A new kind of AI agent is being developed in China, and it's a little bit like a regular AI agent, but it can do a lot more than just code and ask good questions. And it's pretty good at it.
00:16:15.800Anyway, Howard Lopnik is talking about Trump's tariffs, and specifically the ones on China and Mexico and Canada.
00:16:27.080And he says, if fentanyl ends, meaning those countries stay up and out and keep it from coming into the U.S., I think these will come off, meaning tariffs.
00:16:36.920But if fentanyl does not end or Trump is uncertain about it, they will stay this way until he's comfortable.
00:16:47.380Now, I hate to be negative Nelly, but I don't really think there's much chance that the tariffs are going to affect in the long term fentanyl.
00:19:00.900The things he's doing very clearly have a, you know, let's say a destabilizing effect in the short term because people don't know what's going to happen with tariffs, etc.
00:19:10.700But in the long term, it could work out just great.
00:19:16.240There's a whole bunch of stuff that Trump's doing that are directionally.
00:20:25.800And then Van Jones said that offending most people in the country and calling everybody sexist and racist and transphobic and every other name and then saying, please follow us.
00:20:42.300So every time I hear somebody who actually does understand what's going on, and I think Van Jones, you know, he's obviously playing for one team, but he understands.
00:20:54.840Well, this is a very clear statement of the problem.
00:20:57.240When I found out my friend got a great deal on a wool coat from Winners,
00:21:27.240I started wondering, is every fabulous item I see from Winners?
00:21:32.060Like that woman over there with the designer jeans.
00:21:53.400Well, let me tell you what the other Democrats are doing to try to right the ship.
00:22:00.180According to Politico, this sounds like I'm just making it up.
00:22:04.800But according to Politico, a lot of Democrats have started cursing in public.
00:22:08.480So they give a whole bunch of examples of Democrats using the F word and the S word and the GD word.
00:22:21.860And apparently it's sort of a big trend.
00:22:24.520And I'm thinking to myself, they are so out of ideas that they're really doubling down on this.
00:22:30.100If we can get the messaging right, if we could just get the messaging right, and then they look at Trump, and they'll see that every now and then he'll throw an S word into his speeches and stuff, and they'll go, yes, yes, that's what it is.
00:22:58.640And then Elon Musk was pointing out that the liberals seem to be getting violent.
00:23:03.840You know, they're attacking Tesla locations, et cetera.
00:23:07.680And so they've got cursing, they've got cringe videos, they've got random violence, and then they've got Representative Hank Johnson, Democrat from Georgia.
00:23:23.680He just, in public, he actually said this, he believes that Trump and the MAGA movement want black Americans, quote, confined, and back to, quote, picking cotton.
00:23:41.160And then Jasmine Crockett, who might be the dumbest Democrat of all, so they're giving her the most attention, because they're like, oh, I don't know if the cursing and the cringe videos and the violence are enough.
00:23:58.580We better have our dumbest, worst spokesperson be the most prominent one.
00:24:05.400So Jasmine Crockett went on some show, MSNBC, and said it's not illegal for illegal aliens to come into the country.
00:25:28.800But what they want to do is promote some kind of alternative for teachers that don't join the union.
00:25:34.960So they would give teachers liability coverage, better curricula, some patriotic and pro-capitalist teachings, and professional development.
00:25:46.660I assume those are things that the union does.
00:25:49.600So they're trying to match the benefits without all the bad stuff, which is basically just being a tool of the Democrats.
00:25:57.580So, if we could figure out how to break the hold of the teachers' unions, the United States has a chance.
00:31:04.940So it seems to me there would be a lot more evidence of Russia doing something like that.
00:31:12.480And then the other context is that it's what everybody does to all of their adversaries anyway.
00:31:19.060So the idea is that if you're just boosting, you're not creating, you're not creating from scratch, but you're just boosting those elements within our society that are the most destructive, that that's all it takes.
00:31:35.040And I'm thinking, isn't that exactly what we do to overthrow other countries?
00:31:40.160Don't we routinely fund their most divisive elements, specifically to weaken them and stage a coup?
00:31:52.980So maybe everybody's just doing it to everybody.
00:31:56.960But the bigger context, the thing that to me seems the most salient, is that there's nothing these other countries could possibly do to boost the most corrosive parts of our society that isn't already being done by Democrats, and specifically Soros.
00:32:18.420So is Soros working for one of our adversaries?
00:32:23.600Soros, because he seems to be more tightly wound around our Democrats, and it feels like that we're being torn apart from the inside.
00:32:35.960I don't see the impact from other countries.
00:32:39.640And my own view of this Yuri Bezmenov, who is sort of the OG of saying that Russia's got this plan to destroy our civilization with their clever shenanigans,
00:33:03.500Because if you thought that it was coming from the outside, you would not be able to fix it.
