Episode 1208 · Sunday, 19 January 2020

Weeping Angels

A contentious Democratic debate fuels media bias claims while the acquisition of financial middleware and the rise of television surveillance signal a new era of data vulnerability.

By The No Agenda Show | 3h 2m listen | 27 chapters
Weeping Angels cover
The No Agenda Show · No. 1208

About this episode

CNN and the Democratic National Committee faced immediate backlash following a primary debate defined by a high-stakes confrontation between Senator Bernie Sanders and Senator Elizabeth Warren. The network leveraged a hot-mic moment to amplify claims that Sanders doubted a woman’s ability to win the presidency, a narrative that sparked accusations of media bias and intentional friction. Meanwhile, Tom Steyer and Senator Amy Klobuchar struggled to maintain footing as the field narrowed ahead of the early primaries.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi drew criticism for her celebratory use of commemorative pens during the formal transmission of impeachment articles to the Senate. In the private sector, Visa finalized a $5 billion acquisition of Plaid, a move that consolidates control over financial middleware and raises alarms regarding the security of screen-scraping technology. Simultaneously, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin outlined the Phase One trade deal with China, while Special Envoy Elliot Abrams confirmed new USAID funding strategies intended to support the Juan Guaidó administration in Venezuela.

Technical warnings dominated the final segments as the CIA Weeping Angel project resurfaced in discussions about Smart TV surveillance and ACR tracking. The hosts analyzed the latest deepfake voice simulations of Barack Obama and JFK, dismissing the current quality as subpar. The episode concluded with a knighting ceremony for Craig Martin and a report on Chinese infrastructure loans in Zimbabwe from Sir Uncle Bob.


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CHAPTER 01 / 27 Discussion

CNN Democratic Debate, Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren Conflict

CNN hosted a Democratic primary debate featuring a high-profile confrontation between Senator Bernie Sanders and Senator Elizabeth Warren regarding whether a woman could win the presidency. The network reported a ratings increase to 7.3 million viewers, attributed to the promotion of this specific conflict. Post-debate "hot mic" audio captured Warren accusing Sanders of calling her a liar on national television while candidate Tom Steyer attempted to intervene.

cnn· bernie sanders· elizabeth warren· joe biden· tom steyer· jeff zucker· democratic debate

00:00 A-ba-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da- I'm John C. D'Bara. It's Crackpot and Buzzkill! In the morning! You almost disappeared there with your cowbell. Were you leaning away from the microphone? No, I just probably blew out everything. You changed something. You changed something. Too loud. You did. I'm telling you. You changed something since we tested. We always do a test before the show.

00:50 Tell me you twiddled your knobs. You twiddled the knob, I know you did. You twiddled the knob. I don't twiddle knobs. Yeah, you do. You're a knob twiddler. You're one of those guys who would say, oh, something's broken and then you're twiddling knobs. Yeah, well, if I had knobs to twiddle, I would. Okay, I must say that personally, I'm tired of it all. How about you? I loved it. The last debate was the worst ever. Who could ask for anything more? Now they had incredible ratings for CNN's time slot for their debate. 7.3 million viewers up from the PBS debate which was 6.2. So I guess their, you know, the last few days before the debate their ratings gambit worked. They got the fight going between Bernie and Elizabeth Warren and people tuned in for it and I think they were not disappointed.

01:53 The people, well we were disappointed. Disappointed was the worst. It wasn't anything interesting. I do, I will say that the debate between Elizabeth and Bernie was quite amusing, especially the, you, I caught the, I would start at the end, I have the hot mic. Yeah, okay. Which I think is the way to listen to this. Start with that and then we can go into the debate if you want to do that. But this is the hot mic clip. I think you called me a liar on national TV. Let's not do it right now. You want to have that discussion, we'll have that discussion. You called me a liar. You told me. Alright, let's not do it now. I don't want to get in the middle of it. I just want to say hi, Bernie. Yeah, good. The best part of that clip was Steyer saying, I just want to say hi, Bernie. Yeah, what a brown-nosing jerk. Well, it shows you where he is in the standing. I mean, he doesn't even get to say hi to Bernie normally.

02:54 That's how low on the totem pole Mr. Steyer is. Oh yes, and then Bernie just brushed him off. But see this, this was what CNN intended. This was their show. Their entire show was around Bernie and Warren and this he said, he didn't say. That's what it was and they got a 1.1 extra million viewers because of it. That was the whole purpose of the debate. Everything else, I agree, was the worst ever. But from that television perspective, they didn't blow it out right away. They brought it in about a quarter of the way through. Then they had another tense moment, and then at the end, they had to release this video with the audio after the debate because the televised version didn't have the audio.

03:44 Right so yes somebody why do you think somebody snuck it? Oh? Yeah, Jeff Zucker gave it himself to Posted himself on YouTube, please you think that was a leak I mean it was it was the whole thing was a giant scam you are correct. We might as well listen to this I have the Liz versus Bernie opener Okay, yeah. CNN reported yesterday that and Senator Sanders, Senator Warren confirmed in a statement that in 2018 you told her that you did not believe that a woman could win the election. Why did you say that?

04:28 Well, as a matter of fact, I didn't say it. And I don't want to waste a whole lot of time on this because this is what Donald Trump and maybe some of the media want. Anybody knows me, knows that it's incomprehensible that I would think that a woman could not be president of the United States. Go to YouTube today. There's a video of me 30 years ago talking about how a woman could become president of the United States. In 2015, I deferred in fact to Senator Warren. It was a movement to draft Senator Warren to run for president. And you know what? I said, stayed back. Senator Warren decided not to run and I did. I did run afterwards. Hillary Clinton won

05:11 the popular vote by 3 million votes. How could anybody in a million years not believe that a woman could become President of the United States? And let me be very clear, if any of the women on this stage or any of the men on this stage win the nomination, I hope that's not the case, I hope it's me. But if they do, I will do everything in my power to make sure that they are elected in order to defeat the most dangerous president in the history of our country. Right, so he was ready for the question. He got the question. Well, if he was ready for the question, he should have been ready to throw it back at him and say, you know, this is a set up by you guys because he did say the media. He says this is what Trump and the media wants us to do. Bitch about this. He should have thrown it back. This is a set up question. You guys specifically ran this up in a. You should just thrown it back. I would have been fantastic if he had done that.

06:07 Well, but now, I didn't say he had a good retort. He was ready for it. He had something, but yeah, what he didn't expect was the next part, which I guess is, which clip is that? The Liz versus Bernie retort. So Senator Sanders, Senator Sanders, I do want to be clear here. You're saying that you never told Senator Warren that a woman could not win the election. That is correct. Senator Warren, what did you think when Senator Sanders told you a woman could not win the election? I disagreed. That was fantastic.

06:46 I mean, that was the most chicken shit thing you could possibly do and it was hilarious. Now just to be clear how this works, this is one of our favorite ways of doing reporting. In fact, one of the CNN analysts, Jess McIntosh, had this to say. about this after the debate. I couldn't agree more. I think that the moment between Warren and Bernie is obviously the one that's going to be replayed the most. And I think what Bernie forgot was that this isn't a he said she said story. This is a reported out story that CNN was part of breaking. So to have him just flat out say no I think wasn't nearly enough to address that for the women watching. Now there was actually something in the original question

07:32 Let me just see. Listen to what the CNN moderator says here. CNN reported yesterday that Senator Sanders, Senator Warren confirmed in a statement. So the way this works is someone from the Warren campaign calls CNN and says, man, can you believe what happened in 2016? Bernie said that in a private dinner to Warren. They say, oh, now they don't know it's the Sanders campaign, of course. And they call up Elizabeth Warren and say, hey, did that happen? And then she says, oh yeah, yeah, yeah, that's true. I confirm it. So she didn't say she just confirmed it. It's the circular reporting that we're always laughing about. And they literally said she confirmed it. And oh yeah, CNN was instrumental in breaking this. That was the entire ratings bonanza and it brought in a million viewers. That's not bad. That's a thousand CPMs. That's pretty good. That's a lot. Yeah.

08:31 Well, considering these things were more than a dead on the vine and there was no other possibilities going on here. No, they had nothing. They needed... Look, you need a controversy. And that's what it was. And it was kind of good for Joe because he got to hang back and... Oh yeah, he didn't say much. No, and he... Not only that, but he was... When he did speak, it was... Oh, it was bad. In fact, he threw out one... What was this? I had... It's my favorite. We are in a position right now where we have to remember who we are. We're not who we are! It's like Obama's lines. This is not who we are. I'm not who we are! He was just throwing all kinds of shit out there.

CHAPTER 02 / 27 Discussion

Tom Steyer, Environmental Justice and Racial Rhetoric

Candidate Tom Steyer faced criticism for his debate performance, specifically his phrasing regarding "black and brown communities" unable to breathe clean air. Despite his background in the coal industry, Steyer positioned climate change as his top priority and pledged to declare a national emergency on day one of his presidency. His delivery was noted for a perceived lack of authenticity and unusual physical mannerisms during the broadcast.

tom steyer· environmental justice· climate change· coal industry· racial rhetoric

09:16 And Steyer? No, Steyer was good. This was one of... There was a lot of this during the debate. I would do it from the standpoint of environmental justice and make sure we go to the black and brown communities where you can't breathe the air or drink the water that comes out of the tap safely. Most racist thing I've heard. It's unbelievable. The black and brown communities as if that's like one... Where's the black and brown people? Oh, they're in the community over there? Oh, okay, thanks. You go over the hill, in the black and brown community. Well actually I have that as a larger clip. Oh good. Because how do you think the black Americans feel about this? When they're going for something tangible, some reparations. Yeah, and they can't breathe their own air. And they get brown people. They're trying to breathe their own air, which is unbreathable, and they throw in some brown people.

10:06 As if it's all the same. It's so racist, that guy. He doesn't even know it. He's a moron and he's obviously a kiss-ass. He has to go over to introduce himself to Bernie after all these debates. I mean, come on, buddy. Did you see, I don't know if you got the clip, the first question for Steyer was, well, you know, you've been a businessman, you've been in finance. No, he made his money in coal, but they couldn't bring themselves to say it. They couldn't bring themselves to say, hey, you made your money in coal. No, it was finance. Okay, thanks. Here's where he, his target was environmentalism and he, listen for the round of applause. There's a round of applause in here that he gets, just listen for it because it's very funny.

10:49 But this is why climate is my number one priority and I'm still shocked that I'm the only person on this stage who will say this. I would declare a state of emergency on day one on climate. I would do it from the standpoint of environmental justice and make sure we go to the black and brown communities where you can't breathe the air or drink the water that comes out of the tap safely. But I also know this. We're going to create millions of good paying union jobs across this country. It's going to be the biggest job program in American history. Yeah, well can't wait. Ready for it. I just love it. So he says it. Yes one guy out there. Yeah, I've been calling it for a national emergency National emergency everybody Standby

CHAPTER 03 / 27 Discussion

Amy Klobuchar and Bernie Sanders, Electoral History Dispute

A dispute arose during the debate when Senator Amy Klobuchar claimed to be the only person on stage to have defeated a Republican incumbent in the last 30 years. Senator Bernie Sanders countered by citing his 1990 victory over a Republican congressman, leading to a mathematical disagreement on stage. Klobuchar's performance was characterized by visible nervousness and a focus on her perceived competence over traditional political aesthetics.

amy klobuchar· bernie sanders· republican incumbents· 1990 election· debate gaffes

11:43 Probably the most embarrassing thing for Bernie was this Liz Warren, I don't know if I have this clip, but it's not really that important. But she goes on about herself and bragging about how she's the only person that's beat a Republican in the last 30 years. Yeah. And then Joe says, hey, that was me. Well then Bernie comes out, no not Joe, Bernie comes out and says, oh I beat somebody in 1990. Oh no, it's Bernie, you're right, I'm sorry, it was Bernie. And so she's looking around and she's doing takes, she's doing like double takes and mugging and they had the camera on. Yeah.

12:21 And so she's going, what? Then she calls him out on it. And then he doesn't even understand the math and just keeps barreling ahead and changes the subject. I thought it was a point for her, even though it still made them both look silly. This debates Liz and Bernie 30 years ago, too. To set the record straight, I defeated an incumbent Republican running for Congress. When? 1990. That's how I won, beat a Republican congressman. Number two, of course, I don't think there's any debate on people. Wasn't that 30 years ago? I beat an incumbent Republican congressman. And I said I was the only one who's beaten an incumbent Republican in 30 years. Well, 30 years ago is 1990. As a matter of fact,

13:12 But I don't know that that's the major issue of the day. No, it is the meme of the hour. What an idiot. I get it. How old is Bernie? 76? He's a little slower. A little slower than that. He's 80. He's 80? I think he's 80 or close to it. 78, whatever. Doesn't matter. My favorite, I do have one more with Bernie. Most of my clips are quite short. You just heard the long ones. But there was one Bernie, it's called, I think I'm using it. Oh yeah, I have it down as an ISO. This is under Bernie. It's Bernie. Before I tell you, this I think is a, he just did this on the, this is Bernie, completely Bernie.

CHAPTER 04 / 27 Discussion

Joe Biden, Special Forces and Coalition Coordination

Joe Biden struggled to articulate his foreign policy stance during the debate, specifically regarding the use of special forces. He emphasized a requirement to use small numbers of special forces to coordinate with other countries and build coalitions, echoing policies from the Obama administration. Observers noted his verbal stumbles and questioned his ability to withstand future debates against Donald Trump.

joe biden· special forces· foreign policy· coalitions· debate performance

13:57 uh... all right i see okay it's not under debate you've labeled the burden that label it weird to okay we go for you but before i tell you that because of the house it's the best performative of the evening ladies and gentlemen but before i tell you that because of the i'll tell you but before i tell you that i'll tell you something else i think that's uh... that's pretty good that's a and and of show worthy really scott well i got a bunch of them so i will go over and uh... Now, let's go to my favorite was of course, well, here's the gobbledygook. This is Biden. I want you to explain to me what he's actually saying if you can even understand his words. Dropped it. Here we go. So it's a fundamental difference than negotiating with other countries. It's fundamentally the requirement that we use our special forces in small numbers to coordinate with other countries to bring together coalitions.

14:50 Well, it's apparently what they've done during the eight years that he was vice president. Coordinate. It's a fundamental difference than negotiating with other countries. It's fundamentally the requirement that we use our special forces in small numbers to coordinate with other countries to bring together coalitions. No. No, he's just not qualified to do this. Can you imagine if he becomes the nominee and then he has to stand against Trump? It's just not gonna work. He's just gonna melt. Well, it could be. There's one opportunity for him. What's that? Trump's such a bully with guys like this that, you know, they try to, you know, he would start ridiculing his inability to pronounce negotiating and other words and start to

CHAPTER 05 / 27 Discussion

Fox and Friends, Trump Rally Counter-Programming Comparison

Fox and Friends aired a highly produced segment comparing the Democratic debate to Donald Trump’s concurrent campaign rally in Milwaukee. The visual presentation utilized a split-screen effect where the Democratic candidates were shown in black and white while Trump was shown in full color. This framing contrasted Democratic warnings of war and economic failure with Trump’s claims of economic prosperity and military success.

fox and friends· donald trump· milwaukee rally· propaganda· split-screen

15:42 Make people feel so sorry for Joe. They might vote for him because nobody felt sorry for Jeb Bush No, and by the way, nobody felt sorry for any of the Republicans that Trump went after I think it was Van Jones I knew you were clipping all this so I didn't get very much. I think he actually called Joe Biden low-energy He actually said it was low energy Fox and friends did something interesting Which was a very nice propaganda piece They ran, because you know Trump did a rally during the debate of course, counter-programming, in Milwaukee I want to say? I think it was Milwaukee. So while they're debating he's up on stage doing his thing. So the next morning Fox took the debate

16:34 side-by-side with Trump and played a quote, you know, I have it here, so you play a quote from something from the debate and then Trump with the counterpoint. And what was super nice about this in from a propaganda standpoint was the left screen, which was left for a reason, was black and white and the right screen with Trump was in color. We have a president who is lying again. and could drag us into a war that is even worse than the war in Iraq. Bernie and the radical left cannot protect your family and they cannot protect our country, nor do they want to, I think. We have lost our standing in the region. We have lost the support of our allies. America is winning again. America is respected again. We could do much better than a Trump-led

17:23 trade deal. We will enact trade deals that result in more products proudly stamped with that beautiful phrase, made in the USA. I am ready to take on this president on the economy. Our economy is booming, wages are rising, poverty is plummeting. No one is above the law, that includes the President of the United States. While we're creating jobs and killing terrorists, Democrats in Congress are wasting America's time with demented hoaxes and crazy witch hunts. This is a decency check on our government. It is a patriotism check. At stake in our present battle.

18:03 is the survival of the nation. What these people are doing, they will destroy our nation. These Republicans led by Mr. Trump basically kicking the American people in the face. Republicans are fighting for citizens from every background and from every race, religion, color, and creed. We are a movement. I gotta say, they did a good job on that. Now what was this? Let's go over this again. So they opened the show and from the night before, from the debate... What show? Fox and Friends in the morning. It's their stupid morning show. I never watch it. Well, no, of course you don't watch it. I don't watch it either. No, no, people watch it. So this was not an ad. This was something they put together? John, it was an ad. It just wasn't paid for. It wasn't in an ad slot. Oh, it's a dated ad. Of course it is. That's how they open their hour with this. So left screen, black and white, these clips of the debate. Right screen, Trump, full color in Milwaukee, back and forth.

