Stay Free - Russel Brand - RUSSIAGATE HOAX 2.0 BEGINS! Kamala's Russian Playbook Returns - Here We Go Again, Folks! SF447

00:00:00.000 [Music]

00:10:48.000 Hello there, you Awakening Wonders.

00:10:49.000 Thank you very much for joining me today on Stay Free with Russell Brand.

00:10:54.000 Just to start off, Putin, what a terrific guy.

00:10:58.000 Russia, what a lovely bunch.

00:11:01.000 We'll get to the details over the next hour, but I understand it's the way the space is going.

00:11:08.000 If you're watching us on Rumble, Be thankful for that fact because Rumble is as yet still free.

00:11:15.000 Like X, Rumble is banned in Brazil.

00:11:18.000 Rumble is banned in France.

00:11:19.000 It's possible even that the Rumble honchos, is the word I'm going to use, could be under threat as so many independent media tech figures are these days.

00:11:34.000 Hello Gorilla Wagon, hello Van Halen, hello all of you awake and wonders watching us in locals.

00:11:42.000 Listen guys, we've got a lot to cover in the next few minutes.

00:11:44.000 We're going to be talking about the reboot of Russiagate.

00:11:48.000 We're being told once again that Russia has infiltrated independent media.

00:11:56.000 Russian carve-outs are making shady payments to independent media figures.

00:12:02.000 I don't think that bird's going to fly, you know.

00:12:06.000 And we're also going to look at We're going to look for work.

00:12:09.000 Some of this stuff's quite close to home.

00:12:10.000 Let me get into this.

00:12:11.000 If you're watching us on YouTube, we'll be there for about 15 minutes, then we're going to be exclusively on Rumble, and of course, on locals of our AwakendWonder community, where if you are a member, you can come and see me live.

00:12:22.000 Let me know if you were in attendance, by the way, in Phoenix, Arizona, from where I've just returned from doing Tucker Carlson's live show.

00:12:31.000 Let me know if any of you were in the audience for that.

00:12:35.000 Let's cover some of the stuff that's Directly affecting us.

00:12:38.000 Is this legit?

00:12:41.000 There are some people saying that an arrest warrant has been issued for Chris Pawlowski, CEO of Rumble.

00:12:49.000 And after we've seen Pavel Durov arrested in France, you have to entertain the idea that Figures that support free speech potentially could be under threat.

00:13:03.000 Now that X and Rumble are banned in Brazil, now we're seeing more and more conversation about censorship and the normalization of censorship.

00:13:12.000 We have to be sort of alert to these stories.

00:13:14.000 My prayer is that it's not true and these prayers are becoming more effective.

00:13:19.000 We might jump in for a moment and have a look at Trump.

00:13:21.000 Trump is just doing an impromptu press conference Post one of his numerous trials, this one is an appeal for one of the cases with which I'm sure you're familiar.

00:13:34.000 Have we got that?

00:13:35.000 Can we get the audio of that?

00:13:39.000 Utterly insane efforts to introduce propensity witnesses, Jessica Leeds and Natasha Stoynoff, most notably, in an unfair and improper effort... Can you mute the audio for a second?

00:13:53.000 Don't look good when someone else is talking, does he?

00:13:56.000 Like when he brought Bobby out for that rally, I always feel like when you're sort of there watching Bobby, I feel like it didn't suit him that, the role of the onlooker.

00:14:07.000 We'll jump in and out of that story as the show goes on.

00:14:14.000 There's a few posts and little clips from my appearance with Tucker.

00:14:19.000 This is what Benny Johnson posts about that.

00:14:21.000 He's just impressed, I think, by the sheer number of people.

00:14:25.000 And here is a clip I've not watched yet about me talking about my baptism.

00:14:30.000 I was involved with Bear Grylls.

00:14:32.000 Bear Grylls sort of appeared in my existence, coming out of the shadows, and said, would you like me to come and baptise you on the 28th of April?

00:14:42.000 of April and I sort of went, yeah, but I meant no. I would not like you to come. You know

00:14:51.000 you sort of make plans. You know, like I think if I'd known so many people there I'd have

00:14:57.000 been a little more anxious about it.

00:14:59.000 It's an incredibly well attended event.

00:15:01.000 We gave away tickets to some members of our AwakendWonder community.

00:15:05.000 If you are an AwakendWonder you get the opportunity to see lots of Live events, and if you respond to the message in the chat now, you can just apply for tickets whenever we have them.

00:15:14.000 You never have to pay for them.

00:15:15.000 That's just one of the things we offer to our supporter community, as well as some forthcoming specials that I think you're really going to love.

00:15:23.000 This clip says that I'm going to explain the world to Tucker in less than 60 seconds.

00:15:28.000 I can't imagine which 60 seconds that was.

00:15:31.000 And I suppose that if you have that kind of polarity, a kind of tension, where crisis is beneficial to the most powerful interests in the world, it's likely that you will see a perpetuation of crisis.

00:15:41.000 Endless crisis.

00:15:42.000 If the military-industrial complex benefit from war, you will have war.

00:15:46.000 If the pharmaceutical complex benefit from ill health, you will have the perpetuation of ill health.

00:15:51.000 If they require you to eat food that's bad for you and take medicine that's bad for you, then you find that this great, wonderful nation, in which I'm a foreigner, traipsing willy-nilly back and forth that border, almost at will, popping in them cages that Obama built.

00:16:07.000 Then I suppose that what you have instead of this wonderful nation, you have a kind of conveyor belt where we're sort of turned into larvae with parasitic tubes attached to us.

00:16:17.000 One end being pumped full of sugar and seed oil, the other end being pumped full of needless pharmaceuticals.

00:16:24.000 Actually, that's been edited.

00:16:25.000 There's no way I could have done that in 60 seconds.

00:16:27.000 There's one claim I simply won't make for myself and that is that I'm a man who leans heavily into brevity.

00:16:33.000 Tucker, now is his most recent show.

00:16:36.000 The night after that was with Vivek Ramaswamy and I think Bobby Kennedy made a surprise appearance.

00:16:42.000 I was very interested to see Vivek talking to Jordan Peterson and how he said that his personal contribution to the Republican movement would be to ensure That the Republican Party did not remain in the capture of the donor class.

00:16:57.000 As this new movement continues to grow, it feels like it's important to me at least, and tell me if you agree with this in the chat, to continually reiterate that this cannot remain a partisan issue.

00:17:11.000 We have to look at the Problems that underlie our systems.

00:17:16.000 And to me, it appears that the ability for a donor class to control both parties in your country, the industry of lobbying's endless ability to magnetize and direct policy in the trajectory of your nation, unless that's addressed, it's...

00:17:33.000 It's pretty unlikely that the world's going to change as significantly as is required.

00:17:38.000 Let's have a look at Tucker and Vivek and Bobby Kennedy.

00:17:43.000 And so it's an honor to introduce Robert F. Kennedy Jr.

00:17:48.000 [Applause]

00:18:14.000 there you go It seems to me that that will be beneficial in the ongoing framing of the counter-movement to what seems like another four years of bureaucratic civilian management if

00:18:30.000 Marla Harris wins the election.

00:18:32.000 We're going to be talking about the re-emergence of Russiagate.

00:18:35.000 Russiagate rebooted.

00:18:37.000 Can we buy that story a second time after last time?

00:18:40.000 What is the function of the Department of Justice when it comes to the investigations into independent media content creators?

00:18:49.000 What is the role of the Department of Justice when it comes to the ongoing persecution of Donald Trump?

00:18:54.000 And have these Fume is an award-winning flavoured air device.

00:18:57.000 Are they being directed by interests that are no longer democratic?

00:19:00.000 Before we get into that, our main story, here is a brief word from one of our partners.

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00:20:18.000 Now back to the content.

00:20:20.000 Thank you.

00:20:23.000 Let's go back now to Donald Trump's impromptu press conference.

00:20:27.000 Let's have a look at that.

00:20:28.000 I had really good numbers, but they were very conservative, very much on the low side.

00:20:34.000 And the judge knew that.

00:20:36.000 And the judge ruled a fine against me, the likes of which has never even been heard of.

00:20:43.000 Businesses will never come to this state as long as that is able to be held up.

00:20:49.000 Because we won that trial so conclusively.

00:20:52.000 We had an expert witness said that President Trump's financial... This was an expert witness from the Stern School of Business, one of the most highly respected people in the country as an expert witness.

00:21:06.000 He said, to the best of my remembering, it's a big statement, but he said, this is perhaps the best financial statement I've ever seen.

00:21:15.000 But the judge made me pay like a $400 million fine.

00:21:20.000 This is a consumer fraud statement.

00:21:23.000 Think of it.

00:21:25.000 Consumer fraud case that they made it in.

00:21:29.000 The judge refused to give it over to the commercial division where they could understand things and they would have dismissed it immediately because this case had no merit whatsoever.

00:21:41.000 Hey! 0.99

00:21:42.000 No you don't!

00:21:42.000 You don't slip that advert in!

00:21:44.000 Cut that stuff!

