The Auron MacIntyre Show - Building Institutions ｜ Guest： Matthew J. Peterson ｜ 1⧸11⧸23

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00:01:30.520 Hey, everybody. How's it going? Thanks for joining me this afternoon. I've got a great stream with a guest I think you're really going to enjoy. Now, we've talked a lot in this corner of the internet about the need for alternative institutions. You know, lots of analysis, lots of understanding, lots of explaining, but we've talked a lot also about the need for building. And I thought I'd bring on someone who is involved in the work of building who would be very interesting for you guys. Matthew Peterson. Thanks for joining me, man.

00:02:00.520 Hey, it's great to be here. Great admirer of your work.

00:02:05.100 Oh, well, thank you very much. And I'm very glad that you're doing the work you're doing, which is why I wanted to have you on. I think it's so important to not just talk about all of the different things we're analyzing and all of the problems and everything about that, but also solutions. And you're somebody who has a lot going on and we're going to get deep into that. But before we do, for people who are maybe a little less familiar with your work, could you give a little bit of background?

00:02:31.220 Yeah, so two years ago, I moved from California to Texas. I was just a random, random occurrence, you know, taxes were lower.

00:02:42.420 And really came to Texas to found new founding. And the goal of new founding is really to be the venture studio we need to create the things we need, particularly in media, tech and finance.

00:03:01.920 But to solve some of the problems that, you know, that prevent, let's call it a, you know, an aligned economy from emerging and an aligned culture from emerging.

00:03:13.860 And there's similar problems that lots of businesses face. And so we tackle those head on. We connect people, we connect talent, we connect capital, aligned to aligned investors to businesses.

00:03:26.140 And we, we basically like created the venture studio that was like, let's try to do all the things, right. And, and really went to town in the last two years.

00:03:35.560 And now we have some, you know, emerging, some things work, some things didn't work, but now we have kind of an emerging picture of, you know, of some things that really are working.

00:03:46.160 And does that make sense? I mean, that may not be specific. I feel like probably some of the audience is like, yes, and some is no, what are you talking about?

00:03:55.980 But, you know, in venture, you're trying to build what you think is going to work and what's needed.

00:04:00.500 And we felt like, you know, practically in the commercial cultural space, we need a new movement that is really in a way similar to ESG or social justice,

00:04:09.760 that is struggling to break forth, moving in a different direction.

00:04:13.620 And, and, and we're, we want to birth that baby.

00:04:18.040 So we're, we'll get into a lot of that. But for people who are unfamiliar, what is your background in?

00:04:24.600 Are you, are you someone who's a businessman? Are you someone advertising finance?

00:04:28.160 Like, where, where did you kind of build this skill set that's going to allow you to kind of move this forward?

00:04:34.420 Yeah, exactly. So I was involved in a lot of media.

00:04:38.860 media. And, and politics, really, is my, is my background. And, and I'm very entrepreneurial along the way, like I built, you know, little things here and there.

00:04:50.580 So my role at new founding is more on that side of things is to see the strategic positioning, and to match, right, to match the people together, and also just a general entrepreneurial general partner kind of thing where I come up with ideas and experiment.

00:05:08.560 Um, so, uh, you know, my background is varied. I mean, I, I started out wanting to, um, save the world in education. Um, you may, uh, you may be familiar with this phenomenon.

00:05:21.120 Um, and, um, you know, I was torn between going into politics, but I thought, you know, people just go straight into politics. Like that's weird. You know, I was smart enough to realize that that's, that's not right. Uh, something wrong with that. You got to do stuff. And so, but I, but I was, I was drawn to ideas.

00:05:38.880 And so I was drawn to understand more about the founding and how to place it in terms of political philosophy. Um, and I thought that, you know, shaping the university was very important. I still do. Um, but I soon realized along the way, as I did other entrepreneurial things that I had skills in, in, uh, communication and, you know, communication strategy, and then doing a lot of online stuff from a very young age. Um, uh, you know, I was a sued, uh, well before that was a thing.

00:06:08.880 I was a thing on Twitter, uh, before Twitter existed, I was a sued. Um, and I, I, uh, made money off of that too, because I was, uh, getting involved in journalism and consulting and doing all kinds of shady things. Um, so, so anyway, along the way I would go do these more entrepreneurial things and I'd say media and politics and consulting. And then, and then I was still in education until I realized that, uh, much too late. I wish I had realized it sooner, uh, that there really wasn't an end game there because the only way to change

00:06:38.740 education is to be in charge, uh, and wield power from the top, uh, you're certainly not going to do that from the bottom by convincing anyone. And that means you've got to be on a board or a president, right. Or, you know, administrator who is very good friends with the board and president. And as soon as I realized that the hard way in microcosm, I was like, I'm done, you know, I'm done with this. Like, this doesn't make any sense. Plus the world's falling apart, you know? Uh, and so, you know, so politics and, and media with, uh, with, uh,

00:07:08.740 experience in between and this academic background that I slowly left behind.

00:07:14.980 Excellent. So I'm going to pitch you a few softballs. They may seem obvious, but I feel like there are still a lot of people who aren't completely on board or don't completely understand the essential nature of kind of this approach. So, uh, we'll, we'll start from that, uh, zoomed out view and then we'll kind of, uh, move in and get more specific. So why do we need this approach? Why don't we just win an election

00:07:36.740 and like have a president and pass some bills? And then we can just get back to kind of the 1950s. Like, why is it essential to have this, uh, you know, all encompassing approach or this approach where you are, uh, you know, looking at, uh, commercialization, networking, all those different things. Why do we just have this, you know, political solution that kind of puts everything back on track?

00:07:57.300 Yeah, well, the, the short answer is, is because you live in a system that is so corrupt, uh, that corruption is what is normalized and what it's become. Uh, no politician is going to save you at this point. Um, no, no, you know, I like to tell, uh, conservative audiences, you know, Donald Trump or Ron DeSantis, neither of them are going to save you, put them in the white house tomorrow.

00:08:23.860 And the reason for that is that you have an apparatus that has, uh, changed over a very long period of time in some cases, uh, you know, some, sometimes slowly and then suddenly. Um, but it's a, it's a, it's a system that's encrusted. It's, it's enthroned, uh, it's enshrined.

00:08:42.580 And in that system, you know, where, how power flows, uh, is, is just not really directly related to who comes into that office. And so I still think those things are important. I don't discount them. I'm not someone who says, oh, well, you know, it's, it's all over. Um, but the party is a vehicle to be used political parties and politicians, frankly, for the most part are going to be pushed forward.

00:09:09.060 Uh, they're going to be symbolic of actual, the actual flow of power and, and victory and the real battle almost at the end of that. Right. Almost like, almost like a bobber on the current, like that's the policy, you know?

00:09:22.280 So I, I've just come to the conclusion that the system is set up in such a way that they don't have the ability to, they don't have a magic wand to wave. Uh, and you know, I consider myself someone, I guess I know a lot of people in that world and formally studied it even if that matters, which it doesn't. Uh, but also, um, you know, also have examined it over the, you know, experience, interacted with this system.

00:09:47.420 So there's no way you solve the problem with law at this point, uh, when, when law has shaped something that's bigger than law, which is, you know, the contours of the entire, let's call it the actual constitution of the regime, the actual form or structure of the society in which you live has calcified into something that cannot be changed, uh, by, by moving politicians around, uh, you know?

00:10:14.880 Yeah, I think that's really important for people to hear. Again, it may feel obvious to some of us, but it's really essential. I think when people it's, it's especially because of the nature, I think of like political talk radio and TV and that kind of things, you know, the horse race thing is just, well, you know, focus on the candidate, focus on the details, look at the polling. Oh, let's get to the next cycle of issues. Let's zoom in on this next thing.

00:10:38.160 It's so easy to get swept up in that. That's what kind of churns and burns in the news media, but that's not the focus. Like you said, no politician is going to come in and sweep in and save you. And that doesn't mean it doesn't matter who's in the white house or who's getting elected.

00:10:53.940 And it doesn't mean that law doesn't have a role, but the really essential thing that I think you pointed out there is that law in and of itself, even if you could get those paths, which I think the Republicans have proven they're not very good at, but even if they could move the ball in that direction, what you don't control are all these things that are part of the system, but are outside of the direct apparatus.

00:11:16.600 You don't control the actual implementation of that law once it's passed. And so it's really key, I think, for conservatives and those on the right to understand that opposition is not simply one or two bills away, an election away, a news cycle away.

00:11:34.460 It's a long process. It's something that's involved. It's something that's complicated. And that doesn't mean it's not winnable, but it means that you need to shift your priorities and your understanding and your outlook if you want to win.

00:11:46.880 This is a lifelong project, not a two-year election where you can just go back to what you were doing before and ignore it once you're done.

00:11:54.920 Yeah. Can I just, I mean, I think that's, that's very well said. And I think one way to look at this would be, you know, Adrian, Adrian Vermeule, you know, Pope Adrian Comstock Vermeule III or whatever. Great, interesting guy. He was a law professor, right? If your, your, your audience doesn't know him. And he does, I mean, I disagree with him on some things, but he makes a great point about the power of the administrative state.

