The US military-industrial complex manufactures public consent for war through media propaganda, creating conflicts that serve no genuine defensive purpose.
Dave Smith argues that the military-industrial complex is so sophisticated it includes intelligence agencies, weapons manufacturers, and media that together manufacture public support for war, using the Gulf War as an example where a superpower was convinced it was threatened by Iraq. ✦ AI generated
Dave Smith · Lex Fridman · 2025-04-09 · original ↗
plays this moment only · 28:31 — 32:02
The military industrial complex in America. It's so big and it's so sophisticated. And it's so, it's not just that there's, there's this, there's the intelligence agencies, there's the weapons manufacturers, then there's the like people in the media who are either directly or indirectly just parroting, you know what I mean, all of their talking points. And so it's not just that you can kind of like, you make money when there's a conflict, but you have this entire apparatus to like create the conflict and then create the public sentiment for that. And then we're, And it's interesting, we're in an interesting place because we're kind of in this like new frontier of now where shows like this can happen and there's a lot of them and a lot of them are humongous like yours. But for so long, this just didn't exist. And it was just like, oh, like for so long, it was the case that like the New York Times and NBC and CBS and ABC and the Washington Post and the Associated Press, I guess, they could just move the nation. I mean, if they wanted to be like, hey, there is the idea that, forget even like after 9/11, the idea that in 1990, 1991, that there was any organic movement from the American people going, you know, we really got to see about the Saddam Hussein guy. You know, the dictator in Iraq is having a slant drilling dispute with the Amir of Kuwait. we really got to do something about it. Like that is not something that organically came from any, that was not like a few soccer moms hanging out, watching their kids game being like, I really do think, I think in a couple of years we're going to have to send these boys over to Iraq. Like that's not, they just from the top down were able to create this feeling that like, hey, there's a new Adolf Hitler on the rise over here in Iraq. We got to go see about this. There are these poor people in Kuwait. We have to do that. You know, like there's, they were able to create this desire for war that was, it's really incredible when you think about it, because there's, I think for the most part in human history, you would have had to have some type of plausible threat, some type of plausible reality to convince people that we actually have to go to war in order to deal with this. Whereas like, the United States, the idea that in 1991, the United States of America would feel threatened by Iraq was just ridiculous. And yet they were able to do it.
verbatim transcript · starts at 28:31
(00:00:00) The following is a conversation with Dave Smith, an outspoken and at times controversial anti-war libertarian, comedian, and podcast host. (00:00:11) And now a quick few second mention of a sponsor. (00:00:14) Check them out in the description. (00:00:15) It's the best way to support this podcast. (00:00:17) We got Call of Duty for video game fun, Tax Network USA for figuring out your tax problems. (00:00:27) Notion for collaborating with your mates and integrating AI in the whole process, Shopify for selling stuff online, and BetterHelp for figuring out the problems of your mind. (00:00:37) Choose wisely, my friends. (00:00:39) If you're watching or listening to this on Spotify, I decided to start putting the same ad reads for me at the beginning as I do on Apple Podcasts and the RSS feed, since a lot of folks in the survey said that they actually like the random non-sequitur (00:00:54) weird, strange, chaotic things I talk about in these ad reads. (00:00:59) And I said that they would be happy to skip when they don't feel like listening. (00:01:04) I do make it easy to skip with timestamps on screen and in the description. (00:01:08) And I'm not adding ads in the middle. (00:01:11) So hopefully this whole thing works for you. (00:01:13) Let's see. (00:01:15) I do try to make the ad reads interesting and personal, often related to stuff I'm reading or thinking about. (00:01:20) But if you skip them, please still check out our sponsors. (00:01:24) I'm grateful for them. (00:01:25) Sign up, buy their stuff. (00:01:27) Whatever it is, I enjoy it. (00:01:29) Maybe you will too. (00:01:30) Also, if you want to get in touch with me for whatever reason, go to lexkuma.com slash contact and now on to the full ad reads. (00:01:38) Let's go. (00:01:40) This episode is brought to you by Call of Duty, Warzone. (00:01:44) Cue music. (00:01:46) And the return of the iconic Verdansk map. (00:01:51) It is out now. (00:01:52) The wait is over. (00:01:53) Verdansk is back. (00:01:55) This reminds me of how much I like Schwarzenegger movies. (00:01:59) I've been talking back and forth with Robert Rodriguez, who is a legendary filmmaker, in part for the action movies he creates, in part for the improvisational genius that he has. (00:02:13) Anyway, talking to him, learning about him, thinking about his work and watching his work reminded me how much I love action films. (00:02:21) And I think of Call of Duty, given its realism, as an action movie I can be a part of, I can be inside of, I can participate in, I can tell the story of the movie with my own actions. (00:02:36) You can download Call of Duty Warzone for free and drop into the Verdansk map now, rated M for mature. (00:02:44) I don't know why I'm doing the movie Announcer Voice, but let's keep going with it. (00:02:47) This episode is brought to you by Tax Network USA, a new sponsor, an awesome sponsor, a full-service tax firm focused on solving tax problems for individuals and small businesses. (00:03:00) I just did a really, really, really deep dive on theoretical computer science. (00:03:06) I shouldn't say with who. (00:03:09) One of the most brilliant people I've ever met. (00:03:10) Super technical episodes. (00:03:12) Super long episode. (00:03:13) Anyway, P versus NP came out briefly. (00:03:16) It's not their thing, but it is a thing I've thought about for many years. (00:03:19) Of course, it's the elephant in the room of theoretical computer science. (00:03:25) So I took a lot of courses on complexity and always loved the puzzles of algorithms, of data structures, of proving various things about algorithms. (00:03:34) I love that field. (00:03:35) Anyway, I mention that because when I think about the United States tax code, what I think about is complexity. (00:03:44) And I wonder there'll be a future when AI will be unleashed on that tax code and will be used to simplify it. (00:03:54) There's nothing that brings more joy to me than taking a complicated thing that makes a lot of people's lives (00:04:04) super painful and simplifying it, and therefore helping those people have less pain in their lives. (00:04:12) And I think the US tax code is the source of probably more pain in the United States than anything else. (00:04:18) Anyway, you want to have really great people to help you deal with that pain, essentially, to relieve you of that pain, to relieve you of that stress, that burden. (00:04:29) can be the heaviest of burdens. (00:04:31) Anything financial related could just break you. (00:04:35) So great professionals that work on taxes are really a gift to the world. (00:04:40) Anyway, talk with one of their strategists for free today. (00:04:44) Call 1-800-958-1000 or go to tnusa.com/lex. (00:04:54) This episode is also brought to you by Notion, a note taking and team collaboration tool. (00:04:58) They have been integrating AI better than basically any company I've seen. (00:05:03) Always at the cutting edge, always thinking how AI can be actually used to solve practical problems. (00:05:09) Not for a prototype, not for a demo, not for a thing to post on X, look at the cool thing I did, but actually make you productive at the thing you do at the individual level and at the team collaboration level. (00:05:20) This really is the problem. (00:05:22) AI should not just be a thing that makes you dream of the possibilities of what's to come. (00:05:29) It should be a thing that just makes your life easier every single day. (00:05:32) And despite what people think, it's actually not that easy to integrate AI in this kind of way because human intelligence, human ingenuity, the speed at which we're able to figure out a puzzle and know the next hop from the puzzle, you know, the tab, tab, tab, tab, (00:05:50) vibe coding thing, but applied to document collaboration, document development, document summarization, all that kind of stuff. (00:05:59) That's what Notion is incredible at. (00:06:01) You could try Notion AI for free when you go to notion.com slash flex. (00:06:04) That's all lowercase notion.com slash flex to try the power of Notion AI today. (00:06:11) This episode is also brought to you by Shopify, a platform designed for anyone to sell anywhere with a great looking online store. (00:06:19) I've recently returned to Nietzsche, and I wonder, what is the Nietzschean concept that explains the will of the entrepreneur? (00:06:32) What is that? (00:06:34) Is that trying to reach for power? (00:06:37) Is it trying to reach for immortality? (00:06:40) Is it trying to find the meaning of existence in the creative act? (00:06:48) There is something deeply creative, of course, to the entrepreneurial pursuit. (00:06:52) It is fundamentally creative. (00:06:55) It feels like pain, right? (00:06:57) It feels like risk. (00:06:58) It feels like chasing money. (00:07:01) It feels like chasing impact or having a positive influence on people's lives. (00:07:08) But when you're in it, and I think about Johnny Ive, when you're in it at your best, what you're doing is you're creating. (00:07:17) That's probably what Nietzsche would say. (00:07:19) It probably is the creative act, is the drug, the joy, the will that pulls at the entrepreneurial heart. (00:07:29) Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at shopify.com/lex. (00:07:34) All lowercase, go to shopify.com/flex to take your business to the next level today. (00:07:39) This episode is also brought to you by BetterHelp, spelled H-E-L-P, help. (00:07:48) Since we mentioned Nietzsche, I must go to maybe another intellect, Carl Jung and the shadow, the archetypes. (00:07:58) I wonder how much of our existence is trying to contend with the (00:08:03) uniqueness of the person we see in the mirror and the bin society puts us in. (00:08:12) There is something about, especially the American spirit, that resists categorization, the binning process. (00:08:20) And in that tension, I think a lot of dark stuff can emerge. (00:08:27) Resentment, regret, depression, (00:08:33) The gap between expectation and