00:21:45.000 Mind you, that did look like a pretty good game.

00:21:47.000 He was, I think, 400 million.

00:21:49.000 That's quite a fine.

00:21:50.000 We'll go back to that eventually, but we can't be running their glary little commercials, can we?

00:21:55.000 My word, we're pushing that foom, baby.

00:21:59.000 Okay, so hey, shall we do our main story?

00:22:00.000 Listen, if you're watching this on YouTube, you're gonna have to click the link in the description.

00:22:04.000 And join us over on Rumble.

00:22:06.000 I'll tell you why, because this story, Russiagate.20, start the countdown, this story, Russiagate.20, covers a variety of complex ideas.

00:22:17.000 We're going to be starting with, well, how can the mainstream media be carrying, once again, the idea That Russia are interfering in elections.

00:22:26.000 And does that seem plausible to you when Putin has already declared that his personal preference would be a Kamala Harris presidency?

00:22:35.000 And what's happening with the leaked DOJ investigation into independent content creators?

00:22:41.000 And we're going to touch upon Stephen Crowder, Rumble creator's investigation into the DOJ.

00:22:46.000 We're going to have to work out what is it that this version of Russiagate is about?

00:22:51.000 Okay guys, let's get into it.

00:22:53.000 First of all, maybe we should start off with the, let's have a look at the mainstream media reporting on the subject, pushing the idea that it is indeed RussiaGate.20 Breaking news!

00:23:06.000 The Biden administration taking a series of actions to target what they allege are attempts by Russian-backed actors to manipulate public opinion here in the U.S.

00:23:17.000 ahead of the presidential election, according to two senior U.S.

00:23:20.000 officials.

00:23:21.000 Joining us now is NBC's Ken Delaney.

00:23:23.000 And Ken, what more have we learned?

00:23:26.000 Jose, this is being described by our sources as a whole of government action designed to

00:23:30.000 target Russian propaganda and disinformation aimed at interfering in the 2024 election.

00:23:37.000 It is said to include sanctions by the Treasury Department, law enforcement action by the

00:23:42.000 Justice Department, and one of the focuses is on RT, formerly known as Russia Today,

00:23:47.000 that network of Russian government-funded English-language websites and television platforms

00:23:52.000 that was flagged all the way back in 2017 by the U.S.

00:23:55.000 intelligence community as a vehicle for Russian disinformation and election interference.

00:24:00.000 And at that time, the Justice Department required RT to register as a foreign agent.

00:24:06.000 We remain to be seeing exactly what actions the U.S. will take against RT today, but this

00:24:11.000 does appear to represent an escalation in the efforts to try to purge the system of

00:24:16.000 Russian propaganda and disinformation.

00:24:19.000 What's interesting is that, look, the U.S. has been saying all along that not only Russia

00:24:23.000 but Iran and China, but particularly Russia, has been consistently trying to manipulate

00:24:27.000 American public opinion.

00:24:28.000 with disinformation on social media platforms, use of fake accounts, and through RT, through

00:24:35.000 its state-sponsored platforms, as they did in 2016.

00:24:39.000 The difference now is that there are mechanisms in place, particularly on social media platforms,

00:24:44.000 to try to stop and flag fake accounts before the influence operations spread too widely.

00:24:50.000 So it remains to be seen what impact this Russian disinformation is having.

00:24:55.000 But nonetheless, this is a stance by the Biden administration to say, if you're violating

00:24:59.000 U.S. laws and policies, we're going to come after you. 0.98

00:25:03.000 Attorney General Merrick Garland is expected to chair a meeting of the government's election

00:25:07.000 task force today, this afternoon, with FBI Director Chris Wray and other officials,

00:25:12.000 and he may have public comments to make about this effort at that time.

00:25:16.000 The first time Russiagate happened, my intuitive reaction was,

00:25:22.000 "There's some leaky audio on in here, guys. Yeah, can you come in? There's some audio on.

00:25:29.000 Thanks. Something's sort of, it looks like cans are on with, or it might have changed."

00:25:34.000 It might have been that that microphone that you just spoke in was on.

00:25:39.000 Thank you.

00:25:40.000 The first time they did that, Russiagate, it seemed like an inability to address the lack of their government's actual popularity.

00:25:50.000 A disinterested, or in fact uninterested electorate turning away from the kind of mainstream politics that had consistently failed to deliver the type of results that the electorate Feel that they deserve, and in fact you could argue that they do deserve, this version of it.

00:26:05.000 Don't you think that...

00:26:07.000 Don't you think that this is sort of an attempt to create absolute bewilderment?

00:26:11.000 Yeah, it is.

00:26:11.000 It's Russia.

00:26:12.000 I'm messing with my audio right now.

00:26:13.000 I'm telling you, that's what's happening.

00:26:15.000 Don't you think that what we're living in now is a time of such sort of delirium that, like, do you think that Russian misinformation could genuinely impact the outcome of the 2024 election?

00:26:31.000 Because there is so much bloody information to consume.

00:26:34.000 Let me firstly get into this.

00:26:36.000 Morning Joe certainly aren't happy with the idea that we could potentially be dealing with Putin.

00:26:44.000 It's been long since I've called any leaders of Europe or the U.S., but we're not against any type of contacts.

00:26:57.000 We're not limiting them.

00:26:58.000 Yes, sometimes we exchange some kind of information using different channels, first of all through the foreign ministry.

00:27:07.000 It's not for us to determine.

00:27:11.000 These are elections of the U.S.

00:27:13.000 people.

00:27:14.000 I said that if we can name a favorite candidate, it used to be Joe Biden, but now he is not participating in the election campaign, and he recommended to all his allies to support Ms.

00:27:34.000 Harris, so that is what we are going to do.

00:27:37.000 Yeah, that is some Olympic level trolling.

00:27:42.000 What would they do there though? Would they troll their own population on Russian media?

00:27:46.000 So he would assume that that would get picked up in the US and would play well.

00:27:55.000 I don't understand how many levels to this game there are.

00:27:59.000 Let's have a look at other legacy media outlets dealing with the inconvenient news that Putin would prefer Kamala.

00:28:09.000 And if they would prefer Kamala Harris, why would they be trying to manipulate and influence the election in favour of Trump?

00:28:20.000 How many levels to this simulacrum is there?

00:28:24.000 President Putin said this morning that President Biden was his first choice for a second term, but that now he'd like Vice President Harris to become the next American president.

00:28:36.000 Her laugh is so expressive and infectious, Putin said at an economic conference.

00:28:42.000 But is the former spy telling the truth?

00:28:44.000 U.S.

00:28:45.000 intelligence agencies believe Putin prefers Donald Trump over Harris, seeing him as less likely to continue supporting Ukraine.

00:28:53.000 And Washington believes Putin is already trying to influence the election.

00:28:57.000 On Wednesday, the State Department said it would designate five Russian state-funded news organizations, including RT, formerly known as Russia Today, Ruptly, and Sputnik, as foreign government missions and limit visas for their employees.

00:29:12.000 The Justice and Treasury Departments are acting as well, indicting two RT employees accused of funding an American right-wing media company to carry out the Kremlin's influence campaign.

00:29:24.000 The Justice Department's message is clear.

00:29:27.000 We have no tolerance for attempts by authoritarian regimes to exploit our democratic system of government.

00:29:36.000 A spokesman for RT told NBC News the group had several responses including ha ha ha ha and 2016 called and wants its cliches back.

00:29:48.000 It's getting deep, guys.

00:29:49.000 could potentially mediate a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine.

00:29:53.000 President Putin said he is open to negotiations and that China, Brazil or India could serve

00:29:59.000 as a mediator.

00:30:00.000 Hoda.

00:30:01.000 All right, Richard Engel for us there in Ukraine.

00:30:02.000 Richard, thank you.

00:30:03.000 It's getting deep, guys.

00:30:05.000 The legacy media, of course, are claiming that numerous independent media content creators

00:30:15.000 have accepted money from a Russian carve-out.

00:30:19.000 The same way I suppose that CIA carve-outs often generate media in Ukraine.

00:30:25.000 I know this because it's sort of happened to me.

00:30:27.000 They're claiming that Benny Johnson and Tim Pool and Dave Rubin and others have accepted money from a Russian carve-out.

00:30:36.000 Now I know that all of them deny that.

00:30:39.000 And let's have a look at the legacy media's reporting on it.

00:30:42.000 And this image... You can't... Now that is Dave Rubin!

00:30:47.000 And that is dear Benny Johnson.

00:30:50.000 But that fella in the middle, that's just a guy with a hat on.

00:30:53.000 Do your research, Guardian!

00:30:55.000 You can't get away with that!

00:30:59.000 Tim Paul would not wear an oatmeal-coloured hat, would he?

00:31:04.000 That's an offensive misgendering of Tim Paul taking place there at the Guardian.

00:31:10.000 OK, let's have a look at Megyn Kelly explaining this extraordinary story.

00:31:16.000 So here's the deal.