00:12:21.460 I would say, I would say right now, more important than any law being passed by far. I mean, a thousand fold. I would trade us not passing the right, not passing a law or possibly even electing any politician to electable federal office, putting anyone in power. I would trade both those things, electing a law or putting anyone in the political offices in the plumb book for the federal government.

00:12:49.440 For one thing. And that's control over everyone else who works in the federal government. Yeah. Right. I mean, if you, if you took all the employees of the administrative state, similar in a state government, if you took all the employees in the educational system, K through 12 in a state and the state university system, and you put them in with people who thought rightly about these things, that would be far more powerful than passing any damn law.

00:13:15.440 You wouldn't need to pass the law. Laws would take care of themselves or they just resist the law. So, I mean, that's the way to think about it. Because right now, you know, it's not very clear. It's not very clear. What, what do you do?

00:13:28.160 What do you do when you come in and you're, oh, you're in charge of this, this ship now. You're the captain of the ship. Here's the captain's quarters. Here's the three people who work for you. Everyone else here works on the ship too, but actually they all hate you and won't do what you say.

00:13:42.760 Yeah. Yeah, exactly. No, that's, that's something that I think, you know, the Trump administration learned, uh, in a very visceral way. And, you know, I've talked to guys like Andrew Klosser and it's clear that that lesson was learned. Um, that, which is good. There are people thinking about how to solve that problem. Now it's, I, hopefully the next time someone gets a crack at that, it won't look the same way because that will have been considered and there'll be a plan in place.

00:14:12.440 But that's a, it's a very difficult problem on a lot of levels because even if you're aware of the issue and even if you want to set up the mechanisms to fire bureaucrats and properly vet things and get people past that kind of stuff, what you're really looking at is an apparatus that is so large that it's difficult to overcome because you might be able to, you know, have some control over hiring and firing, but you don't have control of the education mechanism.

00:14:38.060 So the people who are, you know, certified, who are qualified, who have the credentials to become these administrators and these bureaucrats are steeped deeply in the ideology of your enemies.

00:14:50.120 You don't have the ability to control the legal system outside of it. So anyone serving inside the administration could basically be opening themselves up for endless lawsuits and testimony in front of Congress, because it's very clear that the left is more than willing to basically imprison any of its political enemies.

00:15:08.680 It has the option to, while the right just kind of twiddles its thumbs and complains about candidate quality.

00:15:14.680 I think the problems are obvious, like I said, we know about these, but the solutions that you've been talking about, the things that people are going to found are going to be really influential.

00:15:27.440 So let's talk a little bit about institutions, right? We know we want to control these bureaucracies, like we understand the importance of them.

00:15:35.440 But why do we need institutions outside of those in order to influence and control the bureaucracies that then could create kind of those essential changes?

00:15:47.120 Yeah. So you need to look at what forms. What we're talking about with institutions, I think, is what forms human souls, what forms human beings.

00:15:55.760 You know, and by form, we mean, not just bodily, right? Although they do form you bodily and what they allow you to eat or encourage you to eat, right?

00:16:05.880 What they encourage you to do with your body, whether that's to mutilate it or to, you know, to to nourish it.

00:16:14.220 But but the way in which we if you don't like the word soul, you can talk about behavior, like what shapes us.

00:16:20.620 Right. And and what shapes us are are things like media, which is educating us all the time.

00:16:27.680 The hours you spend on your screen throughout your whole life is really the primary educator in a way at this point for most humans.

00:16:35.860 And and education, obviously, in a direct way is trying to form you.

00:16:42.900 And when you look at all these institutions, I mean, the power they have is that they shape the people who then go into, you know, the government and they shape what everyone what the purpose is.

00:16:58.900 Right. What are you trying to accomplish with power?

00:17:01.460 And how does power masquerade itself often and tell you that it's well, this is really for the sake of the common good, because, look, every every no one no one ever says you need to support me because I need to have power.

00:17:17.160 Right. The way this works is similarly with, you know, and this isn't even very cynical or Machiavellian.

00:17:22.720 I think it's just true. You can have different takes on human nature.

00:17:26.560 But, you know, no one ever gives a tip. It comes to corruption or whatever, to the hotline because of the common good.

00:17:33.000 They do it because they hate that bastard over there. 0.96

00:17:36.260 You know, no one gets in trouble in our society right now for breaking the law because they just randomly happen to found to be bad. 0.99

00:17:42.200 It's that they're in a power war with someone else. Right. And then they leak.

00:17:45.500 That's just the way that's just the way these things work.

00:17:48.200 So, anyway, I mean, go back to your question. I mean, these institutions are what shape the goal, what the purpose is.

00:17:55.600 And you don't if you're if you're really just about power or your own self-interest, which is something every human being has within them, the desire for just to defend themselves.

00:18:05.040 You're always going to have to make an argument for justice or an argument for why this is good for everybody.

00:18:10.540 Right. And you can't just say it's good for me. That's pure tyranny.

00:18:14.620 Everyone recognizes it such and then you've got a legitimacy problem.

00:18:17.220 So so all these institutions shape that debate.

00:18:20.580 They shape what we think we're trying to achieve in common and who we are as human beings.

00:18:25.420 And the idea that you can just you know, you can waltz in with a couple of politicians at the top of the federal apparatus and solve the problem is sort of crazy.

00:18:33.620 Like that may have caused the problem over a long period of time.

00:18:36.720 Over a long period of time, you may be able to or, you know, maybe you could speed that up somehow if you take more power.

00:18:41.620 But you can you can rearrange that.

00:18:44.820 But you're talking about the way human beings think about themselves, what they think their purpose is, how they live their lives every day.

00:18:53.060 You know, you have to go to these other institutions.

00:18:55.020 And if they're controlled by people who you radically disagree with about these things, then, you know, you've got a real problem.

00:19:01.240 And that's the problem we face.

00:19:02.460 Yeah, that's that's very true.

00:19:05.380 You know, Gatana Mosca called this a political formula.

00:19:08.260 And a lot of people will, like you said, they'll get cynical and Machiavellian saying, well, you know, basically this political formula is just a justification for power.

00:19:18.320 It's just a cynical justification.

00:19:19.540 But Mosca says that actually it's really essential over the long term that you believe this, that, you know, while you can reduce this to this political formula, if people aren't bought in, including the rulers, eventually it shows.

00:19:35.340 And so when you have institutions, when you have power centers that are oriented towards the good of the people they're serving, when they do benefit the rulers, because they always will, but they also benefit the ruled.

00:19:48.800 When everybody's interests are aligned, that's really when power is flowing well.

00:19:53.440 That's when everyone benefits.

00:19:54.760 That's when everybody prospers.

00:19:56.640 And if you don't have that, if you have that that fundamental break, then you have a huge issue.

00:20:02.360 And so until you kind of realign those institutions to be benefiting people, to be shaping those souls, be shaping those minds, those hearts in a direction that's going to benefit both the rulers and the ruled, you're always going to have kind of a sick society.

00:20:18.920 And so I think in a lot of ways, the key is realigning those interests.

00:20:24.540 But to realign those interests, you need to know the people you're fighting for, right?

00:20:29.120 You need to understand the community you're fighting for if you want to better their lives.

00:20:34.140 You can't just have some kind of formless, shapeless blob.

00:20:37.620 You have to actually get in and look at the people and care about them.

00:20:41.400 And so one of the things I think that I've seen you kind of look at and focus on is building institutions that are looking to serve the interests of a group,

00:20:50.300 looking to serve people who are going to be aligned, who are going to have similar values, who are going to share something rather than going for this big, broad umbrella,

00:21:00.180 focusing on something that's truly going to benefit and build a reciprocal relationship with kind of a group that's going to move forward together.

00:21:07.960 Yeah, thank you for that.

00:21:09.220 I'm glad you noticed.

00:21:11.580 That is certainly the goal and easy to say, hard to do.

00:21:17.480 Look, I go back on this to the very simple way in which Aristotle talked about corruption,

00:21:22.960 which I think is the classic definition of it, which is really like whoever, whether it's one person,

00:21:29.100 whether it's a few people at the top or whether it's a democracy where there's a majority involved,

00:21:34.340 if that group of people decides that, you know, they're going to rule for the sake of themselves and maybe they're backscratching pals and not for the sake of everybody,

00:21:46.740 then the common good isn't served and it's corrupt in some way because, like you said, those interests aren't aligned.

00:21:53.400 And I think when it comes to these institutions, we need new ones because when we say like they're intrinsically corrupted,

00:22:00.400 I think people kind of struggle with that.

00:22:01.860 Like, what are you talking about?

00:22:02.600 We'll just reform this, reform that.

00:22:05.360 Well, what I mean by that is that they really have a deep-rooted lack of principle and purpose,

00:22:12.180 like that from which they arise, like what existence for being and like what they're trying to accomplish.

00:22:18.440 And this gets really, really practical.

00:22:20.460 You know, it's a really practical point, like you're saying, where what is, why does this exist?

00:22:24.760 It's kind of like what Trump used to ask in the Oval Office and scare the crap out of people with, you know,

00:22:28.680 why are we in NATO? 1.00

00:22:31.520 You're crazy. 1.00

00:22:32.600 You're, you're insane. 1.00

00:22:34.080 How dare you ask that? 1.00

00:22:35.880 I mean, why, why does this institution exist?

