With the revelations that the CIA were more involved than they ve ever previously admitted in the assassination of JFK, we ll be asking: who is more dangerous? Elon Musk or the CIA? We ve got a fantastic show for you today, where we re asking Elon Musk, he s done that Twitter poll. Is it a manipulative technique? Skullduggery and trickery? And who s more dangerous: the CIA or Elon Musk? In our presentation, here s the effing news. We ll be talking about the Nord Stream pipeline explosion. Did that involve the CIA, or was it the work of the Deep State? And what s going on with doxxing on social media platforms? In this video, you re going to see the future. You re gonna be in this video. You're gonna see the past, you're going to be in the future, and you're gonna have to live in the present. That's what I say on Tuesday's in the chat. Happy Tuesday! - Matt, Gareth and Alex. - The Daily Wire. Matt, Matt, Alex, Gareth, Alex and Alex - What's the deal with Elon Musk and Deep State involvement in the JFK assassination? - Who is the bigger threat to American democracy? and who is the more dangerous threat? - Who's more dangerous than the CIA and who's the bigger danger? - Is Elon Musk a free-thinker or the Deep state? or the deep state? - or is he a free speechutist? - and is he an Elon Musk fan? - And what does he really think of the Trump avatar? - What does he think of Elon Musk really think about the most powerful man in the public discourse? - Does he really care about what he s up to it? - Do you think he s a good guy or a good or not a bad guy? - does he care about that he s good or a bad thing? - is he really a good thing or not? - Can he really be a good enough? - can he have it all? - Will he be an enemy of the real or a great guy? ? - And is he be a real or not really? - - and does he know what s he really need to be a better than a real man? - Or is he just a really good guy, or a really just a good one? - Should he be allowed to have it or a little bit of both?
00:03:14.000A load of gas deals have been done between the US and the UK, so it seems that it was expedient.
00:03:20.000One of a series of coincidences that has been beneficial to the most powerful forces in the world.
00:03:25.000On the show today, we've got Barry Weiss, whose Twitter files revelations have changed the narrative again around deep state involvement in social media, on social media platforms.
00:03:37.000So if you're watching this on YouTube, you've got to stay with us, although After 10 minutes, we leave YouTube.
00:04:36.000Of course, one of the things that's interesting about this, if you're an Elon Musk supporter, and let us know if broadly you're sympathetic towards Musk owning Twitter and his agenda and objectives, is that he has now become somewhat sensorial.
00:04:48.000Admittedly, his case would be towards people that are doxing or revealing personal information.
00:05:16.000In a tweet on Wednesday evening, Musk said, real-time posting of another person's location violates Twitter's doxing policy, but delayed posting of locations are okay.
00:05:28.000And obviously the pushback he's getting is, I thought the whole point of you taking over Twitter was that it was going to become a free speech platform and people are now saying, if you're now banning people for Are you a free speech absolutist?
00:06:30.000Relative to Musk, what will it make for you to go away and stop?
00:06:33.000I don't like the phrase relative to Musk, because then I think of actual Musk as a pheromonal scent going up the snout hole, and I'm reminded of my one conversation with Elon Musk, live conversation, where he said, Russell Branding, and I went, Elon Musking, and that...
00:06:47.000In a sense, I didn't know it then, that was the peak of our relationship.
00:07:04.000With this clip here, Ross, is like, there's one element of it which is CNN are obviously not treating this guy in a kind of, they're not treating him as if he's doing something wrong.
00:07:24.000They're using the template of a hostage terrorist situation, but they cannot, Presently as that, because otherwise it would be reprehensible, giving a voice to the lad.
00:07:34.000So they've got some nuanced work to do there over at CNN, which is not, as you know, their forte.
00:08:08.000Or some jet boots, or something like that.
00:08:10.000Now, the reason we're interested in Elon Musk is he is a lightning rod for the mainstream media cyclone that's sent around, which he is continually lost in, deluged in.
00:08:23.000We think that these CIA revelations around JFK are super interesting, not just because of their historic relevance.
00:08:29.000There was a time where, if you said, I think JFK was assassinated by the CIA, that was a conspiracy theory.
00:08:37.000Well, that's when the term conspiracy theories came about.
00:08:47.000These are the OG conspiracies and often we're called conspiracy theorists.
00:08:51.000That's why we are always very keen only to use very serious facts undergirded by professional journalists.
00:08:57.000Yeah, obviously, just to jump in quickly, the other element to the CIA, obviously we're talking about JFK, but one of the revelations, and Barry Weiss who's coming on later will be talking about it, is CIA infiltration into big tech.
00:09:09.000So we were talking earlier about this, is the big story about Elon Musk that he's banned a few people from Twitter, or is a bigger revelation that the mainstream media are not focusing on, the fact that The fact that the CIA are infiltrating big tech.
00:09:21.000I suppose the assumption would be that they're not reporting on that because ultimately that's in alignment with their general and shared interests.
00:09:29.000Let's have a look at this story about Lee Harvey Oswald and the newly classified, newly revealed or declassified information.
00:09:36.00013,000 JFK assassination documents have been declassified and released.
00:10:25.000Hey listen, if you're watching us on YouTube right now, I'm going to have to tell you that we are going to get so conspiratorial, so revelatory, so open, honest and transparent That YouTube simply would not allow it.
00:10:38.000Ultimately, YouTube, as you probably know, has been, to a degree, co-opted by mainstream media networks.
00:11:04.000We're going to carry on if you're on YouTube.
