stuff.

01:03:11.480 Another one

01:03:12.040 that says

01:03:12.580 all filters

01:03:13.300 off,

01:03:14.340 but it might

01:03:14.740 be a different

01:03:15.140 company,

01:03:16.140 it's just

01:03:16.460 looking at

01:03:17.080 the same

01:03:17.400 data and

01:03:18.040 perhaps it's

01:03:18.580 on the

01:03:18.840 blockchain

01:03:19.200 so that it

01:03:20.860 lives forever.

01:03:23.200 Now,

01:03:23.480 I don't know

01:03:23.960 where Twitter

01:03:25.100 is on that,

01:03:26.040 but Jack

01:03:27.140 talks about it

01:03:28.080 as Twitter

01:03:28.860 becoming a

01:03:29.520 client of

01:03:30.940 this third

01:03:31.980 party system.

01:03:32.780 I don't

01:03:34.640 know how

01:03:35.000 that would

01:03:35.820 ever allow

01:03:36.480 Twitter to

01:03:37.140 survive,

01:03:37.900 because it

01:03:38.300 feels like

01:03:39.020 Twitter would

01:03:40.140 be giving

01:03:40.580 away their

01:03:41.060 entire

01:03:41.440 advantage and

01:03:42.500 business model

01:03:43.240 to do that,

01:03:44.260 but maybe I

01:03:44.800 don't understand

01:03:45.320 the details.

01:03:46.640 So,

01:03:47.620 I don't feel

01:03:48.420 as if Twitter

01:03:49.160 can pull that

01:03:49.940 off because

01:03:51.000 there would be

01:03:51.560 a stockholder

01:03:52.260 revolt,

01:03:53.520 if I understand

01:03:54.660 it correctly.

01:03:55.640 Now,

01:03:55.840 I probably

01:03:56.300 don't understand

01:03:57.200 it correctly,

01:03:58.400 because I think

01:03:59.580 Jack would know

01:04:00.240 that,

01:04:00.540 that would be

01:04:00.880 obvious,

01:04:01.240 so there

01:04:01.620 must be

01:04:01.880 something I

01:04:02.320 don't know

01:04:02.600 about this

01:04:02.960 situation.

01:04:03.960 But,

01:04:04.380 there could be

01:04:04.880 some other

01:04:05.320 company that

01:04:06.840 is not

01:04:07.180 Twitter,

01:04:08.180 that builds

01:04:08.720 something that's

01:04:09.780 sort of a

01:04:10.240 blockchain,

01:04:10.960 that has a

01:04:11.360 different way

01:04:11.800 to look at

01:04:12.320 that same

01:04:12.900 data,

01:04:13.420 and you can

01:04:13.780 slice it

01:04:14.280 any way you

01:04:14.780 want.

01:04:15.440 I might get

01:04:16.120 rid of people

01:04:16.700 who have a

01:04:17.300 certain quality

01:04:18.600 that I don't

01:04:19.160 like,

01:04:19.520 you might

01:04:19.840 filter it a

01:04:20.480 different way,

01:04:21.580 and then you

01:04:22.100 just decide

01:04:23.780 which filter

01:04:24.360 you're going

01:04:24.680 to use,

01:04:25.060 and that would

01:04:25.400 be your app.

01:04:26.400 So your app

01:04:27.000 would just be

01:04:27.480 the filter on

01:04:29.000 the same set

01:04:29.620 of data that

01:04:30.200 everybody in the

01:04:30.820 world is

01:04:31.180 looking at,

01:04:31.760 because it's

01:04:32.360 just all

01:04:33.320 available all

01:04:33.960 the time.

01:04:35.660 All right,

01:04:36.380 and that would

01:04:38.140 give, I think,

01:04:39.220 Twitter protection,

01:04:40.220 because then

01:04:40.760 they're just one

01:04:41.440 filter, you 1.00

01:04:42.100 could pick

01:04:42.460 another one

01:04:42.940 if you like,

01:04:44.020 and then I

01:04:44.600 think everything's

01:04:45.220 fixed, right?

01:04:46.620 You just need

01:04:47.340 somebody to

01:04:47.780 build that

01:04:48.160 thing.

01:04:49.160 All right,

01:04:49.500 that's all for

01:04:49.980 now, and I

01:04:51.140 will talk to

01:04:51.680 you tomorrow.

01:04:53.000 One warning,

01:04:53.780 I will give you

01:04:54.400 that the story

01:04:58.480 about Putin

01:05:00.660 critic Navalny

01:05:01.880 who got

01:05:02.240 poisoned but

01:05:02.940 recovered when

01:05:03.640 he goes back

01:05:04.280 to Russia and

01:05:05.740 is immediately

01:05:06.340 arrested and

01:05:07.160 will be jailed

01:05:08.160 for years.

01:05:09.360 What was he

01:05:10.040 thinking?

01:05:12.420 Any updates on

01:05:13.720 locals, creator

01:05:14.740 bundles?

01:05:15.660 Not a useful

01:05:17.260 update, except

01:05:18.140 that it's still a

01:05:18.920 top priority,

01:05:19.560 and those

01:05:21.260 conversations are

01:05:22.180 ongoing right

01:05:22.880 now.

01:05:23.780 But I'll keep

01:05:24.600 you updated on

01:05:25.220 that if anything

01:05:25.800 changes, and I

01:05:26.480 will talk to

01:05:26.880 you later.

01:05:29.920 All right,

01:05:30.720 bye for now.

Real Coffee with Scott Adams - January 18, 2021

Episode 1256 Scott Adams： Grading the News Networks on HOAX Reporting, Impeachment Trial Fun, and More

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