00:22:39.140 What's the purpose of it?

00:22:40.280 And when the institutions get corrupted and you lose sight of all that and you're just doing all this crap because you just have to do it and don't understand, that's when you need new ones.

00:22:49.040 And so there you say very simply, like, it's like the talent network, you know, I started doing this informally.

00:22:54.500 I don't know how it comes to me, but people will, people will see my, you know, they'll see what I'm saying about the scene.

00:23:01.160 And this is why the investors like me, by the way, you know, the finance guys have always, have always loved me because they, they see that I think they see that I see something about what's going on that, that maybe I'm willing to articulate that other people aren't and other people don't see.

00:23:15.660 And, you know, they, they want to, they want to know where, you know, where these things are going.

00:23:22.260 But very, very practically, they would, they would knock on the door and they'd say, hey, man, I really like your tweets, you know, can you get me out of my job?

00:23:32.740 Can I, do you know other people who believe this?

00:23:35.260 Because when you, when you take a stand and you're pre-canceled, you're, you say this and people see that you have some legitimacy to, you know, your background or professional, whatever you're doing.

00:23:44.940 Then they start flocking and saying, hey, do you know, can I be general counsel to a non-crazy, you know, firm?

00:23:50.280 Do you know this, you know, that.

00:23:51.580 That started, I don't know, like four years ago, at least four, four, three to four years ago.

00:23:57.600 And, you know, I noticed that.

00:24:00.220 And here we are now in, in 2023, and we've built this proto-talent network, which we've experimented on.

00:24:07.220 We've iterated over time.

00:24:08.660 And, you know, I don't do the details to some great tech guys who also went through woke companies and they understand hiring process.

00:24:15.920 And what were we doing there?

00:24:17.400 The problem is you can talk all you want on Twitter and you can have all the suits you want and it's great.

00:24:22.680 These people need to get out from under woke capital. 0.95

00:24:26.580 How are they going to do that?

00:24:28.460 Right?

00:24:28.700 I mean, how do they live a better life?

00:24:30.660 Well, the problem is they need to know, like, where else can I work?

00:24:33.160 Where else can I use my talents?

00:24:34.400 So let's create an in-between, you know, network where they sign up and we go to also the businesses who want them and we use our network to quietly build that and just allow people to get out from under woke capital and build things with like-minded people.

00:24:50.580 And to me, it's one of these things where, I don't know, I'm probably a psycho in this way because I always, some people are always like, what do you want to do, Matt?

00:24:57.800 I always end up doing what I think needs to be done.

00:25:02.000 You know, we need to figure it out.

00:25:03.240 And so the talent network is one simple way in which I say, look, we got to connect these people.

00:25:08.640 Let's figure this out.

00:25:09.660 And that will move the ball forward, I believe, in ways that go far beyond what most politicians are talking about.

00:25:16.700 Yeah, I agree with that so much.

00:25:19.300 I would trade a large number of theoretical political victories for a reliable alternative network of employment for people willing to stick their necks out there, right?

00:25:29.820 Like, I had this conversation so many times with people and I was shocked, but I guess I'm not anymore.

00:25:38.040 I would talk to people who, you know, I have more opportunity to talk to people higher up and, you know, with more influence.

00:25:44.840 And they would just say things like, well, you know, everybody just needs to stand up and say the truth.

00:25:50.020 And once they all, you know, everyone has the courage of their convictions to speak out, then the whole thing will turn around.

00:25:55.600 And I'm just like, guys, have you lost your mind?

00:25:58.160 Like, have you been out in the real world in the last five to 10 years?

00:26:02.620 I mean, the people, you know, forget the average worker, guys, you know, Papa John was fired from his own company.

00:26:09.880 He was the face of the company.

00:26:11.220 He was the Colonel Sanders of the company.

00:26:13.000 His face is on the side of the product.

00:26:16.080 And he got fired from his own company because, you know, he transgressed in, you know, some video somewhere.

00:26:22.600 Where you really think some average guy who's a widget in some massive bureaucracy or company somewhere, you know, is just going to, like, you know, stand up and speak the truth and they're going to be fine.

00:26:34.160 You can't ask people to charge machine gun nests if you don't have a plan for victory.

00:26:39.520 You know, one or two guys might be willing to walk into the firing line if they think that the rest of the guys are going to be able to move on.

00:26:47.160 But if every single person who runs forward gets mowed down, then no one's going to go.

00:26:52.060 You've got to have a plan for people.

00:26:54.420 And, you know, I just don't understand how people think that, you know, you've got guys like Jordan Peterson who, you know, a lot of valuable things to say over time.

00:27:03.440 But, you know, are attacking, you know, internet pseudonyms because, oh, well, you know, you're not having the courage of your conviction.

00:27:12.100 Well, guess what?

00:27:12.820 The people in your country who did that and stood up, you hung them out to dry.

00:27:16.700 They lost their jobs.

00:27:17.960 They got their bank account seized.

00:27:19.680 Like, that's not a way to encourage people.

00:27:22.960 You've got to have an alternative network if you want people to have families, if you want people to build, if you want people to be involved in the community.

00:27:29.640 They need a way to do that while also saying the truth.

00:27:33.820 You can't have them destroy themselves and destroy their futures standing up to a movement that you're not willing to stand up to yourself.

00:27:40.740 Oh, yeah.

00:27:41.300 I mean, yeah.

00:27:42.000 Yeah.

00:27:42.360 Amen to all that.

00:27:43.460 I mean, it's so, so true.

00:27:46.400 And I just, I don't understand.

00:27:50.060 You have to be out of touch in some way.

00:27:52.600 You know, I get why, like, the think tankers on the right will not get it because they haven't really, they don't even know anything about what's going on.

00:28:00.120 And I've worked at, you know, I think the best right-leaning think tank, but it's not like this.

00:28:05.340 But it's very, it's just very true.

00:28:06.800 Like, people who aren't in the scene, they're not talking or interacting to a lot of, you know, professionals.

00:28:15.780 They just have no idea what's going on.

00:28:17.380 At this point, you have to live under a rock not to see it.

00:28:19.480 But you're so right.

00:28:21.480 And it strikes me, like, it's really weird.

00:28:23.960 It's also really weird how the rhetoric around this is kind of poisonous. 0.97

00:28:29.440 Like, kind of Jordan Peterson on one side saying, oh, ha-ha, soothes, you know, you're cowards, which is completely crazy.

00:28:36.760 And then on the other side, like, there are people who are like, no, no, you know, never, never come out, never, just stay under their radar completely.

00:28:44.880 And I kind of come in between them and say, guys, there's things we can do on both sides of this, right?

00:28:49.260 I mean, of course, you're going to stay as sued.

00:28:51.760 You should protect yourself.

00:28:52.760 I mean, I was as sued before all this stuff.

00:28:54.940 I got to understand the value of it.

00:28:56.880 And look, the founders were, or the country, if you're talking to a boomer.

00:28:59.980 That's right, yeah.

00:29:00.820 Some of the founders were all sued.

00:29:02.480 Exactly.

00:29:03.960 Because they were, but so, so how do you, you know, how do you solve that problem?

00:29:07.800 And it's weird to me that people don't get it.

00:29:10.880 It's not like you're a coward if, you know, let's take a couple different examples.

00:29:15.260 Like, let's say you're in, like, some kind of professional, like a lawyer.

00:29:20.380 And you're, you know, for most, compared to most people, you're doing pretty well.

00:29:23.520 But you're still kind of paycheck to paycheck or not.

00:29:26.360 You're not like, you know, huge investor status.

00:29:29.120 You're not like a partner in the firm.

00:29:31.200 But you're up there.

00:29:32.260 Let's say you're a doctor in the same way.

00:29:34.820 Probably live in an urban area.

00:29:36.780 You're doing pretty well.

00:29:38.840 Maybe a little golden handcuffs going on.

00:29:40.780 But, you know, you're doing all right.

00:29:44.200 And you got a family.

00:29:46.000 And let's say, you know, you're a Christian.

00:29:49.340 And you're pretty conservative.

00:29:51.400 And, you know, you're, what?

00:29:53.700 You're in your mid-40s, right?

00:29:56.560 And this all snuck up all around you.

00:30:00.860 What the hell do you want this guy to do?

00:30:03.840 Right? 0.99

00:30:04.240 I mean, commit career suicide and say, like, I disagree with all of your woke doctrine. 0.89

00:30:09.700 And just, like, fall from the cliff, you know, onto the ground.

00:30:12.840 I mean, he's got kids, family.

00:30:15.820 Like, where is he going to go?

00:30:16.980 Where is he going to go work?

00:30:17.900 How is it going to work?

00:30:18.860 And what you see is that people are willing, the kind of people I'm talking about, they're not cowards.

00:30:25.140 They're just trying to figure out, what do I do that's not insane here?

00:30:28.200 Can I work with people who aren't losers, who are of equal talent, you know?

00:30:32.320 I'm willing to take a pay cut.

00:30:33.620 I'm willing to move to a red state.

00:30:35.600 But is this really feasible and possible?