reality. (00:08:36) Added with some neurotransmitter malfunctioning sprinkled on top. (00:08:45) Boy, is the human mind wonderful and a terrifying machine that can destroy itself. (00:08:51) Anyway, better hope is a nice first step to try to avert the coming storm. (00:09:00) Check them out at betterhelp.com slash Lex and save on your first month. (00:09:04) That's betterhelp.com slash Lex. (00:09:08) This is the Lex Friedman Podcast. (00:09:09) To support it, please check out our sponsors in the description. (00:09:12) And now, dear friends, here's Dave Smith. (00:09:32) You are a longtime libertarian, perhaps an anarcho-capitalist. (00:09:38) You can talk about that. (00:09:39) Can you explain the different variants, flavors of libertarianism and (00:09:45) where you stand among those variants. (00:09:47) Yeah, so there's almost like anything like with left-wing schools of thought or right-wing schools of thought, there's many different camps and different thinkers. (00:09:56) And so within the kind of broader theme of libertarianism, there was a lot of influence from people like Ayn Rand, Milton Friedman, Thomas Sowell. (00:10:06) Those were, I think, some of the more mainstream figures. (00:10:10) And then there's kind of like the Ron Paul brand of libertarianism, which is kind of distinct from that other camp, where they're much more of an emphasis on foreign policy. (00:10:19) All of them kind of fall into the radical minarchist points of view. (00:10:24) And then there's Rothbardian (00:10:27) anarcho-capitalist. (00:10:28) Then there's also like David Friedman, who's an anarcho-capitalist, but from a completely different perspective than Murray Rothbard. (00:10:34) I would probably be most, I'm most closely like with the Rothbard school, which is very similar to Ron Paul, but even maybe a little bit further in that, you know, the very little bit of government that Ron Paul might support. (00:10:47) You've been a big fan of Ron Paul. (00:10:49) Can you explain what you admire about him? (00:10:51) A big fan is an understatement. (00:10:53) I think Ron Paul is like the greatest living American hero. (00:10:57) I revere him on the level of the founding fathers, Thomas Jefferson or George Washington. (00:11:05) Number one, I mean, all of the major issues that he was correct in his understanding of them, his diagnosis of what caused these problems and his solutions. (00:11:17) And in hindsight, there's just like a million different examples of (00:11:23) where almost everybody today would agree, even though his ideas were very controversial at the time, he'd be like, oh my God, if we had just listened to Ron Paul about that, we'd be so much better off. (00:11:32) But I think there's something almost deeper than that about why Ron Paul inspires so much love from so many people is, okay, so number one, the guy, (00:11:45) He was a champion of these views for decades when there was no payoff for it at all, where he was just kind of alone in the woods being, you know, they used to call him Dr. (00:11:56) No, because, well, he was a medical doctor. (00:11:59) And then he was, he would be the lone no vote in Congress, like all the time, like on the bills that the entire Congress, bipartisan agreement, everything is, and there's one vote against it, you know. (00:12:11) and that he would be that guy. (00:12:12) He clearly kept doing what he was doing simply because he believed it was right, not because there was any benefit for him. (00:12:19) In fact, he dealt with a lot of headaches for the views that he had. (00:12:23) And then he was just a genuine person of integrity. (00:12:25) You know, he's the only congressman who I've ever heard this about, and like DC insiders, people on the Hill will say this. (00:12:32) He was the only congressman of my lifetime who the lobbyists simply stopped visiting. (00:12:39) He was the only one who they just stopped going to his office because they were just like, there's just no getting through to this guy. (00:12:45) He was just not playing politics like that. (00:12:47) And he was, you imagine what it must have been like from like the lobbyist perspective when they first tried to go there, and they'd be like, all right, listen, we really need you to, vote yes on this or that. (00:12:57) And he was like, the Constitution doesn't authorize us to do that. (00:13:00) And they're like, what? (00:13:01) Like, who in this town even talks like that? (00:13:04) You know? (00:13:05) And so there was just, he's also just, I've met him (00:13:08) many times at this point. (00:13:09) And he is just genuinely, he's like one of those guys who's just from like an older, better generation. (00:13:17) Just he's the sweetest guy, but he's like, but he's not a pushover. (00:13:22) Like he was a tough guy in his day and he was an athlete and he was in the Air Force and is married to the same woman for I think over 60 years at this point, has like a big, beautiful family. (00:13:33) He was a country doctor. (00:13:34) He was a baby doctor who delivered thousands of babies. (00:13:37) Like he's (00:13:38) It's just, it is, he's like this kind of classic American figure. (00:13:44) And, I just think, at the risk of falling into hero worship or something like that, (00:13:51) I do think he's a, I think he's a genuinely great man and I think great men are to be revered. (00:13:57) Yeah, as you said, there's integrity there. (00:14:00) Can you speak to the ideas that Ron Paul represents? (00:14:02) Like he says, some of the things he's been right about. (00:14:04) Maybe can you speak about the economics of the Fed and maybe war and being anti-military intervention? (00:14:10) Well, I think it comes, it all came from kind of the same central thesis, which is that the highest political value ought to be liberty. (00:14:20) And (00:14:21) That the government, by its very nature, is an instrument of force and tyranny, and that, therefore, the more government you have, the less liberty you have. (00:14:32) I think he also was... (00:14:35) he was way ahead of his time in really calling out the corruption in DC. (00:14:42) And I think that's one of the things that's kind of, that it's a common through line between the Federal Reserve and government spending and of course, this crazy war industry that our country has. (00:14:55) So there's a lot of components to that, but essentially Ron Paul was talking about draining the swamp way before it was like this dominant (00:15:04) mass message. (00:15:05) And I think Ron Paul in many ways laid down, he laid the groundwork in his 2008 and 2012 presidential campaigns for, not saying that he leads to Donald Trump, but he laid the groundwork for Donald Trump to be able to get up at the South Carolina Republican primary debate and look at Jeb Bush and say, your brother lied us into war. (00:15:30) You know what I mean? (00:15:31) And to have the Republicans agree with him, these were a lot of the same people who had voted for George W. (00:15:37) Bush twice and supported the war and even mocked their liberal, fellow countrymen for not being on board with it. (00:15:45) And a lot of that was the work that Ron Paul did and people waking up to how messed up all these wars were. (00:15:54) And I think that at least from, there were a couple major things for me, okay, at the time. (00:15:58) So I was like, I was, (00:15:59) I was a young man when I first found Ron Paul. (00:16:02) I was in 2007 was when I first saw him and then started obsessively reading all of his books. (00:16:08) And so I was young. (00:16:11) I'm born in 83. (00:16:12) So what did that mean? (00:16:12) 23, 24 when I first found him. (00:16:15) So I was a young guy. (00:16:16) And at least for me at the time, there were like kind of two categories in my, you know, naive mind where, okay, there were like the liberals (00:16:27) who supported big government at home, but were skeptical about, big government abroad, or they're skeptical about wars. (00:16:35) And then there were the conservatives who said that they supported small government, limited government at home, but were always on the side of whatever the next war is. (00:16:44) And at least for me, and I think for a lot of people of my generation, Ron Paul was the first guy who came along and said, like, no, I'm for limited government here and abroad. (00:16:54) And it was kind of like a portal (00:16:56) where you could access a different perspective on the world. (00:16:59) And then once you saw that, you were like, wait, that's actually what makes sense. (00:17:02) It makes it doesn't make sense to like, what are what is it exactly that like all the Ronald Reagan and George W. (00:17:09) Bush and even like Milton Friedman and guys like that and Thomas Sowell and the it's like you want a constitutionally limited world empire? (00:17:18) Like that's what you guys stand for? (00:17:20) Because that doesn't fit together at all. (00:17:22) And so why is it that we are taking this as a given? (00:17:25) And then of course, the more you look into it, you realize that like, okay, there. (00:17:30) those two things do make sense together. (00:17:32) And then also that kind of like in the initial wave of like the original progressives, look, people like Woodrow Wilson or FDR, these were people who were pushing big government at home and big government abroad. (00:17:45) And that actually made much more sense as a cohesive worldview. (00:17:48) And to oppose that would be (00:17:50) the Ron Paul worldview. (00:17:52) And then the other thing for me, and this was actually, this was my introduction to Ron Paul, and this too to me was like kind of a portal in a way. (00:17:59) It was a way, at least in my naive, not fully functioned brain, or fully developed brain at 24 years old or whatever, it was a way for me to kind of get, like I tapped into something that was outside the empire. (00:18:15) And I had, (00:18:17) I had heard a lot, I was already against George W. (00:18:20) Bush and I didn't like the war. (00:18:21) I had already figured out, you know, I think this war in Iraq is bullshit. (00:18:26) And I think that we were lied into it. (00:18:28) And so I kind of got that. (00:18:29) And then there were liberals and left-wingers who I knew. (00:18:33) I grew up in New York City, so I was very familiar with the left-wing perspective and who were critical of George W. (00:18:39) Bush and for fighting the war and, you know, signing the Patriot Act into law and things like that. (00:18:46) But I had never really heard anybody break it down the way Ron Paul did when he was, when he basically was like, look, there's a reason why these terrorists hate us. (00:18:57) And it's not what they're telling you. (00:18:58) They don't hate us for our freedom. (00:19:00) It's not as if, I remember the way Pat Buchanan put it, which I always loved, was he goes, he said, Dick Cheney makes it sound like Osama bin Laden stumbled on, like in the deserts of Afghanistan, he stumbled on to a copy of our Bill of Rights somewhere. (00:19:14) And he