00:11:05.000join us now. So the Biden administration said in a memo that keeping documents classified
00:11:11.000will protect against an identifiable harm to the military, defense, intelligence operations,
00:11:16.000law enforcement or the conduct of foreign relationships that is of such gravity that
00:11:22.000outweighs the public interest in disclosure. How can that be true? It's simply, don't you think,
00:11:28.000and let me know about this in the chat and the comments, do you think that the whole focus of
00:11:32.000classification is preventing you get information that if you add it you go well I'm not going to
00:11:38.000If this is their level of corruption, if this is how much they represent their own interests and the power of corporations against ours, then I refuse to participate in their systems.
00:11:45.000It's not going to be that the revelations make you so happy that you giddily wander out in front of a carriage in Disney World, is it?
00:11:53.000So, the White House added that the release of any remaining information will continue to be withheld from the public until June 30th, 2023.
00:12:29.000He's going around doing assassinations everywhere.
00:12:31.000Prominent JFK expert Jefferson Morley, a former Washington Post reporter and the author of numerous books on the intelligent community, told a press conference that Oswald had secretly been involved in operations to undermine U.S.
00:12:40.000supporters of Fidel Castro in the summer of 1963.
00:12:45.000Amazingly, Oliver Stone's movie incorporated a lot of these themes and ideas.
00:12:50.000We should get Oliver Stone on, shouldn't we?
00:12:52.000I also was watching Tucker talk about this case in terms of the CIA connection with Jack Ruby, who was the guy, the supposed lone shooter and I think one of Tucker's points were... He wasn't very well.
00:13:05.000He wasn't very well and I think a psychiatrist went to visit him And I suppose the argument that we're ultimately presenting you with is, where does the real threat to democracy and your personal freedom come from?
00:13:16.000are these multiple connections just happen to be CIA people involved.
00:13:20.000And I suppose the argument that we're ultimately presenting you with is where does the real
00:13:24.000threat to democracy and your personal freedom come from?
00:13:28.000The nominated enemies of the state or the state itself and its corporatist interests? As a
00:13:35.000former Hollywood, am I going to call myself a former Hollywood movie star?
00:14:14.000They generally make CIA operatives come across as sort of I don't know what secretive swarthy clandestine heroes rather than right bastards ruining the lives of ordinary Americans and people all over the world and just try being in Latin America.
00:14:29.000Here are just some real, like before you make your mind up about What the CIA infiltration into social media sites, which we believe should be the bigger story rather than Elon Musk's maverick character and undoubtable billionaire credentials as the world's richest man.
00:14:45.000The more important power is the perennial power of the deep state, unchecked, unaccounted, undemocratic power that's embedded into our systems.
00:14:54.000Here are some of the CIA's biggest Historic scandals, so you can get an idea of the breadth and depth of their infiltration and power across American cultural and indeed political life.
00:15:32.000The CIA has infiltrated big tech and social media platforms, including Facebook and Google, with the companies hiring dozens of agents and former agents.
00:15:40.000But at number one, forced imprisonment.
00:15:43.000In 1972, a crack commando unit was sent to prison by a military court for a crime they didn't commit.
00:15:48.000These men promptly escaped from a maximum security stockade to the Los Angeles underground.
00:15:52.000Still, today, wanted by the government, they survive as soldiers of fortune.
00:15:56.000If you have a problem, if no one else can help, and if you can find them, then maybe you can hire the A-Team.
00:16:36.000Hey, and now with further elegance, professionalism and brilliance, we're presenting our Here's the News item, which is about the blowing up of the Nord Stream pipeline.
00:16:46.000Do you remember that in 2014, I think it was, Condoleezza Rice said, yeah, we need to get that business away from Russia and into US hands.
00:16:53.000Do you remember Joe Biden saying publicly, oh, you know, we'll find a way of shutting down that pipeline?
00:16:59.000Do you remember that when the pipeline did blow up, we went, oh, Putin's done that himself.
00:17:04.000And now, deals have been done between the UK and US energy companies that suggest that the Nord Stream Pipeline's failure is advantageous to the kind of energy interest that you always suspected it might be.
00:17:16.000You knew something crazy was going on, and you were right.
00:17:19.000You just needed us to help you tie together the facts.
00:17:36.000It's not as if, like, now that America and the UK have done a deal to replace the deals that might have existed between Russia and European partners and the whole reason it was blown up was to create the opportunity for these deals.
00:17:48.000Just put on the normal news and shut up!
00:17:53.000We have an amazing story for you today, particularly if you have a memory that expands beyond the last couple of months and you haven't been bludgeoned into amnesia by a media that wants you dumb, idiotic, spellbound, and hypnotized.
00:18:04.000The Nord Stream Pipeline, which, you know, was blown up mysteriously, and Jocko Willink said on this show, Navy SEALs could easily do it.
00:19:04.000I'm afraid he has titmanitis, one of his diseases.
00:19:07.000Now, according to British media reports, UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak is poised to make a gas deal announcement with the United States after the COP27 climate summit.
00:19:15.000Just pause for a moment to draw attention to the fact that you can only find this news on the Indian internet.
00:19:19.000The United States has promised the whole of European Union of 15 billion cubic meters of LNG this spring and UK hopes for about 10 billion cubic meters of the supply.
00:19:29.000After all the things they said about this war, about how it was a humanitarian war.
00:19:33.000After all the things that happened in Iraq, about how they said that was a humanitarian war, how they were weapons of mass destruction, and how we now know that it was part of a plan called the New American Century.
00:19:41.000After all of that, you would think that they would at least wait a minute before building a fucking pipeline to replace the one they blew up.
00:19:50.000This move would be considered as UK stepped towards independence from Russian-linked oil and gas imports amid Ukraine invasion.