00:30:39.140 And then let's go even higher real quick.

00:30:41.800 Because a lot of people will say this.

00:30:43.020 I was talking about this with my buddy, Matt Marsden, the other day.

00:30:46.260 And the whole thing is so true.

00:30:47.500 Like, you can't sit there and say, like, I used to do this all the time.

00:30:51.040 I still do it for some people.

00:30:52.540 I think once you have over $500 million, like, I want you to say something.

00:30:57.000 But there's this attitude you'll have where you have FU money, right?

00:31:00.220 And if you have FU money, why don't you do X, Y, and Z?

00:31:02.320 But the reality of human existence is it's not as if this is all cowardice either.

00:31:07.860 If you have FU money, they are going to come FU if you go off the reservation.

00:31:13.140 You have a lot to lose.

00:31:15.060 It's not as if, in fact, you probably have more to lose because they're going to care more about screwing you if you go off the reservation than they will somewhere else.

00:31:24.100 So, yes, you can go to war with them, the wealthier and more powerful you are.

00:31:29.140 But then you have to count the cost.

00:31:31.000 And then even if you're not a coward, you're just smart.

00:31:33.760 You're thinking, is it worth it, right?

00:31:36.160 Is it worth it that I go off all – I throw everything away that I have position-wise because, say, I say I support Donald Trump publicly?

00:31:45.360 Is that worth it or not?

00:31:46.920 Well, that's a legitimate question.

00:31:48.320 It's a legitimate prudential question, right?

00:31:50.920 So, to me, it's like what's reasonable here is how do we make it easier for all these people to take baby steps in the right direction?

00:31:59.960 Yes.

00:32:00.520 You know?

00:32:01.880 So, you've always been picky about your produce.

00:32:04.620 But now you find yourself checking every label to make sure it's Canadian.

00:32:08.780 So be it.

00:32:10.060 At Sobeez, we always pick guaranteed fresh Canadian produce first.

00:32:14.120 Restrictions apply.

00:32:15.080 See in-store or online for details.

00:32:16.760 Yeah, no, I think that's huge.

00:32:21.320 Like, if you really care about this, if you really want people to have the courage or your convictions, build something that allows it.

00:32:26.760 Build the safety net.

00:32:27.840 Build the network.

00:32:28.980 Create the – you know, not to invoke the evil name of unions here, but, you know, create mutual aid societies where if someone gets canceled, someone loses their job, someone, you know, gets taken out, you know, standing for something that you believe in,

00:32:44.740 they're not just gone tomorrow, they're not homeless tomorrow, they're not just completely disappeared tomorrow, create those networks where if someone has an option to exit, an option to escape,

00:32:55.320 they can suddenly say, all right, I'm going to stand up and I'm going to say this because tomorrow, maybe I take that pay cut, maybe I make that move, but my kids will still eat because there's another job lined up with people who agree with me.

00:33:07.800 And there's a way forward, you know, that I can see.

00:33:10.140 There's a line to victory where the pain, I may endure it, but there'll be something on the other side.

00:33:16.220 It's not just martyrdom.

00:33:17.260 It's not just jumping off the cliff, running into the machine gun fire, you know.

00:33:20.800 One of the other things that I think I've seen you talk about, which is essential, is also, you know, conservative or right-wing employers and businessmen, entrepreneurs walking the walk when it comes to credentialism, right?

00:33:33.380 We've got an entire system built around people paying vast amounts of money, taking out huge loans, putting themselves in indentured servitude for the rest of their lives so they can sit in a progressive seminary, fund woke ideology, and then come out and parrot it in the halls of power for the rest of their existence.

00:33:52.980 Because if they don't, there's a financial gun to their head.

00:33:56.120 And if there's going to be any escape from this, then conservative businessmen, guys who are putting this stuff together, it's not enough to just to build the network.

00:34:03.920 You need to have a system where you can vet and employ people who are willing, capable, able, trainable, but didn't devote themselves to this, didn't buy completely into this indoctrination system.

00:34:17.420 And if you're not willing to do that, if you're not willing to take a chance on people who have the ability, but decided that maybe, you know, eight years of piling money into this system and sitting in front of professors that hate them isn't worth it.

00:34:31.580 Like, if you're not willing to engage with those people, then you're missing out on probably some of the best upcoming talent.

00:34:36.080 Yeah, boy, I couldn't agree with you more there.

00:34:40.980 My whole sort of educational background was rebellious in the sense that I did the dumbest thing money-wise.

00:34:48.640 You know, I just went from undergrad on to where I could read the books I wanted to read and study the actual things I wanted to study.

00:34:55.760 Crazy idea, I know.

00:34:57.080 Yeah, I know, right.

00:34:58.340 But, and all the stuff I wanted to study was like, what was the founding really like?

00:35:03.960 Like, you know, what is like a traditional Western elite education for like 2,000 years.

00:35:09.880 But, you know, it drives me nuts.

00:35:12.520 Here's the problem.

00:35:13.660 The problem is that when you are really thick into credentialism, like you, it really, really matters, you know, where you went to school and you got that Harvard degree or whatever.

00:35:23.320 What's hilarious is New Founding is all against credentialism.

00:35:27.580 And I do have, like, we need to put a quota against the Harvard people who have turned traitors against their schools who are working there.

00:35:36.080 When I was growing up, let me put it this way, to show the depth of my emotion here.

00:35:40.000 When I was growing up, I remember going to these things, it's like conservative, you know, young Lebowski urban achievers for conservative, you know, events.

00:35:48.320 And you go to them and be like, oh, yeah, look at the young people, they're great.

00:35:52.460 And you kind of be like, you know, I was talking to that guy from that elite school and I don't want to say anything, but he didn't even know the books I was talking about.

00:36:00.800 You know, he didn't even read those books.

00:36:03.440 And we're all supposed to be on the same side.

00:36:05.940 And when you say something like that, I'd be like, oh, you must be envious, son.

00:36:09.180 You know, you didn't go to that school.

00:36:10.500 I'm like, no, no, I'm literally saying, like, maybe he's smarter than me because it's really just a giant IQ test in your mind.

00:36:15.660 Maybe, but he hasn't read the books, though.

00:36:20.100 Right.

00:36:20.540 If you're relying on credentialism to the extent you are now, that means that you have lost a notion of what the substance of education is and what actual skills you need in your business.

00:36:33.300 So, in other words, you don't have the ability to judge yourself or your institution or your business doesn't have the ability to judge yourself who actually has the skills you need.

00:36:43.200 You're lazily relying on that piece of paper and other people to do that work for you.

00:36:49.140 That shows a lack of confidence.

00:36:51.380 That shows a kind of insecure bureaucratic mindset that means things are already far along the route to decay.

00:36:58.800 And what I would say is if I look back on the older people that I respected in my life, you know, some of them had elite degrees, et cetera. 0.91

00:37:09.540 But they were all people who were like, they just saw talent and they had the confidence to say, I don't give a crap where this guy went to school.

00:37:18.620 Like, that was a smart essay. 0.83

00:37:19.840 Like, he's coming over here.

00:37:21.240 Or the business guy who, like, you know, is like, I don't care.

00:37:24.280 Like, I came up from the mailroom.

00:37:25.900 This kid, you know, has some skills.

00:37:27.560 We're going to put him in here.

00:37:28.260 I don't care whether you've got these degrees.

00:37:29.860 And we've lost that because we've lost the confidence that we actually know intellectually and practically or, you know, business-wise who can do what.

00:37:40.420 And so, look, if you're a conservative, you know, out there and they're out there who's a CEO of a big company, you're going to have to do the work.

00:37:49.720 You know, you cannot – if you keep funding the system, it will destroy you.

00:37:53.800 It will destroy your business.

00:37:55.280 Maybe you'll be able to retire, but if you keep going by these degrees now and you don't get the message now, you're not going to get it.

00:38:01.540 Now, there are people who do understand that, but they don't know what to do, right?

00:38:06.120 They're a CEO.

00:38:07.080 They realize, like, everyone in marketing is all – I don't want to get in trouble.

00:38:14.080 Everyone in these – you know, I know they're all against me.

00:38:17.800 They're all very woke.

00:38:19.140 And I know the advertising agency is basically like pedo-satanism.

00:38:22.980 I get that, you know.

00:38:23.920 Or maybe they don't, but we can make them aware of that.

00:38:26.680 I mean, the worst people possible.

00:38:28.760 They hate me.

00:38:29.460 They give millions of dollars to everyone who hates me.

00:38:31.800 And yet, I'm giving a $50 million contract every year, right, to this advertising agency or to this law firm that persecutes my side and people who believe what I believe.

00:38:44.680 Now, that is a solvable problem, though, given what we were saying earlier.

00:38:50.440 Given that if you looked at a bunch of advertising agencies across the country, you could cobble together multiple alternatives with people of equal talent who've worked at those places.

00:39:01.000 You could cobble together – law firms are already emerging of people, if you care about the credentials and all that, who have equal talent who just would be the non-woke alternative.

00:39:10.060 And that's what we have to actively build.

00:39:12.400 And then as far as getting the younger kids, you know, not from these schools, there it's like you've got to look at institutional alternatives, right?