was like, oh my God. (00:19:16) God, they're free to look at this speedy trial. (00:19:19) Are you kidding me? (00:19:20) Like, this is like, what is going on here? (00:19:22) They can own guns and their women can wear miniskirts. (00:19:25) And that just made people so angry that they were ready to, you know, like suicide bomb themselves. (00:19:30) And like, that makes no sense at all. (00:19:32) And then Ron Paul was just like, no, look, here's the thing. (00:19:35) If we think we can just go around the world killing people, propping up dictatorships, putting our military bases in the Muslims' holy land and not engender hatred (00:19:46) from that, then we do that at our own peril. (00:19:49) And I thought that was, it was such an interesting kind of, it had always been, I'm an 80s and 90s kid. (00:19:55) And to me, it was always kind of a given that like America's number one, we're the force for good in the world. (00:20:01) And it was like an interesting introduction to the idea that there are people outside of that (00:20:09) who are dominated by that, who don't care for it very much. (00:20:13) And like that, that's what 9-11 was actually about. (00:20:15) And for me, I was living in New York City. (00:20:17) I was 18, I think, when 9-11 happened. (00:20:19) And that was like the moment of my childhood. (00:20:22) It was a huge thing to live through. (00:20:25) I mean, we were attacked. (00:20:26) This seemed like something that could only happen in a history book. (00:20:28) That didn't happen to America in the 90s. (00:20:31) 2001 was basically the 90s. (00:20:34) And (00:20:36) And it was just like, oh, finally it clicked. (00:20:38) It was like, that makes sense. (00:20:39) It was the first time I had ever heard like an explanation and an understanding of this whole thing that we're involved in now, from 9-11 to the terror wars, that actually just made perfect sense. (00:20:51) Yeah, we should also say that there's some degree of truth that the battle is not just militaristic, it's also cultural. (00:21:00) And then many of those parts of the world don't want (00:21:04) other people's values forced onto them. (00:21:08) Right. (00:21:08) But the way that George W. (00:21:09) Bush and Dick Cheney and every right-wing host in America and Sean Hannity and Bill O'Reilly and like everybody, what they were saying is that they hate that we're free. (00:21:20) Whereas it was much closer to saying like, they don't like us imposing on them. (00:21:26) even like all the hardcore neocons, Bret Stephens, the New York Times, he wrote this piece on the 20th anniversary of the invasion of Iraq, so 2023, to cheerlead the war in Iraq. (00:21:38) And he goes through the whole piece, and there's not one mention of the million people who died in the war. (00:21:44) You know, he literally just goes, the pieces just measure life under Saddam Hussein versus life under the Shiite (00:21:53) parliamentary system that they have now. (00:21:55) Which one's better? (00:21:56) And he's arguing this one's better, therefore it was worth it. (00:21:58) But there's like no mention. (00:21:59) It's like, okay, but what about the 20 plus million people who were displaced? (00:22:03) What about the million people who were killed? (00:22:04) What about all the millions of people who were injured? (00:22:07) What about the 10s of thousands of our soldiers who have blown their brains out in the aftermath of the thing? (00:22:12) Like, it's like so many times this is true with government policy in general. (00:22:16) people talk about the end result that they want, but you're like, but what about the process by which you get there and how much hatred, could you, I mean, I, it's not that hard for me to put myself in other people's shoes. (00:22:30) And I have two little kids (00:22:33) and a wife. (00:22:34) And if anybody were to ever try to argue to me that they have to be the eggs that get broken to make some bigger omelette, like it's okay. (00:22:42) Like, you know, we're ultimately going to impose something on your society that's better than what you have right there. (00:22:47) It sure does suck that your wife and kids got to be the one who get taken out. (00:22:50) I mean, I'm, as I'm just saying this to myself, (00:22:54) and this is not real. (00:22:55) This is just a thought experiment I'm making up. (00:22:57) I'm already pretty close to being a terrorist. (00:23:00) Like my next thought is kind of like, well, okay, well, I hope you're going to like it when you watch your family die in front of you. (00:23:07) Now I'm not, hopefully, even if that happened to me, I wouldn't go kill that guy's family. (00:23:12) Like maybe I'd just go after him or something. (00:23:14) But I could understand, and I think most people who have kids could understand, (00:23:19) Going to a level of the most evil, dark place you could imagine if something ever, anyone ever threatened or actually did something to your kids. (00:23:30) Yeah, we have to remember the thing that's difficult to measure that you just mentioned, which is the hate that's created by every bomb that's dropped. (00:23:37) It was General McChrystal who, you know, was the general running the war in Afghanistan. (00:23:43) He wasn't like, (00:23:44) He wasn't Ron Paul, you know what I mean? (00:23:46) Like he was a sir, yes sir, how do we fight and win this war general? (00:23:51) And he's the one who coined the term insurgent math. (00:23:53) 10 minus 2 equals 20. (00:23:55) You know, it's like the more, the more you keep, I was just reading, I was rereading about this the other day because of the, you know, Trump's been bombing the Houthis in Yemen. (00:24:06) And (00:24:08) it was like when we first, I think it was in, at least in 2009 is when Obama really stepped up the drone campaign, the then secret drone bombing campaign. (00:24:18) And Yemen was one of the major theaters. (00:24:21) And even back then, when it really was just a, it was a war on terrorism, like the main targets were always Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula and their presence in Yemen, (00:24:32) Even then, so before the Saudis invaded, so from 2009 through 2015, AQAP just kept growing. (00:24:40) It was doing all these targeted bombing campaigns, and they call them targeted. (00:24:43) 96% of the people are innocent who get killed, but they call them targeted drone bombings. (00:24:49) And they, and Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula just kept getting bigger and bigger because, it's like, every time you go in there, it's like, okay, you took out one target and then you took out three little girls and, a few, and every one of those little girls had brothers and uncles and fathers and, all of them just signed up to join the fight now because, and I found Ron Paul was the first one (00:25:12) who really made this click for me. (00:25:14) But it's in a way, and I'm not like, I'm not a leftist, I'm not an egalitarian, I'm not a cultural relativist. (00:25:21) I'm not saying that all cultures are the same or that we all look at the world the same way. (00:25:25) There's enormous differences between all of us. (00:25:27) And I personally think some are better than others. (00:25:30) But (00:25:31) There are things that unite all of us. (00:25:33) And in a weird way, I remember one time I was arguing with a Democrat guy on a SE Cup show. (00:25:40) I used to be a contributor on her show. (00:25:43) And we were arguing, and it was after a terrorist attack here in New York, a fairly minor one. (00:25:48) It was like a guy like, I think he hit someone with his car and then jumped out with a gun, and then the cops lit him up and killed him. (00:25:55) This is like back in 2017, I think. (00:25:57) And (00:25:58) He claimed to be ISIS inspired. (00:26:00) I don't remember if there was like a direct connection or not. (00:26:03) But they were, at the time, they were like, doesn't this mean we got to step up the war in Iraq or in Syria where ISIS's stronghold is? (00:26:10) And I remember the guy saying to me, he goes, you know, I went off on how these wars have been disasters. (00:26:16) And he goes, yeah, but Dave, what you're saying here is we're supposed to do nothing. (00:26:20) this just happened and now we're supposed to do nothing. (00:26:22) And so even though this guy had a suit and tie on and we're in a cable news studio and we're in a first world country, we're in the United States of America and we're having the basic thing that he's saying (00:26:33) is like, what do you say? (00:26:34) You're saying we're not going to go kill some motherfuckers? (00:26:36) like, I mean, he was just putting it as like, do something. (00:26:39) But what's something? (00:26:41) is dropping bombs on human beings, you know, when like, yes, some innocent people are going to die. (00:26:45) But okay, but it's the same thing. (00:26:48) It's the same after 9-11, we're like, we got to go fucking invade some countries right now. (00:26:52) That's the same impulse. (00:26:54) It's like, they killed some of our people. (00:26:56) You think we're not going to show them who the real killers are? (00:26:58) You think there's a chance that you could come here and that is like the most human (00:27:03) extinct ever. (00:27:04) It's like some other tribe just came in here and killed some people in our tribe. (00:27:08) So what do you want to do about that? (00:27:10) Well, I don't know. (00:27:10) It's not going to take me too long to figure out. (00:27:12) We're going to go kill a bunch of people in their tribe. (00:27:14) And I do think that like that is, I think that's the major motivating factor for both sides of the Israel-Palestine conflict. (00:27:22) I think that's the major motivator for both sides of the war on terror conflict. (00:27:26) And it's like, that's, it's, (00:27:28) In a way, when you look at it like that, there's something, even though it's so dark and tragic, there's something almost beautiful about it where you're like, oh, we're all caught in this same cycle. (00:27:38) Yeah, it's deeply human, the warring between tribes, but, you know, especially in the recent years, but more and more through human history. (00:27:46) there's almost like a third party, which is this military industrial complex, which is making money from the two tribes. (00:27:53) So if you just have two tribes, one, I've been reading a lot about Genghis Khan. (00:27:57) If this is why Genghis Khan banned this, it was very common in Mongolia before Genghis Khan to steal people's wives. (00:28:07) It's like, you're my wife now. (00:28:08) Right. (00:28:09) And he realized that that creates a lot of conflict. (00:28:12) Yeah, it sure does. (00:28:14) That seems natural and human, that kind of conflict. (00:28:16) But whenever a third party rolls in and starts making money on the whole thing and then driving that forward, then the escalation of the conflict comes with this whole machine that makes de-escalation really difficult. (00:28:30) Yeah. (00:28:31) military