00:19:56.000That was always the intention, to just take over gas exports from Russia.
00:20:01.000Brian Sullivan is live in Rotterdam as part of a week-long series he's doing on Europe's energy crisis.
00:20:06.000We're going to talk about specifically liquefied natural gas and the U.S.' 's role in, and again, I don't think the word saving Europe or the phrase saving Europe is too strong, Becky, because without U.S.
00:20:17.000imported natural gas, Europe would be in a far more dire situation.
00:20:23.000Not only do they want to hide the true origins of this war, not only do they want to allegedly destroy this pipeline and sell us gas that we were previously buying from a competitor, they want to sort of be thanked for it, for all those saviors.
00:20:37.000Well, you know, I don't think it's too strong to say that we are the new Jesus of gas provision, but instead of lasers, which I believe Jesus used to shoot from his hands, I think I'm right, I think it says that in the Bible, we shoot liquid gas into Europe, like Jesus' gas mill.
00:20:52.000Rishi Sunak, WEF Goldman Sachs, has pledged that the new partnership to boost energy security, efficiency and affordability will cut prices for Britons and ensure the UK's national supply can never again be manipulated by the whims of a failing regime.
00:21:08.000As part of efforts to drive down the cost of living, the US will aim to export at least 9 to 10 billion cubic metres of liquefied natural gas to UK terminals over the next year, more than doubling the level in 2021.
00:21:19.000Firstly, it's not appearing significantly in mainstream media.
00:21:46.000It's just like you're being continually bewildered, bombarded by information.
00:21:49.000And then they have the gall to talk about misinformation and disinformation when they are the epicenter of this phenomenon.
00:21:54.000Rishi Sunak said the partnership will help end Europe's dependence on Russian energy once and for all.
00:21:59.000How can you sell this as this is a benefit?
00:22:01.000How can you sell this as anything other than advantageous to the corporate interests that were always set to benefit and whose agenda was likely pursued from the outset?
00:22:09.000The very fact that there's any energy deals being done at this time at all should tell you that there's more to this war than the mainstream media are reporting.
00:22:17.000Let me know what you think in the chat.
00:22:18.000Let me know what you think in the comments.
00:22:20.000Citing the war in Ukraine, Mr. Sunak and Mr. Biden said in a joint statement that it is more important than ever for allies to work together to build resilient international systems.
00:22:39.000If they're profiting, that means that the scarcity is not the issue.
00:22:43.000It means the extraction of profit is the issue.
00:22:45.000President Joe Biden promised a White House press conference in early February that the US was able to shut down the German-Russian Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline in the Baltic Sea if Russia invaded Ukraine.
00:23:16.000But how will you do that, exactly, since the project and control of the project is within Germany's control?
00:23:26.000We will, I promise you, we'll be able to do it.
00:23:30.000Oh, you think because Joe Biden on the television said that they would blow up the Nord Stream pipeline, then it did blow up and then they did do a bunch of energy.
00:23:39.000You thought that that That meant that the whole thing, and perhaps the war itself, was about war and profitability for powerful American corporate interests rather than the humanitarian effort to aid Ukrainian people.
00:23:51.000We set up that pipeline, then blew it up, then did those deals as a surprise for your birthday!
00:23:58.000This is exactly what happened when we tried this in Iraq!
00:24:01.000We pulled that statue down to cheer you up!
00:24:04.000When Russia indeed invaded Ukraine on February 24th, Washington was able to get Berlin to suspend the pipeline project that was about to go online, even though it wasn't in Germany's interest.
00:24:13.000The pipeline has remained closed ever since, and then was blown up by Putin.
00:24:18.000But ending the war and lifting the sanctions would lead to the reopening of Nord Stream 2.
00:24:21.000Prior to the Nord Stream explosion, President Vladimir Putin told a press conference that Russia was ready to resume supplying natural gas to Germany if Germany lifted its economic sanctions against Russia.
00:24:31.000Putin said, after all, if they need gas urgently, if things are so bad, just go ahead and lift sanctions against Nord Stream 2 with its 55 billion cubic metres per year, all they have to do is press the button and it will get going.
00:24:41.000A peace deal would mean Nord Stream 2 would reopen which would help Germany and Russia but crush US aims at regime change and making Europe dependent on US energy.
00:24:49.000Don't you think that that is at least part of this, what's going on here?
00:24:53.000Do you really believe that at the core of this issue is the tyranny of Putin and helping Ukrainian people?
00:24:58.000Helping Ukrainian people is the right thing to do.
00:25:01.000If indeed Putin is a tyrant, I imagine that he is, then of course that is a bad thing.
00:25:06.000But do you not think that these pieces of information, him saying that, the pipeline, do you think that this is all irrelevant?
00:25:12.000Do you think that all of these economic interests being advantaged, whether it's the military-industrial complex or energy companies, is sort of an inadvertent consequence of this conflict?
00:25:20.000Oh wow, God, we were just doing the right thing, helping Ukrainian people, and look, all this stuff happened!
00:25:27.000For decades, the US opposed European projects to receive energy from Russia.
00:25:31.000It wants Europe to buy more expensive US oil and gas.
00:25:34.000Here's Condoleezza Rice speaking in 2014.
00:25:36.000I also understand that one of the complications is the Europeans who are very dependent on the Russians for energy supply and business relationships.
00:25:45.000Now we need to have tougher sanctions and I'm afraid at some point this is going to probably have to involve oil and gas.
00:26:36.000A 2019 Pentagon-funded study from the RAND Corporation on how best to exploit Russia's economic, political and military vulnerabilities and anxieties, which is a Nasty thing to have done anyway.