00:39:20.000 You've got to look at other institutions that are outlying educational institutions, look at those alternatives, start to realize the top 5%, 10% of those kids are going to be just as good, in fact, way better than your other students because they're actually educated.

00:39:32.100 And then also, God forbid, that multi-billion dollar businesses had to do this, but also, why don't you develop tests for what you know you need yourself?

00:39:43.220 Yes, yes, exactly.

00:39:45.060 This is the one that always gets me, right?

00:39:46.720 Like, tech has already solved this in many ways.

00:39:49.240 You already have a lot of these, you know, IT certifications and stuff.

00:39:56.720 You already have these tests built in.

00:39:58.480 Do you know how to use this program?

00:40:00.140 Are you already well-versed in this stuff?

00:40:02.000 Can you build this stuff?

00:40:03.180 And you just go in, you get your certification, you move on.

00:40:05.900 A lot of guys don't even need to go to college for this stuff.

00:40:08.520 They just go ahead, they start taking the certification test, and they're done.

00:40:11.860 If you're serious about this, create a test that, you know, checks out, you know, does this person understand this process?

00:40:19.820 Are they capable of it?

00:40:21.120 Or even, yeah, here's an even more radical one.

00:40:24.080 Why don't you have a program where you train promising people?

00:40:28.300 Where you, I don't know, you could take someone into your business, and they, you know, could learn under someone who's familiar with the process.

00:40:36.380 We could call it, I don't know, apprenticeship.

00:40:39.800 Something like that, you know.

00:40:40.940 It's a wild idea, never been tried before.

00:40:44.720 But I'm willing to bet that, you know, somewhere out there, there's an option for this.

00:40:49.140 But it does drive me nuts when there's just this lazy and slavish acceptance.

00:40:55.260 Like, as long as you are bought into this idea that you have to hire from an institution that is basically guaranteed to build a fifth column inside your own organization, yeah, you're just doomed.

00:41:07.960 And like you said, it's an admission of incompetence because what you're saying, what a lot of these people are saying is I am not confident in my ability to, A, vet management, and, B, find enough people who are then themselves capable of identifying and installing talent inside my institution.

00:41:27.600 They're saying, basically, I need to offload all of this work onto institutions that hate me because I am incapable of finding people to do it myself, and that is just profound weakness.

00:41:38.440 You've got to have the confidence, you have to have the willingness, you have to make the investment, and you have to be able to provide alternatives like testing that would allow you to say, okay, this guy's smart, he was willing to look at this.

00:41:49.900 You know, I've got a friend who, you know, otherwise was, he was a burnout for a long time, and he didn't really get anything together with his life.

00:41:57.380 And then one day he kind of figured out that there was this manufacturing place that had high-skilled employees, and if you went in and you took the test, you could start at a really good job and have a family and have benefits if you just learned this particular skill, took the test, and he didn't have to go to college, he didn't have to even pay for any kind of tech college stuff.

00:42:18.780 He got the manual, he learned the stuff, he mastered it, he took the test, and he started, you know, he was able to make a good living, have a family, have kids, just being able to do that.

00:42:29.780 He was smart, he was capable, he just didn't have the avenue to realize that without staring at a wall of debt and four to eight years of committing himself to something he hated.

00:42:40.260 And you have to be able to provide alternatives like that if you want to go ahead and find people who aren't completely bought into this system.

00:42:47.600 Yeah, no, it's exactly right.

00:42:48.980 I mean, I think one thing to prey on, because what I find works the best with, let's say, you know, elites or people we need to convince is not so much rational argument as shame.

00:43:00.920 And they don't like being shamed, because they think they're supposed to know this, and they're supposed to be that, and they're more self-conscious than a lot of regular people.

00:43:12.200 And so the shame should be, you don't have, like what you said in the beginning, you don't have the confidence to make this choice yourself.

00:43:18.200 And I will tell you, it doesn't matter what field it is, whether any part of business, education, media, finance, whatever. 0.90

00:43:24.400 Those old guys who are just like, who had, it's the best if they have the elite degree, right, but they didn't give a crap about it.

00:43:32.300 They just recognized talent and would take it wherever they were.

00:43:35.100 The idea you could work yourself up through the mailroom, right?

00:43:37.920 I mean, that is what's lacking.

00:43:40.820 It's essential to shame them on it.

00:43:42.840 And there are a thousand routes to shortcut all this BS.

00:43:47.720 And you pointed out a lot of them.

00:43:49.340 I mean, apprenticeship, it's like Abraham Lincoln didn't go to law school, people.

00:43:52.380 You know, he studied some things, and he worked with a lawyer, God forbid, to learn how to be a lawyer.

00:43:59.660 Ultimately, that's how you learn anyway.

00:44:01.720 We have to have law schools? 0.95

00:44:03.340 That's insane.

00:44:04.180 That's a cartel.

00:44:05.040 That doesn't make any sense, especially now. 0.99

00:44:07.100 Get rid of them all, like firing squad for all that.

00:44:09.340 I mean, we can solve these problems by simplifying things in many ways.

00:44:14.600 And, you know, of course, I don't want to idolize the past, but I do think back in my own family.

00:44:20.160 I mean, I have a grandfather on one side who he got an associate's degree, pretty fancy, and went and ended up working for IBM the rest of his life, basically.

00:44:30.760 And, you know, very engineer mind.

00:44:33.540 You know, he stayed solving the problems rather than moving up in management, even to the point of more money because he just liked to do that.

00:44:40.640 And, you know, I think about him a lot because he was very talented, right, in the peculiar smarts that he had.

00:44:48.800 And he was able to utilize it and provide a life for his kids, even though he was the child of Swedish immigrants, right?

00:44:55.560 On the other side, you've got a farming family out in the country.

00:44:59.620 And my grandfather there, he's like the black sheep of the family, ran away to California for a while.

00:45:04.780 You know, he had some time, comes back, you know, high school education.

00:45:10.260 What does he do?

00:45:11.140 He goes to a factory.

00:45:12.420 He's able to provide for his family.

00:45:14.360 And he's the guy who, you know, had that job for enough to get his retirement.

00:45:18.260 And he's reading books about history and whatnot in his free time, right?

00:45:21.800 Because he has leisure time, he's not – the whole way in which the calculus that's being used here for prestige is also screwing us up, right?

00:45:33.860 Because the idea of what a decent way of life means and is has also been completely screwed up.

00:45:40.480 And they're like Mike Rowe's whole thing, right?

00:45:42.240 He's totally right on.

00:45:43.520 Like we don't respect people who actually can make things and do things that we all need to live.

00:45:48.520 That's insane, you know?

00:45:49.880 So I don't even know where to begin with it, right, in some ways.

00:45:53.520 But we have to take these small steps to delegitimize their system and then small steps to take on different facets of this and find things that actually work to just propel people forward into real jobs.

00:46:08.040 And then third, I guess, is the last thing I said, which is really important, which is what you do a lot of and we all try to do, which is just delegitimize their prestige, right, and just mock their credentialing system.

00:46:18.820 It's like you're so lame, you have to use this old system in a country of 350 million people with the same like elite schools that existed 300 years ago, you know, here.

00:46:29.020 You can't find another way, you know?

00:46:30.920 I mean, you don't have no other way to gauge talent.

00:46:33.720 And meanwhile, look at these places.

00:46:35.160 They're atrophying.

00:46:36.180 They're cesspools.

00:46:37.140 Yeah, I think a big thing there is the delegitimization.

00:46:43.260 And I wanted to ask you about this because there are lots of arguments about entryism versus parallelism, right?

00:46:52.200 Like, do you try to recapture these institutions?

00:46:56.200 Do you long march your way back into the existing institutions?

00:46:59.660 Or can you build parallel?

00:47:02.080 And if you do build parallel, how do you keep the existing institutions from basically just coming around and snuffing you out once you have some level of success?

00:47:11.620 So I wanted to ask you about that.

00:47:13.220 Do you feel like it's an either or?

00:47:16.080 Is it a both and?

00:47:17.560 What is your strategy of entryism versus parallelism?

00:47:21.000 So I was always inclined to the parallel, really, my entire life and was told that, no, that's impossible.

00:47:29.100 No, that's impossible.

00:47:30.640 And now it's like, thank God for anyone who did it 10, 15 years ago because everything they built is like the only thing you have, right?

00:47:37.520 So I tend towards it.

00:47:39.200 On the other hand, of course, I have a modified pincer movement.

00:47:42.340 I do think there are, of course, there are institutions and places that you can reform or take shots at.

00:47:48.940 I would just say, like, there's a lot of it to me that's complete trash at this point and no one should be wasting their time other than maybe like, you know, it's like a behind enemy lines kind of recon.

00:48:01.980 And maybe you're doing some good there by taking a few kids out of the Ivy League schools a year or whatever.

00:48:07.700 That's fine, you know, but way less emphasis should be placed on that.

00:48:11.900 Now, the institutions where you can perform or enter and do some damage do exist.

00:48:18.300 And probably the best example of that is the state system if you're in a red state, right?

00:48:23.300 I mean, there, I don't know if this is quite the long march.

00:48:26.640 It will take a while if it's successful at all.