industrial complex in America. (00:28:34) It's so big and it's so sophisticated. (00:28:38) And it's so, it's not just that there's, (00:28:41) there's this, there's the intelligence agencies, there's the weapons manufacturers, then there's the like people in the media who are either directly or indirectly just parroting, you know what I mean, all of their talking points. (00:28:56) And so it's not just that you can kind of like, you make money when there's a conflict, but you have this entire apparatus to like create the conflict and then create the public sentiment for that. (00:29:09) And then we're, (00:29:11) And it's interesting, we're in an interesting place because we're kind of in this like new frontier of now where shows like this can happen and there's a lot of them and a lot of them are humongous like yours. (00:29:23) But for so long, this just didn't exist. (00:29:27) And it was just like, oh, like for so long, it was the case that like the New York Times and NBC and CBS and ABC and the Washington Post and (00:29:39) the Associated Press, I guess, they could just move the nation. (00:29:42) I mean, if they wanted to be like, hey, there is the idea that, forget even like after 9/11, the idea that in 1990, 1991, that there was any organic movement from the American people going, you know, we really got to see about the Saddam Hussein guy. (00:30:00) You know, the dictator in Iraq is having a slant drilling dispute with the Amir of Kuwait. (00:30:08) we really got to do something about it. (00:30:09) Like that is not something that organically came from any, that was not like a few soccer moms hanging out, watching their kids game being like, I really do think, I think in a couple of years we're going to have to send these boys over to Iraq. (00:30:22) Like that's not, they just from the top down were able to create this feeling that like, hey, there's a new Adolf Hitler on the rise over here in Iraq. (00:30:32) We got to go see about this. (00:30:34) There are these poor people in Kuwait. (00:30:35) We have to do that. (00:30:36) You know, like there's, they (00:30:38) were able to create this desire for war that was, it's really incredible when you think about it, because there's, I think for the most part in human history, you would have had to have some type of plausible threat, some type of plausible reality to convince people that we actually have to go to war in order to deal with this. (00:31:02) Whereas like, (00:31:04) the United States, the idea that in 1991, the United States of America would feel threatened by Iraq was just ridiculous. (00:31:12) And yet they were able to do it. (00:31:13) Well, so to push back a little bit, throughout human history, there was also a thing, you look at the Roman Empire, where just the cultural values were different, where military conquest was seen as a good thing. (00:31:25) So like, we just almost assume in the United States, (00:31:30) War has been framed in the defensive sense, like where offensive war, we're not doing that anymore. (00:31:36) You make a fair point. (00:31:38) It's certainly true that throughout human history, there's been, there's been like overt (00:31:46) empire building and wars of conquest and things like that. (00:31:50) But I guess I'm just saying at least even there, you would have some type of cell of like why we're going to go take these resources and why that will be good for us. (00:31:58) Whereas the idea that they're like Kuwait just needed to be defended by the Americans seems so (00:32:07) It seemed so hard to convince anybody, and yet they were able to do it. (00:32:11) If you read like neocon writing in the 90s, it was very interesting because they would tell the truth a lot more. (00:32:19) And they were, essentially, I think there was, the Soviet Union had just collapsed. (00:32:26) It was what Charles Krauthammer dubbed the unipolar moment. (00:32:30) There was like a lot of, there was excitement, there was a feeling of invincibility. (00:32:35) And also the neocons weren't in power after 92, really. (00:32:39) I mean, they had a little, they were in the George H.W. (00:32:41) Bush administration, but after 92, they really weren't. (00:32:43) So they're just writing at these think tanks and it just didn't seem as, you know, like they weren't as guarded. (00:32:48) There weren't like these accusations of you're a war criminal or something like that. (00:32:52) But what he said, what Jonah Goldberg agreed with was that every, I think the statement was every 10 years or so, America's got to find a puny little country and put them up against the wall just to let the rest (00:33:04) of the world know that we mean business. (00:33:06) And that was actually their mentality. (00:33:09) I'm sure there's people that agree with that. (00:33:11) I happen to disagree with that, but the drums of war are beating a little bit over Taiwan and China. (00:33:17) More than a little bit, yeah. (00:33:18) But there I can't even see a justification of a just war. (00:33:21) What is the long-term benefit to society if you do military intervention? (00:33:26) Well, I also think this, and I've been saying this for a while, but I do think there is this like, (00:33:31) There's like this empire mentality that Americans have got to shake off. (00:33:38) Like as if it's even a question of whether we should allow it or not. (00:33:43) Like are we in a position to allow or not allow that? (00:33:47) Why do we, it's almost like if you were, (00:33:50) like I don't, I hope China doesn't invade Taiwan. (00:33:52) I hope Taiwan remains as free as possible. (00:33:55) I hope China becomes free. (00:33:56) I root for freedom and prosperity for everyone, you know, but I also root for like everybody to have a healthy marriage. (00:34:03) But if you were like, if you were talking to me and you were like, hey, the guy down the street is cheating on his wife. (00:34:10) Like, I don't think we can allow this. (00:34:13) I'd immediately be like, that's really not my place. (00:34:16) And then on top of that, I also have no power. (00:34:17) I have no authority over what they do in their marriage. (00:34:20) Like I have to be concerned with my marriage. (00:34:22) And the idea that like, imagine if there were the political will to invade Mexico. (00:34:31) Like if DC decided we're taking Mexico City, like that's going to be part of America now and we're taking it by force. (00:34:38) And then China was like, we're not sure if we can allow this. (00:34:42) I think immediately most Americans would be like, allow? (00:34:46) Like, how the fuck do you think you're going to stop us from taking Mexico City? (00:34:51) What are you going to do, China? (00:34:53) You're going to send your Navy ships over here to fight us off the coast of Mexico? (00:34:58) Good luck with that. (00:34:59) And at least from my understanding in almost all the war games that they've run, if we did militarily, even if it doesn't come to nuclear weapons being used, in which case the whole world gets blown up. (00:35:10) But even if (00:35:12) We go to militarily try to stop China from invading Taiwan and no one, everyone agrees to not use nukes and we just fight a conventional war, we lose that war every time. (00:35:22) I think what you said applies to a lot of the wars we've been involved in, but China and Taiwan is a little bit different because of TSMC, because there's an economic dependence. (00:35:32) If that was the concern, then the response would be, we need some type of Manhattan Project. (00:35:37) And I'm not supporting a government project here, but there would be, we need some type of Manhattan Project to say, (00:35:42) We're going to make these things here. (00:35:43) We can't. (00:35:44) And look, I was running that experiment before saying, like, what if we all pinky promise not to use nuclear weapons or something like that? (00:35:50) But that's not the reality of the situation. (00:35:53) The more reality, look, even in Ukraine, everybody, the biggest talks, the biggest pushers of this policy and Joe Biden's policy to fund Ukraine, no one's suggesting we send in the 82nd airborne, which is really the only thing that could repel the Russians right now and restore, you know, Ukrainian, the (00:36:12) original sovereignty of the Ukrainian borders. (00:36:15) But no one's suggesting we send in the 82nd Airborne because we all know. (00:36:18) Well, we can't have a direct war with Russia. (00:36:20) That's the end of the world. (00:36:22) And same thing with China. (00:36:23) So, you know, I'm not saying microchips or whatever aren't important, but there's (00:36:29) We can find other ways to, Taiwan is not magical. (00:36:33) Like we can produce these things in other places, no? (00:36:35) So you have the humility to say that you don't really know much about the situation. (00:36:39) It sounds ridiculous, but there's something magical about not Taiwan, but DSMC. (00:36:43) It's incredibly difficult to manage the supply chain and manufacture at such a low cost that they are. (00:36:49) And to add to that, China has been signaling about the one China policy, but you're absolutely right that you shouldn't be doing the Washington thing of (00:36:58) beating the drums of war. (00:37:00) It's like completely the counterproductive thing. (00:37:02) There should, you should actually try to find partnerships with China, build friendships and cooperation. (00:37:08) Like India is doing a good job of this. (00:37:10) Like build friendships. (00:37:11) This is the 21st century. (00:37:14) conflict, this Cold War thinking is going to be destructive to the economy, destructive to humanity, to the flourishing of the individual nations of the world. (00:37:23) There's just nothing positive except making money for the military industry. (00:37:27) Well, yeah, and it was totally destructive during the original Cold War, too, and almost led to nuclear war on a couple of different occasions. (00:37:33) But look, I would just say, and I really, I'm no defender of the Chinese regime. (00:37:38) I hate communism and fascism, whatever they are, some hybrid mix of the two. (00:37:44) They're paying you, aren't they? (00:37:45) Yeah, no, fuck them. (00:37:47) By the way, a lot of people speculate online, but I'm not getting any of these checks, man, and I'd really like them to start coming in. (00:37:54) But there's... (00:37:56) even when it's like China, you say China's asserting the one China policy, but the one China policy is the policy of the United States of America and has been for 50 years now, right? (00:38:06) So it's not, I think what's happening there a lot of times is that essentially, even though officially the one China policy is the policy of the United States of America, all of these American politicians and (00:38:21) different figureheads across powerful centers in America are saying that China doesn't have the right to go into Taiwan. (00:38:29) And then China's in the position of being like, well, hey, wait a minute. (00:38:32) No, that's