Episode 600 Scott Adams - Let’s Discuss a Tweet Because Everything Else Seems to be Fine

ba-bum ba-bum hey everybody hey John come on in here good to see you you know what time it is it's time for a coffee with Scott Adams the best time of the day get your dopamine pumping that's the sound of dopamine pumping and it doesn't take much to enjoy this moment it takes very little actually all it takes is a cup of our glass the stein the chalice detector - thermos a flask maybe a canteen a vessel of any kind fill it with your favorite liquid I like coffee and join me now for the unparalleled pleasure of the simultaneous sip get your simultaneity goin here we go ah tingly shivers shivers I tell you Wow Oh what it is what a way that starts today well I'd like to talk about all the problems in the world first okay that was me talking about all the problems in the world because it turns out there aren't any real problems in the world at least if you take it from the news because the news is talking about a tweet that's right the biggest news in the world is a tweet that was worded in such a way that people feel bad for other people when I say feel bad for other people what I'm talking about is Anderson Cooper feeling very very very bad that these tweets might make other people feel bad that's your big problem of the day that's your headline news somebody's tweet make somebody else maybe feel bad we would ask those people to come on but we couldn't find anybody who feels bad and although we couldn't find anybody who actually feels bad we could find hundreds of people who feel bad for the people who don't feel bad now it used to be that if you did something that would make somebody feel bad that was the story somebody did something somebody else feels bad well there's there's something to talk about but we don't have that anymore now we have somebody does something let's say it's a tweet a provocative tweet and instead of people feeling bad they really don't care one way or the other but there are people who feel bad for the people who should feel bad but they don't seem to feel bad because they don't really care do you know who I think was the least bothered by the go back home tweets from the president I don't know this for sure so I'm just gonna put this out here I think the group least bothered by the go back home was American black people I don't know that to be true and I'm certainly not going to put myself in their heads and I'm not going to you know speak for any other group I certainly can't do that but it feels to me like they understood the point which is it's not about race it's about loving your country and if you have a loyalty to some other country blah blah blah but moreover it was just a bull trash talk it wasn't even it wasn't even factually on point it was just trash talk that made real people really feel bad for other people who if you ask them would say do you know what I have to worry about a lot more things than that tweet that's for sure now if I told you yes I have many times that's a way to evaluate your filter online let's say you're looking at the world one way and interpreting it one way somebody else is looking at it another way whether it's this presidential tweet some people say my god it's it's a racist outrage and other people it's just trash darkus nothing very different filters one of the things that you can do to test your filter to see which one is the right one is to see which one predicts better one of the filters predicts that the president will do at a bunch of racist stuff and that people who were good at spotting racist stuff will notice that's why you would imagine if you have one filter the other filter says no you're just imagining I did do the simultaneous if you missed it so the other filter says no he's just trash-talking like he always does and you're imagining all the bad stuff which of those two filters would predict that Israel would name a settlement after President Trump is that the filter that says oh yeah he's I think he's back in the neo-nazis would Israel not be able to detect that someone was backing neo-nazis if he were the President of the United States yeah I think I think Israel would be able to detect that so my filter this says he's just talking seems to be consistent with observation what we observe is that Israel says that's just politics he seems like the greatest friend Israel ever ever had which of the filters would predict that that President Trump would be strong on prison reform is it the one that says my god he'll do anything that's bad for brown and black people or is it the filter that says it's just politics of course he wants what's good for Americans that's his job and he wants to be evaluated presumably everybody wants to be evaluated by how they do with their job so why would he be different so my filter predicts a hundred percent of everything that's happened a hundred percent my filter allows and protects everything you observe but if your filter uh-huh if your filter only predicts half of what happens and the other half is just inexplicable well maybe it's time to rethink your filter on life let's take a little deeper into this whole go back home tweet you all know the background I don't need to give you the background we're talking about president Trump's tweet that's causing everybody's hair to be on fire so here let me show you some of the craziness that this is cost so over at CNN where we're opinion and news are treated as the same thing and I say that because CNN doesn't do a good job of