00:48:29.960 But it would be open warfare as DeSantis is doing, you know, in Florida.

00:48:35.380 Yeah.

00:48:35.640 Where you're just saying, look, we're not giving up these institutions.

00:48:38.740 This is our state.

00:48:40.280 This is the red state mindset.

00:48:41.980 This is the Florida blueprint.

00:48:43.060 And I'm going to put people on the board who I know have a sense of what education is and ought to be and are against all of your BS.

00:48:50.520 And we're going to, you know, I'll go to war and use that. 0.99

00:48:53.000 And we're going to march through.

00:48:54.340 Exactly.

00:48:55.320 So, you know, I don't know if that's what most people have in mind.

00:48:58.240 They used to have in mind, like, we'll slowly reform and convince people from within.

00:49:02.720 But if you mean, like, slowly take over in a place where you do have the upper hand, like a red state where there's a strong governor, absolutely.

00:49:12.560 Now, let's take the private sector.

00:49:15.160 There, I think it's good.

00:49:16.900 It's good for publicity's sake to attack, like, the Fortune 500 or Fortune 100 with the shareholder revolts on our side.

00:49:26.140 God forbid we did that, you know, to attack them publicly.

00:49:30.440 I don't think, though, you're going to really do much.

00:49:35.040 Like, Disney, for instance, are they going to fire their creatives, you know, who are very interested in children?

00:49:43.960 No, they're not.

00:49:45.680 So, they're the enemy.

00:49:49.160 They're on a swan dive, I hope, into oblivion.

00:49:51.940 We need to make sure that happens.

00:49:53.500 But you're not going to, like, slowly take over Disney.

00:49:56.180 That's crazy, right, to my mind.

00:49:58.660 Are there medium-sized companies, though, where it's still potentially could go either way?

00:50:05.380 Absolutely.

00:50:06.300 Absolutely.

00:50:07.300 So, to me, it's about realistically what can you reform and what is so far gone that it's just the enemy that needs to be destroyed.

00:50:13.960 Yeah, I think that's a really good point.

00:50:17.160 And this is why my argument continues to be for DeSantis in Florida, staying in Florida, is the essential work that can get done there, right?

00:50:26.520 Like, I am very skeptical of the ability of entryism in the federal bureaucracy.

00:50:33.520 Like, completely controlling and reforming those, at least at this point, seems almost impossible.

00:50:38.720 But there is a real option of doing what DeSantis is doing in Florida, putting guys like Rufo on college boards and that kind of thing.

00:50:46.980 That is something that he really can control.

00:50:49.800 And you can start to get conservatives comfortable with the idea of we fire enemies and we hire friends.

00:50:57.580 The end, right?

00:50:58.880 Like, because you actually have real control of the hiring and firing mechanism.

00:51:03.460 And you can get people used to essential tactics that absolutely have to be taken if you want to go ahead and make any headway.

00:51:10.760 Yeah, I basically agree with that.

00:51:13.320 I think there are some parts of the federal bureaucracy you could potentially, excuse me, worm your way in or whatever.

00:51:21.020 But you're not going to, like, take the whole thing over.

00:51:23.120 You could do some good.

00:51:24.860 But that's a different dynamic, very different dynamic than you have at the state level.

00:51:30.800 And look, I think there's a ton that can be done if you have leaders that are willing to say what's required.

00:51:41.420 And when you say, like, hiring and firing friends and enemies, everyone thinks today, like, this is some, like, radical, rebellious, you know, thing. 0.97

00:51:52.240 I think that's asinine. 0.92

00:51:53.860 I mean, I think this is common sense. 0.81

00:51:55.700 Like, you're talking about people who disagree about such fundamental things that you can't really have a society with them long term.

00:52:05.180 You know, you're disagreeing about such radically fundamental things about what a human being is, what a family is, what a man is, what, you know, sexual relationships are, what a citizen is, what a nation is.

00:52:18.780 You disagree about all that, like, you disagree basically about more fundamental things than a lot of religious wars have been fought over.

00:52:27.420 That's right.

00:52:27.880 That's exactly right.

00:52:28.680 And you're going to bring these people into your business in some higher leadership position and expect that everything goes well.

00:52:35.540 Well, it's about talent.

00:52:36.760 There's plenty of talent in the world, dude.

00:52:38.680 Like, this is the crazy thing, too.

00:52:40.220 You think that in a country of this many people, hundreds of millions of people, you can't find equal talent at when you have all these other universities, you know, some of them which are fairly selective, like the top 5%, you know, just maybe the top, if it's just an IQ test, okay, the top percent may be a little smaller.

00:52:59.900 But even that is way overrated here when you look at the actual talent on offer.

00:53:04.140 So, anyway, the friends and enemies things, it takes you a long way.

00:53:10.280 You go back to, like, old school businesses in America for the last 100 years, there's a lot of friends and enemies that will take you a long way.

00:53:17.200 And this, you're so right about this.

00:53:20.280 This reaction, like, oh, we can't do that.

00:53:22.160 Something about that would be wrong.

00:53:23.480 No, no.

00:53:24.280 Something about that would be right, would be far more right than the wrong thing you're doing now, which is going to destroy you, your business, and America.

00:53:31.680 And the more that we can figure out, like you and I and others, how to explain that to people and show it to people in action, the better.

00:53:40.560 Again, I think DeSantis' move on that board is a step in the right direction because he's not messing around.

00:53:45.180 It's like, nope, you can tell the kind of people I want, I want to build a Hillsdale-type school here.

00:53:50.120 And if you don't like it, you know, and that's what you need to do in business.

00:53:54.560 The first thing you should do, like Musk, I mean, he played kind of nice with them for a while.

00:53:59.180 I don't think he's fully on our side, but over time, what has he done?

00:54:02.880 He's just gotten rid of people.

00:54:04.480 Yeah.

00:54:05.640 And I don't want to just rant the way we read this, right?

00:54:08.940 Yeah, no, it's good.

00:54:10.520 I want to ask you one more thing.

00:54:12.740 We only got to talk about the business stuff, and maybe we need to line up another episode so we can talk about the rest here.

00:54:18.620 But I want to make sure I get at least one more question on the business side before we kind of wrap things up here.

00:54:24.060 And this is a big deal, but I know not everyone has an answer for this.

00:54:30.180 This is a very difficult question, so if you don't have an immediate answer, it's okay.

00:54:33.080 We can just rumin on it for a second.

00:54:35.160 But the finance issue, right?

00:54:38.000 One of the biggest problems that I think a lot of people are looking at when you're looking at this business stuff is, yeah, you can do all this stuff, right?

00:54:45.280 Like we can hire for the right people, and we can build these networks, and we can select for competence and for ideological alignment or just shared values, whatever.

00:54:55.820 We can do all this stuff.

00:54:57.000 We can hire the canceled people and give them shelter. 1.00

00:54:59.380 What happens when the banks cut you off?

00:55:01.640 What happens when your business is trying to scale to a point where you compete with other people who have infinite funding from all of the global American empire stuff, and you can't compete because you can't get a loan?

00:55:15.520 Like how do people deal with the fact that it seems like the entire financial system is moving in a way to try to align itself to be able to cancel businesses, even guys like Musk, who might stand up and make a difference in this way?

00:55:33.700 Yeah, no, I think that is one of the central questions I ask myself on a daily basis.

00:55:37.540 It's one of the central questions that guides what I'm doing now, why I kind of threw everything to the wind in order to come and do what I'm doing now, and the simple answer in my mind is if we don't build that, it's done, and we still have some time.

00:55:56.220 I don't think it's over.

00:55:56.960 We have some window of time to build an economy within an economy that potentially could scale up fairly quickly, and I do believe that.

00:56:08.020 But of course, that system is also incompetent, though.

00:56:12.520 It's very powerful, but it's incompetent and sort of blundering, and it wants to die in some way.

00:56:19.260 And this is the good thing about the techies, right?

00:56:21.600 This is the good thing about the tech guys, like the actual disruption, like actual disrupt the world.

00:56:25.720 That's what I want to do.

00:56:26.780 Not the fake Silicon Valley, like, oh, we're going to disrupt this company.

00:56:29.660 I want to disrupt that civic order, right, that commercial order that is now wielding outsized control throughout the world.

00:56:38.860 And what I would say is I think there's a window of time in order to build the elements and to separate people out who want to separate out to build those financial structures.

00:56:49.320 So, you know, we – and to me, it's a race.

00:56:53.540 So, number one, like a good example that everyone does know about publicly is the states, right, the red states saying we're not going to go with BlackRock anymore.

00:57:04.660 We're not going to use these big investment vehicles.

00:57:07.280 What does that free up, right?

00:57:08.520 It frees up billions of dollars potentially, say, to 25 red states that could go now to large financial structures that are non-woke or they're on our side.

00:57:19.160 And they start, you know, cycling the money around.

00:57:21.700 Like, I will say this as a – I don't know if a white pill, but it's something that is somewhat positive.

00:57:28.600 These people – like, there's a lot of people who do realize this is a problem who are in finance.

00:57:33.160 Like, finance is the most black-filled area of the elite sectors that I interact with, you know, and I've seen this for the last five years.