not actually the policy. (00:38:34) We maintain this one China policy, but we allow them to kind of do what they want to do. (00:38:39) And, you know, the most obvious example of this was when Joe Biden actually said (00:38:47) we wouldn't allow that and we would militarily intervene if they went into China. (00:38:50) And then, and this was so bizarre, then the White House, whoever that was, came out to correct the president of the United States and say, no, the policy of the White House is the one China policy. (00:39:05) Which, look, I mean, again, I think the whole point of this is that the reason why whoever the hell was able to overrule Joe Biden and his administration, I don't know who that is, (00:39:16) But the whole point is that if you say, and this is why there is some wisdom in America accepting the one China policy, is that if you tell China (00:39:28) that we recognize Taiwan's independence and that they're not a part of China, that might be the type of thing that would make China invade and say, no, we're not accepting that. (00:39:38) And so at least right now, it's like, kind of like, okay, here's, look, this is the reality. (00:39:43) It's something that you kind of run up against with the war in Ukraine a lot and with the situation in China and Taiwan is that there are (00:39:54) There are constraints placed on us by reality. (00:39:58) It's not all just how would you like us? (00:40:00) the world to be? (00:40:01) How would you like it to work? (00:40:02) Obviously, I think we would all like that bigger countries don't invade smaller countries and bigger countries don't bully smaller countries around. (00:40:09) That is not the way of the world. (00:40:10) We are a big country that is the biggest bully in the world. (00:40:14) So we're in no position to let, but what we're kind of in the position is just like, you're like, hey, we'd sure love if you don't do that. (00:40:21) You know, you can do it and you can get away with it, but we would sure love it if you don't. (00:40:26) And so the goal would be to do everything we can to make sure that (00:40:30) doesn't happen. (00:40:31) When Vladimir Putin starts talking about like, hey, if you keep pushing the idea of Ukraine joining your military alliance, I'm going to invade that country. (00:40:39) The goal there, or the move there, would be to be like, okay, we'll stop talking about that. (00:40:44) Is there something else that we can agree on? (00:40:46) You know, like, is there a way that you will promise you won't do anything to them? (00:40:50) And okay, and we'll promise we won't bring them in our military. (00:40:53) Like, that's the goal. (00:40:54) You don't just go like, no, fuck you, we're doing it anyway, over and over and over again until they do the thing. (00:41:01) I think we got to the discussion from the military industrial complex and military intervention and Ron Paul before that. (00:41:06) If you could like rewind a little bit, is there any amount, according to you and according to various flavors of libertarianism, is there any amount of military intervention that's justified that's okay? (00:41:23) Well, I would say, okay, so (00:41:27) at least to me, in terms of pure libertarian theory, or just in terms of what I think is right or wrong, like there is such thing as a just war. (00:41:37) The most obvious example of that would be like you're invaded by a military and fighting them off. (00:41:44) So in that sense, also, like even if you want to, if you want to kind of isolate from everything else, (00:41:52) from, all of the awful US policy toward Russia post-Soviet Union to all of the, NATO expansion and color-coded revolutions and all of these things. (00:42:03) If you want to, you know, Vladimir Putin invades Ukraine, I do think the Ukrainians have a right to fight and protect their land. (00:42:10) Like there's an aggressive, there's an aggressor there and you have a right to defend yourself. (00:42:16) So certainly in that sense, I think the American Revolution was a just war. (00:42:21) I think there are, there can be just wars. (00:42:25) In terms of pure libertarian theory, I think I would say that, look, you don't, you never have a right to kill innocent people. (00:42:36) That's never morally okay. (00:42:39) Now, there could be a scenario, just like this is true in life in general, right? (00:42:43) Like, there's lots of things that you don't have the right to do, (00:42:46) But you could come up with some scenario where you might be in a position where you have to do it because there were all of these extenuating circumstances, like for, you could think of something where like, you remember the Saw movies where they used to, these crazy like horror scenarios, but it's like, okay, so there's a person, you know, an evil bad guy has buried a key inside this person and you have to kill that person in order to get the key in order to unlock these 20 people to let them out of a cage. (00:43:16) Now, (00:43:16) Look, you still don't have a right to kill people. (00:43:19) It's horrible and wrong. (00:43:20) And what you did there was still evil. (00:43:22) But if you were taken to trial over it, you could probably explain to a judge and a jury, be like, I know, but the situation I was in was either these 20 people were going to die or this one person was going to die. (00:43:33) And under that situation, I chose to save the 20. (00:43:36) So like, in other words, by perfect theory, no, you never have the right to kill innocent people. (00:43:42) There could be a scenario where you were like, look, we had to take this military action and some innocent people did die. (00:43:49) And it's so tragic and awful that we had to do this, but we are certain that many more people would have died had we not done this. (00:43:57) Now in that case, I would look at that as like, number one, it's much like killing the one person to save the 20. (00:44:05) It's still wrong. (00:44:06) It's still an immoral thing that you were forced into doing. (00:44:09) It's not justified. (00:44:11) I would say that the overwhelming onus should have to be on you to demonstrate that you absolutely needed to do that. (00:44:20) And that's how I feel about all these wars. (00:44:22) You know, it's not like, you know, I think that like, let's just say, like, if you could make World War II, like, (00:44:31) you could reduce it down to the simplest caricature of what World War II is and say there's no Joseph Stalin. (00:44:36) We're not even partnering with him. (00:44:37) Like there's a good guy in Russia who we were partnering with and there's and the British Empire had never done anything wrong. (00:44:43) They were just nothing but good guys. (00:44:44) And of course, FDR was nothing but a good guy and Hitler was even worse than the real Hitler. (00:44:48) You know what I mean? (00:44:48) And in order to stop them, we had to go on this bombing campaign and we only got Nazis. (00:44:55) We only killed the bad guys and we were able to take out the Third Reich, but one eight-year-old girl died. (00:45:01) and you did this thing that stopped the whole world from falling into subjugation. (00:45:05) So I think almost everybody would agree, Jesus, man, you have to do that. (00:45:10) Okay? (00:45:11) This is, you have to do that because the whole world's going to be subjugated. (00:45:14) There's nothing but good guys here. (00:45:15) The Nazis are so evil. (00:45:17) And there's one, I still would say that every single time World War II came up, we should all just be somber and we should all just think about that little eight-year-old girl who died and what a horrible thing it is that we had to do that, you know? (00:45:30) And so, like, (00:45:31) I mean, there are these campaigns where like, 10s of millions of people are killed. (00:45:37) The fact that anybody's ever like spiking the football or this kind of like rah rah, we were the good ones. (00:45:44) And then also when you add in all those other complicated factors like that, this wasn't the scenario at all. (00:45:49) But I do, so I guess essentially I'd say, no, you don't ever have a right to kill innocent people. (00:45:55) It's never self-defense to be killing innocent people. (00:45:58) I mean, short of like, (00:46:00) some type of scenario where if you're holding a baby and coming at me shooting and I shoot back at you and, okay, I was acting in self-defense and it happened to kill a baby. (00:46:08) But I'm talking about like what the scenarios where you're dropping bombs on cities. (00:46:15) It's never justified. (00:46:17) And the overwhelming onus should be on you to demonstrate that you absolutely have to do it. (00:46:22) And that should be the standard. (00:46:23) Because there's so many other standards that I see thrown out that I just think make no moral sense at all. (00:46:29) You know, people will argue about like in Gaza, they'll argue about (00:46:34) the civilian to combatant ratio, which I like that to me doesn't really, that's not what counts. (00:46:41) That's not the measure that's important. (00:46:43) And also no one knows what the numbers are. (00:46:45) They all just kind of like pretend to. (00:46:47) And then the other thing will be that people, as someone just recently argued with me about, they'll say like, well, Hamas has to go. (00:46:56) That's the starting point. (00:46:57) Hamas has to go. (00:46:58) And I'm like, no, I don't think you get to say that. (00:47:00) Because the truth is that, look, you can make an argument that Hamas has to go. (00:47:04) Sure. (00:47:05) You can make an argument that the Likudniks have to go. (00:47:07) You can make an argument that Kim Jong-un has to go or that G has to go or that Putin has to go or that Zelinsky has to go. (00:47:13) Or certainly I would make an argument that Joe Biden had to go. (00:47:16) But just because a government has to go, that doesn't mean you could just go kill all their people. (00:47:20) Yeah, that should not be the starting point, like the assumption, the axiom of the discussion. (00:47:26) The question is, there no other option than doing it this way? (00:47:32) It's like, okay, like October 7th happened. (00:47:34) We can all agree this was like a horrific tragedy and an indefensible act of terrorism. (00:47:41) Like, okay, is it guaranteed that another one of those is going to happen tomorrow? (00:47:46) Or was this the biggest security failure in Israeli history? (00:47:50) Okay, well, if it's the biggest security failure, (00:47:53) Let's just say, not even going down the inside job rabbit hole or anything like that, but just saying it's a giant security failure. (00:47:58) Okay, then put a bunch more men at that fence, first of all. (00:48:01) And now you got to talk about how can you achieve your goal while inflicting the minimum amount of devastation on innocent people. (00:48:09) Let's talk about it since you brought it up. (00:48:12) October 7th. (00:48:13) So what exactly do you think about the October 7th attack by Hamas on Israel? (00:48:20) I