00:31:17.000 The DOJ is alleging that these two Russians who worked for RT, I mean, that does matter, but it's really the fact that they're in Russia and they're Russian and they're pushing Russian interests.

00:31:28.000 What they did was they called their friend Lauren Chen.

00:31:31.000 Now, she is a Canadian citizen who's living and working in America, I believe living here too, but definitely working in America for, among others, The Blaze.

00:31:42.000 And she's a relatively well-known conservative personality online. 0.66

00:31:46.000 I will say she's a troll. 1.00

00:31:49.000 I unfollowed her a while ago because it was obvious this is not a person worth listening to on X. So they contacted Lauren Chen because, unbeknownst to me, she had worked for RT for a year as a commentator.

00:32:07.000 Apparently on the air, but at least writing articles for them.

00:32:10.000 So openly affiliating with this channel.

00:32:13.000 Now, it's not the RT.

00:32:14.000 It's definitely state-run media.

00:32:16.000 It is with Russia. 0.94

00:32:18.000 I mean, good luck finding them doing anything critical of Vladimir Putin.

00:32:21.000 Trust me.

00:32:23.000 They try to get more and more influence in the United States.

00:32:26.000 They've had people reach out to me many times to try to get me to do something.

00:32:31.000 It's a no.

00:32:32.000 Okay, they know that by this point.

00:32:35.000 But in this case, they did reach out to Lauren, according to this indictment, and said, help us form a new independent media company and help us find influencers who will work for it.

00:32:47.000 And according to the indictment, she did.

00:32:49.000 She and her husband both did that and recruited guys like Dave and Tim Pool and Benny and three others I never heard of.

00:32:57.000 And she, according to the indictment, knew that the Russians would be funding this and editing content.

00:33:06.000 But the influencers, the conservative podcasters, did not.

00:33:11.000 And that's according to the indictment.

00:33:12.000 That's why none of them has been indicted.

00:33:14.000 The feds are saying Rubin, Poole, Bennington, they didn't know.

00:33:18.000 They were not told.

00:33:20.000 In fact, they were given misinformation by Lauren because, they allege, she knew they would never do this if they understood it was being funded by the Russians.

00:33:30.000 She told them that it was all being funded by some French businessman Uh, Edward Gregorian.

00:33:38.000 And the indictment alleges that both Tim and Dave, I don't know about the others, tried to kick the tires a bit, obviously not enough, on who this is.

00:33:47.000 Who's Edward Gregorian?

00:33:49.000 And they wanted to see, like, a profile of the guy, all that was forwarded was a LinkedIn, which appears obviously to have been fake.

00:33:57.000 And then Dave Rubin is, according to the indictment, the guy who pushed more and said, like, this isn't enough.

00:34:02.000 And then they created this whole fake profile of this guy, Edward Gregorian, that's like pretty fancy.

00:34:10.000 I'm holding it up for the listening audience and you can see.

00:34:14.000 Frankly, it looks a little obviously stock picture at the top of some vaguely attractive man looking out a window of a private jet.

00:34:23.000 And then it's got all sorts of fawning descriptions about the guy.

00:34:26.000 And Dave apparently did push back even after that, saying, I'm not sure about this guy.

00:34:31.000 It says he's into social justice.

00:34:33.000 Why is he looking for me?

00:34:35.000 Anyway, there was some pushback.

00:34:36.000 But here's the bottom line.

00:34:38.000 They were offering eye-popping sums to these influencers.

00:34:44.000 And they took the deal.

00:34:46.000 Edward Gregorian, mystery man, looking out the window of a private jet.

00:34:51.000 He cares about social justice and he cares about you and me.

00:34:54.000 Let me tell you, I didn't offer us any money, or else you'd have just watched 25 minutes of me telling you that Edward Gregorian's a great fella and we should just follow along with it.

00:35:02.000 Don't you just assume that all media is to some degree propaganda and that isn't in fact the charm of independent media is that the biases are sort of somewhat evident and Declared.

00:35:15.000 Explicitly declared.

00:35:16.000 I mean, on this show, I don't know what we would be capable of propagating.

00:35:21.000 The whole thing's run on pure instinct, intuition, goodwill, faithfulness.

00:35:26.000 So, when you look at the story then, Russiagate is being rebooted.

00:35:30.000 Now, I keep putting the decimal point in the wrong place, don't I?

00:35:34.000 It's Russiagate .20.

00:35:36.000 That's what it is, not 2.0.

00:35:38.000 You're quite right about that.

00:35:39.000 But we can't simply continue to believe that the only reason people would vote for Donald Trump or vote against Kamala Harris and the remnants of the establishment that she represents because of Putin's ingenuity and deception is It's plain that people are utterly disillusioned and on the precipice of despair with the institutions of democracy, the institutions of justice, the institutions of communication, primarily because they've all become so dreadfully corrupted.

00:36:10.000 You can't have it that on one hand Putin is publicly endorsing Kamala Harris, then deceptively ensuring that people vote for Trump.

00:36:19.000 I don't know how he thinks he would benefit from a Kamala Harris It's pretty clear that the Democratic Party are more interested in continuing to fund Ukraine, for example.

00:36:30.000 That would seem pretty likely.

00:36:32.000 I can't pretend to begin to understand it, not for a second, except for saying that the world of media, espionage, surveillance and censorship seems to be governed increasingly by authoritarian forces that benefit from all of us being goggle-eyed and bedazzled and distracted from the things that are truly important, and you know what they are, don't you?

00:36:55.000 Personally, I know most of those influencers, and I would say that None of them are going to actively promote Russian interest for money.

00:37:03.000 It's not how it works.

00:37:05.000 Dave Rubin, double patriotic.

00:37:07.000 Benny Johnson is patriotic to an outrageous degree.

00:37:11.000 Tim Pool seems like a deeply critical thinker trying his best.

00:37:16.000 If America votes for Donald Trump in November 2024, it's not going to be because of the will of Vladimir Putin.

00:37:25.000 It's going to be because of the ineptitude and corruption of the government for the last four years and the general state of disillusionment, the fugue of despair induced by centrist politics that We've got a fantastic conversation coming up for you now.

00:37:40.000 It's with Jay Bhattacharya and Rav Arora.

00:37:41.000 But that's just what I think.

00:37:42.000 Why don't you let me know what you think in the comments and the chat.

00:37:46.000 We've got a fantastic conversation coming up for you now.

00:37:49.000 It's with Jay Bhattacharya and Rav Arora.

00:37:52.000 You should seriously consider subscribing to their sub stack, their consensus sub stack

00:37:58.000 for in-depth coverage of big pharma and free speech related issues.

00:38:01.000 And go to JNRAF's new Rumble channel, featuring their podcast with episodes twice a week.

00:38:06.000 The links are in the description.

00:38:09.000 Consider...

00:38:10.000 Get in the rumble ad free version because if you get rumble premium It supports all of us and rumble will need support because banned in Brazil banned in France banned in Russia And I feel that this organization this platform is committed to free speech and between now and the election We're going to require that you know when you see Like Eric Weinstein, Brett Weinstein, basically Weinstein.

00:38:34.000 When you see the whole Weinstein sibling fraternity suggesting that something eerie and peculiar is going to happen between now and the election, I think it's really important.

00:38:44.000 We're going to speak to Jay Bhattacharya now.

00:38:47.000 This is a fantastic conversation.

00:38:49.000 So yeah, consider that. Let us know guys.

00:38:51.000 Alright, um, I'm gonna, um, we're gonna, we're gonna speak to Rav, we're gonna speak to Jay Bhattacharya now.

00:38:58.000 This is a fantastic conversation, it's been up on locals for a little week now.

00:39:02.000 You'll like it baby.

00:39:04.000 Is it, he gets...

00:39:05.000 This is an interesting conversation when it comes to the deployment of lawfare, an interesting conversation about censorship, and it's interesting to see someone with such credibility and integrity addressing such important issues.

00:39:20.000 Have a look at it.

00:39:21.000 See you in a few seconds.

00:39:23.000 Jay, thank you for joining me today.

00:39:25.000 So great to be here with you, Russell, as always.

00:39:29.000 I always feel that when I'm talking with you, I have a confidence of communicating with an expert, but also I feel like I'm dealing with someone that is very spiritually open.

00:39:40.000 And actually, I'll just start with this, if I can, Jay.

00:39:44.000 Say with the changes that have happened in American politics recently, and it seems like a giddy carousel, and we're adjusting to reality so swiftly, and I think almost now that That our temporal measurements are no longer as relevant, like a day, a week, an hour, a month.

00:40:02.000 It seems like it's almost the same way that communications companies went from charging for minutes to charging for blocks of data.

00:40:11.000 Perhaps our consciousness has been affected by the sheer freight of data we interact with.

00:40:16.000 You know, once you would have only seen, you know, prior to the printing press, how many words would people have read in a day.

00:40:22.000 Now think of the number of words you read on advertising hoardings and endless scrolling and the amount of information you interface with, even if you're not a diligent academic like yourself.