00:57:41.460 It's much more likely that someone in finance, as opposed to media, even if they're a pontificator or politics, God forbid, you know, they're all cucks anyway, or these other – like, tech, to understand how bad things are.

00:57:57.400 But the people who are on our side in finance are like, oh, yeah, dude, this ship has sailed.

00:58:03.820 If not, what can we do, like, before the end?

00:58:06.760 You know, can we separate now?

00:58:09.720 So I don't think it's over.

00:58:12.760 You see the red states taking that step.

00:58:14.760 That is freeing up.

00:58:16.100 You see a lot of people behind the scenes trying to create the kind of investment banks.

00:58:20.660 But the fundamental thing is it's not just about the banking, like everyone thinks, you know, which is the way they ultimately cut you off on the front end.

00:58:29.160 That's what you see.

00:58:30.380 It's you need capital, right?

00:58:32.160 You need investors as a group to be channeling money out from underwoke capital into businesses that are actually making money, right?

00:58:41.740 Not American flag grifts or whatever, like, you need real businesses that make things in America, right, that are aligned with investors who are aligned, and you need to get that money out from underwoke capital.

00:58:53.340 And that is something that, in our offices, we're working on every day, both in microcosm and, like, big picture, what do we do?

00:59:00.720 And I don't have this, you know, there's no magic wand here solution, but I guess I'd just say I think you're absolutely right that that is a fundamental reality, and if we don't resolve that reality as soon as we can, I don't see a lot of, you know, it's time to go to Montana.

00:59:20.000 All right, so we'll go ahead and leave it there for now.

00:59:23.940 A lot more maybe to discuss on another episode, but we're hitting up to that hour.

00:59:28.240 We have a few questions from the audience, so I'm going to go ahead and run those through real quick.

00:59:34.700 I've got three super chats that came from Brad Denton, but he put them on before the stream started, so I can't throw them up there, but I'm just going to go ahead and read them out.

00:59:44.380 Brad, thank you so much for your super chats.

00:59:46.540 They were very generous.

00:59:47.320 I really appreciate it.

00:59:48.720 He says, hi, Aaron McIntyre.

00:59:50.840 Been a friend since you were doing UR Explainers over Magic the Gathering.

00:59:55.340 Thank you very much.

00:59:56.060 Well, very beginning of the show, a lot of duct tape, but we got it going.

01:00:01.780 Glad to see your stocks at a all-time high.

01:00:05.280 Also, long-time fan of a few more abbreviations there.

01:00:13.040 I'm not sure all of those.

01:00:14.260 As a pastor, I preach on the need for Christians to not buy from people who hate us, which I think Matthew Peterson would definitely agree with,

01:00:22.000 and to get involved in building new works to the glory of God.

01:00:24.660 How can pastors and churches support your work?

01:00:27.560 How can I talk to other pastors about your projects?

01:00:30.340 It will take us a long time to build a worthy future for our children.

01:00:34.700 Thank you for tasteful banter.

01:00:36.320 This is better than a wine bar.

01:00:37.880 Well, that's good to hear.

01:00:39.380 So, Matthew, maybe you have a few thoughts on this.

01:00:43.060 I know a lot of people of faith want to get involved, and one of the things that I think people of faith are hesitant about is the ghettoization of their efforts, right?

01:00:56.660 They make these efforts to try to fund projects, to try to make something meaningful that impacts the culture, to grow people.

01:01:05.020 And then they end up getting kind of chintzy or cheesy projects that only deliver kind of substandard stuff to the choir.

01:01:12.840 How can they spend their time well in a way that's going to kind of grow their communities and also raise up maybe young leaders who may be able to then enter the kind of institutions you're talking about?

01:01:26.800 Yeah, by the way, I've seen this stuff about Montana.

01:01:30.580 I certainly didn't mean anything bad about Montana.

01:01:32.900 I love Montana.

01:01:33.700 I wish I could live there.

01:01:36.600 I'm secretly okay with the gulag scenario and go up there as much as possible, and I love Wyoming, too.

01:01:46.560 Look, I think there's a lot.

01:01:48.380 First off, we need to acknowledge that in the past, a lot of this stuff was chintzy and just didn't work.

01:01:56.800 When it comes to religious communities and the pastors, and I feel like just the building of real community that helps people in the local level, the parish level, the church level, is kind of like the microcosm of what we're talking about here.

01:02:13.820 And really, it's the tip of the spear for it, which is making sure that those parishioners, those people that you serve, that they're able to help each other in this way when it comes to jobs, when it comes to what their kids should do, et cetera.

01:02:29.200 Because if you build that there, this almost sounds platitudinous, but it's really not, then all of a sudden, all these other things fall into place for the larger network of people and everything else.

01:02:42.840 So, in other words, you want to build these communities where people are starting to think much more practically about how they help each other as believers or having these shared values or however you want to describe it practically, which might mean building a school, right?

01:03:00.160 Which might mean making sure the church as a whole is trying to shape a school that allows for education.

01:03:05.920 It may mean making sure that people feel comfortable talking about their job situation within the church, right?

01:03:14.200 There's someone they can talk to that's basically like their new founding type person who's going to sit there and say, what's going on?

01:03:20.800 Like, oh, this company is woke, blah, blah, blah.

01:03:22.760 Should you fight it?

01:03:23.500 Should you go?

01:03:24.820 Are there other opportunities?

01:03:26.660 And I think that increasingly, people do get it.

01:03:31.480 They're just not used to at the local level, which is insane, by the way, right?

01:03:35.620 I mean, we've all been taught, like, everyone's been taught, like, oh, there's a 1-800 commercial for this charity that will help the doggies, and the doggies are dying, and we need to help them.

01:03:47.480 And they feel like they did something good if they send a check into some charity they know nothing about nationally.

01:03:53.620 And the idea of, like, actually having a way to contribute to something that's meaningful locally, like, oh, I don't know about that.

01:04:02.580 It sounds awkward, you know?

01:04:03.700 So I do think that the churches can actually implement some of this locally, if that makes sense.

01:04:09.080 No, I think that's a really good message, because, yeah, you're right.

01:04:12.260 So many people just want to outsource everything.

01:04:14.140 Oh, wait till someone else founds this.

01:04:15.800 Wait till someone else creates this.

01:04:17.620 Wait till someone else five states away builds this, because they're really going to care about my community.

01:04:21.720 No.

01:04:22.380 Like, you have to do this.

01:04:23.980 Like, sorry, but it's time to roll up the sleeves.

01:04:26.820 And if you're not in a position to change it, that's okay.

01:04:31.100 But you need to talk to the people in your area that are and make that happen.

01:04:35.500 And by the way, for Brad, it's like, who in your church community and your extended church community around you, what businesses are there that are aligned already?

01:04:45.420 Right?

01:04:45.640 I mean, I want to know about them now.

01:04:48.040 Like, I go back to the, you know, the Catholic, they always have the same, like, printed, you know, everywhere is the same with the local ads in the back, right?

01:04:57.260 And now I'm like, are these people actually aligned?

01:04:59.660 If I knew that they were, I'm going there, you know, and I want them to tell me that.

01:05:04.620 Yeah, yeah, and I want to make it clear, guys, and, you know, there's a delicate balance with your church, because your church and politics will intersect because your religious faith should inform your political practice.

01:05:20.200 But make sure you're not having your political practice dictate the honoring of your faith, right?

01:05:27.260 Like, it should flow from what God wants and the good of your community to then the manifestation of in your politics, not the other way around.

01:05:38.120 And so even though you might have to discuss some level of politics because of just the nefarious nature of what's happening in the world today, remember to keep God and the community centered in your church.

01:05:52.840 And I think that if you have a church that cares about people and is taking care of people and is finding jobs for members and supporting people and taking care of those who are maybe lost their job because they got canceled, that kind of thing.

01:06:06.120 If your church is supporting people, then you will naturally be supporting people who also agree with you when it comes to, you know, this kind of stuff.

01:06:15.180 But don't make that the prerequisite alone.

01:06:17.320 Make sure that you're serving God in the community first.

01:06:19.700 And I think that will naturally bring you to then supporting things that will manifest themselves positively in kind of the political arena.

01:06:26.460 The way I put it really quick is exactly right, is that serve God first, and then from that should arise a way of life that's very practical.

01:06:36.120 Like, you don't have to call it political.

01:06:38.040 It's not, I mean, it is political in like a really broad sense, but of like Aristotle's notion, but in the way most people use political, it's not political.

01:06:46.340 This is about how you live your life practically because of your service to God, so in the church.

01:06:54.100 Absolutely.

01:06:55.340 Christian Smithers here, or sorry, Smitherman for $10.

01:06:59.600 Thank you very much.

01:07:00.840 The right aren't conservatives since we don't want to conserve current culture.

01:07:05.020 Let us be called builders instead.

01:07:07.420 Few negative connotations for that term.

01:07:09.900 I mean, yeah, the problem with conservative, and, you know, I tell this to conservatives all the time, is that, you know, we are no longer the movement that is trying to protect what exists now, right?

01:07:21.720 What exists now is horrible.

01:07:23.840 It's corrupt. 0.85

01:07:24.900 It's decadent.