mean, like what I just said, that it was horrible. (00:48:23) And it's always by the same logic that I'm giving you now, it's always it's always evil to target innocent civilians. (00:48:32) I don't believe, you know, civilians can be held responsible for the crimes of their government. (00:48:39) This was, by the way, the Osama bin Laden logic, which I think would also be the logic of like Bill Clinton or George W. (00:48:45) Bush or Barack Obama. (00:48:46) But Osama bin Laden very explicitly said when he was asked, like, well, are you just going to target like US military sites or are you targeting US civilians? (00:48:55) It was an interview in the 90s before 9-11. (00:49:00) And he goes, no, civilians are fair game too, because you guys have regular elections. (00:49:04) and you guys vote for your government, and therefore you're responsible for the crimes that they commit. (00:49:08) Now, I think that's the logic of a fanatic like Osama bin Laden, and that's not the logic that any of us should follow. (00:49:16) It doesn't make any sense, and it's not true that people are responsible for the crimes of their government. (00:49:23) I think that same argument is used quite a bit by people on the pro-Israeli side when they say like, oh, they had an election in 2005 and Hamas won a plurality. (00:49:33) Therefore, (00:49:35) 20 years later, they have no rights. (00:49:37) I think that's insane. (00:49:38) So, okay, so Hamas had no right to go after civilians. (00:49:44) You know, it's horrible. (00:49:45) And you see, you know, the, these, you know, teenagers being killed and the people, you know, you see the images of people who were held hostage for all this time. (00:49:56) So it's like your heart breaks for those people. (00:49:59) It's truly tragic. (00:50:01) I do think that (00:50:05) It was, in many ways, an indictment of so many different things. (00:50:13) like October 7th happening was an indictment of the entire occupation slash siege of Gaza and the West Bank, for that matter. (00:50:24) It was, I think, (00:50:28) should have probably forever destroyed the legacy of Benjamin Netanyahu, who is, you know, I mean, this isn't like George W. (00:50:37) Bush, you know, was, I mean, he was on the job for almost a year when 9-11 happened, but it was still kind of new, you know, like it was still kind of in his first year of being president. (00:50:47) Benjamin Netanyahu was the longest serving prime minister in Israeli history and had explicitly been like, I'm the tough right-winger who's going to be tough on these (00:50:58) Palestinians who's going to like move away from the idea of coming to a two-state solution because this is what we need to keep us safe. (00:51:05) Like the justification is like, I'm going to be hard on these motherfuckers because that's because I know what it takes to keep us safe. (00:51:13) And that culminates in the worst massacre in Israeli history. (00:51:20) And then, I mean, the other big one is that, I mean, and it's not like a, I wouldn't even say an open secret at this point. (00:51:26) It's just out in the open. (00:51:27) And he had this strategy of propping up Hamas for years. (00:51:30) And so he had this strategy of propping up Hamas for a myriad of reasons. (00:51:37) But a major part of it was that, look, man, as long as there's terrorists in power there, there's never going to be any pressure on us to give the Palestinians a state because, look, what are you telling me I got to negotiate with them? (00:51:49) He was allowing Qatar money to float. (00:51:52) Insisting that Qatar money float to them. (00:51:54) When the Qatar money dried up, sent the Mossad in to insist that it gets back to him. (00:52:00) Hundreds of millions of dollars, briefcases and cash. (00:52:03) And he said in his own words that the reason for doing this was to keep to his words were prop up Hamas, bolster Hamas, to keep them in power so that the West Bank and the Gazans were divided and that the international community as well as (00:52:19) of the liberal Jewish community in Israel wouldn't be able to put pressure on them to make a deal. (00:52:24) But what are the options? (00:52:26) So if he doesn't allow the money in, it also looks really bad for him. (00:52:32) Because if he's not allowing the money in, that means he's not allowing the quote-unquote aid in to help the Palestinians. (00:52:38) Yeah, but Lex, I mean, the dynamic here, right, is from 2007 to (00:52:46) today, Israel's had a full blockade around the country. (00:52:50) They won't let potatoes in, they won't let sugar in, they won't, they, and the justification is because they're dual use. (00:53:01) You know, they can be used to make rockets as well as they can be used to, you know, feed starving children. (00:53:08) So we can't let that in because it's dual use. (00:53:13) But (00:53:14) cash to Hamas? (00:53:16) Does that not have dual usage? (00:53:19) Like, is there nothing else that they can? (00:53:20) So yeah, it's like, yes, when you have a full blockade around the country, you take on certain responsibilities. (00:53:26) And I think this is, you know, this is the essence of really the whole struggle here, which is very tough, I think, for the pro-Israel side to grapple with. (00:53:35) But the bottom line is that Israel hasn't occupied Palestine for like a few months after a war, or even a couple of years after a war, while they're figuring (00:53:44) out what we're going to do with them. (00:53:46) It's been over 60 years. (00:53:47) We're talking about a one week long war or a day short of a week long war in 1967. (00:53:54) Israel's had control of them ever since. (00:53:56) And much like in the same way that like if you kidnap someone and you lock them in your basement and you don't feed them, you murdered that person. (00:54:05) So in other words, stated differently, you're not allowed to kidnap people and lock them in your basement. (00:54:12) But once you do, (00:54:14) you take on a responsibility to feed those people. (00:54:17) You know what I mean? (00:54:17) Like you can't, you're not allowed to keep someone and not feed them. (00:54:20) That is a worse charge than just keeping them. (00:54:23) And so yet, anyway, I guess my point is (00:54:27) The solution to that, if you go like, Well, I'm a bad guy if I fund the Moss, I'm a bad guy if I don't let the aid in, was to let the reputable international aid organizations bring aid in to the people of Gaza. (00:54:39) Don't have, don't pressure the Qataris to send in briefcases full of cash. (00:54:45) Allow internationally recognized, reputable human rights organizations who are lining up trying to do it, stop turning them away and let them in. (00:54:55) And this is just, it's (00:54:57) so long past due. (00:54:58) I mean, like, it's just, I'm not like defending Arab terrorism. (00:55:04) It's, I think it's really, it's a tragedy that the Arabs embraced terrorism. (00:55:09) I don't think it's unique to them. (00:55:11) And in fact, you know, I think it was the Zionist militias who introduced terrorism to that part of the world. (00:55:20) But there was also like, there, look, (00:55:22) Terrorism persists because it works. (00:55:24) And this is true with state terrorism and with non-state terrorism. (00:55:27) It's like terrorism has often worked for people. (00:55:32) I think the thing, like early, I think early Yasser Arafat, I know was very influenced by the Algerians who successfully kicked the French out embracing terrorism. (00:55:46) And it was almost like the major miscalculation (00:55:51) of those Palestinian Arabs who did embrace terrorism was that this isn't the French. (00:55:59) This isn't the French hanging out in some colony with their home country back home, where maybe a few acts of violence could work enough to, you know, the liberal population back home is like, oh, I really didn't like the response to that terrorism. (00:56:11) We killed so many people. (00:56:12) Forget it. (00:56:12) This is too much of A headache. (00:56:14) Let's get out of here. (00:56:15) The Zionist settlers were there to stay. (00:56:17) They weren't going anywhere. (00:56:18) They weren't going back to Eastern Europe. (00:56:21) You know, (00:56:21) But I mean, they weren't, they were just that. (00:56:22) And so it's a tragedy that this whole thing went the way it did. (00:56:28) But you always, whenever you're talking about like a conflict like this, the person who has the, or the party who has the power is the one who needs to make concessions, you know, and the, it's just indefensible that the status quo of the Palestinian people having no rights (00:56:48) Literally no rights. (00:56:49) Being ruled by a government that they do not get to vote for or against, no right to do commerce with the outside world, no freedom of travel, no freedom of movement, no basic property rights, can be kicked out of your home at any time, no right to a fair trial, no right to a lawyer, no right to a jury of your peers. (00:57:06) I mean, the fact that has been the status quo since 1967 (00:57:12) is just indefensible. (00:57:14) And then in the context that has been the status quo, I guess I'm just not, even though I'm against it, it's kind of like when you're just lecturing about the way in which they resist this. (00:57:27) I think it's very tough to be on a strong moral footing, you know? (00:57:33) Yeah, you have to really empathize with decades of suffering in the region. (00:57:39) I suppose my question was grounded in how can the Israeli government, how can the world help the Palestinian people flourish? (00:57:47) So you suggested allowing reputable aid organizations in, but you know, that's kind of almost patching, just helping humans who are suffering. (00:58:03) But that's not how you have a nation flourish. (00:58:06) You have to build up the infrastructure, you have to build up a culture of the education system, the democratic processes of electing and regular elections so that the people are represented. (00:58:20) And you have to form partnerships, friendships, normalization of relations with the Arab world, with Israel. (00:58:27) You can travel back and forth. (00:58:30) and lessen the chokehold, like the security chokehold, you know, that you could say is justified in a militaristic situation, but why is it a military situation? (00:58:44) The question is there, like, where do we go from here? (00:58:48) If we, you know, we'll talk about Netanyahu some more. (00:58:52) He is, you know, he's very criticized inside Israel as well. (00:58:57) Yeah, for sure. (00:58:58) Maybe less so after October 7th, because, again, in the same way you can empathize with the Palestinian people, you can empathize with Israelis. (00:59:09) where October 7th touched just like it did for Americans with 9-11. (00:59:13) It touched some kind of primal thing of fear of like, oh yeah, and like the same thing I said before. (00:59:21) Like I could also very easily go if my, if one of my kids was like at that rave or something like