19:05 I wonder who put this together. I know it's new I haven't seen them do this and I liked it because if you want to satisfy your viewership, it's stuff like that that's gonna work. It was very very slick very but the black and white and the color that that really punched it home. So yeah obviously an ad. Hello. Hello. Imagine the base, my favorite debater, I saved her clips for last. Amy Klobuchar. Yes, I thought she was fantastic. Oh, I love Amy Klobuchar. We as a comedic, yeah, as a comedian. Let me tell you, if I had to choose from any person on that stage, I'd choose her.

CHAPTER 06 / 27 Discussion

Amy Klobuchar, Debate Performance and Gendered Language

Amy Klobuchar utilized a debate tactic of highlighting her own physical stature and competence, comparing herself to the 5'4" James Madison. A linguistic observation noted that both Klobuchar and Warren used gender-specific pronouns like "she" when referring to a future president, rather than gender-neutral terms. Despite a gaffe where she appeared to forget a friend's name, Klobuchar was identified as a candidate with a distinct, albeit unconventional, television presence.

amy klobuchar· james madison· gendered language· debate tactics· political identity

19:49 Well, let's listen to a couple of things I got from her. For one thing, I've got a pretty good ISO. Iso. Iso. It's even called a pretty good ISO. I think that sounds pretty good. Nah, that's our end of show right there. I'm putting it into the slot just in case. Alright, here. Now, I got some short one. Here's, you know, we like to talk about people dropping the tea. Oh yeah. This is an absolute beauty because I didn't know you could drop the tea with this word. My Republican opponents have gotten out of politics for good. Opponents?

20:27 Opponent! What was that? She's trying to say opponent. My Republican opponents... Opponents? She's dropping a P. She's dropping a P-anity. Opponents. My Republican opponents have gotten out of politics for good. Now, under stress, people do make mistakes. Oh, she was shaking like a leaf, as usual. No, it wasn't as bad as it has been in the past. It wasn't as bad as the first debate, but it was bad considering how many she's done of these. She's nervous sounding. As an eye twitcher and a Tourette's sufferer, it doesn't bother me. I think it makes her look interesting.

21:12 Yeah, this make a little dumb but I think worse than that is still this school boy thing where birdies holding his hand up for the teacher to call on him like throughout the entire debate. Call on me teacher and then Tom Steyer by the way when he talks. Yeah, he first of all he has a fake smile at the beginning because I guess somebody told him hey Tom smile a little bit so he puts on this fake stupid looking smile and then he goes right back into his dour look and then he rolls his head in a circle as he talks and it's and it's clockwise and he's rolling his head in a circle as he talks and I'm watching him whoa I was if I had the time I would have made an animated gif but I did

21:56 So I was too busy collecting Amy's clips. Now here's Amy, I got two more clips from her. Amy and the cloak room is the first. And I will never forget going to Crawfordsville here in Iowa, and thank you for bringing up Iowa, Brianne, since that is where we are. And I went to this plant and there was one worker left in that plant. That plant had been shut down because of Donald Trump's trade policies and because of what he had done to those workers with giving secret waivers to oil companies and ruining the renewable fuel standard. That worker brought out a coat rack of uniforms and he said, these are my friends.

22:33 They don't work here anymore. And their names were embroidered on those uniforms. Derek, Mark, Salvador. And that guy started to cry. These are real people hurt by Donald Trump's trade war. Well, now this is what I believe this to be. is something that never works on television. But if so we're in Iowa, everyone's going to Iowa places, you know, this is a pretty big firm, so she wants to localize it for the crowd there and you can usually people do it with an applause moment. Instead she did it with a tear jerker and then you know so they had a you know he brought out the cloak from the cloakroom brought out his workers who have been terminated poof into clear air they're gone.

23:17 So it's a localized thing and it always comes across weird on the national level on television. Yeah, I'd say she sound like a psycho. So the best one I'm gonna push back. She didn't sound like a psycho. I like Amy And then the best one here's Amy talking about her one of her friends whose name she can't remember. This is the big gaffe What do you say to thank you Elizabeth senator Klobuchar, yes, I would like to finish my question, okay What do you say to people who say that a woman can't win this election?

24:03 I hear that. People have said it. That's why I've addressed it from this stage. I point out that you don't have to be the tallest person in the room. James Madison was 5'4". You don't have to be the skinniest person in the room. You don't have to be the loudest person. You have to be competent. And when you look at the facts, I don't know why I just felt like that was the right clip to play.

24:50 Her name is... But what she's... Good, I'm proud to know her name. Her name is... and then she mumbled kind of at the low voice of Kelly. But what she's... Now, here's what I liked about this. She's basically saying, look at me, I'm short, I'm not, you know, your typical body type, model, television star, but I'm competent. And of course everything she said there got lost because she couldn't remember her best friend's name. But that, it's a tactic that I think we should keep our eye on. I'm not, I don't think any of these people should be the president, but keep your eye on her.

25:36 She's got something going. And by the way, she also has her lipstick on like it's a big square block of lipstick. So she sits there and she looks like she's just, she looks like a kind of a Nick Parks character, you know, Wallace and Gromit. It's just this funny look. I mean, she's great. She doesn't have a smile. She can barely smile. It's always kind of a downward smile. She's grimacing. Uh oh. I think Hillary needs to swoop in because we've got nothing on the stage. Nothing! It's what it looks like. Whoa, man, she better hurry. Tick tock, tick tock. Well, they've already given it to Joe. Yeah, you keep saying that, but I'm not so sure about that. Well, I hope not. I'm only saying it from what I'm observing. I'm not saying because I want Joe, even though it will be funny.

26:32 and it will give me the opportunity to pick a vice president. So we do have a shift here. A couple of things are happening. Bernie still has the absolute numbers. He's got crowds. He's got the Bernie supporters. It's a big, that's a big amount of people. We don't really know it. We don't really see it because it's obfuscated. It's just like in 2016. CNN now You know now we have a whole faction of Bernie bros, but it's not just bros although the guys that Project Veritas highlighted were obviously bros. Hey man, Milwaukee will burn! Okay fine, alright Bernie bro. Alright settle down, settle down son, settle down. But there you know it is a very animated base of people and they now also hate CNN. Now this is an interesting

CHAPTER 07 / 27 Discussion

Bernie Sanders, Base Enthusiasm and Media Hostility

Bernie Sanders maintains a highly animated base of supporters who have grown increasingly hostile toward CNN following the recent debate. Comparisons were drawn to the 2016 election, suggesting that if Sanders is denied the nomination again, a portion of his "Bernie Bro" base might defect to Donald Trump due to shared anti-media sentiments. Recent Project Veritas footage was cited as evidence of the intensity within the Sanders movement.

bernie sanders· bernie bros· cnn· project veritas· 2020 election

25:36 She's got something going. And by the way, she also has her lipstick on like it's a big square block of lipstick. So she sits there and she looks like she's just, she looks like a kind of a Nick Parks character, you know, Wallace and Gromit. It's just this funny look. I mean, she's great. She doesn't have a smile. She can barely smile. It's always kind of a downward smile. She's grimacing. Uh oh. I think Hillary needs to swoop in because we've got nothing on the stage. Nothing! It's what it looks like. Whoa, man, she better hurry. Tick tock, tick tock. Well, they've already given it to Joe. Yeah, you keep saying that, but I'm not so sure about that. Well, I hope not. I'm only saying it from what I'm observing. I'm not saying because I want Joe, even though it will be funny.

26:32 and it will give me the opportunity to pick a vice president. So we do have a shift here. A couple of things are happening. Bernie still has the absolute numbers. He's got crowds. He's got the Bernie supporters. It's a big, that's a big amount of people. We don't really know it. We don't really see it because it's obfuscated. It's just like in 2016. CNN now You know now we have a whole faction of Bernie bros, but it's not just bros although the guys that Project Veritas highlighted were obviously bros. Hey man, Milwaukee will burn! Okay fine, alright Bernie bro. Alright settle down, settle down son, settle down. But there you know it is a very animated base of people and they now also hate CNN. Now this is an interesting

27:22 interesting thing because Bernie won't get the nomination, although that's the one America deserves. We deserve to say, okay, here are your choices. Socialism and capitalism. That would be the election to have. Yeah, I agree with that. And I think that that would be fair and that's what we deserve, but it's not going to... A little Milwaukee will burn if he doesn't win. Yeah, fine. That is not going to happen, but CNN will, you know, has double the amount of haters now. Well, not double, but there's a substantial amount who hate CNN specifically because of Trump. And now there's a big bunch of people who hate CNN because of Bernie. So if there's some other schmuck on the Democratic side, who do you think the Bernies are going to go to? I think a lot of them will defect to the anti-media guy. Who's the anti-media guy? Trump!

28:20 Oh yeah, well I thought you meant you were suggesting a Democrat. No! Trump! If they have to choose between, I don't know, Hillary? Well that's what happened last time because my daughter in 2016 was gonna vote for Bernie like all the kids, all the millennials. I don't think she would anymore but she was going to and a lot of people were. They're all excited about Bernie because he was, you know, granddad talking to the kids and once it came out that he was screwed by the Democrats she voted for Trump. And I think a lot of people already voted for Trump that were Bernie bros. Well, they're not, you know, they're not thinking that it's just not like their politics are anything similar. No, no, no, no. But this is not, this is not really about politics. It's about personalities, personality and stuff. I think I will play this just before the

CHAPTER 08 / 27 Discussion

Elizabeth Warren, Student Loan Debt and Executive Authority

Elizabeth Warren proposed a plan to forgive up to $50,000 in federal student loan debt for 42 million people using the Department of Education's existing authority. She claimed this could be achieved on her first day in office without congressional approval. Warren extended this claim of executive prerogative to the pharmaceutical industry, vowing to unilaterally lower prices for insulin, EpiPens, and HIV/AIDS medications.

elizabeth warren· student loans· department of education· executive power· drug pricing

29:09 Debate, Elizabeth Warren was sitting with a bunch of students. In the hours before the Democratic presidential debate in Iowa, U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren detailed her latest proposal on how if elected president she would forgive federal student loan debt of up to $50,000. She says she can do it her first day in the White House and without Congress. I'm running for president because I want a government that works for the rest of us. The U.S. Senator from Massachusetts said she would be able to help about 42 million people with their student debt by using the Department of Education's pre-existing authority, which she says gives the Secretary of Education the power to wipe away loans on its discretion.

29:55 Anyway, so you know that's what people want. That's the biggest selling point for young voters and I still question if they're really going to show up. But that's what they want. Take that student debt off of my back. Anyone who really shows some serious plan for that I think can get a lot of support. Well again, will they show up? Probably not. I don't know if she was a little more clear. I mean, so she says she can do it without Congress, doubtful, but okay. So someone needs to analyze that, need to dive into it. They gotta hurry up. Well, she made it. I think she was on the stage. I think I have one clip of her where she's

30:40 ranting and raving about all these things she's gonna do. Klobuchar said the same thing. As a woman, both of them prefaced it, as a woman president, like the men wouldn't do this, there's a million things I can do and I'm gonna do them all. You know, I had a question about that. So both Warren and Klobuchar say, well, the president, she should do this. Her prerogative will be this. Yeah. Shouldn't it be they? And then, let's just be honest about it. Isn't that... Yeah, you know this is something I should have caught. Not you, but you did. Considering the way we're supposed to use the language today. Yep. You're absolutely correct. We're not supposed to do that.

31:24 But we're supposed to use gender neutral in all circumstances. Yeah. Why didn't those two women, the only two women up there, the only two that use gender specific, you can say I. Yeah. But you can't, but if you're gonna say we, she, she should, it should be they, you're right. Absolutely correct. Kudos to you. I'd give you a clip of the day for catching that if there was a clip to give you a clip of the day for clipping. It's actually worth an essay to be honest about it, that gaffer there. But they both did it. Yeah. Yeah. It was just small things like that, but it wasn't, it was actually not, you mentioned, it's a major thing.

32:09 Well, I do have, let's play this. This is Warren on drug pricing. This is what Warren's going to do. She goes on and on. This is the debate. Warren on drug pricing. Long answer. Why does it make sense for the government, for the government to manufacture drugs, especially when public trust in government is near historic lows? So let's do this both ways. What I also have said is I'm just going to use the power. that is available and I will do what a president can do all by herself on the very first day. And that is lower the prices of certain prescription drugs. I will lower the price of insulin. We already have the legal authority with the president to do that, the president just hasn't picked up and used it.

CHAPTER 09 / 27 Discussion

UK National Health Service, Wait Times and Medicare for All

The UK National Health Service (NHS) reported its worst performance figures, with only 81.4% of emergency patients seen within four hours and significant delays for chemotherapy. These statistics were used to critique the "Medicare for All" proposals championed by Democratic candidates. The discussion also revisited a previous debate moment where all candidates raised their hands in support of providing healthcare to illegal immigrants.

nhs· boris johnson· medicare for all· healthcare wait times· chemotherapy

32:49 I will lower the price of EpiPens, of HIV AIDS drugs. That's going to bring a lot of relief to a lot of families immediately. But you know there are a whole lot of drugs, about 90% of drugs that are not under patent. They're generic drugs. But the drug industry has figured out how to manipulate this industry to keep jerking the prices up and up and up. So my view is let's give them a little competition. There was an interesting article that... here we go, Sky News. Boris Johnson, opening it here, Boris Johnson vows to quote, get those waiting lists down after worst NHS figures ever. So just to give you an idea, the oh so heralded National Health Service, the United Kingdom, which is the best in the world, why would you want to live in America? That's crazy.

33:48 Official data showed only 81.4% of emergency patients in England were seen within four hours. So that's the emergency room, four hour wait. Not much of an emergency. It's A&E, it's the accident and emergency. Yeah, you'd be dead in four hours if it was an emergency. Well, last year, one in four patients had to wait more than two months for the start of their chemotherapy. That's how it that's what that's what happens when you let the government run stuff. What is the point of that? No, it's because it's inefficient that my point is. Well there's nothing inefficient about because if you're prescribed chemotherapy I mean you first of all you have to know you're gonna get chemotherapy then you have to wait two months? Yeah. That's what's the wait for?

34:37 What are you waiting for? Are you waiting for the drugs? No, because the system cannot process you faster than that. It is just the system. It is a government-managed health care system like Medicare for all. No. It's fine. You pay five pounds for your visit or your medication. That's it. Everything else is free. But you have to wait. So I'm just pointing out that Nothing is perfect. No system is perfect and Medicare for all certainly won't be either and that's what she's selling That's why I bring this up. Yes. She's a big promoter of it. Well, they all are They're all promoting it. All right, we don't Bernie Bernie got got a lot of we have to remember this week We had to keep reminding ourselves that in 2016 Bernie got a lot of momentum with a number of messages and

35:35 to stop the tuition, the student loan debt, to get Medicare for all. There was a number of initiatives and everybody, because he got so much traction, as opposed to Hillary, which was let's help the banks. John, they said who thinks illegal immigrants should have health care? They all raised their hand. Come on. I know that was the classic. Yeah. So what a blunder that was such a blunder that the DNC if you remember you have to go back to the first debate not not allowed to do that any question how many peers think that illegal immigrants should have free health care they all raised their hands

36:14 And then it was like, wait a minute, if everyone in the world can get free health care, in other words, all you have to do is fly to the United States on anything and just get free health care, every dying cancer patient in the world would flock here because it's free. Yeah, and then the DNC said, okay, you're not allowed to ask questions anymore where people raise their hand. So those questions are outlawed. Yeah, exactly. But the whole thing... For good reason. That was an embarrassment. That gave away the whole Democratic Party. Watch out if you want to open borders. We don't even need borders. Yeah, I'll raise my hand because Bernie raised his. All right. Are we done with the debate? Because it's taken up too much of our time. There's a lot going on. I just have one last thing which is Biden. This is not from the debate, but it's a Biden clip. Because out of the Biden clip, I took an ISO.

CHAPTER 10 / 27 Discussion

Joe Biden, "Come On Man" and Verbal Gaffes

A compilation of Joe Biden's frequent use of the phrase "Come on, man" was highlighted as a signature of his rhetorical style. Additionally, a clip from the campaign trail featured Biden making a confusing reference to "crack powder or cocaine." These instances were presented as evidence of Biden's declining verbal clarity as he continues his pursuit of the Democratic nomination.

joe biden· verbal gaffes· crack cocaine· campaign trail· audio clips

37:02 So here's the Biden come on man. No but everybody knows who this guy is come on man come on man I'm looking forward to this man come here man hey man. I'll tell you but before I tell you that let me tell you something else. Oh sorry that was the wrong one. No. That was the wrong one. Now we can play the Biden come on man iso. Sorry about that yes. Come on man. Now was this really in the debate? No, but everybody knows who this guy is. Come on, man. No, no. This was not in the debate. I'm looking forward to this, man. Come here, man. Hey, man. That's edited. Did you edit that? Somebody put it together. Oh, okay. Well, let me just hear that again. Come on, man. I think that sounds pretty good. No, I think this is better ISO. This is better. This is better. So far, that's the end of show ISO.