separating what is opinion from what is news they sort of smushed together so the viewer doesn't quite know what has been presented as a fact and what is just somebody's interpretation Fox News as by anybody's measure lots of different opinions and some of them you don't agree with but they do a lot better job of labeling opinion you know the Hannity's opinion right you know that Tucker's an opinion show but listen to this smooshing this is an analysis by Stefan do you pronounce it Stefan ste pH yeah Ian I never know if that's the right way to pronounce it Stefan Collinson now it's presented not as opinion it's actually labeled on the CNN site is labeled analysis now you're just a dumb American and you're reading some some stuff on the CNN news site if it says opinion what do you think of it you think okay well it's not necessarily fact is opinion if it's labeled analysis what are you the dumb American think they're doing analysis doesn't really sound like you're pinyin does it I mean I think that it allows it to be opinion II I think the does allow that but the word seems to be chosen to to blur the difference between the opinion and fact from our own analysis so here's what Stefan calling sense analysis says he says this is just part of it in the twilight zone of the white house the man who unleashed the fury Trump expressed disgust at the vial at the quote vile horrible statements said by the woman he targeted over the color of their skin so on a CNN site labeled analysis they slip in this unsupported statement he targeted over the color of their skin what what at what point that the president targets somebody over the color of their skin it's presented like well that's obvious is you know that there's no point in supporting this fact everybody can see it that's not an evidence do you know who else president Trump told to go back home the British ambassador correct me if I'm wrong did he not send the British ambassador packing and call him stupid come on it just happened he just told the British ambassador to go back home he didn't use those words but is that the important part he told him he said he was stupid incompetent had never met him and why he probably met him but doesn't doesn't didn't even know who he was I told him to go back home yeah I had the British ambassador did anybody say that the president is prejudiced against British people no so to me what Stephan Collinson did here by putting this sentence in his analysis said by the women he targeted over the color their skin to me that's a racist statement isn't it and my point being that if all you're doing is talking about whether or not somebody acted about race and the frame is raised and everything's race and race race race isn't isn't that making things worse you know the president has expressly said that if you're in the United States he's gonna be your best friend you're if you're if you're a citizen of the country he's gonna be your best friend and supporter and cheerleader and if you're not you're on the other team and he doesn't hate you but he's gonna compete against you and make sure that his team does better than the other teams now that's the frame that he's continually and clearly put on all of his political actions the critics continually and expressly this is not an interpretation of mine they continually frame things as racial issues there's no way that isn't the race aside there's no way now the Republicans don't make a big deal of calling the other side racist because it's just not their deal but we have certainly reached the point where a hundred percent of us are racist we actually have a situation yesterday I tweeted about it I think I had 5,000 retweets on it and I said that the you know breaking news the racist press is reporting to the racist public that racist President Trump or no that racist Pelosi is accusing racist Trump of saying bad things about the racist for a congresswoman there's nobody in that story who hasn't been accused of racism a hundred percent of all the people in the news have now been accused of racism there's nobody left there's nobody left I'm gonna drink some black coffee right now and just try to experience the whatever this is the cognitive dissonance we're all experiencing and I drink this coffee this black coffee as a salute to the black citizens of this country who we support 100% I'll drink to that to that point let me ask you this hypothetically you're a black citizen of the United States you've got two friends one of your friends is a registered Democrat one of your friends is a register registered Republican which one's gonna help you get a job which one's gonna do you a favor well maybe both but I'll tell you have you ever met anybody who let's say an African American who who became a Republican have you ever seen an african-american Republican who said that other Republicans treat them poorly have you ever seen that no you've never seen that because Republicans have very clear rules I'm not a Republican by the way all right so I'm not a Republican not a conservative I always tell people and left to Bernie but I have to admit I like Republicans better because they have a set of consistent rules that seem pretty fair to me and they try to live by them and treat other people by the rules the rules are the Constitution if you follow the Constitution you're good with me if you follow the laws you're good with me and on top of that I'm not religious but for a lot of conservatives if you if you're religious you doesn't matter which one if you've got you know a