00:40:34.000 Now, what strikes me as odd is that, you know, you're a Stanford academic, you're not white, and the idea that you would be seen as a kind of a MAGA person seems pretty absurd.

00:40:49.000 But looking at the direction that the Kamala Harris Democrat Party is going in, and your very committed views on censorship and anti-censorship, It would seem that you are a person that would be a ostracized outcast when it comes to the purview of the Democrat Party because they are a default pro-censorship party even when it comes to just the results of your cases that went all the way to the Supreme Court were bounced down.

00:41:22.000 Obviously that was under Biden but ultimately this is a sort of a continuity.

00:41:26.000 It's hardly a sort of a radical Uh, evolution represented by Kamala Harris's ascendancy.

00:41:31.000 She was his VP.

00:41:32.000 She's there using the same manifesto and prospectus.

00:41:35.000 It's not going to be in any way significantly different.

00:41:38.000 In fact, that's what most of us would argue.

00:41:41.000 So do you find, while I recognize that you're going to talk to us about your case, your significant U.S.

00:41:47.000 Supreme Court case where the Supreme Court The request to remove misinformation on social media was subsequently granted after it looked like people, it was very high profile, they were saying, you know, we're not going to do that.

00:42:00.000 I wonder how you feel this case and what the Democratic Party represents Where we find ourselves in 2024, where someone like you, who wouldn't traditionally be regarded as a right-wing fascist or a MAGA person or however that's conveyed, finds herself as an opponent, an enemy of at least that aspect of the state.

00:42:25.000 I mean, I don't want to be too hyperbolic, Russell, but I think that the very principle of free speech is actually at stake in this election.

00:42:35.000 I saw Tim Walz give an interview, you know, the vice presidential candidate, give an interview where he defended the censorship activities of the Biden administration.

00:42:44.000 And just to be abundantly clear, Russell, they censored me in particular.

00:42:49.000 They censored anyone.

00:42:50.000 It wasn't just me in particular.

00:42:51.000 It was people with the kinds of ideas that I have.

00:42:54.000 You know, you may agree or disagree with my ideas.

00:42:56.000 I mean, I think that they were quite reasonable if you, for instance, if you look at what Sweden did and how well it did in the pandemic.

00:43:04.000 But leave that aside.

00:43:05.000 There's no cause.

00:43:07.000 For anybody to say, look, I should be censored.

00:43:12.000 But that's exactly what happened.

00:43:13.000 And the Biden administration fully backed that all the way up to the Supreme Court, essentially arguing that unless they had the right to censor my ideas and people like, and ideas like people like mine, actually, and yours as well, Russell, that somehow the public was going to be harmed.

00:43:31.000 Well, I say the opposite.

00:43:33.000 I think that, in fact, the public was harmed by that censorship effort, by depriving the public of the opportunity to hear contrary ideas.

00:43:40.000 They specifically censor ideas that criticize policies that they were putting forward, policies that end up harming children, ended up harming the working class.

00:43:50.000 And, you know, I don't, I'm not.

00:43:52.000 I mean, I'm not MAGA.

00:43:53.000 I don't, I don't even, I mean, I, I, I tend to be allergic to policy.

00:43:57.000 It makes me, it makes me, that's just, I just don't like any of it.

00:44:00.000 I mean, I try to, I try to stick to data, uh, but in here, I think the principle is still important to me.

00:44:05.000 Science can't work without free speech.

00:44:09.000 Uh, and, and, uh, our polity is, is deprived of, of, of real de- half, half.

00:44:15.000 If you have, you know, you're right, Russell, we have millions and millions of words that we can read.

00:44:19.000 But if the powerful forces can say, look, you can only look at these kinds of words and not these kinds of words, we're going to be misled by just the sheer volume, right?

00:44:27.000 In fact, what we need is the capacity to allow, to be able to sample from all kinds of ideas.

00:44:36.000 And this regime, actually, not just the US, it's around the world, it's sort of emerging.

00:44:42.000 I think, I'm actually scared.

00:44:43.000 I actually feel that if we don't Oppose it, wherever it is.

00:44:49.000 We will paint a civilization into a corner that it can never get out of.

00:44:54.000 I asked you a characteristically broad and carooming question that covered the way that we consume data and what the modern centre-left represents, and we've pulled up your Substack article, The Illusion of Consensus, with the headline in its ruling on Murphy v Missouri, the US Supreme Court harmed free speech, an article that you have written.

00:45:18.000 And to give us a sort of a basic framing of the conversation that we're commencing on, during the pandemic period, the kind of information you conveyed that you alluded to as being sort of pretty reasonable and not that extreme, could you just Give us three to five of the points that you suggested relatively early in the pandemic that were censored and that were rendered as being extreme, certainly censoring them suggests that they were regarded as extreme, just so that we can have some actual examples of what constitutes extremism in this new environment so we can actually see how extreme censorship has become.

00:46:01.000 So one idea was that the disease is very hard to stop.

00:46:05.000 It spreads very easily, right?

00:46:06.000 That was an idea, which meant then that the infection fatality rate was lower than people thought.

00:46:13.000 The second idea was that children were not particularly harmed by the disease, while older people really were by COVID.

00:46:20.000 Third idea, the lockdowns themselves harmed every single person that was exposed to them, including children through the school closures, including poor people around the world, causing starvation on a catastrophic scale from the earliest days of the pandemic.

00:46:39.000 Those were the ideas that were central to the Great Barrington Declaration that I wrote with Sinatra Gupta of Oxford and Martin Kulldorfer of Harvard in October 2020.

00:46:47.000 The idea was to lift lockdowns and focus protection of vulnerable older people.

00:46:53.000 That idea was too dangerous to allow.

00:46:54.000 I mean, the federal government organized itself to try to suppress that idea.

00:46:58.000 And then ideas around the immunity after COVID recovery.

00:47:03.000 If you have had COVID and recovered, you have some degree of immunity.

00:47:06.000 That idea was suppressed.

00:47:08.000 The idea that if you took the vaccine, there were some group of people, specifically young men who had myocarditis and other Other side effects.

00:47:15.000 That idea was ruthlessly suppressed.

00:47:17.000 Even patient groups that were talking to each other online were suppressed and labeled as misinformers just for, you know, telling people about their own experience.

00:47:29.000 The idea that there isn't robust evidence in favor of masking, and in fact, places that have had masks, remandes, and others that don't, had very similar spread.

00:47:39.000 That idea was suppressed.

00:47:40.000 These were not radical ideas, Russell.

00:47:42.000 These were scientific discussions to be had with honest looking at the data, rather than having the government put their thumb on the scale and say, look, Jay is saying that there's such a thing as natural immunity.

00:47:52.000 He's a misinformer.

00:47:54.000 You obviously appear to have been hugely vindicated in the intervening years.

00:48:01.000 Just to run through that list again, natural immunity, myocarditis, the increased likelihood of myocarditis after vaccination, to be more specific.

00:48:12.000 The impact of children, of COVID and whether or not there's a need to shield them and likely that there wasn't a need.

00:48:19.000 the particular vulnerability of the elderly or people with comorbidities

00:48:23.000 and the inefficacy of lockdown and the likely tangential problems,

00:48:28.000 whether they're financial or psychological or even pathological,

00:48:33.000 and their impact on other long-standing diseases like heart disease or cancer

00:48:37.000 and the people that forewent treatments.

00:48:39.000 All of those ideas, you appear to have been significantly vindicated on.

00:48:43.000 So let's now focus on the fact that those were the ideas that were censored.

00:48:47.000 You went all the way to the Supreme Court to contest the government's right

00:48:53.000 to censor that information.

00:48:54.000 And it seemed for a while that you were to be publicly and legally vindicated.

00:48:58.000 And yet at their last, the Supreme Court sided with the government,

00:49:03.000 meaning that the government will continue to have the right to censor information

00:49:06.000 that given on the basis of the examples you've just cited is true.

00:49:11.000 True information can continue to be censored.

00:49:13.000 So what does that mean, Jay?

00:49:17.000 I mean, I think the first amendment, the U.S.

00:49:21.000 First Amendment, which is supposed to protect free speech in this country, is at this point an unenforceable dead letter.

00:49:28.000 That's what it means.

00:49:30.000 So, again, I hope I'm not being hyperbolic unnecessarily, but I just want to justify that.

00:49:37.000 If you look at what the Supreme Court actually did, Russell, they said that I and my co-plaintiffs, Many of whom were arguing ideas similar to what I was arguing.

00:49:48.000 Do not have standing to sue.

00:49:52.000 So the lower courts, what they said is they ordered the Biden administration to stop censoring, to stop coercing social media companies to put labels and to censor and to suppress and de-boost and, you know, sort of toss people off of the platform for spreading those, saying those ideas.

00:50:09.000 The lower courts actually called it an Orwellian Ministry of Truth.

00:50:11.000 That's how they labeled the activity.

00:50:14.000 The Supreme Court said that because there is not an email that specifically says, from some functionary in the government to social media, censor Jay.

00:50:24.000 Instead what you have is emails that say, censor these kinds of ideas, or else.