37:54 Okay, before we do other stuff, I'd like to go into... Wait, wait, before we go to that, I got one more Biden thing. Again, not the debates, but just an ISO possibility. Okay. This is in some situation where Biden is talking to some in some speech and he says, tell me you're not hearing crack pot, which would be you, or cocaine. Crack powder cocaine. Crack powder cocaine. Crack oh, I know what he's saying crack or powder cocaine is what he's saying crack powder. No, he's saying crack powder or cocaine crack powder cocaine Crack powder cocaine. I don't know look he should ask his son Sorry, it's kind of mean It was kind of mean okay

CHAPTER 11 / 27 Discussion

Elliot Abrams, Venezuela Opposition Funding and USAID Grants

Special Envoy Elliot Abrams confirmed that the U.S. government is seeking ways to spend Congressionally appropriated funds to support the "forces of freedom" and the "legitimate government" of Juan Guaidó in Venezuela. The funding is funneled through USAID and the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor. Similar grant programs exist for China, offering between $750,000 and $1.5 million for initiatives promoting human rights and government transparency.

elliot abrams· juan guaido· venezuela· usaid· state department

38:45 I'm done. Thank you. Thank you for that wrap-up. That was pretty good. That's basically what you didn't miss. Or what you might have missed. That was the best of it. The best of the best. We saved everybody some time. You missed nothing! We saved everybody some time. So on the last show we discovered that even though there is a new president of the Ensemble or whatever they call it in Venezuela and Guaido has effectively his term ended, he was not re-elected, he faked trying to get into Parliament by jumping over the fence even though the official said you just could have come in the front door, then he had

39:25 phony swearing-in ceremony as if he's still in charge. We looked at the headlines, Washington Post, New York Times, Wall Street Journal, all of them saying, oh Guaido, you know, still in power, still rocking and rolling, which is literally not true because they... now it is another one of our shills who's in there, I forget his name, but he was another CIA In fact, I think that's even in his title. Ex-CIA guy. Hi, I'm here to run the country. Elliot Abrams, who is the special envoy to Venezuela, did a press conference at the State Department and what he says in this minute clip is mind-blowing.

40:11 We clearly have an agenda to, I don't know what exactly we want to do, but we'd like to have some form of control over the Venezuelan government. Our Obama look-alike Guaido was supposed to be the guy. He never caught any traction, never really did it, just couldn't make it happen. No one supports him. And honestly, the guy's kind of goofy. So he's not the guy. But man, do we have the resources. Elliot Abrams was asked by a reporter, so you know, so tell me about the resources. Tell me exactly what you're doing with the money. And tell me about this money. You know, Congress has voted a fair amount of money to help the Democratic opposition in Venezuela. And we will be thinking... So just to be clear, our Congress approved our money, our tax money,

41:04 to support the Democratic opposition in Venezuela. Already I'm a little irked because hey, we can use that money for something else. But okay, if it's really that important... A lot of oil there, you know. Yeah, sure. If it's that important, man, you are a warmonger, aren't you? A lot of oil money. Who gives a shit? We have enough. Oil, let's get it. We don't need oil. And we don't need the oil money, we just print our own money. That's what we do. So anyway... We need oil not for the money, we don't need oil for money. We need oil because we're a petroleum economy that people don't want to, you know... We have enough for our own oil. It's just, look, South America... We can't have enough oil, man. South America needs to be controlled. It's obvious for obvious reasons and let's listen again how our Congress voted for this to be done and who's doing it.

41:58 in Venezuela and we will be thinking of ways to use those funds and to try to get other countries to give political support diplomatic support, financial support to the forces of freedom in Venezuela. Okay, the forces of freedom in Venezuela. I just love the terms. He literally said, we got to think of ways to spend that money, which leads me to believe Congress didn't appropriate it properly because they just said, oh, Elliott Abrams, oh, here, have this money. Go do what you want. How much money and what is that being used for currently?

42:39 I'm a little reluctant to to go into detail on that because I don't remember the exact numbers, the final number. But we have done an agreement with the legitimate government of Venezuela. The legitimate government. So, what we've done in agreement with the legitimate government, he means Guaido by that. He doesn't mean Maduro or the other guy. Now, the legitimate government, basically, we're giving our money to our boots on the ground. But we have done an agreement with the legitimate government of Venezuela, development agreement, And we are able to do things to help, for example, the free press in Venezuela, to help people keep publishing.

43:32 help people keep publishing is there some kind of moratorium on on websites in Venezuela apparently free press in Venezuela to help people keep publishing and to keep broadcasting we have some funds that we can use for the national assembly some friends So, there are a variety of things. This is really, this is all being done through, well, not all, mostly being done through AID, but also the Democracy and Human Rights Bureau here at State. USAID and a new one, the Democracy and Human Rights Bureau, which is also- That's a new one. You must have looked it up. Oh, yes I did. This is our exit strategy.

44:18 All we need is to write one good grant. This is fin- I mean it literally says opportunities. Here's one. Requests for statements of interest China programs. So the Bureau of Human Rights of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor, which is a part of the State Department, announces a request for statements of interest from organizations interested in submitting statements of interest for programs that protect and promote human rights in China. I think we qualify. If not, we could make a sub-podcast that does.

44:57 Oh yeah, we could do that. The program concepts should demonstrate ability to improve rights awareness and access to justice for Chinese citizens, strengthen and institutionalize citizen participation in government, promote government information transparency, blah blah blah blah blah. The numbers they have available for 2020 I'm just scrolling down because it's a very long thing. They've won grant for $750,000 and won for $1.5 million. John, we're crazy if we don't go after some of this. That's just the China one. We could grab any one of these. Or more. This is a propaganda bonanza. I love these guys. And Congress just gives them the money. There you go.

45:56 Yeah, this is a very interesting outfit. So that's what your money's going towards podcasters in Venezuela Way to go Congress very very proud of the work you're doing Wow, I know it's Abrams. That guy's the best. I like how he said, well, you know, I don't know exactly, but you know, I'm reluctant to say the numbers, but what he really meant was God, if they heard these numbers, it's so huge. But this is one program for China, one, one and a collective two and a half million dollars available. Come on. Yeah.

CHAPTER 12 / 27 Discussion

Nancy Pelosi, Impeachment Articles Procession and Pen Ceremony

Speaker Nancy Pelosi led a formal procession to transmit articles of impeachment against Donald Trump to the Senate. During the signing ceremony, Pelosi used multiple commemorative pens to sign the documents, subsequently handing them out to impeachment managers as souvenirs. This display was criticized as being "off-message" and celebratory, contradicting Pelosi's public stance that the impeachment was a somber and tragic historical necessity.

nancy pelosi· impeachment· signing ceremony· commemorative pens· house of representatives

46:35 Come on, man. Come on, man. Come on, man. Well, we should seriously consider getting some of that money. It's just out there for the takings. Some other podcaster is gonna get it. I agree. We should do it. We'll do it this week. Gonna get it. Gonna get it. Okay, let me do this next perfect piece of information because we had another split-screen moment. The next day we had the president announcing phase one of the China deal. At the same time, Nancy Pelosi transmitting articles of impeachment to the Senate, which fantastically enough literally consisted of the impeachment managers in some kind of

47:22 procession, like a funeral procession lockstep walking across the hall with a lady in front holding the articles of impeachment as if it was a gift, like a scepter that she is handing over. Yes, very British. Is this even a thing? Has it always been done this way, where we have a procession that marches across the hall? No, probably not. I think it may have been something similar during the Clinton thing, but the Nixon never happened So you have to go back to Andrew Johnson and that was like yeah, who knows what I doubt it So there there a couple of things that happened that of note that I have some clips for so what she? Was really trying to do all day Nancy here was make this into some kind of historical moment

48:20 And I don't know if that's for her personally or that this will be her legacy as she impeached a president, but she compared this moment to several historical events in our history and she didn't really have a hook. But she wanted you to remember this date and this time, well not this date, but the December date when the President of the United States was impeached and that's forever. As I've said, it's always been our founders when they started, when in the course of human events it becomes necessary, when Abraham Lincoln forced scorn seven years ago.

48:57 Thomas Paine, these are the times that try men's souls, the times that found us. Again and again, even our poets, Longfellow, remember, listen my children and you will hear of the midnight ride of Paul Revere on the 18th of April in 75, Harley Man is now alive and remembers that famous day and year. It's always about marking history using time. On December 18th, the House of Representatives impeached the President of the United States. An impeachment that will last forever. So apparently what she wants is some nursery rhyme or some little jig that will talk about Nancy Pelosi, the great Nancy who impeached the President on December 18th, that school children will recite in the future. She left out Tinker's Two Evans to chance.

49:54 It's the only thing that she was kind of missed the boat on. A very famous baseball poem. Well, but she was talking about more political type country stuff, not about baseball. However, this moment will be remembered and it will be remembered for something she did. And I think it will go down in history and someone has to make a jig about this or some kind of song. I'm looking at you, Chris Wilson. At the end, she did something very typical that we've seen happen certainly all throughout Obama, and I'm sure it's happened forever, but our show really didn't start until Obama was elected, and that is the signing ceremony where you sign three

50:42 Three dots of your name with one pen, you switch it out, get another pen, switch it out, get another pen, so that you have all of these historic pens that were used to sign this historic document. And she did this for this impeachment, for these impeachment articles, and not only did she sign with each of these pens, she was handing them out to everybody on stage, to the impeachment managers, and they're all taking pictures with their pens. It was so disgusting that even CNN couldn't handle it. We're used to seeing

51:19 signing ceremonies, handing out pens at moments of celebration when a president is signing legislation, when even sometimes, a rare occasion but it has happened, when the House sends over a landmark piece of legislation. It was It was unusual to see that kind of ceremony and making, you know, handing out the pens and smiling for a picture in this kind of situation where the House Speaker has bent over backwards to say publicly and privately, this is somber. This is not a time for a celebration. Understandable. This is history. And the people who are involved want to mark the moment. I didn't expect to see that. Yeah, I thought that was a little

52:02 jarring and certainly I think off message because you heard Nancy Pelosi there say in fact that this was a sad and tragic day and then there she is holding up the pin and having photographs taken with those pins. So yeah, I think it was a little off message for someone who has tried to set a very serious tone and here she is posing for photographs with a pin. So probably not the most committee chairman and the house managers They will have those pens for the rest of their lives. Yes! Yes, broth! The rest of their lives! It's such a treasure to have! Brother! That really is... I mean that's... That was really pretty lame.

52:43 That's a better word for it than that. It's sick. Yeah, yeah. Do the pens have something, are they specially printed on the side of each pen? Of course, of course, of course. They come with a certificate. They send you the box later with a certificate of authenticity. Oh yeah. And by the way, that's your money too. Yeah, that's not cheap to customize every single thing. Because it's not like they're customizing 10,000 at a penny a piece. No, these are not penny a piece pens either. I think he's a nice Tiffany pens or something. Well, Tiffany, probably not Tiffany. Why not? Anyway, I don't know, Tiffany even make a pen? Yes. You've never heard of the Tiffany pen tap? The Tiffany pen tap? Yes, this is a...

CHAPTER 13 / 27 Discussion

US-China Trade Deal, Phase One and Enforcement Triggers

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin detailed the "Phase One" trade agreement with China, which includes a commitment from China to purchase $50 billion in American farm goods annually. The deal features a dispute resolution process and structural changes regarding forced technology transfer and intellectual property. As part of the agreement, the U.S. lifted China's designation as a currency manipulator, provided the new enforceable commitments are met.

steven mnuchin· china trade deal· trade deficit· intellectual property· currency manipulation

53:32 Wow, maybe it's not a thing anymore. Did you say White House? No, the Tiffany Pen tap is in a boardroom when everyone's in agreement they take their Tiffany Pens and they all tap on the... You've never heard this phrase? Never. Huh, yeah. So while this was taking place, and we can certainly do more, but I would like to just switch over briefly to the other screen. The president was announcing and subsequently signing with pens his deal with China. Which is really one thing and one thing only. I have Mnuchin here to explain it. He was on Lou Dobbs. I cut Lou Dobbs out. Lou Dobbs talks three times as much in the interview as Mnuchin. It's unbelievable how boring that guy is. He likes to talk. So really what it is, is we've already leveled out the trade deficit. China has, I think it was already announced that they

54:25 agreed to acquire 50 billion worth of farm goods from us. I think that was already kind of, that was known, it was probably baked into all the numbers and that's over, I believe, a two-year term. There have been Some changes to the forced technology transfer intellectual property, which really isn't important as Mnuchin says here It's all about the accountability. There's a very detailed dispute resolution process This is an enforceable agreement just as the president Dictated it would be there were two issues here One was he wanted to reduce the trade deficit and two he wanted structural changes particularly

55:03 around forced technology and other issues. So this is an additional $200 billion, which is very significant. And specifically for our farmers, there'll be $40-50 billion annually of purchases. So this is a great win for American business and American farmers. And I do think this can be good for China. China has 1,350,000,000 people. They've got a large growing middle class. And if our companies can compete fairly selling things to that middle class that's a huge growing market for our workers. I love what he says here because he starts off by saying this is a big win for the Chinese people because it's good for our workers listen to this and this nidnok. Well they got a large growing middle class and if our companies can... Wait let me go back a little bit here

55:49 Where was it? I don't see how it benefits China, but okay. And the agreement is a precondition, if you will, to this phase one to relieve the Chinese of the currency manipulator status that, well, actually you penned on them. Well, the only reason why we changed that is because there's a chapter in this agreement on currencies and foreign exchange. It's fully enforceable. There's very strict commitments that they will not manipulate their currency going forward.

56:36 And as a result of that, we got comfortable lifting the designation. But like every other part of this agreement, that will be an enforceable chapter going forward. So since the mainstream will not pay any attention to this or explain it at all, they'll just go, blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. The phase one is really not that much of a big deal, however it's an enforceable agreement with triggers so that if China doesn't follow the basic tenets of the agreement then we can call them out. There's you know the It'll be very clear and then we probably start nuking them or something. I don't know. But this is not a very important deal for the details. It's important for the process going forward that we have agreements that we know that people abide by them. And that's really it.

57:26 They could at least... You can stop. Don't start saying going forward. He said it too many times already. Oh, well, exactly. Because there's nothing. There's really nothing in there. The only thing is it sets the ground rules so that I guess in modern parlance we can call them out and you know and then reverse everything and pile the sanctions back on whatever. But I think they want to do a deal. It would make sense. They want to do something. Well, everybody wants to do something. Everybody wants to do something. I don't know what's gonna come of this. But at least he's giving some lip service. Nobody else ever did. Yes. Time went on forever without any...

CHAPTER 14 / 27 Discussion

Lev Parnas, Rachel Maddow Interview and Robert Hyde Texts

Lev Parnas, a former associate of Rudy Giuliani, gave an extensive interview to Rachel Maddow regarding his involvement in Ukraine. Parnas addressed text messages from Robert Hyde that suggested Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch was under surveillance, though Parnas dismissed Hyde as a "drunk lunatic" making empty boasts. Parnas also alleged that Vice President Mike Pence was tasked with pressuring President Zelensky to announce investigations into Joe Biden.

lev parnas· rachel maddow· robert hyde· marie yovanovitch· rudy giuliani

58:12 Without anybody even paying any attention to the fact that we're losing all our jobs that factories are moving overseas and everyone was making a lot of money Except the American worker. Yes. Thank you. You see why they voted for Trump. Yes, you know why they're gonna keep voting for Trump I don't see the Democrats sucking them back in. Don't worry John you have your spot at the convention. You'll get it. It's fine We get your message. I need it You got your spot, bro. It's all cool now last night kind of on the cusp where yesterday, well it started yesterday, big news breaking! I guess they found extra people and documents just before they transmitted the articles of impeachment and all of a sudden Lev Parnas, who used to be Trump's guy, is doing an interview with Rachel Maddow. Oh, this was fun! And I really tried to understand, because you know,

59:09 Lighten the game for show prep really trying to understand exactly what is it issue apparently? There's a new character this Floyd Floyd guy yeah, yeah work for for Giuliani Well the no that's the Lev Parnas guy he works for Julian Lloyd is well. That's important because Floyd is One of these guys who shows up at a lot of Trump events much like many people Because he donates a lot of money. I think he's donated $55,000 to the America first Super PAC which is where this Lev Parnas guy he donated 350,000 but he did it through a shell company which is why he's indicted and rightfully so because you can't have foreign money coming in and

1:00:00 Even though we know how it's done, usually credit cards and everyone's doing it. You gotta do it the right way. So Parnas has WhatsApp messages that have been released. I'm not quite sure if they went through how they've been released or if it's part of the grand jury. I don't know what it is but Rachel Maddow has them. And there it's very clear that he's texting with this Floyd character and the Floyd character is saying stuff like, okay man, yeah, well we've got the ambassador in our purview, we see what she's doing, we've got her under civilians. Okay, she's no longer on her phone, she's turned off her computer, so she's in her house, she's not online.

1:00:41 these kinds of messages going back and forth. This was tied back to part of the transcript, if I understand it correctly, from the call with Trump and the President of Ukraine where Trump says, I'm paraphrasing, well she's gonna go through a lot of trouble herself, referring to the ambassador And that was in conspiratorial circles taken as, oh my god, he was talking about taking a hit out on her. Then there's this Floyd guy who's surveilling her and knows apparently when her phone is on or when her computer's on, they were trying to take her out, they were trying to kill her. And if you remember, she was called back to the United States because there was a fear for her security.