00:26:46.000Included a recommendation to reduce Russian natural gas exports and hinder pipeline expansions.
00:26:51.000The study noted that a first step would involve stopping Nord Stream 2 and that natural gas from the United States and Australia could provide a substitute.
00:26:58.000This RAND study also prophetically recommended providing more US military equipment and advice to Ukraine in order to lead Russia to increase its direct involvement in the conflict and the price it pays for it.
00:27:08.000Even though it acknowledged that Russia might respond by mounting a new offensive and seizing more Ukrainian territory.
00:27:13.000Now, I don't know who participated in this round report in 2019, but isn't this just, like, exactly what's happened?
00:27:20.000The Obama administration opposed the pipeline.
00:27:22.000As part of the major sanctions package against Russia in 2017, the Trump administration began sanctioning any company doing work on the pipeline.
00:27:29.000The move generated outrage in Germany, where many saw it as an attempt to meddle with the European market.
00:27:34.000In 2019, the US implemented more sanctions on the project.
00:27:36.000Upon coming into office, President Joe Biden made opposition to the pipeline one of his administration's top priorities.
00:27:42.000Oh, on the news, it was all about helping people and making Saudi Arabia a pariah.
00:27:45.000Well, at least that's one promise he has delivered on.
00:27:49.000During his confirmation hearings in 2021, Secretary of State Antony Blinken told Congress he was determined to do whatever I can to prevent Nord Stream 2 being completed.
00:27:58.000Months later, the State Department reiterated that any entity involved in the Nord Stream 2 pipeline risks U.S.
00:28:03.000sanctions and should immediately abandon work on the pipeline.
00:28:06.000As Russia was gathering troops at Ukraine's border at the beginning of this year, US administration officials issued threats against the pipeline's operation in the event of a Russian invasion.
00:28:15.000In January, Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, one of the main players during the 2014 Maiden Coup in Ukraine, issued a stern warning against the pipeline.
00:28:24.000If Russia invades one way or another, Nord Stream 2 will not move forward.
00:28:31.000A simple, uncomplicated narrative that doesn't involve sabotage, espionage, long-term energy goals, and potentially a war that's being used to advance economic interests rather than humanitarian ones.
00:28:43.000We know how our governments behave, right?
00:28:46.000Our government would never do that, and if they did, surely our media would report on it, right?
00:28:50.000So, there's absolutely nothing to worry about in spite of this overwhelming, academically underwritten evidence and even people involved in the conflict directly saying they would do what eventually happened.
00:29:25.000Were you astonished by the mainstream media's reaction to these revelations, or was it largely what you expected?
00:29:31.000And do you feel vindicated having resigned, broadly speaking, from your position at the New York Times because of the new establishment liberal orthodoxy that was prevailing there?
00:29:41.000How has this experience affected you and your opinion on mainstream media journalism broadly, mate?
00:29:47.000It just confirmed what I experienced myself and it was vindication of exactly why I decided to walk away from the prestige and start my own thing that is trying to close the gap between reality, the reality that people can see with their own eyes and ears.
00:30:05.000And the insistence on sort of putting the narrative, whatever it is that given day, over reality.
00:30:12.000And that's exactly what I'm trying to do with The Free Press.
00:30:15.000You asked if I was surprised at the kind of mainstream media blackout or then the insistence once they had to cover it that it was a nothing burger.
00:30:24.000But you'd be hard-pressed to come up with sort of a cleaner example of one of the problems happening, not just in America, but, you know, around the world more broadly, which is this incredible gap between the things that the legacy press has decided are news and the things that actual living people in the world think are news and are important to them.
00:30:44.000And I would venture to guess that most Americans, whether or not they have a Twitter account or have ever logged on to this, See that two stories here matter a great deal to them.
00:30:54.000One, the fact of the incredibly cozy relationship between parts of the United States government, namely the FBI and Twitter.
00:31:03.000And second, the unbelievable power that basically a handful of private companies have over the public discourse.
00:31:11.000Those are the things that Matt Taibbi, me, Abigail Schreier, Michael Schellenberger and a team of incredible independent journalists have revealed.
00:31:19.000And I think the fact that Elon Musk decided to come to a bunch of people essentially
00:31:24.000with newsletters rather than the Washington Post and the New York Times tells you a lot
00:31:29.000about, you know, where real trust in the media these days actually lies. And it's just no longer
00:31:48.000How thoroughly those social media organizations have been infiltrated by state interest and as you say how much power is wielded by those very social media organizations.
00:32:00.000The previous incarnation of monopolizing power was in Energy resources of course and the fact that attention, consciousness itself can be controlled in the way that it has been.
00:32:10.000Our community here on our channel are astonished.
00:32:13.000It's sort of like Foucaultian biopolitics.
00:32:19.000Yeah, I think one of the things that is so strange to me about this is that somehow caring about outsized corporate power, caring about the amount of power that a number of extraordinarily wealthy individuals or political cliques within companies have over the entire world, the idea that that's now coded as a right-wing or conservative issue is absolutely bizarre to me.
00:32:46.000I do not understand how we've gotten to a place where that is not in the interests of everybody, and specifically not in the interests of the left, that historically has cared deeply about outsized corporate power, has cared deeply about the voices of everyday individuals being censored by big tech, in this case, and the government.
00:33:09.000All of which I know is exactly what you talk about on this show, which is why I'm really excited to be here.
00:33:13.000The emblematic issue that has initially defined this arc, even prior to the revelations that you and your colleagues,
00:33:20.000if that's the correct term, have made, was the Hunter Biden story,
00:33:25.000which when I first learned of it and started hearing about it,
00:33:29.000it was with the tinge of publications like the New York Post,
00:33:33.000and because of the hue of sexual and drug-related orientations,
00:33:37.000I felt that perhaps it was a sleaze story rather than a power story,
00:33:41.000and as was commonly understood, something that, you know, needn't or oughtn't be reported.