that and just got gunned down or kidnapped by, I could understand being like level the whole goddamn place. (00:59:33) And I'm sure I would feel that way if that was one of my kids, you know. (00:59:36) So yeah, no, that's exactly right. (00:59:39) I mean, (00:59:39) there's lots of examples in the world of, France and Germany are right next to each other and Ireland and England are right next to each other and they're just totally living in harmony right now. (00:59:51) Like there is just no, the thought of them going to war is like inconceivable right now. (00:59:57) Not saying it could never happen in the future, but it seems pretty hard to imagine. (01:00:01) And that being the case would have been very hard to imagine for a very long time. (01:00:07) You know, like there, I mean, there's (01:00:09) some serious levels of brutality between those two societies. (01:00:13) And even more directly involved, Egypt and Israel went to war four times in a couple decades. (01:00:22) They went to war. (01:00:23) And then in the late 70s, they made a land for peace deal. (01:00:26) They haven't been to war since, you know, and like I do at least try to hold out that like (01:00:33) that is, it's not like Egypt is, you're not going to say they don't have an issue with radical Islam in Egypt. (01:00:38) You know what I mean? (01:00:39) Like, that's not the answer. (01:00:41) It's just that they made a land for peace deal. (01:00:43) And once there wasn't, you know, once that wasn't, that was solved, it was kind of easier to avoid the war. (01:00:49) And I do like to think that there could be a solution to the Israel-Palestine question, but it's going to have to, (01:01:00) It's going to have to involve Israel taking their boot off of the Palestinians' neck. (01:01:04) And I know that that's scary. (01:01:06) And I understand that there are like legitimate concerns about that. (01:01:09) There's the great Thomas Jefferson quote about slavery, which was, we have the wolf by the tail, and we can neither afford to hold on to him nor risk letting him go. (01:01:25) which is like, you could see where that would have been like a real concern of people, right toward the end of slavery or, whatever, in the early 1800s, say the first half of the 19th century, where you'd be like, okay, we recognize this is wrong now. (01:01:41) But (01:01:42) We've had these millions of people enslaved for all these years. (01:01:45) If we let them go, they're going to fucking kill us. (01:01:47) And what are you saying? (01:01:48) They're citizens now? (01:01:49) Meaning the Second Amendment applies to them? (01:01:51) Meaning that the guy who I enslaved now can get a gun? (01:01:55) You know what? (01:01:56) And so, okay, there are the, but I think in hindsight, looking back at it, we would all just go, (01:02:02) Yeah, but you can enslave people. (01:02:04) So whatever risks come with the next phase of this, unfortunately, you're going to have to just deal with that and move, you have to start with abolishing slavery. (01:02:16) And it is good to also remember in the hopeful message you send, at any day you can make a deal. (01:02:23) That's one of the frustrating things I had with the, I hosted a debate on Israel and I was like, it just felt hopeless. (01:02:29) And a lot of people I talk to, it feels hopeless, but I have a lot of, I maybe naively see a lot of possibilities of peace there. (01:02:37) I see, for example, normalization of relations with Saudi Arabia and Israel, and then Saudi Arabia taking some ownership over Gaza, something like that, some interesting, where a big major player in that region takes (01:02:52) ownership and steps as the middleman. (01:02:55) Yeah, I agree with you and you're 100% right that and even before October 7th, I think many steps had been taken away from the peace process and the feeling of that. (01:03:04) I mean, really, I think since the Second Intifada is when like the appetite for peace, I think in Israel was greatly diminished. (01:03:14) But to your point, I mean, it's going to take really painful concessions (01:03:21) on all sides in order to get there. (01:03:25) And I think that the, personally I think, and I don't know if I say this for the, not necessarily like the Arab world, (01:03:36) But at least the nation states, like their governments, I think are pretty much there. (01:03:42) Like Saudi Arabia and UAE and Jordan and Egypt. (01:03:48) Like if the Israelis, they're almost like, look, these are American sock puppets, you know, for the most part, right? (01:03:54) And so their thing is that like, okay, 100% of my population is (01:04:01) completely opposed to what Israel is doing to Palestine right now. (01:04:04) And they just hate that Israel, that the nation was created at all, that all the Arabs were kicked out of what is, very important land to them religiously. (01:04:13) And so the governments there are like, look, we want to continue to have US tax dollars flooding in here. (01:04:22) We'd love to make a deal with Israel, but you got to stop doing this to the Palestinians so my own people don't rise up against me. (01:04:30) So I think as long as the Israelis were like, fine, we'll do a two-state solution or something like that, I think Saudi Arabia couldn't wait to broker. (01:04:36) In fact, they proposed A two-state solution just a few years ago. (01:04:40) I mean, they would love to be a part of that and normalize relations. (01:04:45) Amongst the Palestinians, (01:04:49) which again, I think this, I think this had been accepted multiple times, at least by their leadership. (01:04:54) It's like, you're going to have to accept that like you lost in 48. (01:04:58) You're going to have to accept that you lost in 47. (01:05:00) You're going to have to accept that the state of Israel does exist. (01:05:03) And you're going to have to accept that like the right of return is not going to literally mean that everybody can go back to where they were. (01:05:12) And what Israel is going to have to concede is that (01:05:15) It was awfully fucked up that they kicked a lot of people out of their land and that the whole a land for people, for a people without land was never true. (01:05:24) That was just a slogan that felt good to avoid what you guys actually did. (01:05:29) And the fact that it was inexcusable that you guys occupied these people for 60 years and that has to end immediately. (01:05:36) I interviewed Douglas Murray recently. (01:05:39) He just wrote a book on Israel and Hamas called On Democracies and Death Cults. (01:05:44) He makes what I think is a strong pro-Israel case, focusing on Hamas as an evil organization, evil for its corrupt leadership, who's essentially stealing money from the Palestinian people and allocating the money that is there towards terrorist militaristic operations versus building up Gaza. (01:06:07) Can you steelman the case for and then against this perspective? (01:06:10) Sort of centering, we've been talking about the people, about centering around Hamas, which is like this extremist religious organization. (01:06:23) The perspective being like they need to be, as you mentioned before, eliminated before any progress can be made. (01:06:29) Okay, so if I were, so steelman Douglas Murray's case, I would say (01:06:37) I guess the case is right. (01:06:38) Look, Hamas is a fanatical death cult, essentially, which I do think is a fair description of them. (01:06:48) There is no question that they have pursued, they have, they have pursued a path (01:06:56) that was just devastating to their own people. (01:07:00) And there's no question they have not spent the resources they have on. (01:07:05) Their priority has not been uplifting their own people. (01:07:08) Their priority has been, I think, essentially antagonizing Israel into this overreaction so that they can turn world opinion against Israel. (01:07:17) I think they've been very effective at doing that. (01:07:21) And (01:07:22) And again, I think the argument would come back to something like, and the people kind of voted for this in 2005, and the people sure do, we sure do see a lot of people cheering when Hamas is doing some pretty horrific stuff. (01:07:34) And so, hey, you got that on one side, and you have a kind of a country that's much more similar to Western societies on the other side. (01:07:43) If we can just like linger on that, Steel Man, what do you make of the celebrations? (01:07:48) in Gaza after October 7th. (01:07:51) I think it's sickening and incredibly disturbing. (01:07:55) I just, I guess the way I look at it, I always, and maybe there is a degree of like naivete to this, or perhaps it's just that I just don't want to allow myself to go down (01:08:08) a certain path because I think it leads to such dark outcomes. (01:08:11) But I just always, I always try to be kind of like against the government for the people, against the powerful, sympathetic to the powerless. (01:08:21) I think that, look, it's sickening. (01:08:24) You see big crowds cheering on, you know, people who have been, you know, with these people who have been in captivity for, I think, some of them for over a year and a half. (01:08:37) I also thought when Nikki Haley and other Israeli politicians are signing the bombs before they're launched into Gaza, I found that sickening. (01:08:45) I think there's all types, I think like mission accomplished banners and flying on jet. (01:08:50) I mean, I think all of the, I think having Bob Hope specials at the end of the Persian Gulf War was sickening. (01:08:56) I just think all of it is like horrific. (01:09:00) I just, I look at it and I try to say to myself, okay, we had one 9-11 (01:09:06) in this country and we all collectively we lost our minds as a society we were ready to go bomb whoever the hell our politicians told us to bomb and we didn't care how many people it killed and we killed a lot more than than a lot more than Israel or Hamas has killed doing it and (01:09:27) I try to think to myself, okay, imagine being trapped in what is, people could call it whatever they want to. (01:09:35) I do think Pat Buchanan and these guys were right to call it a concentration camp. (01:09:38) You're trapped in a 5 mile by 25 mile area where you cannot leave. (01:09:45) You are stuck there. (01:09:47) You don't have an airport because the Israelis bombed it. (01:09:49) You don't have a seaport because they won't allow you. (01:09:51) have no access to trade with the outside world. (01:09:53) And you're not suffering through a 9-11. (01:09:56) you're suffering through 1000 9-11s. (01:10:00) Your whole life has been, these are people, the people in Gaza are, their entire life has been being refugees. (01:10:06) You know what I mean? (01:10:07) Their entire life, there's generations of people who have been in this status now. (01:10:12) And so, (01:10:14) if my society lost its mind after one 9-11, I just have a tough time like judging the people who came up in this environment. (01:10:23) But there's no question it is. (01:10:24) I