1:01:31 So now all of a sudden we have escalated this corruption by Trump, as alleged, into a hit job by Trump. And so, and then the guy who's under indictment for election campaign contribution fraud, He all of a sudden decides, well I'm gonna be a good guy, I'm gonna go talk to Rachel Maddow about everything. And so I had to get, because she published everything this morning or maybe late last night online. And this Floyd character is a guy that apparently the Trump Hotel, and this makes total sense in DC, it's kind of like the

1:02:14 The the bar from Star Wars is a whole bunch of unsavory characters Everyone's hanging around in the bar in the lobby and you know a DC is very much like this anyways No, but no different from Hollywood people hang out at the Four Seasons Hotel bar and, oh hey, I see, hey, is Bobby De Niro over there? You know, and so you can talk about it. You might bump into him, might say, this is where most of the business is done, it's where all the lobbyists are. And of course, the Trump Hotel in DC has got to be an unbelievable seething pit of Republicans and hangers-on mainly. That's the thing. So this Floyd guy,

1:02:53 You know, he's got money, he's handing it out so you get invited to stuff and he's talking to people and apparently he now had, through his contacts in Ukraine, had the ambassador under surveillance and he's texting back and forth with Lev Parnas and here's Rachel's interview with him specifically talking about this frightening individual. Why did those exchanges happen? What was he trying to tell you? I don't believe it's true. I think he was either drunk or he was trying to make himself bigger than it was, so I didn't take it seriously and I was trying to, if you see I didn't even respond to him most of the time and if I did it was like something like LOL or okay or great or...

1:03:34 you know, something like that just to, because I wouldn't respond for a long time and then I didn't want him to get rowdy if I saw him next time and say, oh, why didn't you type response? I would just amuse him until eventually as you could see, I cut him off. Well, the texts where he was supposedly reporting on the whereabouts of the ambassador went on for a week. I mean, it wasn't like one drunk night. This went for seven days. He couldn't have been drunk the whole time. He's drunk all the whole time. He wakes up and he's drunk. He starts at six. I mean, I've never seen him. This, by the way, is not what Rachel wanted to hear. She did not want to hear the guy is a total lunatic. He's drunk at six in the morning until late at night. But it will continue. So you thought that this was him making it up. You didn't believe he actually had the ambassador under surveillance? Absolutely not.

1:04:21 I asked Mr. Parnas several times over the course of our interview if those text messages from Robert Hyde indicated a real threat to Ambassador Yovanovitch. I asked him about it as many different angles I could come up with. I was insistent in asking he was adamant in his response. This is Rachel covering for herself because what she doesn't want... This is really bad. Yeah, what she doesn't want is Twitter exploding and saying, you didn't ask hard enough! You didn't push you didn't get no follow-up questions you suck something like that it was totally her covering her ass and it's honestly good down yeah of course it was sad it's sad that she did that she should have just not aired it at all very good at what she does and this was not in the studio this was at I think

1:05:10 The guy's lawyer's office, so she was a little bit out of her element. But that's how important the story was to her. To her. Because she's like, I can't believe it. I thought they were gonna kill her. They were gonna kill her under surveillance. Now the guy's just a drunk lunatic. Let's hear that again. I asked Mr. Parnas several times over the course of our interview if those text messages from Robert Hyde indicated a real threat to Ambassador Yovanovitch. I asked him about... By the way, I said Floyd, but it's Hyde. I made a mistake. Are you clear on whether or not there was ever an actual physical threat or a threat of personal intimidation against Ambassador Yovanovitch? Never from my side or anybody I know. You didn't worry that she was actually in physical danger? Never, never. Because you didn't believe Mr. Hyde?

1:06:11 Okay, so that was kind of a bummer. But the guy did say something, which I think rings true and is very plausible. But then he used the excuse of the hurricane, but it wasn't because of the hurricane. It was because he was angry that Zelensky still didn't make any attempt or effort to make any announcement before he was going to meet him. And he was... Why do you know that was an excuse and that wasn't the real reason? Because I spoke to Rudy. Rudy would talk to me too. I mean, we spoke about this every day. I mean, everything that was going on was discussed between me, Victoria, Rudy, I mean, the team.

1:06:54 So President Trump is supposed to go. He decides not to go. Vice President Pence will go instead. He sends him instead, yeah. And basically he was supposed to go there and get it strained out that Zelensky was supposed to make another announcement. And that didn't happen. And that's when Bolton, Secretary Bolton went over there and I think he has a lot to say. I'm not going to talk on this but I think he's a key witness to his conversation with Zelensky and when he came back and why he left or got fired or however you want to look at that. Let me make sure I understand what you're saying. When Vice President Pence went over there on September 1st again in President Trump's stead,

1:07:33 that you believe, or you have reason to believe, that Vice President Pence was tasked at that meeting with getting President Zelensky to announce investigations of Joe Biden specifically. Yes. And to tell him that they wouldn't get their aid until they... I don't know exactly what he was... But it was all... To demand the investigations. Like I said, the aid itself was something that I think the president decided to do, what's it called? But it was, I think, a reaction to that there was no announcement being made after so many attempts and so many promises. So holding the aid was the president's own sort of innovation to add to the leverage, to add to the pressure that people like you and the vice president and Mr. Giuliani and everybody else involved in this effort was putting on the Ukrainian government. Correct. So Rachel's leading the witness at the end but the first part

1:08:23 That rings true to me. I think it was Pence's job to go and get an announcement. I think he messed it up, and for that reason alone maybe, he will not be on the ticket. I'm predicting it right now. He will resign. Someone else is going to be on the vice presidential ticket for Trump. I think you screwed up royally there, especially because it's now coming out. Well, after those clips, I should reiterate the ban on Rachel Maddow clips. Yeah. It's so unexciting. These clips are boring. Yeah, but this, you know, we do have to play surface. Let's just take a look at that one issue. This guy, has this guy ever talked to the president? No. Has the guy ever met the president? Doubtful.

1:09:10 The guy's a Rudy Giuliani, you know, fixer. And works for Giuliani. I don't know. This seems like it could be just a whole lot of thin air to me. I'm not convinced about any of it. There's no proof of anything. The cat's not a bag man? No, I think he is a bag man. I think he's the perfect bag man because he doesn't look or act like one. I think he is a bag man. And I think he screwed this one up. And write it down in the book. He won't be on the ticket. He will not be on the ticket. Did you have the book? Are you writing it down in the book? You got a book, a red book? Is it in the book? Geez, let me get a book. Oh God. I gave up on the red book some time ago, but I'm going to write this one down in this particular ledger.

CHAPTER 15 / 27 Discussion

No Agenda Stream, Episode 1207 Artwork and Site Outage

The hosts discussed technical issues with the "Nashownotes" website, speculating on a potential Amazon server outage. They reviewed the artwork for Episode 1207, titled "Imminent Threat," which featured a child with Oreos and a "podcasting is addictive as cocaine" theme. The No Agenda Art Generator was promoted as the hub for listener-submitted artwork, including a rejected piece featuring Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on a $33 bill.

no agenda stream· nashownotes· episode 1207· podcast artwork· amazon servers

1:09:58 Ah, what is today's date? Today is the 16th of January 2020 and while you're doing that I would like to thank you for your courage and say in the morning to you the man who put the C in the crackpot cocaine. Conceit! Yeah, hold on a second while I write this in the book. You're still writing? Well, in the morning to you, Mr. Adam Curry, also in the morning to ships and sea boats and the graffy and the air subs and the water and all the dames and knights out there. In the morning to our trolls in the troll room. Who you can find and not just find but join at noagendastream.com. It is where people hang out. It is where they hang out to be with each other, to chat about the shows that are playing. They find shows, listen to shows. Shows are live as they're recorded for podcasts. You can subscribe to shows and I've made it my mission for 2020 I'm going to upgrade noagendastream.com.

1:10:53 I'm very excited. I got a lot of ideas a lot of people willing to pitch in and help so Hello trolls. Thank you. Thank you for being here, and thank you for inspiring me and trolling no agenda stream calm also in the morning to our artist just Who brought us the artwork for episode? 1207 oh is my sight down. Oh my goodness. We're down This is actually problematic Whoa, that's dangerous. Hold on a second because we may not be able to... No? Wow, that's really weird. Is it like Amazon can't be down? Sure. Amazon could be down. It could be sabotaged by Microsoft. Nashownotes.com refusing to connect.

1:11:41 Wow. That's weird. Did you pay your Amazon bill? Yes, yes, and a hefty one it is at that. It's okay because we can still say that the title of that episode was Imminent Threat. It's an imminent threat and the artwork was brought to us by Net Ned as we looked for a number of... we looked through a number of different pieces of artwork And this was the podcasting is addictive as cocaine with a little kid with the Oreos. Yeah, it was great. And there really wasn't anything else. I mean, the one we both liked. We had to go to the evergreens to find that. No, this was, was that an evergreen? Yeah, it was an evergreen. Yeah. The one we liked was, um, Cesium 137 did one with a $33 bill with AOC on it, Sandy OC.

1:12:38 And we liked that a lot, but he had used such a crappy overlay. He needed to do an original overlay. Yeah, he just had... if he had... I mean, seriously, maybe 15 minutes of extra work would have nailed it. Because the idea was good, execution up until... it was just... there's no way we could use it, it wouldn't pop. A lot of Meghan Markle stuff, a lot of obscure jokes... But that was really the best one. Yeah, I don't think there was any other contender which is why we had to go to Evergreen's. But it doesn't matter because every show is a new opportunity for artists to show off their wares. It's another opportunity for us to get a great piece of art which we appreciate very much. And you can find all of that or upload your own at noagendaartgenerator.com. And thank you very much, Ned, for helping us with an image that popped. Really made the difference.

CHAPTER 16 / 27 Discussion

Knighting Ceremony, Producer Donations and African Imperialism

A formal knighting ceremony was held for Craig Martin, now "Knight North to South," following a $500 donation. Other significant producers were thanked, including Sir Kevin McLaughlin and John Benson. A detailed report from "Sir Uncle Bob" in Sub-Saharan Africa described Chinese economic "scams" involving infrastructure loans and the consumption of "mopani worms" in Zimbabwe. The segment included various "karma" requests for health, jobs, and horse racing.

knighting· donations· karma· china in africa· mopani worms

1:13:38 Noahjenderartgenerator.com. And we do have a few people to thank as producers, associate executive producers and executive producers for show 1208, right? Yes, 1208. Craig Martin is at the top of the list of Phoenix, Arizona, 500 bucks. Hi John and Adam, the $500 donation puts me over the top for my knighthood. Please knight me as knight north to south. All right. He moved from Fairbanks, Alaska, north to Phoenix, south, Arizona. Hence the name North to South. I love your show. I never miss an episode. Your show has made me skeptical of virtually everything. Virtually everything I hear in the media, that is. Yes. So thanks for that. My life is so much simpler before.

1:14:25 It's supposed to be an improvement. It's supposed to be an improvement. What are we doing? One of my favorite dog dogs. Yuck. One of my dogs recently, one of my dogs, yuck was diagnosed with bone cancer. If there was one thing that can beat this, that's it's her. But I would appreciate dogs or people too. And fuck cancer jingles. I would also like the same. I would like some racehorse karma, brother. Racehorse karma? Yeah, he owns a horse. He wants a simpler life. You own a racehorse? Wow. He's running a stakes race on Saturday in Santa Anita. Wow. Her name is Fast Enough. Let's hope he's first. If this works, just imagine the new revenue for you. Actually, we have made a point of not doing karma for football teams. No.

1:15:23 Now, this is a little different. It's his horse. But in the case of a horse race, and maybe it's for the horse's health, I think we should, it'll be allowed. But only if you own the horse. Yeah, okay, so that's a new rule. Dude, that's a difference. You're rooting for your local team. You don't own the team. It's not any part of your home or business. But if you own the horse, I think it's allowable. Yes. But we don't have horse karma, so we'll substitute with a side of goat. Dogs are people too. You've got karma.

1:16:08 Let us know how it turned out. Sir Kevin McLaughlin, Earl of Luna, 349.97. Jiggle request health and jobs karma for all the producers. Swazant nuff karma boobs. Thank you Adam and John for the, I guess there's a bunch of, I don't know what that is, all that they suggested. Thank you John and Adam for the excellent work you do to help Or a mid-day stay healthy and small today's donation of three forty nine ninety seven is five small donations rolled up in the one. Boobs 808, lopsided boobs 806, small boobs 6006, small lopsided boobs 6008, and schwozant nufkarma 6969. So Kevin McLaughlin. Earl of Luna. He loves boobs. I believe completely in the First Amendment and in boobs.

1:17:03 Now I'm a believer. Because I like boobs? 69! 69, dudes! You've got karma. You know, I forgot about that clip. It was the Brooke Baldwin show on CNN. Yeah, it's the guy from Barstool Sports, I think, isn't it? I can't remember, but he loves boobs and she was so offended. Uh-huh. That's funny. That clip is very funny clip. John Benson 333 33 from Fort Mill South Carolina a pretty good list today. Yeah Yeah, he's out after we told him we needed some more help than last time Hey, John and I'm after being hit in the mouth a month ago by my friend Richard I'm finally making a donation at the best podcast in universe and humbly request D douching You've been D douched I'll be at the Charlotte meetup on Friday can't wait it's like a party

1:18:01 Thanks for all you guys do and if you have time please play the following jingles. Pastor Manning, Kellyanne Conway money shot, Alex Jones babies grown in cows, and three you can see, can you see the juice? That's a show of money shot! Woo Jesus! Woo Lord! Look at that! That's a money shot! Kellyanne Conway Conway in the money shop! Well I'll admit it too, when they're talking about nuking and the president saying fire and fury I'm gonna come around and stay around the house. Wow this is the longer clip. Like a chicken you know. We love you for that. I'm gonna play this because I don't remember this whole it's only 20 seconds. You guys are worse than I am. For 25 years I've been building babies and cows! Oh my gosh! Can you see that juice? I don't know if that was me or Jones.

1:18:50 The, uh... No idea. I've never heard it before. Babies in cows. Well, I thought... Hmm. I prepped this segment, you know, I tried. Well, give him his karma. Oh, did he want a karma? Well, I would give it to him. Oh, okay. Well, I thought we were supposed to request karma. You've got it. Changing the damn rules. No, no, no. Deducing. Deducing. We gave him the deducing. We've been throwing karma constantly. John, his name is... His name is John Benson. He didn't ask for a deducing and didn't... Oh, he did. And we gave him the deducing. I didn't ask for karma and you keep telling me no karma unless requested. I would like to document that. That is not true. I said no de-douching unless requested. You cannot find a documentation for what you just asserted. That's possibly true. I may be incorrect.

1:19:39 Julie McNeil's next on the list along with our big list of executive producers. Because we throw out karma all the time. Hey, hey, I said I may be incorrect. You don't need to rub it in. Julie McNeil, 33333 St. Gabriel, Louisiana. Nice little town there. Gentlemen, this is by the way, I want to point this out. This is one of the problems I'll have with these. When you have these two notes that are both colored, I can see reading into the next one. Gentlemen, I'm in closing at 33333 on behalf of my smoking hot wife, Julie, who's bur... Wait, hold on. Who is this?

1:20:16 I'm not talking anymore because you know I'll just be called out wrongly this donations from Julie but apparently Adam managed to swap it out because it was a Donation on her husband making a donation on behalf of a smoking hot wife Julie whose birthday's on the 16th There you go by my calculation this amount should secure her a spot at the roundtable nice I hit her in the mouth years ago, and she's normally doesn't do that I hit her in the mouth years ago, and he has been a and she has been a fanatical listener ever since, huh? I would like to request the title Dame Julie of Grand Isle, Louisiana if this is not already taken. I don't think it's been taken. Let me look on the list. Hmm, I don't think that's taken. No, I think we'll just... It's not on here, so she can have it. I would like to call out our friend John in Lafayette, Louisiana for being an utter douchebag. Douchebag!

1:21:12 Huh, utter douchebag. And I'd like to make a special request that you play for her anything with CNN correspondent Elle Sharpton in it. Well, he's MSNBC. MSNBC, yes. Not CNN. CNN is not that bad. The more the better. Keep the fantastic work at Julie's husband. In St. Gabriel, Louisiana. Okay, shorty. R-E-S-P-I-C-T. And thank you, and we'll see Julie, your smoking hot wife, at the round table later on. Luke Bixler in Charlotte, North Carolina, also 33333, and also with a complaint. Forgive me, potfathers, I have sinned. It's been years, a long listener, I've been a years-long listener of the show, yet this is my first donation, and such a humbly request a de-douching. You've been de-douched.

1:22:08 Insert generic but heartfelt platitudes about amygdala size and relative sanity here. I just ended a career in the military and feels I absorbed some residual jobs in house karma. Is my tradition to transition i'm sorry to the private sector was fairly painless and i feel i made a soft landing i'd like to return said jobs the original nancy. And house karma of the gold variety if you please back into the ecosystem over the past months i hit both my. How randy and my smoking hot girlfriend in the mouth.

1:22:51 And would like to call out both, in other words the double, as douchebags. Looking forward to meeting their fellow Charlotte slaves tomorrow at the meetup. I think that's today actually. I'll close the door requesting your choice of Sharpton. Yes, that's actually today the meetup. So yes, that's Charlotte today. Hold on a second. And what was the last request? Was a random Sharpton? Yeah. But resist we much. We must and we will much about that be committed. Jobs, jobs, jobs and jobs. Let's vote for jobs! Richard Kampfuhus. Kampfuhus. Kompuis. Oh, Kompuis. Ah, I didn't see that. The P and the H is not an F in Dutch. Kompuis. Kompuis means camping house.