00:33:46.000But the fact that this has become, in a sense, a litmus test of the level of censorship is extraordinary
00:33:51.000and also a way of marking and measuring the way that what we call the left,
00:33:55.000establishment neoliberalism, the new conservatism of our age,
00:33:59.000because it certainly doesn't have any interest in sharing power, generating new power bases,
00:34:03.000telling the truth, holding corporate power to account.
00:34:07.000It shows you now that this has become, in a sense, the centre of true establishment power in the way that their interests align with big tech, the way that their interests align with the military-industrial complex.
00:34:19.000So we're, in a sense, facing at least a new understanding.
00:34:23.000We finally understood that power isn't what it was when it was Dick Cheney and Wolfowitz and Bush.
00:34:38.000What I'm saying is, doesn't this suggest a completely hollowed out, nullified, corporatised Democrat Party that's no longer fit for purpose?
00:34:45.000I can't fit that many words into a sentence the way you just did, but what I can say is I think one of the things that our reporting has revealed, and one of the reasons that I became so uncomfortable at the New York Times as a journalist whose vocation is to pursue my curiosity and to look into dark corners, even when what those dark corners reveal is inconvenient to the powers that be, is the way that there has become a kind of hive mind, let's call it, between Parts of the government, big tech, legacy press, and they're all sort of speaking in unison.
00:35:19.000And whenever a huge group of powerful institutions are speaking in unison and censoring anyone that deviates, even in the smallest way, we should be skeptical.
00:35:29.000The fact that the New York Post was locked out of Twitter for reporting on the news, regardless of how tawdry and frankly tragic a lot of the things on that laptop were, Anyone who had any principle should have opposed it.
00:35:45.000The fact that so many people under this fig leaf of hacked documents, as if that's not what the New York Times and the Washington Post do every single day, what are the Pentagon Papers?
00:35:55.000The idea that that was the fig leaf that they hid behind Told you just about everything you needed to know about what was actually happening there.
00:36:04.000And I think the reporting that Taibbi has done, the reporting that my colleague, and that's definitely the right word, Michael Schellenberger has done, have revealed the fact that essentially what the FBI did in the case of the Hunter Biden story was pre-bunked an inconvenient In other words, they preyed on, I think, the well-intentioned inclinations of people at these tech companies and essentially told them, there's something coming down the pike.
00:36:35.000And you should just be aware that, you know, the Russians are trying to steal the election or sway the election.
00:36:40.000So that when the story of the Hunter Biden laptop came out, they were already primed to understand it in a particular way.
00:36:48.000But for me, the reason that story was an important moment is I just couldn't understand, even if you think the New York Post is a right-wing rag, I think it's the paper of record in New York, but even if you think that, and even if you think what's in the Hunter Biden laptop was tragic and embarrassing and shouldn't have been relevant to who you voted for in the election, go with all of that.
00:37:10.000Shouldn't it chill you, the idea that one of the most powerful amplification systems in the world, in all of humanity, in all of human history, was locking out a newspaper from sharing information?
00:37:24.000It really shouldn't matter what party you vote for.
00:37:27.000It shouldn't matter what you think of Hunter Biden or Joe Biden or Donald Trump.
00:37:31.000To oppose that on the very—on the most basic principles, principles that are enshrined in our Bill of Rights, in our Constitution.
00:37:39.000I mean, these are like—it doesn't get more fundamental than that.
00:37:44.000And it really was shocking to me to watch the way that people fell around this particular story.
00:37:48.000And I think the reporting that we've done over the past few weeks have vindicated, frankly, the reporting of The New York Post.
00:37:55.000What it seems to me, like Barry, is that these principles are a veil that masks a real appetite for tyranny, a kind of tyrannical impulse that will be exercised when necessary.
00:38:09.000Perhaps what concerns me most is the set of assumptions that Ordinary people are unable to discern the validity of information for themselves, are unable to calculate what information to pay attention to.
00:38:24.000For me, this suggests that the principles that are pushed to the forefront are not relevant, not rooted, grounded or relevant.
00:38:32.000I also feel that what we're beginning to see is nominated public villains that, again, that I wouldn't typically particularly support or laud.
00:38:42.000For example, Trump, somewhat uniquely banned from that platform, and then curiously, currently, Musk himself.
00:38:50.000I wonder if you can talk to us about what appears to be veiled by sort of liberal aesthetics, a kind of new form of technological tyranny and what you think about the
00:39:01.000movements within media and the kind of figures that are presented as new avatars for vilification? Okay
00:39:12.000I think, first of all, having been the villain of the day more than once on a platform like Twitter, I definitely think that when you're trying to redraw the bounds of what is in and what is out, what is morally acceptable and what is not, you have to make public examples.
00:39:30.000You have to scapegoat particular people in order to signal to everyone else watching, look what we just did to that person.
00:40:18.000There were many different kinds of categories.
00:40:21.000Jay Bhattacharya is a celebrated doctor at one of the best universities in America.
00:40:27.000He happened to have a view that I think has largely been vindicated by the way over the past few years, that blanket lockdowns during COVID would on balance be detrimental to us.
00:40:39.000In other words, him and other people who signed onto this thing called the Great Barrington
00:40:43.000Declaration took the view that the vulnerable should be protected and locked down and resources
00:40:50.000should go to them, but for other ordinary healthy people, that it might not be the best
00:40:56.000things and that the after effects economically, psychologically, emotionally, might be worse,
00:41:03.000that the prescription might be worse than the cure, whatever that phrase is.