00:50:28.000 If you don't censor these ideas, we're going to go after your company in effect.

00:50:32.000 They have lots of emails like that, but nothing that says, from Government Functionary to the social media company CensorJ.

00:50:39.000 Therefore, I don't have a standing to sue.

00:50:42.000 And in fact, only if you have that email chain that specifically says, you know, CensorRFKJr or something, then you have standing to sue.

00:50:51.000 Otherwise, you do not.

00:50:53.000 And so on that basis, they invalidated the preliminary injunction that told the Biden administration that they're not allowed to censor anymore.

00:51:02.000 There can be no objectivity.

00:51:03.000 Currently I'm in the process of acquiring Freedom of Information Act-related data, and it's so plain that the obstacles and roadblocks that can be thrown down are so favourable to the set of interests that constitute modern power that the entire exercise is all but futile.

00:51:24.000 Except here and there, as with quantum physics, You can sort of trace the outline of what may be inferred from the movements that you see elsewhere.

00:51:36.000 You can see that, well, if a particular department says we haven't got any correspondence relating to Russell Brown, because I know that, you know, in addition to the censorship you experienced, You experience vilification, condemnation, problems at the university, Stanford University where you work, personal attacks.

00:51:54.000 Now, back to my point about Freedom of Information Act requests, if you ask a particular government, department or member of parliament, me being a UK citizen, Give us the information you have on Russell Brand, which is mine, that you haven't got the right as a tax-funded organisation to keep that information, and they say, we don't have any, when it's a matter of public record that they communicated with X, Rumble, YouTube, then you know they're lying!

00:52:22.000 You know they're lying.

00:52:24.000 And I know that you were subject to similar measures, although of course there was a very particular flavour to the attacks that I was the recipient of, and certainly I have to bear responsibility for the lifestyle that I indulged for a long while.

00:52:39.000 Even though I, of course, strongly deny the allegations that arose from those attacks and those media activities, the long-standing and long-practiced media activities.

00:52:54.000 So, what I'd like to say is that when you get a Supreme Court ruling that says that the government can continue acting that way, And when you have, like, you know, I'm asking you the questions, I suppose, with this particular hue, Jay, because it is the Democratic Party National Convention, and we've seen Joe Biden given an exceptional send-off.

00:53:15.000 We've seen the sort of hypocrisy of the Obamas, the sort of incredible kind of...

00:53:25.000 Grandstanding of Hillary Clinton, and it makes me wonder, say like at the beginning of the COVID crisis, Trump was in office, they were in opposition, and in my country, Rishi Sunak and the Conservative Party were in office, now Keir Starmer's in office, you know, there's been a transition of government in both nations, but neither party, you know, are able to say, Now that we're in power, we're going to have an honest inquiry as to what went on during that period when it came to censorship, when it came to malpractice and pharmaceutical deception, perhaps on behalf of the pharmaceutical companies, the obvious problems of the regulatory bodies.

00:54:05.000 None of these inquiries are going to take place.

00:54:08.000 They always sort of seem like phatic exercises or they come to early secession.

00:54:15.000 So what does that tell us about these kind of self-congratulatory parliamentary or congressional figures and parties that they are unable to address this?

00:54:26.000 What does it tell us about the systems themselves, Jay?

00:54:31.000 They're fragile, Russell.

00:54:33.000 So if you have a set of ideas, as nice as they sound, as important as they may be, if they cannot stand the challenge of people freely discussing them online and elsewhere, Then what good are they?

00:54:52.000 They haven't stood the test.

00:54:54.000 So if you have a party, and actually, by the way, I agree with you, it's not just one party.

00:54:59.000 I mean, this is actually, I think, a function of our government, which is not just who's in office, but the sort of the bureaucracies that underlie them.

00:55:08.000 The instincts of the bureaucracy is that the bureaucracy is right, and anyone that challenges the bureaucracy must be intentionally misinforming the public or trying to harm the public.

00:55:19.000 Well, that can't work in a democratic society because the ideas on which the bureaucracy functions require challenge.

00:55:27.000 They require sharpening.

00:55:29.000 And it's free speech that allows that to happen in the first place.

00:55:34.000 Free speech will certainly allow lots and lots of people to say wrong things here and there, but the danger from the bureaucracy itself Embracing the wrong ideas, putting policies in place without the challenge of having to justify themselves, essentially using their vast, almost totalitarian power to suppress challenge.

00:55:56.000 What that says is that our societies are fundamentally, at their core, irrational, Russell.

00:56:02.000 They can't work.

00:56:03.000 It can't possibly work.

00:56:06.000 And they're fragile.

00:56:08.000 Any idea that doesn't allow itself to be challenged, even with false ideas, that can't respond to those challenges, they almost certainly are not going to work.

00:56:19.000 They're going to end up worse than that, Russell.

00:56:22.000 They're going to end up harming people.

00:56:25.000 By the way, you mentioned something in the question.

00:56:29.000 I wanted to make sure I got it in.

00:56:31.000 Our society is also quite unforgiving.

00:56:34.000 I think the idea of grace, which ought to be at the center of how we think about other people.

00:56:40.000 Every single one of us is a sinner.

00:56:42.000 I think it ought to be a core function of our society, a core sort of mechanism of our society.

00:56:50.000 And it seems like it's actually connected to this misinformation thing.

00:56:53.000 The idea of misinformation regime is not even to actually suppress it so that people can't hear my ideas.

00:56:59.000 It's to label me with a scarlet M for misinformer, right?

00:57:03.000 To make me seen as saying false things, even when I'm not necessarily saying false things.

00:57:08.000 In fact, I'm not saying false things.

00:57:12.000 We are a more judgmental society than when Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote the Scarlet Letter in the 19th century.

00:57:20.000 What you, I suppose, are illustrating there, Jay, and what your case in particular demonstrates, is that what the state has assumed is a kind of moral and spiritual power that is akin to a god, ultimately, if they have the power to say, this person now is marked, you cannot trust that person.

00:57:42.000 They've kind of ultimately socially executed you.

00:57:47.000 And if they have such omnipotent control, forgive the tautology, of various systems of censorship, government and adjudication, that amounts to a kind of deist power.

00:58:02.000 I wonder sometimes, given that you've alluded to the extraction of grace from that purview, if that is what we are ultimately facing.

00:58:11.000 A set of systems that have annihilated the role of God, the meaning of God, the purpose of God, the principles that one might consider to be godly, that they may themselves now In an extraordinarily Luciferian move, appoint themselves as a comparable and enthroned adjudicator that can, you know, and I would love to use these assets, like this is, you know, in 2023 acknowledge that what happened in particular with your case and the other

00:58:46.000 Great Barrington Declaration contributors, they censored you illegally and impeded your First Amendment rights.

00:58:56.000 And then we'll have a look at having, you know, once we have a look at that, we'll have a look at the subsequent Supreme Court reversal, really, from, you know, from 2024.

00:59:07.000 So firstly, just have a look at what happened in the first place.

00:59:11.000 The U.S.

00:59:11.000 Department of Justice is reviewing a federal judge's injunction that could have major implications for First Amendment rights.

00:59:18.000 The order from the judge, appointed by former President Trump, puts restrictions on when Biden administration officials can contact social media companies as the legal challenge moves through the court system.

00:59:29.000 Republican attorneys general in Missouri and Louisiana filed a lawsuit claiming that the White House went too far in pressuring social media companies to remove misinformation about America's election security and the COVID-19 pandemic from their platforms.

00:59:46.000 I mean, it really... Look, the only pandemic we have is among the unvaccinated. 1.00

00:59:51.000 It's pretty astonishing, isn't it, to see Biden make that claim in the context of controlling misinformation.

01:00:00.000 So that seems like 100 years ago.

01:00:02.000 It's actually from July 2023.

01:00:04.000 That person is no longer president, not going to be president anymore, almost as if they never were.

01:00:10.000 president and so that was the moment where it seemed like there had been government overreach

01:00:16.000 that the judicial institutions of America would address but that's not how it played out of course

01:00:22.000 is it Jay? Well so first that you see in that clip demonization of a vast class of people right you

01:00:30.000 You see based on a false claim about the scientific basis of that claim is that somehow that the vaccine stops you from getting and spreading covid on that basis.

01:00:42.000 You can you can then move to say that that vast class of people is somehow inferior.

01:00:47.000 They're killing people, right?

01:00:49.000 They're somehow a danger to society.

01:00:50.000 It's an incredibly dangerous thing that essentially the othering of a vast number of people, a creation of a class of unclean people, a new caste system, if you will. 0.94

01:01:01.000 Yes, it's a kind of, I would say, the foundational argument for a new rationalist eugenics. 0.97

01:01:12.000 The idea that these unvaccinated people, inverted commas, well let's have a look at those demographics and see what kind of races and economic classes those people are primarily drawn from, are, as you say, inferior and therefore, in a kind of Foucaultian idea, killable, excludable. 0.98

01:01:32.000 Exactly.