1:23:54 Richard Campinghouse $333 in Holland. Adam and John and all listeners to the best podcast universe. First off some Jigo requests. One on de-douching. This is my first time donation. You've been de-douched. Jobs, jobs, jobs karma for myself. Goat karma for my smoking hot Swiss wife Karen who has to finish a couple of essays before a deadline on the 20th of January. Shit high school kid. What is the deal? I smoke and hot wife He says a smoking hot wife. That's a finish a couple of essays. Maybe she's an essayist. Well, you write essays You're just not a smoke. I'm an essayist. Yeah, but you're not smoking. I'll send a war and peace via john at the Dvorak.org Yes, please do that we all would appreciate that here you go with your jobs jobs jobs jobs and jobs Let's vote for jobs! You suck.

1:24:56 Samuel Liechtenstein in New York City, 333, no jingles, no karma. Thank you, Samuel. Nicholas Miller in Tucker, Georgia, 333. We have a big list today. Charter boat karma. Just got my license going back to BVI Tortola. That's a British Virgin Isles. Okay. To get my catamaran stamp. He wants a big donation bro. Hey bro, receive bro. He's gonna go out on his catamaran baked. Yeah you've got karma. It's the best way to go on a catamaran is baked. Are you kidding me? Gerald poppy mean well from parts unknown 250 bucks.

1:25:44 And he's our first associate executive producer. Another donation from Dr. Doctor for my beautiful wife, Alison, and daughter, Lynette, who are very attractive listeners. Oh, I'm sorry, attentive. We all appreciate the insightful analysis of the political quagmire. It sounded like donations have been slow. Yes. And we want to keep the show going. How about giving us a don't eat me Joe Biden and a few other good sound effects. They're all funny. Keep up the good work. Was that what she wanted? I hope so they're all funny. It was all a bunch of sound effects didn't say jingles it's sound effects so I gave sound effects. Yeah sound effects is what you did. Yes I found the clip wheel again for our clip blitz.

1:26:55 Colin Preston 222 60 no jingles no karma. Thank you sir uncle Bob and somewhere in a APO box number military military 222 22 what's there to a PO and DPO? Oh, I don't know Well someone in this chat room might know a PO versus DPO. That's a very good question I've only seen a PO really have you ever seen a DPO is it? defense post office or what is the a Army post office, I think. Yeah, okay. All right. Or something. Anyway, he says it's been a long time since the last donation has been floating around Sub-Saharan Africa for the last 18 months due to a job reassignment. I've managed to keep up with the best podcasts in the universe though and it keeps getting better. A few observations from having visited 10 different countries since arrival on continent. Maybe it should be CPO. On continent? Is he off world?

1:27:54 Here he goes. The Chinese are taking over Africa and your analysis is pretty much spot on. Of course, we put that in the show, I think about eight, nine years ago. Easily. Yeah, easily. It was one of the first things we did. Yeah, it's like, hey, just so you know, China's taken over Africa. Yeah. Yeah. And it seems to be still going on. A loan is granted, say for the bill. This is what we've discussed 10 years ago. A loan is granted, say for the building of an airport, as in the case of Lusaka, a Chinese construction company is then hired, which sends the loan money right back to China. And then when the African country Inevitably defaults on the loan, boom, China ends up with a collateral which is often mine. This is American style of economic hitman. Read the book, Economic Hitman by John Perkins.

1:28:46 Don't read the original edition, don't read the update. Collaterals, mining rights, or share of the ownership, state owned, it's actually more than that. This is more complicated than this, but at least notice it's a scam. The absolute most disgusting thing I've seen in my life was a mopani worm in Zimbabwe. It's a thick caterpillar of the emperor moth, and it's supposedly a delicacy in this part of the world, a very chewy, a very chewy exterior with a thick and gooey interior that's too large to swallow whole. Which means you have no chance but to chew it and chew it and chew it some more. I've never come so close to vomiting on my boat and it's

1:29:31 And I've eaten some really disgusting things in my life. With that, would you please do I like bugs, followed by can you see the juice, and then give all the producers a big shot of goat karma and good health and safe travels for 2020. Also, some photos of Chinese imperialism in Africa might be helpful. You think so? Yes, please send us some. I could try and send as few As few as they are very interesting and almost I could try to send a few. He says as few. I'm sorry, it's hard to read. You know, you're getting up there with the Joe Biden territory. We might not want to make fun of people anymore.

1:30:10 Yeah, I might. Finally, I'm thinking of a meetup in Zambia. The DRC or Addis Ababa. What are your thoughts? Yeah. Would you two attend? No. Love and light, Sir Uncle Bob of the Unincorporated Default County, Georgia, or DeKalb County. And then he's got a photo which I don't have. I like default county better. I like default county. Default county joke. Thank you very much, Sir Uncle Bob. A minor war and peace, but it's appreciated. Here's what you requested, sir. We eat bug. You eat bug. Oh, that's not the right one. Nothing like fresh bug. What the hell is that? I love bug. That's the wrong one. You're on a roll.

1:31:00 What do you mean I'm on a roll? I've done everything beautifully. Except for that one. Yeah. What is the... but which... I love bugs. Bugs, bugs, bugs. Maybe it's this one? Uh, no? Well this is... this is... Oh, I see the problem. I got it. Here we go. Tastes like poop. Oh my gosh. Can you see that juice? You've got... Karma.

1:31:39 I'm kind of still baffled by he says he attached a photo but this is a PayPal. This comes from his email note and I saw the photo but it's not not interesting enough to discuss that's why I just moved on. Baron Chris Spears we'll move on to him he's right down the street from you in Austin Texas. He's doing it 22 bucks. I want to thank you for your courage and some long overdue value your way. I would like I would assume an appropriate de-douching is in order. I wish both of you a belated merry new year. Thanks for continuing to put out an outstanding product. Baron Chris. And we'll give him the requested de-douching. You've been de-douched.

CHAPTER 17 / 27 Discussion

MoveOn.org, History and Impeachment Fundraising

The origins of MoveOn.org were traced back to a Berkeley software company known for the "flying toaster" screensaver. The organization was founded during the Clinton impeachment to urge the country to "move on" from the proceedings. Currently, the group is using the Trump impeachment to solicit $5 donations for billboards and mass mobilizations, a tactic the hosts compared to their own "value-for-value" model.

moveon.org· bill clinton· impeachment· fundraising· flying toasters

1:32:24 Is it guys a baron is the way would he never need a de-douching well? America's Heartland in Saudi Arabia ah Dave Fugazotto there is 2020 Step up and chip in you freeloading douchebags. You know this It's funny Dave says that I signed up for move on I Somehow they got my phone number and they texted me. So, you know, I do this for the show obviously, and they said, would you like to receive alerts from MoveOn? I said, yeah, I'll receive some alerts from MoveOn. Let me read the first alert just so you know where these people are coming from. MoveOn.org. John, what is the genesis of MoveOn.org again?

1:33:08 Moveon.org began, it used to be, it began as a software company in Berkeley called Berkeley Systems and they're the ones that did the flying toaster screensaver. Do you remember that? Yeah, yeah, of course. Well, this is during the Clinton impeachment and the owners of the company got a hair up their ass. They were pissed off about this being a thing. And so they started this organization called moveon.org referring specifically to the impeachment and how we should move on from the impeachment. And so they took their company, which was specializing at the time in creating screen readers for the blind.

1:33:50 And they morphed it into this moveon.org and so I don't know what happened to the rest of the operation. But the idea was to move on from the impeachment. Move on everybody. That's why it has such a crazy name. That's what it means. Move on. Here, move on alert. Speaker Pelosi will send impeachment articles to Senate today! All uppercase. Trump's trial starts next week. We're running billboards and have organizers on the ground in key states driving calls to the Senate and prepping for another mass mobilization. Chip in five dollars? So if that tells you where they're coming from and who's behind that stuff I think you know. So even moveon.org is using chip in which is why it's lovely when our

1:34:36 Peerage uses it mockingly. Chip in, you freeloading douchebags. Which is what moveon.org would love if they could write that. Just stop for a second and appreciate the transparency and honesty of this group we are. Yes, I'll re-read Dave Fugazotto's note. Step up and chip in, you freeloading douchebags! That's what everyone would like to say, but apparently they can't because they're not a family like us. Well... Leave it. Move on.

CHAPTER 18 / 27 Discussion

Producer Credits, Newsletter Strategy and Direct Marketing

The hosts discussed the importance of the show's newsletter as a reminder for listeners to support the "value-for-value" model. They addressed technical challenges with HTML emails and spam filters, noting that while some listeners prefer plain text, HTML is more effective for marketing. They recommended ProtonMail as a reliable alternative for receiving the newsletter and thanked several high-tier donors, including Tony Santos and Adam Barrett.

mailchimp· protonmail· direct marketing· newsletter· value for value

1:35:15 Phil in Annapolis, Maryland, $203.33. We have a good list today. Yeah. Hey now, I was hitting the mouth a few weeks ago while reading the comments of a PC Magazine article. Please accept this humble first time donation. Request a de-douching from Phil in Annapolis. You've been de-douched. What are you read daniel mariano two hundred bucks parts unknown. Jingles huntsman chinese and that's true if i can get a goat karma to be great a friend hit me in the mouth a while ago and i've been a loyal listener since the nine hundreds.

1:35:55 Adam, I only remember you as the cool guy with the hair doing your MTV years and didn't really follow your career after that. John, I've been a fan since your tech TV days. You are tied with Patrick Norton as my third favorite personality behind Sumidas and Erika Hill for obvious reasons. We're number three! They're number three. Anyways, keep up the great work. And what do you want? He wanted a Huntsman and a Karma, a regular or goat? He wanted a, that's true, if I get a goat Karma, yeah. I thought he wanted Huntsman. Yeah, you know, he said Huntsman, Chinese and, and that's true, I'm sorry. Oh, okay, that's true. Let me grab that one. And a Karma, regular or a goat? Goat. That's true. You've got Karma.

1:36:48 Huntsman's daughter who is on The View quit. Oh really? She's gonna work full-time for, now there's gonna be back to one just one conservative, and now she's gonna work full-time for her dad who's gonna be running for governor of Utah. You must be sad because it's ruined your view viewing experience. I never watched The View. It's hard to watch. Yeah. I don't like anybody on the show. Okay. Tony, I do, the other shows that are out there is The Talk.

1:37:27 Which is kind of artificial version of the view. It's not quite as good. It's not quite as lively. And then the one that's probably the best of the group is The Real. Yes. The word is The Real. Which is all ethnic. There's not a white person on that show. Ethnic. Ethnic, really? Lonnie loves ethnic. Okay. It's all ethnic. It's called black. They're not ethnic. No, they're not. No, there's two women are Asian. They're not black. Oh. I think one of them actually, one may be Hispanic. I think there's a Hispanic, maybe two Asians, and one, maybe one or two blacks, max. So why do you say ethnic? Because it's the only way to describe all these things. How about a bunch of women? It's a bunch of ethnic women. There's no whites is what I wanted to say. Ethnic, okay. But ethnic is, I don't know, I think it's just not right.

1:38:16 I don't know, I think I am right. Ethnic, which means they have ethnic, but if you're black American, you're not ethnic, you're black. If it matters. I just thought that was interesting. Go ahead, dig away. I'm digging a grave for you, my friend. I'm just trying to protect you. I don't think so. Tony Santos, Knight of South Jersey, meanwhile, could be protecting us because he donated 200 bucks. Adam and John, thanks for the twice weekly dose of reality. Can I get a John, what? Can you believe this? Can I get a John Huntsman Chinese and Chinese asshole clip? No. We never had two jobs. We never had a John Huntsman or a clip for years. It is very rare. Very rare. That's interesting. Yeah. Random number. I'm looking for jobs, Carmichael, as I'm having a hard time with my current job as a dude named Ben and might jump ship to the family business. Love and Light. Tony Santos, King of South Jersey.

1:39:18 Okay, so now night night night so huntsman Okay, here we go. I put on the LGG kitchen she Donald Trump don't trust China China is asshole And the jobs car was just jobs jobs and jobs. Let's vote for jobs. Oh That's funny. Yeah, we might as well do the podcast or the anti-Chinese podcast because we're not going to get a visa anyway to keep playing that clip. Well, I think we're doing a great, we're doing exactly what the State Department would want. Well, they should be paying us to play that clip. Yes, every time we play that combo. I have no idea why that clip is so inherently funny. Yeah, it's... Play it again, please. Okay, well, I just got rid of it. Hold on.

1:40:04 Easy, easy to find again. Huntsman, here we go. He doesn't understand this situation. No, I'm with the China is asshole. Oh, okay. Well, that's an easy one. I thought you, I thought, well, maybe it's the combo. No, it's the one I think is just inherently funny. Yes. Donald Trump don't trust China. China is asshole. Why are you laughing? It's great. But why? Well... Shurkega of the Shree... What? I'll be doing Sir Keg of the S-Ring. 200 bucks. Making up for times I thought about donating but never got around to it. Jingle requests, Reverend L's, dealer's choice and Sir Keg of the S-Ring. S-Ring. Okay. R-E-S-P-I-C-T People think we have like some huge library of Sharpton stuff, but really we have about four that are a minute and a half long.

1:41:08 So when people say, hey throw a random in there, it's like I don't really want to use a minute and a half. That's why I resort to the respect often or... That ladies and gentlemen is Adam trying to tell you quit asking for nothing but Sharpton clips. We got plenty of other things. Thank you. Adam Barrett, meanwhile, comes in with the best donation of 200 bucks and says and finishes it off with NJNK. So we end with that and we want to thank him for that courtesy. Fantastic list. Thank you so much. We needed that we need to make up for low low numbers in the past was it three shows tooth shows? Yeah, since the beginning of the whole this year. Yeah, it's the whole all of this It's interesting because people don't understand or maybe we should just I'd like to talk about it briefly. The newsletter is important because it reminds people that there is a show and The reminder is also a reminder to support the show. I

CHAPTER 19 / 27 Discussion

Deepfake Voice Technology, JFK and Obama Simulations

A demonstration of a deepfake voice creator showed the current state of AI voice synthesis. The host recorded a sample sentence and processed it through filters meant to mimic John F. Kennedy, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama. The results were critiqued as being poor in quality and easily distinguishable from the actual historical figures, despite the growing concerns surrounding the technology.

deepfake· voice synthesis· jfk· barack obama· bill clinton

1:48:11 No, I mean having to pass. That's what 25 years of marriage will do, I guess, huh? You got a show today? You guys are still doing that podcast? Thank you to our executive and associate executive producers. These titles are real and you can display them. I am ramping up my LinkedIn account. I'm starting to, I found the login. I'm starting to clean it up a little bit. So if you haven't already connect to me, then connect and you know, we'll see if we can build some of the network there, but you do have to have.

1:48:46 your title, your producer title in your profile on LinkedIn. And it has to be showed prominently. And a lot of successful people have it in there. So you'll be able to see how other people do it as well. And above all, thank you for supporting our Value for Value Network. And we'll be thanking more people in our second segment, second half of show. And if you'd like to support us, you can do it for the Sunday show. Go to... Dvorak.org Slash N A. And you are up to speed on all things debate, so you'll be cool now. Our formula is this. We go out, we hit people in the mouth. What the? Order. Race. Shut up, slave. So talking about Buzzkill Jr., he sent me a link to a deepfake voice creator. Okay.

1:49:45 Now this is a web page I can put in the next newsletter, although you might not be interested. I decided you put a... it can turn your voice into Kennedy's voice, Obama's voice... Now wait a minute, are these the same guys that did the Joe Rogan voice fake? Is it the same outfit? I don't know, but I don't think so. It's independent researchers. They also do Oprah and Clinton and a couple other people, including one of them who I think is a researcher. So I decided to put into the thing, you put your voice in, and here's John's voice. This is me putting in one of the things that I'm gonna say. No Agenda is the best podcast in the universe. Now that's you. That's me. That's you and you recorded that on your phone.

1:50:34 No, I recorded it on a cheap mic that's hooked to the other computer. Oh, okay. It sounded cheap. But you can hear what it is. What does it say? What did I say? No Agenda is the best podcast in the universe. No Agenda is the best podcast in the universe, right? Yeah. So it's understandable. Yeah. Let's hear what it sounds like in Kennedy's voice. The only chance to kiss the best fighter is to hear of the recipient. Did Buskill Jr. send this as, hey this is great? Wow, fooled me. I thought it was JFK. Yeah, well I want to hear Clinton, Clinton voice.

1:51:18 Okay, Clinton voice. Sounds just like Clinton. Just like him. This is really... I'm being fooled. I know you'd be stunned. Now here is Obama, just to get these out of the way. Which one? Obama voice. Okay. Alright. I'm better than that. Well that was no good. So let's try it. I had one, I got this one, this one, I said something else and this is Obama voice and he's got this weird noise at the end.