00:41:06.000So in other words, Jay Bhattacharya was turned in, not just on Twitter, but in the culture
00:41:12.000more generally by these legacy institutions as a kind of boogeyman.
00:41:19.000They did that in order to enforce the view that that idea is dangerous.
00:41:25.000And that if you touch that idea, if you question the logic that, you know, cloth masks don't prevent the spread of COVID, obviously true.
00:41:34.000If you question the idea that, I don't know, this virus came from Wuhan, and 10 miles down the road, there's this crazy lab where they're doing gain-of-function research.
00:41:44.000You know, you're a xenophobe and a conspiracy theorist.
00:41:46.000It's all about ring-fencing ideas that are—it's about intentionally coding people and ideas that are considered third-rail, dangerous, outside-of-the-line, isms, phobias, whatever.
00:42:01.000What any kind of baggage that they can be larded with in order to say, if you want to be on the right side of history, don't go there.
00:42:08.000If you don't want your reputation destroyed or your career ruined, don't go there.
00:42:13.000And it has been an unbelievably effective tool.
00:42:17.000And that is the thing that I am unbelievably interested in because I think you see it in all parts of, it's not just American life, although I'm in New York right now, it's all over the world.
00:42:29.000And so this deeply human impulse in us, right, which is to be with the good people, to not be cast out of our tribe, is almost on steroids right now because of platforms like Twitter and Facebook and all of the rest.
00:42:44.000Because we don't need to go to a public square and watch someone get stoned.
00:42:47.000We can watch it happen digitally all day, every day.
00:42:51.000And we are social animals and we learn to sort of prevent ourselves from being vulnerable or putting ourselves into harm's way.
00:43:01.000Barry, yeah, not only does it make sense, it's terrifying that these tools of ostracisation have been mobilised to a fully immersive and omniscient degree.
00:43:13.000When I hear you describe that, and it's interesting the example you chose, it seems that Something unique took place during the pandemic in how much power was unquestionably granted to already potent institutions and organisations.
00:43:31.000And it appears to have, what do I want to say, gilded or gird a new era Of unquestioning compliance, where you find, for example, with criticism of the war between Ukraine and Russia is incredibly censored now and people just accept that, that you can pull up an article from 2014 in the Guardian where they were posing the very questions that would now be considered apostasy, the NATO infringement, the coup in 2014.
00:44:03.000And we've just seen this with the pandemic.
00:44:08.000Do you feel that something is being engineered on a massive scale or do you just feel that the exponential growth of these tools happens to be in the hands of the current regime and therefore we're experiencing what appears like a unique and egregious tyranny but it's actually just the tools have emerged rather than a new ideology?
00:44:56.000But you have to think about who created, at old Twitter at least, who was the institution?
00:45:02.000The institution was 98 to 99% progressive or Democrats.
00:45:07.000If Twitter was a social media platform that was located in Western Junction, Colorado, The story would be a totally different story, but it's as if people are surprised that, you know, if you live in San Francisco, if you're working at a place like Twitter with t-shirts that say stay woke, you know, if you, you know, your entire world
00:45:32.000So should it be surprising that they regard certain kinds of speeches beyond the pale?
00:45:37.000Should it be surprising that they view what I see as, in some of these cases, just heterodox ideas or just typical conservative ideas as something more like hate speech?
00:45:49.000Anyone that's ever been in a very homogenous, whether politically or religiously, environment knows that that's the case.
00:45:58.000Yeah, so you think that the ideology is an appendage rather than the essence?
00:46:02.000Now I know a lot of people that watch this... No, I think the ideology is deeply rooted.
00:46:08.000I'm just saying that when... I'm not ascribing Ill-intent to many of these people.
00:46:17.000I think many of these people genuinely thought, let's just take the case of Trump and you watch the way they were talking back and forth to each other.
00:46:24.000And it in many ways reminds me of the times.
00:46:28.000There were true believers who said Trump is basically akin to a terrorist leader or the Christchurch murderer.
00:46:35.000And those people are driven by ideology.
00:46:37.000You see people saying, Including you all, Rob.
00:46:40.000I basically I left academia because I could affect more change in the world from joining Twitter.
00:46:45.000But then there are other people who are looking out at what was happening in Washington and saying this is an unprecedented situation.
00:46:52.000It calls for unprecedented decision making.
00:46:54.000There's gradations, as there are in any groups, and I think that that's an important aspect of what was happening at Twitter in the period we were reporting on, old Twitter.
00:47:05.000It's frankly what happened at the New York Times during the very hot summer of 2020, where some people at the New York Times genuinely believed that running an op-ed by a sitting Republican senator literally put their lives in danger.
00:47:19.000But the vast majority of people who signed on to an idea like that were doing it because of social pressure and because they believed that if they didn't, they would be on the wrong side of history.
00:47:28.000And I think that dynamic was playing out at old Twitter.
00:47:31.000It was playing out at The New York Times.
00:47:52.000And in a sense, those social dynamics and the homogeneity that you're describing, though, it has been arrived at.
00:48:01.000There is a process that has generated that.
00:48:04.000And we also are talking about state collusion and intervention and censorship and an astonishing degree of infiltration by, in particular, The FBI.