01:07:26.900 It's hostile to a good way of life, and so the term conservative, you know, just kind of has to go as attached.

01:07:34.560 I use it because people understand it colloquially, but it's not a useful organizing tool.

01:07:39.720 The same is true, I think, of actually the dissonant right.

01:07:41.900 While it's useful as a kind of a loose collection to identify something very quickly, it's not a very good name.

01:07:47.300 It's not a very good organizing principle, you know, builder, you know, might have to work on that, but it has the right connotation, right?

01:07:53.580 It has the right understanding of, you know, that foundation that you are creating to move forward.

01:08:00.700 You're no longer there to conserve the corrupt system that's falling apart.

01:08:04.320 You're assembling something that's going to be useful for the future, and I think that's what everyone needs to understand is powerful, and that's why I wanted to talk to someone like Michael, because I think he does, you know, understand that in a very profound way.

01:08:15.500 Yeah, I mean, I love this comment, Christian.

01:08:19.020 I mean, I struggle with this, too, because I just don't want to use the word conservative.

01:08:23.440 Like, I'll have editors insert it into what I'm writing.

01:08:25.920 Yeah.

01:08:26.360 I don't want to use that word anymore.

01:08:29.120 On the other hand, we kind of have to sometimes.

01:08:31.040 It just feels so, I feel so icky using it at this point.

01:08:34.660 Yeah.

01:08:34.800 But builder is what the connotation.

01:08:38.080 I like that because, you know, I don't know if it's the word, but because it's not destroy, which is what everyone thinks.

01:08:45.760 And some of my friends even, and some maybe within myself, you just feel the desire to destroy what's out there, but that's not enough.

01:08:53.300 And that's the whole point of new founding and kind of my project and everything we want to do to foster a new commercial cultural movement is you can't defeat, you know, a positive with a negative, right?

01:09:03.100 And it's not, it can't be just destruction.

01:09:05.480 What are we building for?

01:09:07.160 What are we building?

01:09:07.900 What's that thing that we're building that we have a broad-based vision of agreement on?

01:09:11.840 That's, you have to fight for something.

01:09:13.880 So I love, I love the vibe, yeah.

01:09:16.280 Yeah.

01:09:16.700 And make sure, guys, you're checking out Matthew's stuff, you know, that this does exist.

01:09:20.720 That's, you know, why he's here.

01:09:22.000 And so, you know, some of these projects are still in their infancy.

01:09:25.580 They're in different levels of completion.

01:09:27.140 There's, you know, it's all being worked on.

01:09:29.360 But, you know, if you don't see something that you need, you know, think about how you can create it in your own community and also how you can reach out to someone, you know, like Matthew and see, you know, if you're able to create that as well.

01:09:42.540 Let's see here.

01:09:43.540 We've got QuirtsyZZ7 for $5 Canadian.

01:09:48.240 Sorry about that, friend.

01:09:49.300 What is your suggestion for people who work in municipal governments in blue state colonies?

01:09:55.220 Yeah, I mean, that's very difficult.

01:09:57.040 It's hard enough, even, you know, as someone who's worked in, you know, government-related positions in red states.

01:10:02.560 That's hard enough.

01:10:03.680 You know, there's still a large level of kind of woke bureaucracy built into all that stuff.

01:10:09.160 Blue states even more so. 0.84

01:10:10.640 So, Matthew, what do you say to people?

01:10:12.500 A lot of people, you know, oh, you've got to flee blue states.

01:10:15.580 You've got to get out of there.

01:10:16.660 It's essential.

01:10:17.620 Other people say, look, we have to have presence in blue states.

01:10:21.060 They're where a lot of the money is.

01:10:22.420 They're a lot of political influences.

01:10:24.920 What do you say to people who are kind of working inside those systems in those blue states?

01:10:28.780 Well, it depends on the situation you're in.

01:10:32.860 I would say, I mean, since you're focused on work in this question, we'll talk about that.

01:10:37.640 I would say a few things.

01:10:38.800 One is I know a lot of people who live in blue states who live in red rural areas.

01:10:44.400 Totally get that.

01:10:45.160 My own family, basically, is some of my own family is in western New York and, you know, Pennsylvania.

01:10:51.280 I don't know what you call Pennsylvania at this point in the battleground.

01:10:53.880 But I know people in California who live in very Republican areas.

01:10:57.060 Like, that's different to me.

01:10:58.780 That's a different determination.

01:11:00.340 Sometimes there's family involved.

01:11:01.880 We can't leave family.

01:11:03.000 I totally get.

01:11:03.980 But I guess if I would just say you need to be realistic about it.

01:11:08.320 If you're in, like, blue municipal government, you know, you're in the belly of the beast.

01:11:12.520 I would just say you are, like, you're behind the Iron Curtain, as far as I'm concerned.

01:11:17.580 Like, you are in enemy territory.

01:11:20.080 I would see that as, can I say this?

01:11:23.480 I mean, I'd see that as, like, quiet, resistant, central.

01:11:26.200 Like, you know, sabotage.

01:11:29.220 Not in terms of violence, but, you know, but sabotaging the project.

01:11:35.260 Possibly being able to teach people outside, you know, about how these things work.

01:11:41.540 And then, of course, in everyone's personal life, always, you want to be a light to the

01:11:45.360 people around you and find allies where you can.

01:11:48.960 But, you know, I would just, you're kind of like a missionary almost, right?

01:11:54.720 Or, you know, a spy or an insurgent.

01:11:58.200 I mean, that is really the way I would look at it.

01:12:00.480 And you'd look at what people in those roles can accomplish and do.

01:12:04.060 And some of those things are positive, like getting a bunch of dissenters together who

01:12:09.840 quietly didn't realize they disagreed.

01:12:12.080 And then you have, like, a sleeper cell that can potentially, you know, do all kinds of

01:12:15.960 interesting things, leak stuff, leak information to friendly press, like the Blaze, you know.

01:12:22.820 I mean, there's interesting things to do.

01:12:24.720 But you have to be in the mindset of, you know, I am behind enemy lines.

01:12:29.600 I am in the belly of the beast.

01:12:31.840 Now, am I a missionary?

01:12:33.380 Am I a spy?

01:12:34.720 And am I an insurgent?

01:12:37.240 Absolutely.

01:12:37.660 No, that's an interesting take.

01:12:39.000 And I think a good one.

01:12:40.640 So, yeah, that's a good answer.

01:12:42.440 And, Brad, I'm sorry I couldn't put your questions up there.

01:12:45.900 But I see you are here in the chat.

01:12:47.080 I'm glad you were around for those answers.

01:12:48.880 Thank you again, man.

01:12:49.600 And I really hope those are helpful.

01:12:50.920 We appreciate it.

01:12:51.660 Those are good questions that I think are essential for people to think through.

01:12:56.080 All right, guys.

01:12:56.680 I think we got through all of our Super Chats there real quick.

01:13:01.520 Matthew, if people want to find your work, I mean, there's all kinds of stuff.

01:13:04.520 It feels like you've got so many organizations and places where things are going on.

01:13:09.240 Where do you want to direct people who want to find what's going on?

01:13:12.020 Do you have anything big coming up you want to announce?

01:13:13.740 Anything like that?

01:13:15.900 I'm not making around trying to do an announce.

01:13:18.600 There's always things going on.

01:13:20.060 But I would say if you follow me on Twitter, you know, D-O-C-M-J-P, you can see in my banner a bunch of interesting stuff that I'm doing. 1.00

01:13:30.320 And that's probably the best way.

01:13:32.100 And then if God bless you, you're a better person than I am and you're not on Twitter.

01:13:35.960 You know, I would say, you know, I'll make it when I can just take my cell phone and give it to some assistant and say, I'm never touching this again.

01:13:46.460 You know, that's when you'll know I'll consider myself to have one.

01:13:50.380 So probably, you know, we'll see.

01:13:52.160 So if you're not on Twitter, I would say newfounding.com.

01:13:56.520 At least check out the talent network there.

01:13:58.740 You're going to want to see that effort.

01:14:01.440 And we have a list of other things that we work on on that page.

01:14:05.180 So either newfounding.com or on Twitter, D-O-C-M-J-P. 0.99

01:14:10.100 Excellent.

01:14:10.640 And guys, if this is your first time here, make sure that you are subscribing.

01:14:14.480 If you haven't done it yet, the show is now available on all the major podcast platforms.

01:14:19.740 And when you do go over there and subscribe, if you could leave that rating and review, that helps a lot with everything.

01:14:25.680 I really appreciate it.

01:14:26.600 It's already growing quite a bit.

01:14:28.220 It's awesome to see that.

01:14:29.120 And I know a lot of people prefer to listen while they're working out, you know, mowing the lawn, playing video games, whatever.

01:14:34.400 So if you want to go ahead and grab that, just follow the links below the description of this video and you'll be able to sign up there.

01:14:41.820 So, Matthew, thanks again for coming on, guys.

01:14:44.140 I appreciate all the great questions of the audience.

01:14:46.760 Really good.

01:14:47.480 And as always, we'll talk to you next time.

The Auron MacIntyre Show - January 11, 2023

Building Institutions ｜ Guest： Matthew J. Peterson ｜ 1⧸11⧸23

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