01:01:33.000 It just absolutely shocked me to hear a President of the United States speak in those kinds of ways, speak in those kinds of terms.

01:01:41.000 The other thing about that is that in July 2023, the judge that He made that order.

01:01:49.000 Yeah, he was Trump-appointed, but he was following the First Amendment.

01:01:52.000 He was saying, look, the Supreme Court, I'm sorry, the Biden administration, the government should not be allowed to go to tell social media companies, essentially coerce them, force them to take down people, label them with a scarlet letter, just for the crime of disagreeing with the Biden administration.

01:02:10.000 That's essentially what was happening.

01:02:13.000 And that, I mean, that's a very, very American idea.

01:02:16.000 Like that the government, there are limits to what the government ought to be able to do.

01:02:20.000 This goes back to what you were just, what you were saying earlier, Russell, that the idea that somehow the government, the bureaucracy, the deep state science itself is somehow a replacement for truth.

01:02:32.000 I mean, it's not that they don't have some truth in them, but they are not the truth.

01:02:37.000 Any entity, any human entity that claims that status is automatically suspect in my eyes.

01:02:44.000 And that's essentially what they're saying.

01:02:45.000 They're saying that they have the hold of the truth to such a degree that they can dehumanize vast populations that disagree with them.

01:02:56.000 That's not the basis for a healthy society.

01:02:58.000 No, one can almost sense beneath the rational rhetoric a far more primal loathing waiting to be expressed.

01:03:08.000 Just give me the reason to be able to condemn and hate these people.

01:03:13.000 Just give me it.

01:03:14.000 Is it that they're racist? 1.00

01:03:16.000 Is it that they're stupid? 1.00

01:03:17.000 Is it that they won't take their medicine? 1.00

01:03:20.000 The hate is ready to go, just give me the portal to squeeze that hatred through.

01:03:25.000 Let's have a look at the subsequent video, this is from June 2024, which amounts to sort of a reversal of the contemplated measures that we saw in the last video.

01:03:35.000 So the Supreme Court has ruled that the White House can pressure social media companies to remove content that may contain disinformation.

01:03:44.000 The case in question dealt with the Biden administration's decision to do that during the COVID-19 pandemic.

01:03:50.000 In a 6-3 decision, the justices said the plaintiffs who brought the lawsuit didn't have legal standing.

01:03:56.000 So with respect to the private people who sued and said I was kicked off of Facebook or other social media platforms, or the states that sued and said the Biden administration pressured me into, or excuse me, impermissibly pressured these social media platforms into making certain content moderation decisions, what the court said here with Justice Barrett and the majority is You can't link any alleged injury to government action, and so you're not the right people to bring this claim.

01:04:30.000 So it's really interesting in the sense that this case was supposed to be a fairly big First Amendment case, but I'm not going to teach it in my First Amendment class.

01:04:38.000 I'll teach it in my constitutional law class about what you need to show in order to prove standing.

01:04:44.000 So in terms of precedent, it doesn't answer that big question of how much can a government entity, in this case, a presidential administration, say to, for instance, Facebook during a pandemic, I really want you to take these steps when it comes to content on your platform.

01:05:04.000 What does it tell us about the direction your country is heading in, Jay?

01:05:10.000 Okay, so a couple of things.

01:05:12.000 I've been saying a lot of pessimistic things.

01:05:13.000 Let me just say one optimistic thing here, because it's worth saying.

01:05:17.000 So the case actually, because it was ruled on standing, which says that I need to show an email from some functionary to a social media company, and that censors me particularly, we didn't have that.

01:05:33.000 So the majority of the court didn't rule That it's okay for any administration to censor.

01:05:39.000 What they ruled was that I didn't have the right to sue to stop them from censoring, right?

01:05:44.000 So there's a distinction there.

01:05:47.000 The case is going to go back down to a lower court and we'll fight over whether we actually did have standing.

01:05:53.000 But the case is going to be joined by the RFK Jr.

01:05:57.000 And there, there's emails directly ordering social media companies to censor him.

01:06:02.000 We have those emails.

01:06:03.000 I see, so you're going to become co-plaintiffs, then you'll have standing.

01:06:08.000 Thanks for explaining that distinction, that it's not about whether or not the government has the right to censor, it's whether you have the right to sue when they do censor.

01:06:16.000 So it's sort of not as dreadful as it might first sound.

01:06:20.000 But, Russell, The problem is that usually a lot of courts will sort of use standing as an excuse not to rule on the fundamental substance of the thing.

01:06:29.000 And the substance of the thing is just black and evil, right? 0.98

01:06:33.000 It basically says the government ought to have the right to censor anyone it wants, any idea it wants.

01:06:38.000 And so, in fact, the standing ruling has substance.

01:06:42.000 What it means is that the government, in order to get around this ruling, can essentially say to social media companies, censor these ideas.

01:06:49.000 They won't say censor Russell Brand.

01:06:50.000 What they'll say is, censor interesting discussions about spirituality and politics.

01:06:56.000 I mean, they'll say specific ideas that you say, and then you'll get censored.

01:07:02.000 And you will not have the right to sue to stop them.

01:07:04.000 Even with the demonetization on YouTube where it was a matter of public record that the Department of Culture, that ultimately the regulatory body that have the right to fine and sue social media companies, publicly demanded that my content be demonetized and effectively taken down without there being any judicial process.

01:07:27.000 Do you know that we have information that suggests that the phrase innocent until proven guilty ...was being censored.

01:07:34.000 So it's, and you know, obviously prior to the extraordinary allegations, there was a period of, he's a conspiracy theorist, he's right-wing, and I'm very sensitive to what you're saying about the sort of scarlet letter, because once there's been a ferrari of that magnitude, you know, people like, there's gonna be a lot of people like, well, I can't sit and watch this guy, you know, on the basis of that.

01:07:55.000 And the fact is, is that YouTube did demonetize.

01:07:57.000 Thankfully, Rumble, you know, with their CEO, Chris Pavlovsky, took a stand.

01:08:02.000 And thankfully, X, under Elon Musk, took a stand.

01:08:05.000 Obviously, these are two men that understand the way the wind is blowing.

01:08:10.000 But it's, as you are pointing out, we are, I suppose it's just a rising tide.

01:08:17.000 And what COVID offered us, it was an opportunity to see, and forgive me for the kind of glee in this, but I'm glad that there's people like you that are like, Hold on, this guy's a Stanford University scientist who's only saying, oh, excuse me, it's not even extreme.

01:08:32.000 You don't, it's not that you're saying that there should be no such thing as vaccines.

01:08:35.000 It's not these, everything that you're saying is perfectly reasonable and referring again to the list from the beginning of the show.

01:08:41.000 Natural immunity is effective.

01:08:43.000 Well, that's been proven.

01:08:44.000 Children are not subject to the same fatality or even effects of COVID.

01:08:49.000 Proven.

01:08:50.000 Masks don't work.

01:08:51.000 Proven.

01:08:51.000 Lockdowns don't work.

01:08:53.000 Basically proven.

01:08:54.000 Although, again, you know, to the more fundamental ...problem of science's objectivity.

01:09:00.000 Who is gonna conduct the clinical trials to show that lockdowns are not effective?

01:09:05.000 Who's gonna conduct the clinical trials into increased myocarditis, turbo cancers, all of the new neurological conditions?

01:09:12.000 Are Pfizer gonna pay for those trials?

01:09:14.000 Are the universities that take significant funding from pharmaceutical companies gonna fund those trials?

01:09:19.000 Is the nation going to fund those trials?

01:09:20.000 Are the WHO going to fund those trials?

01:09:22.000 Those trials ain't going to get funded.

01:09:24.000 Those clinical trials will never be funded, won't take place.

01:09:27.000 The empirical evidence will never be provided and that will remain as misinformation because they control reality more than just the judiciary and these institutions.

01:09:37.000 I mean, you know, what you just said, the last point is so important, Russell.

01:09:40.000 It's more insidious than money.

01:09:43.000 Essentially, it's like you have a map of the world and you've marked off a vast chunk of it and says, no one can go here.

01:09:53.000 And no one will go there, right?

01:09:54.000 No scientist will want to cross what the government has told them they're not allowed to think about.

01:09:59.000 Like they're not allowed to cross into the boundaries of places they're not allowed to say.

01:10:03.000 It is the death of science.

01:10:05.000 It essentially says that you have a set of functionaries that control what scientists can or cannot ask.

01:10:13.000 And even if you gave the scientists all the money in the world, they still would never go there because they don't want to be labeled a misinformer.

01:10:19.000 They don't want to be labeled as the kind of person that thinks these forbidden thoughts.

01:10:24.000 It is the death of science.

01:10:25.000 It's the death of reason.

01:10:26.000 Oh wow, it's so incredible, isn't it?

01:10:28.000 Because as a Christian, I'm sympathetic to the idea that the Enlightenment era for all of its near miracles was, I heard this recently from Father Julian of the Brompton Oratory, it could be regarded as an amplification of the false light of Lucifer, enthroning, as it did, a kind of materialistic, rationalistic, individualistic, Facilitating reason, i.e.