00:48:16.000And what I've found more broadly in my conversations with, like, Adam Curtis or Glenn Greenwald,
00:48:22.000and now in conversations in-house here, is that much of the ideology around civil rights
00:48:28.000and what has come to be known as identity politics is a convenient way of distracting
00:48:32.000us from the fact that when it comes to the crunch, Democrat interests ultimately align
00:48:36.000significantly with establishment interests elsewhere, the military-industrial complex,
00:48:41.000the financial industry, and big tech, and in order to create a diversion, not because
00:48:45.000there is a genuine ideological yearning at the heart of the establishment, i.e. its financial
00:48:50.000heart, but because it is a convenient way of dividing people, these ideas are promoted.
00:48:55.000And to your point earlier, it used to be accepted and ordinary that we would just sit and chat
00:48:59.000to people that, what, could be the best?
00:49:02.000Or had really wacky outlandish conspiratorial views?
00:49:06.000Or, you know, take for example something like as evidently frivolous as Graham Hancock's documentaries about the origin of our species.
00:49:15.000Although, in a sense, what could be more important?
00:49:17.000In a way, the idea that that should be censored or dangerous feels like there's a climate of amplification and an appetite for censorship.
00:49:26.000And while the principles appear to be somewhat fluid, i.e.
00:49:30.000you could find yourself on the wrong side of the argument tomorrow if the wind changes once this precedent has been set and these powers have been granted, it does seem that at the moment there are a set of ideals that are being represented one way or another.
00:49:46.000Yeah, but the list, the strength, when you, I get letters from people, maybe you too, you also do Russell, like every single day that feel like they were written in the Soviet Union.
00:49:57.000In other words, it's people saying to me, thank you for saying this out loud.
00:50:07.000But if I said those things out loud, you know, I don't know what would happen to me or my career.
00:50:12.000How did we arrive at that in the West?
00:50:15.000I mean, and I think one of the dynamics of it that is particularly insidious is as you watch, right, as a ordinary person, the list of things grow longer and longer that you have to say or that you don't have to say or that you have to avoid.
00:50:32.000You're thinking to yourself, what are they going to add tomorrow?
00:51:11.000Then they're thinking, well, where can I actually speak the truth?
00:51:15.000Where can I actually not walk on eggshells?
00:51:18.000Where can I actually be my full selves?
00:51:20.000And they will run into the open arms of political extremism.
00:51:24.000One of the reasons I think it's so important to resist the censorious impulses that I think both of us, for various reasons or from various directions, want to resist is because of that, is because of where this kind of Ideology ultimately leads to, and it leads to a place where there's no political center, where people cannot talk to each other, where there's polarization, and where you have half the country thinking the other half are Nazis depending on which side you're on.
00:51:55.000That is a recipe for violence and disaster, and it's not a country I want to live in which is You know, a lot of the reason why I decided to say bye bye to the New York Times and to try and start something that lives up to those kind of values, to have honest conversations, transparently, out loud and fearlessly.
00:52:14.000And I think, you know, frankly, like any journalist who believes in in the old school values of journalism needs to be doing the same thing right now.
00:52:24.000My personal perspective is one of optimism about humanity, that actually people that are different can get along and you don't need authoritarianism at the center of all of our institutions, systems and society in order for people to behave correctly.
00:52:43.000It's not born of naivety, it's born of true optimism.
00:52:47.000I also think that what's being masked is the birth of genuinely new political visions,
00:52:54.000that we have a heterogeneous political space now where there are no real alternatives,
00:52:59.000where there are no real voices that are interested in advancing ordinary people's lives, and
00:53:06.000that we're being invited to bicker and squabble and even kill amongst ourselves and against
00:53:12.000one another, rather than identify where real power is.
00:53:16.000To some degree, I think it's just an aesthetic sheen that masks the telos of true power heading
00:53:23.000in the direction that it always has done.
00:53:25.000I'm concerned about advancing globalism, I'm concerned about technological dictatorship,
00:53:31.000advancing surveillance, the ability of the state and private interest to collaborate
00:53:35.000in exactly the way this story has demonstrated.
00:53:38.000For me, we ought be moving towards a time where there is less centralised power, small amounts of government, And a kind of agreements among ourselves of how we're going to treat one another and the kind of freedoms that we're going to grant one another.
00:53:52.000Also, sort of anecdotally, Barry, my feeling is that most people sort of just want to be left alone.
00:53:57.000I don't mean in a sort of a narcissistic, libertarian way, that people just want to run their own, like people don't want to focus on hatred the whole time.
00:54:04.000I think we're being stoked into an unnatural state by these kind of movements and this type of agenda.
00:54:09.000And that's sort of what's fueling it in me, seeing as how you sort of almost asked.
00:54:16.000I mean, I agree with you, and I'll tell you just from, you know, having been on the other side of it, in other words, having been the person that commissioned, you know, the 2000th op-ed about how Donald Trump is a unique danger to society, the incentive in it is, It's unspoken, but it's so obvious, right?
00:54:33.000It's that, you know, like, we know from all of these amazing documentary studies and also just our personal experience that outrage keeps us engaged, right?
00:54:43.000The entire mechanics of these platforms are based on outrage.
00:54:48.000They're not based on kindness or empathy or love.
00:54:50.000And I think that, like, one of the great challenges of our time is how do you use these platforms as the kind of incredible tools that they
00:54:59.000are. And they are. I mean, I've commissioned amazing pieces because on Twitter I was able to connect to
00:55:18.000And I think that it's, yeah, just one of the challenges I find in my own life, forget even as a journalist, just as a civilian, is how do you use what's good about them without becoming subsumed by them?
00:55:30.000And I think I have found when I'm basically living online, and a lot of my life is online because of my work, you know, you start to sort of see people not as three-dimensional and complicated and, you know, working from Good intentions and hearing them in good faith, you sort of start to see people as two-dimensional caricatures.
00:55:50.000And that's just not a—that's not how I want to live.