CHAPTER 20 / 27 Discussion

Smart TV Surveillance, ACR Technology and Weeping Angel

The "Off the Grid" segment warned of the surveillance capabilities built into modern Smart TVs. Manufacturers use Automatic Content Recognition (ACR) along with hidden cameras and microphones to track who is watching and their reactions to content. The segment referenced the CIA's "Weeping Angel" project, which explored using TVs as listening devices, and noted that users often unknowingly grant permission for this data collection in fine-print user agreements.

smart tv· acr technology· facial recognition· weeping angel· cia

1:52:03 I mean, what is the web? What is the URL for this piece of crap? I'd have to get it for you. The point is, it's not very good. Thanks. OTG going OT. I'm an OTG kind of guy. OTG baby! OTG going OT. I'm an OTG kind of guy. Hey, I got a full-on segment today in our off-the-grid segment OTG. We are OTG kind of guys. That means we like to create as little data as possible for commercial companies to exploit and if possible

1:52:48 to keep them from selling our data. And as you know, it's not really the government who's spying on you, it's your friendly Silicon Valley companies and they'll be happy to share it or even sell it to the government. And I have three topics, two just quickies that we can get through. If you've recently purchased a smart TV, Which I think all TVs are now branded as smart TV. Can you even buy a boring old television anymore? Not a good one. No. The one that scares me more than your doorbell, it's your TV. And that's the one people aren't talking about. Smart TVs today, almost all the ones you've bought if you bought a TV in the last few years, it has a camera and a microphone on it that you probably didn't know. If you ran your finger around the black edge of it, you will find a little hole. It's a camera.

1:53:38 They have created the television manufacturers and the networks have created a technology called ACR, automatic content recognition. They're using facial recognition and voice recognition so your TV in your living room wants to know who is watching and what show are they watching. So they're looking at you through a camera using this ACR, facial recognition, they know it's your teenage daughter, voice recognition, they hear her talking and they want to hear Her say, this show is boring and I don't like it. That's why they created it. In fact, this technology is so interesting that some people may not know there was quite a scandal because the CIA said, wait, we could listen and look at people in their homes through their TV. That whole project was called Weeping Angel. You can Google it and see. And people say, is this legal? That's the question. And the answer is actually no, it's not legal. The Video Protection Act of 1998 protects us from that, but

1:54:33 Stewart, every one of us, when we install something or set up a new TV, it says, accept user agreement. When you clicked accept, you are then overriding your own protection because in the fine print that no one has ever read, it actually says, you're enabling us to do something they call smart interactivity. You just gave them permission to use the camera and use the voice, the microphone to look at you and listen to you to figure out what you're watching on TV, who in your house is watching it, what they're saying about it. The Weeping Angels Project, ladies and gentlemen, have a look at that. You will be surprised and you may want to reconsider the device that you've placed so prominently in your living room so that it really can see everywhere and everything you're doing. Even what you're doing when no one's home and you're watching that special channel. Just think about that.

CHAPTER 21 / 27 Discussion

Dating App Data, Privacy Risks and Chinese Ownership

An investigation into dating apps like Hinge and Grindr revealed the massive amount of personal data collected, including exact locations, chat messages, and HIV status. European transparency laws allowed users to see files spanning hundreds of pages. National security concerns were specifically raised regarding Grindr's ownership by the Chinese company Kunlun Tech and the potential for that data to be accessed by the Chinese government.

dating apps· hinge· grindr· data privacy· kunlun tech

1:55:22 But that's not all. John, you may want to get off Grindr. Tonight, an alarming warning from national security officials about the personal information you put on your dating apps. If there is an interest to see it, assume that somebody could see it. Our investigation begins in Europe, where transparency laws give us a window into just how much of your personal data is at risk. This is Victoria. Been on a few dates? Yeah. An American who recently moved to London. Here, unlike in the US, European law requires dating apps to turn over data they keep on users if requested.

1:56:01 We had three people living in Europe request their data. We found that Hinge collected a stunning 250 pages of data on Victoria in less than six months. NBC News looked at these four dating apps and found they collected personal information, including everything from exact location data to sexual preference. Some collecting users chat messages and Grindr collecting HIV status. It's made me rethink using the apps. John Demers is the assistant attorney general for national security. How long does that data live for? It could live forever.

1:56:36 Justice Department officials tell NBC News they are concerned about Grindr, the popular dating app for gay men. It's owned by Kunlun Tech, a Chinese gaming company. Sparking concerns, the app's data could be turned over to the Chinese government. And they laugh at me with my flip phone. They laugh at the flip phone. These are not great services to be a part of. These are not great apps to put on your phone at all. And I have bad news for people. Yeah, bad news. I got a call from one of our security experts who actually, he was a penetration expert and he got upgraded so now he's an analyst. So now he has some time to call me.

CHAPTER 22 / 27 Discussion

Plaid Financial Middleware, Visa Acquisition and Data Scraping

Visa recently acquired Plaid, a financial middleware company, for $5 billion. Plaid acts as a bridge between banks and apps like Venmo, Robinhood, and Coinbase by using "screen scraping" technology, which requires users to provide their bank login credentials. This allows Plaid to emulate a user and access full transaction histories. The hosts warned that this creates a massive security vulnerability and a "murky" legal environment regarding data ownership and liability.

plaid· visa· venmo· screen scraping· financial data

1:57:20 And you know we've been talking about different banking methodologies for transferring money, particularly when it comes to the show. We have Zelle, Z-E-L-L-E. There's a couple others. But the main one that I think we were talking about over the past two shows was Venmo. Venmo and people seem to be paying bills with it and Venmo is a really big deal. And our security producer called me and said, I have to tell you what's going on here. And by coincidence, a whole bunch of news around this company comes out. Not Vemmo, but the company Plaid. P-L-A-I-D. Have you ever heard of Plaid, John? Plaid? No. So I'll spoil... actually, I'll play the intro.

1:58:09 And then I'll explain what they're doing. It's a three-part, three clips here. Plaid is a company that sits in between your bank and your app that you're using. And I can tell you up front, almost any app that deals with money is using this company Plaid. It makes sense, it's an MSA. What's MSA? Microservices Architecture. It is, but it's quite macro in what it does and what it's actually doing is really mind-blowing and it's very... Very important that we understand what they're doing because this company just two days ago was purchased by Visa for five billion dollars and this is literally the day that I'm talking to our producer. He didn't even know that part. Here's an intro to the company Plaid. It's a CNBC report. It's a shitty one, but at least they have the founder in here and you'll hear what they do. Here's the intro. The interesting key to this new era though

1:59:08 is that we are seeing players who are operating to create new infrastructure that will be relevant in the world of banking and big data and artificial intelligence as we go forward. And one of those examples is Plaid. We've integrated with every bank in the U.S. and now most of the banks in Canada and many in the U.K. And those integrations allow us to collect data or take action on your behalf. If you use Venmo, Robinhood or pretty much any other modern finance app, you've also used a company called Plaid. We sat down with Zach Parray, co-founder and CEO of Plaid at the company's San Francisco offices.

1:59:46 We've always had this kind of mantra of making money easier for consumers. We want to make money easier for everyone. We found out we need to go one layer deeper, build the infrastructure that's sat behind these applications. And so this infrastructure is basically the connectivity between your bank account and an application on the web. Through Plaid's Application Programming Interface, or API, the company can do a lot of the heavy lifting on the back end for someone who wants to make an app, Without a third party like Plaid, startups would have to hire their own engineers and create their own ways to sync with banks, which needs to be adjusted based on different laws and regulations of various countries. Plaid also adds analysis on top of the bank account so app users are able to do things like budgeting or expense management. It can authenticate bank accounts for direct payroll deposits and electronic bill payments, verify someone's identity, verify someone's balance in real time, and understand income and employment.

2:00:40 Okay, so we understand the basic premise, you're right, microservices architecture. The reason they exist is that the banks, the US banks, Really had no API application programming interface that they could expose to app developers And I mean, it's also coinbase as you said, it's acorn. It's Robin Hood I mean, there's hundreds of these apps that use plaid as their connection to the bank So they're they're really a piece of middleware, but it's about how they do that and what they do. I'm sorry. I Well, yeah, well middleware technically, but it's off-site so it's an MSA. It is, you're wrong. It is middleware and it's important. That's the crux of this story. Listen to this. They had actually experienced the problem firsthand. So they started out actually building a financial technology app direct to consumer. It was to help them track expenses, track spending, things like that.

2:01:37 and they ran into the problem first hand that they couldn't connect to bank infrastructure. We went to a hackathon, a TechCrunch Disrupt Hackathon, and we just built a product on top of our infrastructure and kind of launched it and it ended up winning the hackathon. We had a ton of people coming to us saying, hey can I use the backend to that application you built or can I kind of license your infrastructure to go build X, Y, or Z. They made it big with their first customer Venmo, which was not a household name at the time. That app, now owned by PayPal, has 40 million accounts in the U.S. They had a pretty massive interchange fee and Venmo wanted to switch their model to running on ACA trails, so direct bank transfers, which have a much lower fee. And they couldn't get consumers to actually link their accounts because it was too arduous, too difficult.

2:02:24 It was a process where you had to type in your account number, your routing number, you had to wait three or four days, go log into your online banking or look at your bank statement, type in two and four cents, they did this trial deposit verification. It didn't work at all and no one would do it on mobile devices. And so they came to us and said, hey, can you do this quickly and easily? And we of course had this instant onboarding process which they started using. We grow as the first derivative of the fintech market. We're fortunate to have almost every fintech company that's built on top of Plaid. As the ecosystem grows, so do we. So for example, many of our lending customers use Plaid to help understand a consumer's complete picture of their finances as they're applying for a loan. So if I go to a bank and I want to apply for a mortgage,

2:03:06 The bank can easily link the accounts that I have with them, but maybe I have a stock investment account, maybe I have another checking account, maybe I get funds from another place. How can I link all those accounts together, create a financial picture and then use that to apply for the mortgage without having to come in with my 40 pages of documentation? The old model of connecting a bank or transaction account by using a routing and ABA number and an account number These are not things that are just lying around Whereas sort of your login to your bank is in your head most of the time so the up talking is important here because it shows you that this is a millennial who has millennial values and doesn't care as much as Us Gen X or slash boomers might about what is going on here as you heard?

2:03:51 The way that did not work for anybody, and I'm sure everyone who's listened to this show, if you've been around for the past 10 years, active and had a bank account, you've probably gone through the routing number, bank account number, wait for the two pennies to be deposited, then go back and then say, okay, I got the two pennies and seven cents over here, and then the authentication is made. Instead, these guys have built a screen scraper. So if you have Venmo, you have literally given them your username and password to your bank account. They go in acting on your behalf and emulate a human being on the website of the bank.

2:04:35 And that's why they can do everything once they're in. They can see your credit card purchases, when you've paid your credit card, anything that you can do with your login to your bank account, they can now do. Which sounds fabulous. But have you read their terms of service? No, because you never heard of plaid. They can do anything they want with the data they have collected and that's all of your banking information every so when you log into your bank So we have mechanics bank, you log into your bank, anything I can do in there, they do because they are literally emulating clicks. They're emulating clicks and they've done it for every single bank. So they are not just facilitating a transfer.

2:05:23 They are acting as you and you don't really know it and you don't know really what they can do other than what you heard is so how do you get these instant instant loans? Because they go into your bank account do an analysis based upon when you pay your credit card what you're using your credit card for that's how they determine for their customer and If you're trustworthy of a loan, because you basically said, hey, come on in and use my bank. Yeah, I think we got the picture. You don't find this to be extremely disturbing? I definitely wouldn't sign up for it. I'm wondering whether it's even legal. You can't be scraping my passwords and doing all this stuff. It's completely legal and here's the segment about that. The regulatory environment is completely different in Europe. It is a little bit more forward leaning around consumer ownership and access to data. Plaid, one of our foundational beliefs is that consumers own their financial data.

2:06:23 and they should be able to do with it what they want to do. And in Europe, the laws are quite clear, saying that consumers have access to and ownership of all their financial data. And actually, they stipulate how that data can be shared, which is great. So it's really forward-leaning there. We still have a long way to go in terms of challenges like communicating across an ocean is no easy feat. When you have a company like Plaid and it takes your data with your permission and uploads it to some other entity, it is now governed by a whole series of murky rules which are overlapping and sometimes conflicting involving third parties

2:07:02 and also involving data ownership. We don't have clarity in the US about who owns the data and importantly we don't have clarity about when the liability for the security of that data transfers from one entity to the next. So what people need to understand is that when you use Venmo They are going into your account and you've given them permission to do anything they want. That's in your end user agreement. I'm just going to read a few things from how we share your information from... You think you're dealing with Venmo, but you're not. You're dealing with Plaid.

2:07:37 We share our data with the developer of the application you are using. So all the data, any data they get from you, which is your entire bank account, not just where the money is, but everything within your banking, what you do with your bank. Our data processors, other service providers, partners or contractors in connection with services they perform for us or for developers. in connection with a change in ownership or control of all or part of our business, such as a merger, acquisition, reorganization, or bankruptcy. So all your data, if you used any of the plethora of apps, now is owned by Visa because Visa just bought it. Between and among Plaid and our current and future partners, affiliates, subsidiaries, and other companies under common control. And we may collect, use, and share end-user information in an aggregate. This includes

2:08:32 a retention, we retain end-user information no longer than necessary to fulfill the purposes for which it's collected and used unless a longer retention period is required and permitted. As permitted, even after you stop using an application or terminate your account with one or more developer, we may still retain your information. This is crazy. I think we get the picture. Yeah, thanks for being an asshole about it, but I think this is important. I, I, you're not letting me talk. I am! All you're saying is I think we get the picture. We have a smart audience. The picture is that these, if you use Venmo, you're basically turning over all your personal information and all your bank data and all your passwords over to some third party. It's not Venmo. It's hundreds of apps, John. Hundreds.

2:09:24 Anyone who's associated with Plaid is what you're saying. Which is every single financial app that's out there that connects to your bank because there is no app that connects directly to the bank except for your bank's app. Every single one runs through this. Yes, I understand what you're saying. My question is, which is I would hope you thought about, is what happens when a mobbed up operation gets involved in this and just steals everybody's money all at once? Exactly the problem. Well, there's been discussions. about these various bank heists worldwide. We've talked about it on the show about two or three years ago. These mysterious bank heists where through electronic manipulation, entire fortunes are wiped out of certain banks and the banks don't like talking about it because it's like the banks never like talking about how they get ripped off when it comes to electronic fraud.

2:10:25 Sounds to me as though we're looking at a setup for a real beauty. All someone needs to do is to get into this company and once they get into their system, it's over. I mean, you have no idea how many apps are using this. It's really, the list is really, really crazy. And I think it's a big story that is, yes, many in our audience may understand it, But I don't think, I think it's bigger than that. I think more people need to understand this. I think legislation needs to be employed. This is not right. Well, everywhere you read about these guys, they keep, the bottom line is the banks really don't want any legislation. They want to have their own API, but now they're stuck between a rock and a hard place because the minute they turn off Plaid, they'll turn off, the biggest is Venmo, but there's

2:11:29 Again, there's just countless apps that tie into this and they'll lose their customers within 10 minutes because they'll all say, oh shit, you don't use Venmo? I'm going over here. So now they've screwed it up because they didn't jump into this early enough. And do you think that politicians and policy makers understand this? They'll understand after the big bank heist. The worst part, the one that freaked me out is Coinbase. I immediately disconnected because I used Coinbase to buy Bitcoin. Well, you're a Coinbase user. Not anymore. But of course now my data can be retained by Plaid and it's now been sold to Visa even though I've disconnected. I'm no longer using Coinbase, i.e. I'm no longer using Plaid. I am very upset about this. Yes, I noticed.

2:12:34 Well, moreover, when you just keep saying, I think we can get the pink check. Well, I think you know, you're beating me up with this. I mean, I got it right away that what's going on. These guys have come through these, when you said screen scraper, if they're scraping my password and my entry into a bank account, and they're just using it to bypass the system that's normally in place, which is the one you mentioned, which is the two cents, which a lot of people don't understand because they never put up one of these accounts. putting a two cents in the account and confirming it takes two or three days for this process to work. Yeah, I can see immediately what the difference is and what they're doing. It just seems it's A, sounds illegal and B, it sounds very something that can be abused to not a little extreme, but to a massive extreme to where you could bankrupt the country. Exactly. That was my point. And I wish you had just said that. That's all.

2:13:26 Well, I tried to, but you called me an asshole. No, because it was the second time you said we get it. Instead of saying... We got it, we got it. I think we did get it. But you should have gotten to the big point, which is the possibility of this bankrupting the country. So these guys, what's going to happen, here's what's going to happen. Because they know they could bankrupt the country. The mob. Or the Russians. Or the Chinese. Anybody. They're not going to do that though, because that's not what you do. What you do is you get into these systems. And you take it out slowly. Yeah, it's the office space. Ten bucks a month. You nickel and dime it to death. You take out a penny here and a penny there and you're just pulling out millions and millions and millions of dollars from the system very slowly because you don't know how much money do you need. And you just keep doing this over the years and you could take out billions before anyone even finds it more than a rounding error. Fannie Mae uses plaid.