01:10:57.000 look at where it's led, look at where it has led.

01:10:59.000 It's led to science being appointed and curated in order to reach conclusions that are favorable to the powerful.

01:11:07.000 So it's very good to see illustrated the positive aspects of the Enlightenment, the positive qualities of reason, and to recognize that as long as science is subordinate to a moral authority that we all agree to, or to some degree at least recognize as being divine, sublime, or true, rather than a kind of utile weapon of the powerful, that there may yet be hope for us.

01:11:35.000 I mean, I think that, well, I mean the Enlightenment is, I'm actually kind of a fan of the Enlightenment myself, but I do, I agree with you that it is the idea that the Enlightenment can, if it's functioning well, reveal every single truth.

01:11:51.000 Well, that itself becomes a totality.

01:11:52.000 In fact, you might even say that the whole censorship idea, that the idea that there is a single man who knows all of science, you know, someone like Tony Fauci can autonomically say, if you question me, you're not simply questioning a man, you're questioning science itself.

01:12:08.000 I mean, that itself is a product of the Enlightenment, if we're honest.

01:12:12.000 And the idea that the Enlightenment can produce all truths, even truths that it doesn't have any capacity to reach, Truths about my relationship with God and my sort of fundamental... For instance, can science explain why I love my kids so much?

01:12:35.000 I mean, even to the point where I'm willing to give up my own life for them?

01:12:39.000 Can science explain why I'm willing to sacrifice my career because of the Because I see the harm that's done to other people's children from the policies that were followed.

01:12:49.000 I mean, I don't see a scientific reason for that.

01:12:52.000 What I see is a... I'm responding to a calling because my purpose here on Earth is beyond what can be explained by simple reason.

01:13:00.000 The Tony Fauci claim is sort of deist and messianic and their counter-argument would be no because science is based on sort of empiricism and clinical trial.

01:13:12.000 Well, we've just rather undone that tapestry of deceit and whoppers because Who's clinical trials?

01:13:20.000 Funded by whom?

01:13:21.000 In what areas?

01:13:23.000 And are you censoring counter-arguments and legitimate voices in the space?

01:13:27.000 So, in a sense, yes, it's functionally a religion anyway, in terms of it's who has power, who has the right to kill, control, Jail, censor, shut down.

01:13:40.000 And why I find that so striking is if you were to watch it, you know, sort of any random five minutes of the DNC, you would think that you're in some sort of candy land of sort of spectral joy and glory because people seem so pretty upbeat.

01:13:57.000 And there's a terrible lack of policy and a galling lack of introspection throughout the entire affair.

01:14:05.000 Jay, just to touch on a few things before I sort of pivot a little bit to censorship elsewhere, and specifically my country, the United Kingdom, I just want to mention that while we're still on your cases and the cases you've been a participant in, Some of the facts that emerged from your various interactions.

01:14:25.000 Employees of a dozen federal government agencies and the Biden White House directly pressured social media companies to censor viewpoints contrary to official narratives.

01:14:35.000 Emails from the White House to Facebook show government officials threatening to use regulatory power to harm social media companies that did not comply with censorship demands.

01:14:46.000 Just like, it's just when you sort of Look at the brass tacks.

01:14:50.000 It's pretty authoritarian and pretty frightening.

01:14:52.000 I mean, there was a federal judge looking at the case that called it what the federal media did or what the government did.

01:14:59.000 They made an analogy to Al Capone, the gangster.

01:15:03.000 I mean, Al Capone will go to Chicago businesses and say, well, that's a nice business.

01:15:08.000 It would be a shame if something were to happen to it, and then gain protection money from them, right?

01:15:12.000 That's essentially what the government did with social media companies.

01:15:15.000 They essentially said, look, you know, Russell's saying terrible things.

01:15:18.000 Jay's saying terrible things.

01:15:20.000 You really need to censor them.

01:15:21.000 And the social media companies, if they were to say, you know, or else, or else, the or else would be, you know, we have regulatory power over you.

01:15:28.000 We can do nasty things to you. 0.92

01:15:30.000 You better listen.

01:15:30.000 It's a lovely social media company you got there.

01:15:33.000 It'd be a shame if someone came along and demonopolized it, broke that up, balkanized it into several assembly run social media companies that responded to the communities.

01:15:44.000 That would be a terrible thing, a terrible thing.

01:15:47.000 Hey Jay, I wanted to talk about what happened in the UK.

01:15:52.000 There was a kind of, obviously, the inciting incident was the murder of three children in Southport and the attack on several others and it kind of exploded into Race riots and anti-race riots and a kind of despair around migration and death and detachment and loss of meaning and purpose.

01:16:16.000 There were so many things that were wrapped up in it.

01:16:18.000 And my personal opinion is that even from a strategic perspective, non-violence is a non-negotiable that we have to Be non-violent and the targeting of different communities is kind of dumb and doesn't help although I'm very sort of I understand why people felt so enraged that their response was irrational and erratic but whilst it would be claimed in my country in the media that the far-right exploited the tragic death of those children

01:16:50.000 It seems to me perhaps more significant that the government exploited the subsequent conflagrations in order to introduce legislation, again connected to censorship and the ability of the government to punish those Who stepped outside of its preferences, its narratives, its purview.

01:17:14.000 Now again, just to clarify, because I am in the UK, that this is certainly not an endorsement of any acts of violence or hostility.

01:17:22.000 I believe in peace above all else.

01:17:26.000 And love, perhaps, is the sort of primary duty of any Christian or any person of spirit, maybe even humanist, of anybody.

01:17:33.000 But I'd like to get your thoughts.

01:17:35.000 Having experienced censorship firsthand, having such a unique insight into it, do you feel that, like, while it is overly simplistic to say, Any crisis can be exploited to legitimize further regulatory authority being granted to the government, whether it's a riot or a health crisis.

01:17:53.000 And are we likely to see more things like that?

01:17:55.000 And what are your personal views as an American on the kind of censorship that we have seen suggested and in some cases implemented in the UK?

01:18:03.000 I mean, Russell, it breaks my heart to watch that violence.

01:18:06.000 I mean, because as I share with you a commitment utterly to nonviolence, I think that's the way you make real social change.

01:18:13.000 But I think there's a real irony here, Russell.

01:18:15.000 Think about this.

01:18:16.000 The reason why these riots are happening is because there's a vast class of people in the UK that feel like they have no voice.

01:18:24.000 That they vote and their people don't get elected or there's a disproportion in the number of votes that they give versus how many representatives they end up having in the Parliament.

01:18:35.000 And they're quite upset.

01:18:39.000 How could it possibly be that silencing their voice further is the solution to that problem?

01:18:44.000 You don't solve the problem of voicelessness by taking away the voices of the people that want to speak.

01:18:52.000 And violence, I think, erupts from that.

01:18:55.000 So I think the idea that censorship will somehow suppress the violence... No, what it'll suppress is the ability for people to talk about what their ideas are in public.

01:19:07.000 Those ideas are not going away.

01:19:10.000 Those ideas are not going to be removed from the earth because of this censorship.

01:19:14.000 What it'll do is it'll radicalize it further.

01:19:17.000 I think it's an extremely short-sighted approach to a fundamental social problem that the UK is undergoing.

01:19:24.000 I thought the EU more generally is undergoing.

01:19:27.000 I mean, actually including the US is undergoing it too.

01:19:30.000 They're all very similar kinds of underlying social forces at play.

01:19:36.000 Whatever the answer is, it's again a complicated set of social problems.

01:19:38.000 It cannot possibly be censorship.

01:19:41.000 The only way we go forward, if you really do commit to non-violence, is to allow people to speak to each other openly.

01:19:47.000 Yes, that's why I suppose the foundational idea of non-violence is non-negotiable and absolutely necessary.

01:19:56.000 It strikes me that when discussing globalism, which by its nature is going to be a diffuse, nebulous and difficult to tackle term, it's helpful to have the kind of examples that we've been circling.

01:20:09.000 What did we experience during the pandemic, which of course required a global response to some degree as a result of literally what a pandemic means.

01:20:20.000 We sort of learned how regulatory power was asserted, how censorship thrived, how profit was granted to some interesting institutions and bodies and organizations.

01:20:34.000 And when we look at what happened around protest in that period, I'm thinking particularly about what happened in Canada and the trucker protests and the protests in this country as well, that those things were maligned and shut down.

01:20:44.000 The demonization of people that were suspicious of vaccines, that was even alluded to in that short clip we watched relating to your case when Joe Biden says it was a pandemic Of the unvaccinated.

01:20:58.000 I think that the pandemic was an interesting period to show us what globalism looks like and what its intentions and what its means and measures are.

01:21:06.000 The case that we've just discussed of the UK riots and this odd response to it and the likelihood that that response will

01:21:14.000 exacerbate the conditions that it was supposed to address seems curious. And I think too

01:21:19.000 the area of agriculture and food production is another indicator because if you're seeing

01:21:24.000 for example around the subject of migration you need to be to not be cryptic riots in Dublin then riots

01:21:31.000 in London and across the UK one has to at least consider the possibility that there are

01:21:37.000 some grievances that have to be addressed.