00:33:09.960So I think he's just looking at the fact that we're naturally divisive, and that if we're naturally divisive, you're going to see all these examples that you're going to say, wait a minute, did Russia fund Antifa?
00:33:34.500We have these wildly divisive elements in the U.S.
00:33:40.120I feel like this Yuri Bezmenov was either just monetizing what was going to happen anyway by acting like he had this theory about why it's all happening.
00:33:57.080Anyway, so if all these countries are influencing us by boosting the worst, most corrosive parts of our society, they don't have a chance compared to the boosting that the Democrats are doing to those exact same entities, and Soros in particular.
00:34:16.320So, anyway, I don't really know how to think about that, other than it doesn't look like it's the biggest problem in the world compared to what we're doing to ourselves, the stuff coming from inside the tent.
00:34:31.480Well, meanwhile, Israel announced yesterday that it's going to be cutting off electricity to Gaza, which would have the effect of cutting off water because the desalbinization plant there would require that electricity.
00:34:44.740And I guess they're going to cut off humanitarian aid.
00:34:49.580I believe they have food that would last them maybe weeks or months, but no more humanitarian aid.
00:34:57.460Now, this, of course, is trying to squeeze them to give up or to give up the hostages.
00:35:04.000But according to The Hill, Tara Suter is writing, that there's a, the Trump hostage envoy thinks that we might have a deal with Hamas or that we could have a deal soon to free all of the hostages within weeks.
00:35:23.820So, that's, Adam Bowler is the White House Special Envoy, and he thinks that every hostage taken by the militant group Hamas could be freed all at the same time in weeks.
00:35:38.540Now, that doesn't even seem remotely likely to me.
00:35:44.460Do you think there's something we don't know about?
00:35:47.520Because if there's no new variables on the table, I don't see how we'd get a different outcome.
00:35:54.240So, remember Trump said, if you don't release them all, they'll be held to pay?
00:35:57.520Is it possible that we've delivered a threat that they completely feel is real?
00:36:39.520Now, the other day, somebody in the comments challenged me to do the best I could to describe the Palestinian side of the Israel-Palestinian conflict.
00:36:53.380Now, that would be the ultimate third rail.
00:37:09.320So, I'm going to give you the best objective description of the situation.
00:37:16.560The first thing I would say, if you're looking at the Palestinian, and here I'm not talking about just Gaza.
00:37:22.260So, we'll talk about the Palestinians more generally.
00:37:24.720I don't think you can understand the situation in terms of who's good and who's bad, who has the better long-term claim, who's got the historical, let's say, the best complaints about what happened and, therefore, the best narrative of how it should turn out.
00:37:46.540As long as you're thinking about who's good or bad, or the narratives or the history, you're just lost.
00:38:04.060If it were reversed, it would be reversed, meaning that the Israelis would be complaining that they were under occupation or worse, and everything that the Palestinians are saying, hey, you're blocking us from statehood, you're keeping us suppressed, they'd say we're in an outdoor prison.
00:38:29.120It would just be the other way around, because you have two societies, two civilizations that are incompatible, and they will always be incompatible.
00:38:40.580There's no way that they're just going to live next to each other in peace.
00:38:44.420So, it's a power dynamic, and that's it.
00:38:54.840And Israel is doing what would be good for Israel.
00:38:57.800What's good for Israel is to increase their land for two reasons.
00:39:05.040One is it could give them a little extra buffer against the tax, but also, wouldn't it be good to have a bigger country?
00:39:12.860Because in the long run, very long run, that will just all be good.
00:39:17.940So, Israel is doing what is in the best interest of Israel, and they have the power to do it.
00:39:24.240As soon as you start overlaying, you know, who's good or bad, or who's moral, who's ethical, none of that makes any difference.
00:39:32.980The ones with the power are going to get what they want, and it will be at the expense of the other side.
00:39:39.340Now, what makes it easy for the Israelis is that the Palestinians apparently have some addiction to violence as at least part of the solution.
00:39:51.040We don't know what would happen if the Palestinians suddenly came up with a Martin Luther King character who had, you know, amazingly, and I think this would be impossible, but amazingly said, all right, we just want to put our case to the world.
00:40:07.260And we want the whole world to watch, and we're going to say what our complaints are, and then we're going to say what we want, and we're going to denounce all violence, but we think that when we make our case, the world will back us.
00:40:21.200Maybe, maybe, maybe that would work for them, but it seems to me that the Islamic culture is more about fighting, and again, I'm not going to say it's right or wrong, good or bad, moral or immoral.