2:14:26 I'm just watching and I'm just looking at what's coming in now. That's mortgages. I just find it... And this is also why 10% of Venmo payments fail because they're screen scraping and screen scrapers fail. That just doesn't always work. This is somebody's really good exit strategy. Well, these guys just sold the company for $5 billion. So that nice exit right there, they don't need to do any... They're done. They can move out. And I don't think, you're right, this would have to be legislation to stop this in its entirety, outlaw it immediately, because there's no way the banks can transition. They're trying, that's what Zelle is about. Zelle is not using plaid, Zelle only works between banks that are hooked up, and that's one of the ways they're trying to get around this. But I think they've missed the boat. It won't happen, it's done. I think that

2:15:29 I think it can be legislated. Oh, it can be, but do you see that happening? I think it can be. I think it can. I think it can be. I don't see it, but I think if somebody took an initiative and started making a... Boy, you! Me? Yeah! I'm not gonna make any initiative. Yeah! No! Why me? Because you're adamant about your more you're worked up you to be perfect You're the guy to go before Congress and get this fixed. Oh, yeah sure I got time for that No, not gonna do it at all not happening. Yeah Yeah, anyway, that was my OTG segment. That was beyond OTG well if you're gonna go in that direction, but gloom and doom I have a if I can find my clips and

CHAPTER 23 / 27 Discussion

Dave Hodges, Virginia Gun Rally and Nuclear Conspiracy Claims

The "Common Sense Podcast" with Dave Hodges was featured for its extreme claims regarding the upcoming gun rights rally in Virginia. Hodges alleged that Antifa would use a "belt buckle strategy" to frame patriots for violence and suggested that missing nuclear weapons or "medical-grade uranium" dirty bombs might be involved in a plot to take out Washington D.C. The hosts critiqued these claims as "crackpot" and "bad podcasting."

dave hodges· virginia gun rally· antifa· nuclear weapons· conspiracy theories

2:16:30 I have a couple of clips. Oops, somewhere. Yeah. Where are my... Sorry. Well, play something while I find my clip list. Okay. Oh, here it is. Here it is. Sorry. I want to play this guy's got this common sense podcast. Common sense podcast. Dave Hodges. Now, this is a podcast I think that goes above and beyond. Generally, above and beyond the conspiracy style of podcast this guy is... Oh wait, is this the vaccine guy?

2:17:19 I don't know if he's a vaccine guy, but he's not a vaccine guy in this. He might be. It would make nothing but sense if he was. But let's just listen to, I got four clips from him because this podcast of his is absolute dynamite and it has to do with what's coming up this weekend because all hell is going to break loose apparently. But let's play Dave Hodges' Common Sense Podcast, Part One. I have written two articles today on the unfolding story connected to the secret meeting behind the Kansas State Legislature and DHS where they were taken to secret briefings, signed non-disposal agreements that we have a handle with our intelligence sources around the country.

2:17:57 of what is happening and I published that in two articles. There's a third part coming out in the morning that's even more damning because this is a story with many moving parts and much of what I said earlier today that was the Hodges hypothesis is now being presented as this is the best evidence and this is our conclusion based on the best evidence as it is right now. Let's go back and establish some facts, shall we? We reported heavily here on this channel about drones circling Colorado. And we assume they were looking for guns. Some people don't believe that at all. Some people say it's a joint operation, guns, plus they're looking for something that's missing. What's missing? Well, if you ask many of the federal agents who are known there in the field, they're all looking for two missing nuclear weapons and they have been for about nine months. And this is no secret. Many people in the independent media are talking about this.

2:18:51 and they're writing about this, they've written about it for a long time, and the drones have sniffers on them and they were looking to detect the nuclear weapons. The drones also expanded their area of operation from eastern Colorado north to the southern panhandle of Nebraska and far into Kansas. Yeah, actually I had this in my prep for last show, we didn't get to it, but But yeah, I heard that this, I heard too this was the reason for the unidentified drones over Colorado was that apparently someone lost a nuke. It fell off and they can't find it.

2:19:32 Yes, there's been a lot of memes been pestering me to talk about these drones that are flying all over Colorado About what's going on because there's all these different. Wait a minute Mimi was convinced that they were mapping That's what you told me the last time she says she thought it was Google or Amazon mapping and it made no sense at all And why would they be I mean you can map with the satellites that are already out there is not as many the cloud cover over Colorado goes away No, so there's a possibility, maybe there is. But this guy's got onto something, but he takes it to, he really brings it to the fore with his kind of conspiratorial notions. Let's play clip two. Uh-huh, and this is why DHS is meeting with the Nebraska State Legislature. They tried to keep that quiet. And the Kansas State Legislature, that wasn't kept quiet. What are they after?

2:20:24 Well, let's jump over to Virginia. What's going on there? Well, this weekend, all hell is going to break loose. Let's pray that God engages that area and brings peace, calm, and tranquility with divine intervention. But the way things are going, the way it's lining up is this. They're going to start the roadblocks and confiscate the guns. As if that's not enough to get the violence started, we have learned, and we have been reporting on this now for about 10 days, that Antifa is headed there to employ what they refer to as their belt buckle strategy. And this is where they mix in with patriots. They dress like patriots. They have their MAGA hats and they appear to be good guys. Oh, hey, go Trump. Yeah, baby, Trump, Trump, kick butt.

2:21:07 And then they start breaking all hell loose. They attack officers, they attack anyone in a position of authority. So the patriots get the blame. Now, what happened in DC right next to the communist controlled blue counties of Northern Virginia? What's there? DC. And what happened in DC 10 days ago? 96 MS-13 and the number of undisclosed amount of terrorists were taken into custody. MS-13, Hitman. We don't know what the terrorist specialty is, but I'm going to make a guess. With the continuity of government drills going on right now in Colorado, I'm going to guess they were rehearsing for the takeout of Washington, D.C.

2:21:52 Really? You're really gonna lay that? I mean, maybe you should just do a show with this guy. You seem to love it. This is dumb. Come on, John. This is dumb even for you. Okay, so you can say this. There's two clips left. If you don't want to play them, and they're even better than what you heard. Oh no, I'm forcing you to play them now. I want to see what's going on. Because you are giving five minutes of someone else's podcast in our podcast, and it's crackpotty. Because we're gonna have they're gonna take out Washington DC with a nuke with ms-13 and Antifa I want to hear it now this by the way the reason I like I wanted to play these clips is because this guy is predicting it for this weekend that means Saturday Sunday, which means we can it'll be the government will have been taken over and Apparently Colorado is gonna get wiped out to be by these nukes and

2:22:49 And Antifa is running the nukes, is that the idea? I don't, he never makes that clear. He's very unclear with these theories. Now, the thing about this is how, when you do, like when you made the Pence prediction, which is a minor prediction that he's not going to run for again, you know, that's months and months and months away. But when you have the nerve to do a podcast and make a prediction like this, that's going to happen in two days. I don't know how you get away with it, because it's not going to happen. This is all bullcrap.

2:23:26 classic, you know, bad podcasting, which is getting the reputation, the whole business a bad name. It's like you might as well put Peter Griffin on. If I can just say the Virginia gun confiscation has been bubbling under for several weeks now. It's come to a forefront. Tucker Carlson now saying this is very scary, very scary. They want to shut down indoor gun ranges. It's a gun grab, gun confiscation, they're coming for our guns. This has been bubbling under for several weeks and I really think most of it is bullcrap. I don't know, okay. Listen, I'm game to hear it all.

2:24:09 Wait, while you're on that, the other thing this guy's claim in this last clip was they're having roadblocks, which he will say is illegal, illegal roadblocks to confiscate the guns. Are people driving around their cars, especially people that have big caches of guns, are they driving around with guns in their trunk? What are they expecting to find? I have a gun in my car. Okay. Of course, I drive. They get you then. I live in Texas, son. You know, in Texas, you're good. You're good to go. Take clip three. And I think this Virginia roadblock situation with Governor Northam or should I say Soviet Premier Northam.

2:24:48 I think this all plays nicely into their hands. Will Antifa be part of a nuclear-based operation? Maybe, maybe not. And the two nuclear weapons are not the only thing you have to worry about, the fact that they're missing. I have learned from a couple of my federal agent sources that they have long been concerned at the border about medical-grade, highly enriched uranium coming into the country because what it is, it's medical. It's for dental, X-rays, X-rays in general. But if you get enough of the medical, the only difference between medical, highly enriched uranium and military grade weaponry is the amount. So if you acquire enough and smuggle it across the border, voila, you can create your own dirty bomb explosion or worse yet a- Now do you subscribe to this podcast? Do you donate to him? How do you come across? What is your connection? This is my first time. I'm a new listener, long time no donor.

2:25:44 Now, is that the end of that one? Nuclear explosion. So it's not just we have to worry about the missing, we have to worry about what's coming in and I had that confirmed for me today. Oh yeah. Okay, a couple of things. One, in what universe Do you need enriched uranium for an x-ray machine? Why are you deconstructing this guy? I don't know. No universe because it's dumb. So his idea about enriched uranium coming into medical systems, okay, we just skipped the whole thing as being idiotic. There is a part four if you're interested. Oh, I'm interested. But let's go down a scenario because things start to make sense when you start connecting all the dots. Really? Number one, if DEC is taken out... I guess this is very interesting that you're doing this.

2:26:42 Where you know, you're very frustrated with me. I get it. You're overdoing it, killing the point about something I thought was important. Yet we're really spending five, six minutes on this idiot. If D.C.'s taken out, we've already rehearsed this, who's the capital? Colorado. But wait a minute, drones, we're looking for what in Colorado? Exactly. So if you're going to take out number one because you want to destroy America, why wouldn't you take out the backup capital side as well? Wouldn't that make sense? Really cripple the country, paralyze its ability to manage its affairs and it would be an easy country to overrun. And is that what the globalists want? Is they establish their new world order? You have to do away with the 423 million handguns, you have to do away with all the veterans. Oh wait, does he bring in the United Nations, have hired someone who's going to be managing the gun collection?

2:27:31 put that in. I hope he put that in. I don't think this is a random comment. I think this is reflective of a view that represents top democratic leadership. Why? Because all of these people are connected in one way or another to the illegal arms deals with Ukraine. Yeah. Okay. Jesus.

CHAPTER 24 / 27 Discussion

Final Producer Credits, Pop Money and Subscription Models

The final list of producers for Episode 1208 was read, including donors like Mike Marik and Sir Chris Gray. The hosts compared the "Pop Money" transfer system to Venmo, noting that Pop Money uses the slower but more secure ACH clearinghouse. They also analyzed their subscription data, revealing that the $33.33 monthly tier is the most popular among their "peerage" of supporters.

pop money· ach· subscriptions· value for value· donor credits

2:28:14 Well, we'll know, Mr. Doubter. Yeah, well, we'll know this weekend, right? I mean, maybe I'll be able to- Yeah, we'll know this week. This guy puts himself out there. He says this weekend. Yeah, I should be able to see the smoke plume from my house. I can't wait. I'm gonna show my support by donating to No Agenda. Imagine all the people who could do that. Oh yeah, that'd be fab. Ha, you laugh now. Alright, we do have a few people to thank for show 1208, helping produce the show. Starting with...

2:28:54 Mike Mara Marik in Marik in Marik in he needs a de-douching. Okay You've been de-douched He came with 150 bucks, sir. Joe from Palm Bay, Florida 1 2 3 4 5 Thomas K 1 2 3 4 5 Jonathan Hess 101 Trevor Burns in Keensburg, New Jersey, 100. Very long note, you might want to look over if there's anything in there that's important. This is about vaccination. It's a very nice note, but it's... I've noted down what he has said. Simon James, $100 in Australia, Sir Chris Gray of the Isle of White.

2:29:47 888.88. He has a birthday for his son Ryan, we got that on the list. Interesting we have somebody at the eye on the Isle of Wight. We've discussed this before, we've talked about it. Every time it comes up I mention it. Yeah, and they have a dynamite lobster restaurant there which all the private pilots fly to the Isle of Wight just to eat the lobster. And you've been there. Of course! Hello! Ryan Walters, 8008. Ronald Schull, 8008, he came in with Pop Money, which is a, I don't believe uses that system. I don't think Pop Money uses it, but while you're talking, I will check. Yeah, check. Daniel Walraven, 7520.

2:30:34 And the funny thing is, I never had to sign up for the pot. The pot mail thing goes straight to the bank. Pot money, right? Pot money. Pot money. Pot money. I don't think they use plaid. They're like the other ones. Yeah, like Zelle. Exactly. They're operating outside the... Yeah, well that's the desperate attempt by the banks to get away from it. Well, pot money came up before... What's that one that people... Venmo. I believe, I think Bob Bunny's pretty old. Yeah, trying to go wall raven, 75, 20. Brandon Foster, 75. Subodh Pathmetary, Louisiana, 73, 73. My son said after hearing Adam talk about the CES Charmin robot, it sounds like a high school science project. Yeah, pretty much. Glenn Spangler, 69, 69. F cancer, my father succumbed to a brain tumor last August, we'll put that at the end.

2:31:35 Bill Leclerc, 61. Yes, I'm still donating, but a lesser monthly amount since I'm retired from my Silicon Valley company. I wanted to donate this amount in honor of my friend, Kerry's birthday. He's on there, but I think he's a douchebag. If not for him, I may have never known about the best podcast in the universe. I think he needs a douchebag call out. Christopher Dechters, 56.78. The Bill and Claire, by the way, was $61. Kyle Thompson, 5510. Amber Simpson, 5510. Christopher Rotger in Matitsi, New York, 5510. A lot of 5510s today, a lot of them. Brian Moss in Rancho. Oh, okay. 5510. Sir Asset of the Canadian, Canadian Woods, 5510. Sam Van Hoer in

2:32:37 Amsterdam, 5432. My last name is still written without the end at the end. Okay. Hold on. Let me see. Alan Hernandez, 5150. Sir Selvarin, 5150. Sean Florian, 5069. He's got to call out Ryan as a douchebag. Shannon Atkins, 5050. Kevin Larson, 5001. Andrew Spieler in Sierraca, and there's Spieler I guess, Sierraca, 5001. Alexander Beatty in Houston, Texas, 5001. And the following people are $50 donors, name and location, if I have it. Michael Burlett in Odessa, Florida. Chris Lewinsky in Sherwood Park, Alberta. Adam Mori in Middletown, Maryland.

2:33:33 Mark Johnson in Aurora, Colorado, let me let me read his note because as of today's payment He says he will become a knight. Please knight me sir maniac of Colorado. I'm traditional So I want mutton and meat at the roundtable. We'll have that for you. I've enjoyed the show for many years Appreciate the hard work you to have done. I assume I should go to no agenda nation for the ring and provide my street address there Please let me know. Yes, no agenda nation comm slash rings and it was nice knowing you I Mark Johnson from Colorado because you'll be gone after this weekend. Sorry to hear that. Where's he going? Aren't they taking out the nuke? They're taking out DC and Colorado. The backup site. Oh yes, I've already forgotten the story. The backup site, what are you talking about? Hello? Nice knowing you, Mark. We'll knight you just in time for the nuke.

2:34:22 Yeah, and they did yeah, so and hit for the hills Although you're an Aurora Brenda Brandon's of why in Port Orchard, Washington John Camp and antlers, Oklahoma Patricia Worthington and Dame Patricia Worthington, excuse me in Miami, Florida al-wah Lebel I'm guessing Charles Evan Eves, I'm sorry Charles Eves Eric Ellen I guess Elaine a land one of the three in Murfreesboro, Tennessee the home of everybody and Kyle Meyer in Atlanta, Georgia. Yes. No, I'm just laughing. I'm just laughing home of anybody everybody. Oh, everybody's in Murfreesboro Yeah, so they work there or they live there one of the two it's the biggest town in Tennessee, I guess and

2:35:15 I want to thank all these folks for contributing to 1208, the show, and this helps produce the show and it makes up for the last couple of three shows which are dismal in donations and we hope that you can keep it up for Sunday. Yeah, it would be nice if we can keep a little more less of the fluctuation, but that's just the way it goes. We ride the wave, that's the life of a podcaster. By the way, John, Pop Money is, you're correct, is not tied to Plaid, they, that's why it takes so long. They use the ACH, the automatic clearing house. So it's an overnight thing, but it takes about three to five days for the money to clear. And that of course is why people don't like it as much. Because it takes- I like it. No, yeah, but you're not a millennial paying for half of your avocado toast to your buddy. And it costs 95 cents to send money. What, on Venmo? No, on Pop Money.

2:36:14 Oh, it does? Venmo charges 3%. So if you buy something for 100 bucks, it's what, 3 bucks? Yep. Hmm. Hold on a second. Why don't I just give somebody 100 bucks? Because people don't have... Cash! Okay, you really want to know why? Because people don't have cash anymore. You and I do. It's on the millennial list, by the way. Millennials don't carry cash. Yeah. Why? What's wrong with cash? What's wrong with carrying a fiver? Anyway, go on. I want to thank everybody who supported the show today. This is really a good showing. Thank you so much. And let's keep it going. Let's keep it going so we can save up a little bit for when it does get meager because these things do happen. There's different periods of year, of the time of the year, etc.

2:37:06 Forget about that. You're producing this show, you're keeping it going, and you should be proud of what you're putting together here. Yeah, we're the conduits, but you should be proud of it, all of you. And also those under $50, again I see a couple at the $49 level, that's for anonymity. And also our subscriptions, which anybody can sign up for. Please consider that, even if you are regular, if you donate regularly. Just, you know, what was the one you said, like, So we have an hourly subscription. I thought that was kind of fun per hour. We have this well, this has been for a while This is 75 cents an hour. Mm-hmm, which is four dollars a week and it comes in as four dollars a week. No, no, very cool And thank you. We actually have a lot of people that took that subscription. I'm sure it's I like it It sounds the most popular subscriptions for anyone who was interested is it it believe it or not the most popular one is

2:37:59 is the $33.33 a month. Yeah, I believe that. It's a great number too. Yeah. Please consider... It was for a while 11.11 was competing with it but over time 33.33 has overtaken it. Very interesting. And we appreciate checks. You can just send a check. Everybody wins with a check. Doesn't cost you anything, doesn't cost us anything. And it's pretty guaranteed to arrive. Whatever you do, do it at the following website. Dvorak.org slash N-A. A couple of karmas by request. Jobs, jobs, jobs and jobs. Let's vote for jobs! You've got karma.