mean, it's, you know, profoundly disturbing. (01:10:27) But I wonder how much of the indoctrination has really made the software of their mind permanently anti-peace. (01:10:42) extremify them. (01:10:43) And that, it doesn't justify anything, but it's more concerning for the prospects of peace. (01:10:51) Well, I'd say I get your point. (01:10:52) I get it's an interesting question that I don't know if any of us know exactly the answer to, but I would say that, like, (01:11:02) even after, what was it, 80 years of the Soviet Union, it's like, and there were real debates back then about like the new communist man and whether the minds had been so warped of people that they would never even want, they would never even care about these things like liberty or national identity or independence. (01:11:20) And then yet at the end, it was all still there. (01:11:23) You know, it was like, it was very repressed and it went underground and people weren't allowed to talk about it, but they all still had it. (01:11:30) And in fact, I was just listening the other day to this Murray Rothbard speech from like the early 90s. (01:11:36) And he was talking about how there was something where there was like a camera crew interviewed like a Chinese family under like a real deal Chinese communism. (01:11:48) I believe it was before Mao Zedong died. (01:11:51) And they were like, they were just saying all this crazy shit to the camera. (01:11:55) Like they were like, would you rather, you know, your sons are like healthy and live good lives or would you rather they suffer but be loyal obedience to the state? (01:12:04) And they were like, we would rather they be obedient to the state and blah, blah, blah, and all these things. (01:12:07) And Murray Rothbard was saying he saw this interview and he was talking to his friend. (01:12:13) He was like, oh my God, this is horrible. (01:12:15) Like it's hopeless. (01:12:16) These people's minds have been warped. (01:12:17) And then he was talking to his friend. (01:12:18) who's like a China expert who had been there a lot. (01:12:21) And he was like, no, they're not. (01:12:22) That's what they say when the cameras are around. (01:12:23) As soon as the cameras go, like they're. (01:12:25) So anyway, I'm just making the point there that like, there is like, look, even in the situation with Israel and Gaza, specifically Gaza, not even the West Bank, when you could look at it, when the peace talks were going on, support for Hamas plummeted. (01:12:42) When the peace talks fell apart, support for Hamas went way back up. (01:12:46) You know, every time there's an aggressive military campaign, support for Hamas goes back up. (01:12:51) So I just think that like, I'm more hopeful than not that like you could get to a place where like, but it requires like you have to, like if you do understand the Ron Paul point about blowback, the General McChrystal point about insurgent math, that you just realize that it's like, you're like, (01:13:13) you're fighting in a way that produces more of the thing that you're fighting. (01:13:18) And so the first step is to stop doing that. (01:13:21) Like your cure is making the patient more sick. (01:13:24) So stop doing that and then let's see if maybe we could heal. (01:13:28) What about the case against the Douglas Murray case of the death cults and that a fundamental part of this process, Hamas needs to be eliminated? (01:13:37) Well, (01:13:38) I mean, first of all, I would just say that, and I'm not, I'm not saying this as a fan of democracy. (01:13:45) I'm not like a big believer in democracy. (01:13:47) I believe in liberty. (01:13:48) And I think democracy is often (01:13:53) but not in line with Liberty. (01:13:55) The Chinese government paid you to say that as well? (01:13:58) That was all I had to get out. (01:14:00) But I get to say that what I want the rest of the pocket, but just that I had to have. (01:14:04) No, well, I don't. (01:14:05) Well, no, I mean, my beef with the Chinese government would not be that they don't hold regular elections. (01:14:09) My beef with them would be that they silence speech, that they people in camps and things like that, the surveillance, that stuff. (01:14:17) I think, look, (01:14:20) When you call Israel a democracy, which I guess is right in the title of his book, and full disclosure, I haven't read the book, but I have listened to some of his thoughts on this stuff. (01:14:32) I think you run up against a real problem, which is that the creation of the state of Israel, even though he tried to walk away from those comments as Norm Finkelstein called out Benny Morris for writing in his book, 1948, which is a great book, his words were, (01:14:48) The Zionist project always knew it was going to involve transfer. (01:14:52) That was Betty Morris's words. (01:14:54) Now, when Finkelstein was grilling him on this on your podcast, he kind of said, like, yeah, but that doesn't mean ethnic cleansing. (01:15:00) That could be voluntary transfer. (01:15:01) You know what I mean? (01:15:02) But the point is, (01:15:04) the Zionist settlers, and they all, they spoke about this openly. (01:15:07) They all knew they had a major problem, which is like, well, you can't create a Jewish state if it's like 50-50, which is, and in all of Israel, it was much less than 50-50. (01:15:17) But even in like the Israeli portion of the partition recommendation, it was very close to 50-50. (01:15:25) Now, you can't really have a Jewish state with a 50-50 voter base because now you're just kind of in a breeding war for the next generation or, you know, like, or like who (01:15:34) Turns out the vote, any more than we could hope, it would be the prospect right now of making America an official Republican state or an official Democrat state. (01:15:46) Well, how are you going to do that, man? (01:15:47) It's like 50-50 between the two. (01:15:49) And so I think what Benny Morris was saying was that they always knew some of these Arabs are going to have to get moved out of here so that we could have more of something, which ultimately where they got to like an 80-20, which is pretty much what Israel's maintained the whole time. (01:16:04) Now, Benny Morris could quarrel about whether that necessarily meant voluntary, but when it happened, it wasn't voluntary, okay? (01:16:09) So like when it actually happened in effect, it involved a massive amount, something somewhere between 700 and 800,000 Arabs being forcefully evicted out of this area. (01:16:19) Now, that's one thing, you know, a lot of nations are started on some things like that. (01:16:23) I suppose if you just did that and then you were left with your 80-20 split and you go, but we have elections from here on out. (01:16:30) I guess you could claim it's a democracy. (01:16:31) Still seems like kind of gaming the democratic system a little bit. (01:16:34) You know what I mean? (01:16:35) Like, if I just, if I just deported 80% of Democrats and then say, look, Republicans win every election, you might be like, yeah, dude, but you didn't exactly get there democratically. (01:16:44) You got there through force. (01:16:45) But forget that. (01:16:46) I'll let that one go and just say, I'll call you a democracy if you just kept being a democracy like that moving forward. (01:16:53) The real problem is the occupation that starts in 1967. (01:16:57) Because (01:16:58) Look, when you've occupied an area since 1967, you can't even really call it an occupation anymore. (01:17:07) It's an annexation. (01:17:08) You know, you took these lands. (01:17:10) You have control. (01:17:11) You are what the definition of the government is. (01:17:15) And you could call Hamas the government all you want to, but they're not the sovereigns. (01:17:19) They're not the final decision makers. (01:17:21) Israel's the final decision maker. (01:17:22) Hamas does not meaningfully in any way decide the biggest questions about Gaza. (01:17:27) I'm talking before this war, not even, you know, pre-October 7th. (01:17:31) And so the problem Israel has in order to call themselves a democracy is that there's somewhere between 5 and 6 million people, less now, because they've killed a lot of them, but there's somewhere between 5 and 6 million people who live under Israeli control who do not have voting rights. (01:17:50) And I just, by any other reasonable, commonly held standard of democracy, we would not call that a democracy. (01:17:59) I mean, like, I'm not, again, I'm not even saying this to try to be inflammatory or try to pick on the Israelis. (01:18:03) There's things about Israeli society I like. (01:18:05) I don't hate the people there. (01:18:07) I'm Jewish. (01:18:07) I love Jewish people. (01:18:08) It's not, but the fact is (01:18:12) That's not a democracy. (01:18:13) That's an apartheid state. (01:18:15) Like, and that's just, I'm not even trying to be inflammatory when I say this. (01:18:18) It's just literally describing what's in front of you. (01:18:20) If we in America right now said, (01:18:23) black people no longer get to vote and black people can only live in these few neighborhoods. (01:18:28) We don't get to call ourselves a democracy anymore then. (01:18:31) You know, and like I'm not even coming at this from a pro-democracy point of view. (01:18:34) I'm just saying like if your defense of them is like, well, we're a democracy, which seems to be the case so much. (01:18:40) Well, no, you're really not. (01:18:42) You're really not as long as you got millions of people who have no say in their own government. (01:18:46) Like then you're really not a democracy. (01:18:49) And so (01:18:50) Again, so you could frame it as democracy versus death cult was his language for Hamas. (01:18:56) It's like, all right, you know, it's a little bit difficult to accuse another group of being a death cult when the group you're supporting has killed so many more people than them. (01:19:06) Now, I'm not saying that's the only metric, like there's other things that are factors too, but the fact is that like you have, I mean, I don't know, to look over the numbers for the whole history of the conflict, but the amount killed (01:19:19) by the Israelis on the Palestinian side versus the amount killed by the Palestinians. (01:19:22) It's 20 to 1 in Israel's, you know, killing more people, maybe more than that. (01:19:29) I don't exactly, you know, I'd have to look at the numbers. (01:19:30) But Israel's killed far, far, far more Palestinians than Palestinians have ever killed Israelis. (01:19:35) And so it just, it rings a little hollow to me to just call them a death cult. (01:19:40) Like we're the democracy, even though none of, you know, there's millions of people who can't vote over, you know, who rules them. (01:19:46) But they're the death cult. (01:19:48) I mean, look, they kill people in a more primitive, barbaric way, I guess you could say. (01:19:52) there's something a little bit cleaner about, like, when it's done by a government and it's collateral damage.