00:40:38.660It just seems to be the reflex, and it seems to be based on cultural impulses, and so as long as they're willing, the Palestinians are willing to do a, or at least some of them, are willing to do a nonstop violence kind of opposition, it just gives Israel a free pass.
00:40:59.280They can just say, well, there it is again, we better take this country, well, there it is again, we better, you know, bomb these people and displace them, well, there it is again.
00:41:09.860So, in terms of strategy, the Palestinians have picked a strategy that sort of will lose forever, because it just gives the other side that has more power, the, a free pass to use it, and so they do.
00:41:29.280Now, if Israel is doing everything that's good for Israel, that would be every country.
00:41:36.140So, you could say, oh, those bad people doing everything that's good for them and bad for other people.
00:41:45.560Every country does what's good for their country, and again, this is not supporting it, and it's not criticizing it, because neither of those mean anything.
00:42:03.080So, you know, and of course, there's other elements to this, such as the military-industrial complex in the U.S.
00:42:11.120We'd like to have another place where we can sell weapons.
00:42:14.100We'd like to be able to project our own U.S. interests through a proxy in the Middle East, so the U.S. has an interest in, you know, Israel being the strongest player in that region.
00:42:26.820And so, that means Israel will have the power, and they will keep doing what they want.
00:42:32.920Now, one of the claims that the Palestinians make is that when the Israelis say, hey, we gave you Gaza, and it was just your own country, and you could have turned it into a paradise, but you turned it into a Hamas terrorist hellhole, and now look what it bought you.
00:42:51.500Well, the Palestinians and the people in Gaza would say, that never happened.
00:43:00.380It's true that you sort of, you know, pulled out, but you didn't stop bombing us.
00:43:06.220But, of course, they always had reasons.
00:43:07.940They were responding to some kind of an attack.
00:43:10.000And they didn't have freedom of travel and commerce, because they were sort of surrounded, and, again, presumably entirely for security reasons.
00:43:22.960The Israel couldn't let them ship in and out anything they wanted, because that would be dangerous.
00:43:28.820Didn't let them travel unrestrictedly for the things that you would normally do for commerce.
00:43:34.760And so, the Gazans never felt that they really had, let's say, the ability to run their own country.
00:43:42.760They felt like they were still under some kind of siege, even if there were no boots on the ground within Gaza itself.
00:43:56.520If you asked them, they'd say, yeah, you sort of on paper gave us Gaza, but it was never free in the way that other countries could be free, you know, to deal with everybody.
00:44:07.440And then Israel would say, how could we give you that freedom when you're just a boiling stew of terrorists who, if we open the roads or open the sea, you'd be shipping massive weapons and turning it into another attack.
00:44:22.000And that, of course, would be exactly the right approach for their self-interest.
00:44:29.160I'd also point out that the thought about having two separate countries, where the West Bank and the Palestinians, forget about Gaza for a second, but if you wanted to have the two-country solution, you know that that ship already sailed, right?
00:44:46.020There are now so many settlements, Israeli settlements, just peppering that entire area, that there's not really any possibility of a two-country solution.
00:44:58.140And again, that would be presumably what the Israeli government wants, to not have a two-country solution, even if they use the words that they would.
00:45:08.360And it looks like they have a long-term plan, Israel, to maximize Israel, which everybody would expect.
00:45:18.080Again, it's not good, it's not bad, it's just power.
00:45:23.040And if you just reverse the power instantly, you would have almost the same situation, except the Israelis would be the ones complaining,
00:45:31.000and the Palestinians would be saying, well, look at you terrorists trying to fight back against our massive power.
00:45:37.780I guess we'll just have to press you a little bit harder, because you're still acting like terrorists, because the weaker party doesn't have any tools.
00:45:47.200So they're going to use some terrorism.
00:46:06.640My take is, as long as you're in the who's good, who's bad, who's got the historical claim, you know, whose Bible says what, that's all just bullshit.
00:46:45.220So, it'll just be more of the same, I think, for a long time.
00:46:52.280Jonathan Turley is writing about crisis fatigue.
00:46:57.860And he's sort of mocking the legal experts in the country, which, of course, in many cases are leaning left.
00:47:05.060And talking about how easy it is to get a thousand legal experts to sign on to any Democrat anything, and then the news will treat it like it matters, that you've got a thousand legal experts to say there's a constitutional crisis, and everything's a constitutional crisis.
00:47:23.680Until you're so tired of constitutional crises that don't seem to actually make any difference in your life, that you just see another list of a thousand legal experts saying there's another constitutional crisis, like every week or two.
00:48:05.380Like, it's the best the Democrats can do is to try to get, basically to reproduce the 51 intelligence people who say the laptop isn't real.
00:48:18.480The most debunked method of truth, it's all they have.
00:48:24.720Let's put together another easily debunked, you know, proof of what's real.
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