CHAPTER 25 / 27 Discussion

Birthday Announcements, New Peerage and Global Meetups

The show concluded with birthday wishes for listeners and the elevation of Scott Lavender to "Baron of Montgomery County." New knights and dames, including Julie McNeil and Mark Johnson, were formally recognized. A global meetup report featured Jesse Coy Nelson's solo meetup in Beirut, Lebanon, with upcoming events scheduled for Austin, Charlotte, New York, and Amman, Jordan.

birthdays· baron· knighting· meetups· beirut

2:38:48 And we do have a list, thank God. That's also been kind of meager the past few weeks. For today we say happy birthday to Julie McNeil celebrating today Sir Chris Grace's happy birthday to his son Ryan. He turned four on December 30th. Sir Chris Gray says happy birthday to his daughter Brianna, she turned one on January 2nd. And Bill Leclerc says happy birthday to his friend Carrie who will be celebrating tomorrow the 17th. Happy birthday on behalf of everybody here, the staff and management of the best podcast in the universe! Do we have a title change? Yeah we do!

2:39:29 Sir Scott Lavender, turn and face the slaves as you have upgraded thanks to another $1,000 in aggregate support to the No Agenda Show. You are now the Baron of Montgomery County in Texas and hope to see you at a next meetup maybe. And thank you very much for your courage and your support of the best podcast in the universe. We have two Let me see... We have one... I've got a little... There we go, can't find my mouse. We have one knight and one dame, so we need an appropriate blade. Ah, that would cause for the lightsaber. It sounds very much like an old-fashioned blade, funny enough.

2:40:21 Julie McNeil, Craig Martin, both of you hop on up on the stage here at the podium next to the round table with the NOAA agenda Knights and Dames. Both of you supported the show in the amount of $1,000 or more and we appreciate that very much and I'm proud to pronounce to Kate the Sir Craig Knight North to South and Dame Julie of Grand Isle, Louisiana. Wait! There's a third one! Mark Johnson becomes Sir Maniac of Colorado! For you, we've got Hookers and Blow, Rent Boys and Chardonnay. We've got Cold Brew, Cold Coffee, Brew & Cannabis, Diet Soda and Video Games, Fish Pie and Falacio, Geishas and Sake, Vodka and Vanilla, Bong Hits and Bourbon, Sparkling Scent and Escorts, Ginger Ale and Gerbils, and by request, although it's always here, Mutton and Mead. Almost a Mr. Maniac of Colorado there, Mark Johnson.

2:41:08 who we just spoke about. I mean he already got eliminated and it hasn't even been the weekend yet and I already I took him off the list. I didn't mean to do that. So he's back and appropriately knighted. Well good he's got that now he can enjoy today and tomorrow. The NOAGENDA Meetups, which you can find at noagendameetups.com. Just a quick overview today we have the Austin Local 512 at 7 o'clock at Doc's Backyard. Of course there's Scott Baird at the Armory who will be hosting that. We have the Charlotte Meetup

2:41:48 Tomorrow, that is at 7 o'clock, Sycamore Brewing. Saturday, we have New York City at 5 o'clock, Athena and Alex hosting that. Also, the other coast, Los Angeles, and that will be at 2 p.m. Saturday, ah yes, we had our meetup, Jesse Coy Nelson had organized a meetup in Beirut, Lebanon. And he sent us a meetup report. Let me just find it here. This is Jesse Coen Nelson for the No Agenda meetup here in Beirut, Lebanon. I cannot lie and say I've got other fellow No Agenda listeners amongst me, but it's still... So Jesse did a meetup by himself basically in Beirut, Lebanon.

2:42:44 I guess we don't have any other producers there. Yeah, it wouldn't surprise me. He has scheduled his next meetup as he continues his No Agenda Toon Man tour. He will be in Amman, Jordan. Saturday and he will be at the Amigo pub in Amman, Jordan at 6 o'clock. So please go to noagendameetups.com and see if you're in Amman, definitely go and visit Jesse. We may have someone in Jordan. I think we do and he's also going to Israel and I know that we have a couple of nights there and they have already communicated so I know they will show up.

2:43:23 And just rounding it out for this weekend, Nashville has their six-week cycle at 7 o'clock and Rich will be organizing that. For all the details go to noagendameetups.com, where you can find a meetup near you or organize one yourself. It really is a fun way to meet other people. have interpersonal human relations and communications without any risk of anyone getting triggered and pissed off because it's just not the no agenda way apparently. Noagendameetups.com and thank you all for your courage for setting these up and for doing them and we need more meetup reports. I love the meetup reports. Going a little long today, but I did want to highlight some messaging that's going on in the

CHAPTER 26 / 27 Discussion

Climate Change Messaging, Ocean Heat and Hiroshima Bombs

NASA and NOAA data identified 2019 as the second warmest year on record, though media reports focused on it being the warmest year specifically for the world's oceans. The discussion critiqued the use of "Hiroshima bomb" equivalents to describe ocean heat, noting that the numbers cited by various outlets and Al Gore fluctuate wildly. The hosts argued that the "second warmest" designation implies a downward trend that is being ignored by alarmist messaging.

climate change· nasa· noaa· al gore· ocean warming

2:44:19 Climate change arena? I have a climate... Good, well I have a climate change intro which was on PBS, Climate Change Report. Okay, hold on a second. Climate Change Report. A severe winter storm in Pakistan and Afghanistan has killed 160 people since Sunday. In other extreme weather news, this past decade was the hottest ever recorded on Earth. That is according to new data out today from NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Scientists said that 2019 was the second warmest year on record. They attributed the global warming trend to man-made climate change.

2:45:05 So we're going in the right direction. We're going down. It's the second. So success is working. Everything's turning around. It's working. It's working out. I think it was funny to do that report right after the Pakistani snowstorm that killed a bunch of people. And it's also Washington State. Poor Mimi's snowed in up there. Is she okay? She got power and everything? Yeah. A quick little reminder, Al Gore started this thing a while back and it is in order to give people a visual about how dangerous climate change is,

2:45:41 He has resorted to a comparison to Hiroshima bombs when it comes to what is happening with climate change and he's upgraded as we go along. So just as a reminder, here's Al Gore from a couple years back. As would be released by 400,000 Hiroshima class atomic bombs. So, 400,000. But not to be outdone, he came back two years later. And it now traps as much extra heat energy every day as would be released by 500,000 Hiroshima-class atomic bombs exploding every day. So, 500,000 Hiroshima-class bombs exploding every day. That is the same amount of energy that we are witnessing right now warming up our ocean.

2:46:31 You see, this is about the warming of the ocean. We had a new report that came out. The report, a credible report. The Guardian did a big write-up on it and this is the messaging from the report. 2019 was the warmest year on record for the world's oceans. Just so you know. Don't be confused because Amy said it was the second 2019 is the second warmest year, but that's for the globe It was the warmest for the oceans the ocean The oceans were the warmest ever. We need to put a number on it. 2019 was the warmest year on record for the world's oceans. That's according to this study published in the journal Advances in Atmospheric Sciences. To put that into context, one professor interviewed by Vice says it's about the equivalent of five Hiroshima bombs of heat.

2:47:22 Every second, day and night, 365 days a year, the ocean's temperatures warmed by 0.075 degrees in 2019, which might not sound like a lot, but the amount of energy that's needed to be absorbed for it to rise like that is astronomical. The single year increase in stored energy between 2018 and 2019 was equivalent to 394 million Hiroshima bombs. Wow, this is scary. Yes, this is true. Woo! 349, 94 million Hiroshima bombs. It's just scary, John. It's just scary. Can you imagine the... I mean, so it's 0.07 degrees, immeasurable, really.

2:48:12 But to make it scary for everybody, we have to say 394 million Hiroshima bombs, then everybody's dead. But wait! Can we make it a little more relatable? The average temperature of the world's oceans reached the highest point on record last year. The Guardian reports that the rise is an indicator of global warming. Adding studies show that oceans are getting warmer every year. According to a recent report in the journal Advances in Atmospheric Sciences, the amount of heat added to the oceans is equivalent to every person on the planet running 100 microwaves 24-7.

2:48:51 Back to the Hiroshima bombs. This is really not gonna work. Hold on a second, you're going too fast. Let's get back to that first clip. Now that woman, she said, she made this comment, she said some millions of bombs a day. Well no, she said that the warming this past, here's how I understood her. The warming this past year of the ocean, which is 0.07 degrees, is the equivalent of 394 million Hiroshima bombs. Oh, for the, okay, that would be for the year. I guess for the year. Because she did the calculation, she said it would be, earlier in the clip she says it would be five

2:49:38 It's like people having five bombs every second of every day, 24 hours a day, 360 days a year. I think this is it. Every second, day and night, the equivalent of five Hiroshima bombs of heat, every second, day and night. Five Hiroshima bombs every second, every second. Yeah, so I did the calculation about what would how many bombs a day would that be to compare it to? Gore's right right right so you multiply 5 times 60 times 60 times 24 100 million 432 thousand oh so that's a so it's gone down from the 500,000 well, it's yeah, but she's kind of she's in the between she's in between 400,000 and 500,000 with 432, but it's gone down

2:50:29 Apparently, yeah. I think Al Gore may be exaggerating. But why aren't we celebrating? Why don't we celebrate if it goes down, if it's the second hottest year on record? Why aren't we saying, hey, it's working more of whatever we're doing? Wait a minute, hold on a second. What you're saying... Yes? is that, and this being the second hottest year, what you're saying is that because we're seeing, what you're saying is that if it's trending up because of global warming, climate change, crisis, whatever you want to call it, advertising, whatever you want to call it, if it's trending up, it should be trending up. It shouldn't be trending up and down and up and down or down. It's trending down. I would say it's trending down too. It's a fact.

CHAPTER 27 / 27 Discussion

Venice Flooding, Carbon Offsets and Show Sign-off

Recent flooding in Venice was attributed to climate change by local officials, despite historical data showing worse flooding occurred in 1966. The hosts mocked the concept of carbon offsets, specifically a Dutch broadcaster's claim to offset production CO2. They jokingly pledged to offset the show's carbon footprint by taking naps. The episode concluded with a montage of clips featuring Donald Trump, Joe Biden, and Bernie Sanders.

venice· climate change· carbon offsets· co2· sign-off

2:51:17 If we're number, if it's the second, well it's like this Venice story. So Venice... Oh, Venice is all dried up now all of a sudden. Not according to this! A remarkable and alarming scene playing out in Venice. You have to understand, there's something called, oh what is it called, a tide? And so you have high tide and low tide. And low tide, Venice was dry. This was what, two weeks ago? Venice is dry. Yeah, dry as a bone. So now the waters come rushing back, the tide is high. But listen carefully to what is being said here. A remarkable and alarming scene playing out in Venice. The worst flooding there in more than 50 years. The worst flooding in more than 50 years. Which means 50 years ago,

2:51:59 It was worse. Yes. So this can't be something crazy new we're all gonna die if it happened 50 years ago. It's something that may happen every 50 years, but that's not how the rest of the report plays out. The report should read, it should be, if it was you would be asserting is true, which is either you're gonna go up or down, it would be the worst flooding ever. But that's not the truth. A remarkable and alarming scene playing out in Venice, the worst flooding there in more than 50 years. People wading through the water across St. Mark's Square, one of the most popular tourist spots in the world. Tonight, the mayor declaring a state of emergency now for what he's calling the apocalyptic rising water there. Here's ABC's Maggie Rooley tonight. Tonight, tourist suitcases floating away in Venice, the mayor declaring a state of emergency, saying the city is on its knees.

2:52:55 Famous landmarks like 1200 year old St. Mark's Basilica inundated, water flowing through the church. My life, this was the first time like this. St. Mark's Square, now a swimming pool. Hotels and shops turned into canals. Water rushes through buildings. All the clothing, all the things in the shops, in the grocery stores, it was all very devastating. The floods have caused at least two deaths and Venice's mayor's blaming the worst flood his city has seen in more than 50 years on climate change. Now Venice is used to seasonal flooding but this one was the second highest in recorded history. David, damages are expected to be in the hundreds of millions of dollars. I just don't understand how you can say it's related to climate change if it happened 50 years ago when we didn't have climate change, apparently.

2:53:48 Or just look at the top stories here. Venice canals nearly dry months after historic floods. Yeah, but this is a brand new report. Venice canals almost dry two months after severe floods. I know. Venice canals reduced to muddy trenches as water levels plummet. Yeah. Yeah. And the other flood was the famous 1966 Venice flood. That was just predating the climate crisis going the other way. We're gonna all freeze to death. Now, we have people that listen to this show that really condemn us for pointing out the obvious, which is that this is bullshit. But okay, you can keep your side. I mean, it's not rational and nobody wants to talk about it, which is the real problem because nobody will let you talk about it. That's the problem. We had a high tide, low tide situation here the other day in the mudflats.

2:54:45 And so the mudflats, we had a low tide, yearly low tide, lowest low of low tides. And the mudflats, I swear, went out into the bay. I mean, they were just out a mile. And then when the high tide came in, it was just a high tide. It didn't lap over the freeway, which is right there at ground level or anything. But they're all, ooh, we're all worried to death, this high tide, this high tide coming in, the big high tide. This is what the way it works. Yep, yep, but you're not allowed to say that. Not allowed to say that. By the way, the Dutch public broadcasters now are running a lower third on certain programming which says production costs of this program and all CO2 associated with it are being offset. So I guess they're buying carbon credits to offset the carbon they

2:55:44 polluted the atmosphere with during the production of the program. Public broadcasting? Public broadcasting is a polluter. Yes. What is the... I'd like to, I think we should do the same. This program definitely uses lots of carbon, CO2 I should say. We pollute the world with CO2. How? I'm opening my mouth. Do you not hear the hot air coming out? So that's one way. That's one way. We're using computers. We have lots of people making clips using computers. So I hereby have a mandate and the mandate is the NOA Agenda Show will offset all CO2

2:56:31 used for the production of this program and we'll do it with a known program. John and I will both have a nap after the show which will reduce our breathing and will reduce and will turn off the lights and we need at least a hundred producers to do the same. And plant a ficus. A ficus? Is that the the plant of choice? It is to me. Affiliates, we're running very late, but I hope you did enjoy this rather extended deconstruction of the No Agenda Show for all media today. And Sunday we will be mourning the loss of DC and Colorado, but at least we'll have predicted it. At least you knew in advance, you had your chance. Had your warning, had your warning.

2:57:30 Go West! Hugh Allison, Tom Starkweather, Josh Brickman, Leo LePuck, all on deck. And coming to you from Opportunity Zone 33 here in Austin, Texas, FEMA Region No. 6 in the governmental maps, in the morning everybody, I'm Adam Currie. And from Northern Silicon Valley where there's no nukes around here, I'm John C. Dvorak. We return on Sunday. Remember, and remember us at dvorak.org slash NA.

2:58:21 Until Sunday, adios mofos and such. You don't get any water. Try going and buying a new faucet. You turn it on, no water comes out. We won't talk about toilets. But how about the shower? I have this beautiful head of hair, I need a lot of water. You turn on the water, drip, drip, drip. Drop. It's a very unpleasant experience. Drop.

2:59:18 situation where we're looking very strongly at sinks and showers and other elements of bathrooms. I'm talking about dishwashers, sinks, toilets. People are flushing toilets 10 times, 15 times. When it comes down to it, it's called rain. I think you called me a liar on national TV. What? I think you called me a liar on national TV. Let's not do it right now. We want to have that discussion.

2:59:59 I'll have that discussion. You called me a liar. You told me. Alright, let's not. You called me a liar? I think you called me a liar. I think you called me a liar on national TV. I don't want to get involved. I just want to say hi, Bernie. Yeah, good. Okay. Like dough, like troll, like troll, my flow, nice clothes, like whoa. But this universe of Alberta thing, it kind of has me like whoa. Like whoa. Like whoa. Like whoa.

3:00:41 We are in a position right now where we have to remember who we are. African Americans, brown, black, women, men, gay, straight. And make sure we go to the black and brown communities where you can't breathe the air or drink the water that comes out of the tap safely. This debate isn't real. I was in Vegas the other day and someone said don't put your chips on a number on the wheel that isn't even on the wheel. That's the problem. We also have to think about how we spend money. It was working, it was being held tightly, there was no movement on the part of the tornadoes made of fire. How would you prevent that from happening again? Let me tell you, but before I tell you that, let me tell you something else. That our giant corporations make billions of dollars in taxes, make billions of dollars in profits.

3:01:26 by the CEOs of large corporations behind doors. Senator Klobuchar, I'd like to bring you in here. Brianne, I want to hit reality here. Tornadoes made of fire. Joe Biden is a rabid dog. He should be beaten to death with a stick. I count that. Other than that, you like him? Other than that, I like him and he... It's going to take a view to the future as well as the readiness to learn from the lessons of the past. And for me, those lessons of the past are tornadoes made of fire. I hear that. Let's go do it. Best Podcast in the Universe! I think that sounds pretty good.