01:21:39.000 And if when it comes to agriculture, the control of land, the patenting of seeds, top-down edicts around controls of fertilizers and other farm practices, and that you're seeing protests everywhere from Sri Lanka to The Netherlands, it's likely that what we're beginning to be able to observe are the consequences of centralized global authority.

01:22:03.000 And it appears that if the problem is globalism that the solution might be forms of localism, which actually is only a Sort of novel term for democracy and applicable democracy, not democracy as a notion, as a gesture, as a shindig, as a party, but democracy as the will of the people as locally as possible, asserted and carried by majority rule, established by assembly and ongoing discourse and conversation.

01:22:34.000 And again, we're at the point where we have to recognize how problematic censorship is, if you believe in democracy, even notionally.

01:22:45.000 You know, Russell, it's interesting to watch the disparate reaction to the George Floyd protests, for instance, right?

01:22:53.000 Essentially, there you had riots worldwide, even in places outside the United States, although the George Floyd murder took place in the US.

01:23:02.000 If you think about it, what's happening is there's a disjunction between Between some protests, where it has the social stamp of approval, the authorities say, these kinds of protests, these kinds of riots, this kind of violence is okay.

01:23:19.000 Whereas like vast chunks of the working class, when they protest, the truckers protest for instance. 0.91

01:23:25.000 In Canada, you know, with Sikh truckers saying, look, I don't want this vaccine mandate. 0.99

01:23:31.000 It's undermining my ability to do my job.

01:23:35.000 Those protests are met with emergency powers act, essentially martial law to suppress them.

01:23:40.000 So you have a social sanction for some kinds of protests and not social sanctions for others.

01:23:44.000 Social sanctions for one kind of violence.

01:23:47.000 And not social sanctions for others.

01:23:48.000 And the question is, what's the dividing line that decides when is violence okay and when it's not?

01:23:54.000 Rather than the basic principle that violence is not okay.

01:23:59.000 That in fact, what has to be is an open marketplace of ideas where people can speak their minds honestly.

01:24:07.000 And so that we can reason with one another.

01:24:09.000 I view this as the fundamental to how our civilization ought to function, which you have now in this globalist order as you're talking about, Russell, is that it uses certain groups and the monopoly it has over violence in order to perpetuate itself while suppressing other groups and even the violence, which I abhor, of those other groups that challenge it.

01:24:38.000 Even peaceful protests like the fundamentally peaceful protests of the Canadian truckers is suppressed.

01:24:46.000 And the censorship is aimed in one direction.

01:24:49.000 It's not aimed at everybody.

01:24:51.000 It's only aimed at the people that are challenging the order, right?

01:24:54.000 So what you have then is essentially something that is very different than the traditional notion of democracy that I thought we lived under very naively before the pandemic.

01:25:04.000 I mean, I think what you see is essentially a worldwide totalizing kind of approach to governance.

01:25:12.000 And so, for instance, it makes complete sense that the EU, Thierry Breton, I don't know what role he plays, some high function in the EU, will write a letter ordering Elon Musk to not speak with Donald Trump on his own platform that he owns.

01:25:29.000 I mean, it makes no sense, unless you think about it, is like these people think they have the right to order all of us, whether we live in their country or not, whether we voted for them or not, it makes no matter.

01:25:42.000 They know what's right and what's good for us, and they control the ability to sanction violence.

01:25:47.000 They control the ability to sanction speech.

01:25:50.000 It's the kind of order that I really think that if people understood, they would rebel against it.

01:25:57.000 To facilitate the imposition of order, it seems that you have to instantiate the condition of chaos.

01:26:07.000 So the kind of events that might be facilitated or exploited, if not facilitated, are likely events that suggest, or indeed are, chaotic.

01:26:18.000 I have noted, and it's so plain and almost phatic to announce, that war benefits the military-industrial complex, disease benefits the pharmaceutical industry, that censorship seems to benefit communication interests and the state, and the observable trend is the centralisation of power to For us to consent to the centralization of power when the technology exists for power to be uniquely aggregated through new networks requires the constant induction of crisis.

01:27:00.000 I've been reflecting a lot lately that we've seen in the commercial sector, excuse me, the advent of, I'm going to take two examples, Uber that aggregates vehicles in order to facilitate rides or Airbnb That aggregates empty rooms to facilitate hospitality.

01:27:18.000 Seems to me that already the technology exists to create consensus and connection.

01:27:25.000 And the reason we're not seeing it applied to democracy, or to governmental institutions at least, is because it would be a de-monopolizing, de-stabilizing, power-sharing, decentralizing technology.

01:27:39.000 And that cannot be allowed to happen because otherwise the game is up.

01:27:42.000 That's why there can be no reckoning around Covid.

01:27:45.000 There can be no reckoning around 9-11.

01:27:47.000 There can be no reckoning because any sensible reckoning would reveal that the institutions themselves are Not fit for purpose.

01:27:56.000 That's why it can't ever be truly addressed.

01:27:58.000 It can only be performatively addressed.

01:28:00.000 Because otherwise, we would all conclude, oh, well, you just have to get rid of these institutions.

01:28:04.000 No point replacing the various apparatchiks and bureaucrats that occupy the roles within the system.

01:28:10.000 That's irrelevant and redundant.

01:28:12.000 It's the systems themselves that have to be changed, and the technology exists now to change them.

01:28:17.000 And once people realize that en masse, it's game over.

01:28:22.000 I mean, Russell, the thing is, I'll tell you why.

01:28:25.000 I mean, I have lots of reasons for hope, but one of the reasons for hope is that this system that you're talking about is inhumane.

01:28:33.000 It's fundamentally inhuman, and it alienates people one by one from it.

01:28:39.000 Like, well, how is it?

01:28:40.000 I mean, I was a pretty conventional professor at Stanford University doing scientific work quietly.

01:28:46.000 And all of a sudden, I'm on your show.

01:28:48.000 It's I mean, that even I mean, that is a you.

01:28:50.000 You were a fantastic, successful performer, comedian, a thinker, and then suddenly you're on the outside.

01:29:00.000 They push to the margin vast numbers of people.

01:29:03.000 system does. Vast numbers of very interesting people are pushed to the

01:29:08.000 margin, vast numbers of working-class people are pushed to the margin, vast

01:29:11.000 numbers of children have been harmed by the system during the lockdowns and so on. It's a system that breeds

01:29:19.000 resistance because what it does is it concentrates power and authority

01:29:26.000 in the hands of so few and it can't possibly last.

01:29:31.000 Fundamentally, it's an alienating system that doesn't allow us to be fully human.

01:29:36.000 Yes.

01:29:36.000 I'm writing that down.

01:29:37.000 That was really good.

01:29:38.000 Thanks.

01:29:40.000 Thanks, Jay.

01:29:40.000 Thanks very much.

01:29:42.000 We've run out of time, at least for this portion of our ongoing dialogue.

01:29:47.000 I hope that we'll be together again soon and that we'll speak soon.

01:29:50.000 I'm in America a bunch over the next few months.

01:29:52.000 I'd love to catch up with you for a conversation in real life.

01:29:56.000 I guess you're in Stamford, wherever that is.

01:29:59.000 California, is that?

01:30:01.000 Where is it?

01:30:02.000 California.

01:30:02.000 Uh-oh.

01:30:03.000 I'm not going there anytime soon.

01:30:06.000 I'm very good at showing people around Stanford and showing the best parts of it.

01:30:11.000 So if you're ever in town, I'll show you around.

01:30:13.000 I'll get myself a mask.

01:30:14.000 It's the only time you ever need one.

01:30:17.000 Thanks, Jay.

01:30:18.000 It's good to speak with you, man.

01:30:20.000 Good to see you, too.

01:30:21.000 Lots of love.

01:30:21.000 Bye-bye.

01:30:22.000 God bless.

01:30:23.000 God bless you.

01:30:23.000 Thank you.

01:30:25.000 I hope you enjoyed this conversation between me and Jay Bhattacharya.

01:30:27.000 We will be back next week, not with more of the same, but with more of the different.

01:30:31.000 Remember, come see me for this Rescue the Republic event if you want to come.

01:30:36.000 Look at that, Jimmy Dore, Matt Tybee, Robert Malone, Pierre Corrin, some good people there, Bobby Kennedy, they're all participating in this event.

01:30:44.000 Let me know if you want to attend, and indeed, if you are an Awakened Wonder, It's just one of those things you can come to.

01:30:50.000 We'll provide a VIP experience for you, respond to the tickets at Russell Brand email, and we'll see you there.

01:30:55.000 Thank you very much for joining us.

01:30:56.000 See you next week.

01:30:57.000 Not for more of the same, but for more of the different.

Stay Free - Russel Brand - September 09, 2024

RUSSIAGATE HOAX 2.0 BEGINS! Kamala's Russian Playbook Returns - Here We Go Again, Folks! SF447

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