00:55:54.000And that's certainly not a way to do good journalism, because good journalism requires you to put yourself in other people's shoes, to be curious about what motivated them to vote a particular way.
00:56:05.000You know, and a lot of journalism right now is basically just derivative of Twitter, where Twitter is the ultimate editor.
00:56:11.000And I think, you know, At least one of my big takeaways having spent much of the past two weeks there is the necessity to sort of get back on the road interviewing people in real life and not just looking at kind of the Twitter conversation.
00:56:26.000It's extraordinary to me that the culture has become as divisive as it has done.
00:56:30.000Half of the voting population can be sort of condemned as fascists or terrorists or unacceptable and that's normalized when I sort of take it.
00:58:00.000You know, audiences are just in a radically different place, and they're seeking voices and journalism that reflects the world as they actually see it, not the world as a few people in midtown Manhattan wish it were.
00:58:16.000Barry, undoubtedly Elon Musk's actions in making these revelations available to you has been beneficial and has advanced the conversation.
00:58:24.000It's difficult to know anybody's motivations, let alone a complex figure like Elon Musk.
00:58:30.000What's your general sense around him stepping down as CEO and that poll?
00:58:34.000Is that something you would care to comment on, mate?
00:58:38.000I think that the The small glimpse that I had from my time reporting on this story has left me very grateful that I did not have $44 billion to spend and that I did not spend it acquiring Twitter.
00:58:54.000I mean, it is just an absolutely thankless job trying to moderate the public square.
00:59:01.000And the question is, you know, does he want to stick to his stated aim, which is to keep it that way, or is it going to transform into something else?
00:59:10.000And I think that is the big question hanging over this entire project is the goal to try and, you know, was was the reason that he opened the archive in order to embarrass the former regime?
00:59:44.000And if you're taking over a company that has lost trust with at least half of the American public, yeah, you should probably clean house, clear the decks, and all the things that he said to me on the record about what his intentions were.
00:59:55.000But then to turn around and start to boot people off of Twitter, to tell people that they can't share a link from a competitor, they can't share a link to Linktree to promote their work, or, you know, and there are many other examples, you know, some of the policies, for example, on doxing seem absolutely sensible to me.
01:00:14.000Of course you shouldn't be able to stalk people on the internet.
01:00:17.000You shouldn't be able to say, Barry Weiss is in this place right now, go get her.
01:00:21.000But I think what people are objecting to is the kind of chaotic nature of the way that these new rules are coming down, the sense that they're basically being implemented and then backfilled with a reason.
01:00:32.000And I think, you know, if Elon Musk or, you know, I don't know if he's going to pay attention to the poll and actually step down, if Elon Musk or whoever the next CEO of Twitter is, wants to genuinely win back trust, It needs to be transparent.
01:00:46.000There needs to be a level playing field.
01:00:47.000And it just needs to be clearly communicated to the hundreds of millions of users on Twitter.
01:00:52.000That is where you do need genuine values and principles, because I suppose values and principles are what remains when it's inconvenient to have them, when it's at odds with your own interests, when it involves sacrifice, and that's why I continually take recourse to what have to be called spiritual ideals in so much as they're not material, and sometimes they transcend rationalism, humanism, and even reason.
01:01:13.000It's sometimes unreasonable to have principles.
01:01:16.000Barry, it's an extraordinary privilege to talk to you.
01:01:18.000You're very, very intense And I really like communicating with you.
01:01:34.000It's good to have people that communicate.
01:01:37.000Like that, I was captivated the entire time, and it's not easy to talk about.
01:01:41.000And I can see the appeal sometimes, um, you know, we're talking about the role taken on by Musk and whoever is pre-, uh, succeeds him, if indeed he does step down, but the attraction of dogma, because sometimes dealing with complexity is so hard, you know, God, I'm just going to call myself this, I'm just going to be this, and whatever they think, I'll do that.
01:01:59.000I think there are two things that I sort of walk away with after these two weeks.
01:02:18.000And I don't know if that means that the solution is to treat things like Twitter like a common carrier in the way that the railroad is or the electric company.
01:02:30.000Power is, this is an incredible power.
01:02:33.000And the power can be really, really corrupting.
01:02:37.000And that the roar of the crowd in the ears of Elon Musk, positive or negative, is just maybe too much for any individual.
01:02:47.000Like, I don't know if we human beings are built for that kind of roar.
01:02:51.000And I have to tell you, I mean, I was just I gained a lot of Twitter followers in this, but the thing I'm looking most forward to over the Christmas holiday is just logging offline and getting back to real life and stepping away from the sort of, like, gladiatorial arena that some of these platforms have become, and touching grass, being with my baby and my wife, and getting back a little bit to reality, because I think that that roar can be, for anyone of whatever political valence
01:03:27.000It seems and sounds extraordinarily overwhelming and the idea of connecting with actual reality and frankly love must be very appealing after enduring that.
01:03:41.000When you said that about the roar of the crowd and that much accrued and centralized power, it seems like a broad critique of monopolisation, capitalism more generally,
01:03:51.000because once you start looking at the principle of municipality, once anybody owns energy,
01:03:56.000resources, communicative tools, it starts to present situations that are somewhat inhumane
01:04:02.000and at odds with what I would dare to call our nature.
01:04:05.000Barry, thank you so much for sharing that information and for the personal sacrifices
01:04:10.000you must have made in order to bring about this story and to get to a position to even
01:04:56.000I believe Scrooge McDuck is actually the star, Gareth.
01:05:00.000You made a bit of a mistake there and you obviously don't know as much about books as I do but that's why I got a book club and you do not.