faith that informs the way you live well then you're okay too Republicans make it very easy to like you how hard is it to be liked by a Republican it's really really easy you just have to do legal things and work that's it it in order to be loved by Republicans just try you don't even have to succeed you just have to try you have to follow the law you know sort of love your country that helps but that's not even necessary you know maybe you shouldn't talk about it so much if you don't love your country but all Republicans ask is just follow the same rules and try you don't even have to succeed and we'll love you I'll say we because I adopt that I adopt the philosophy of if we're all here trying do it our best following the same set of rules and respecting the same set of you know principles that that were all good I can't imagine what it would be like to be a person of color can be in the Democrat orbit because over there you've got to be good with a lot of different things yeah it's it's sort of eight shells over there well I was I was good on this but did I become a misogynist accidentally and if I have I definite everything fairly in just the right way well I think that something important has happened because this tweet it seems to me that the charges of racism against each other have uncovered a truth that like the the dog that wasn't barking it's a truth that we should rejoice at during the time that we have been talking nonstop about whether the words go back home are really racist or just trash talk while we've been discussing that how many real examples of racism have been reported in the news right think about it how many actual examples of somebody I didn't get a job got rejected from something I know there was a racial murder you know I'm sure that these things were happening somewhere around the kind trait but we just have been jabbering non-stop about a couple of words in the tweet because it's the worst thing happening is there anybody here who well let's say that is there anybody here who has negative feelings about I'll just make an example any any person of color so long as they're following the rules meaning the Constitution the rule of law working hard is there anybody here who has any bad feelings about anybody who does those three things you know respect the Constitution follow the law work hard even if you don't succeed everybody here respects that I'll bet I'll bet there are zero exceptions and this is a pretty you know this is we've got what 2.3 thousand people watching this live I'll bet there are zero people here zero out of thousands I'll bet there are zero people who would feel bad about any person of color any any gender any any other anything as long as you follow the rules same rules everybody else is following that's it you know we'd love it if you like if you loved your country but it's optional just follow the rules and try just try but if you're over on the Democrat side I don't know what the standards are over there must be harder see you then has just completely gone into crazy land they actually had white nationalist Richard Spencer on because they I guess they thought they could get him to say some quote that sounded like positive for President Trump and then they would paint president Trump with Spencer so it was Spencer's the white nationalist I guess and here's what he said so Richard Spencer complained on CNN that Trump quote wasn't going far enough saying he gave the movement nothing so in other words the leader of the white nationalist movement is saying that Trump is giving them nothing CNN invited invited him on to guess some you know some love of Trump I guess so that they can paint Trump by this this guy's reputation and the guy says he's given us nothing yes that's exactly right he's given you nothing but he goes on outside racist tweets and what'd he say they seem like they came from a drunk uncle so Richard Spencer says the only thing we had gotten from the president is in in Spencer's opinion quote out racist tweets and look like they came from a drunk uncle now here's the problem who do who do see you then who does see you then agree with who's on the same team as CNN well I don't think they planned it this way but I can tell you two people who have the same view of life CNN and apparently Richard Spencer who also sees the president streets tweet says racist so somehow the left has managed to align themselves with white nationalists because they're they have the same opinion of these tweets and they can't even get the white nationalists to go a little step further and say but he's done things right it's not just the tweets that we don't you know look suspicious he's actually done things right and the white nationalist says that he hasn't done anything for us not a thing that must have been the saddest day on CNN when they couldn't get the white nationalists to do anything except have the same opinion and CNN not a good look CNN does it seem to you that now that everybody's a racist meaning that literally just everybody's racist and by the way I don't say this with hyperbole when I say that the the squad looks racist to me I mean they look racist in the sense that they're framing things in racial terms and they think that something should be done differently because of something-something race I think that's racist now here's you you want to hear the funniest thing that I heard this morning I wish I could give credit did I tweet it I wish I could give credit because it's so brilliant so if you're if you're on this periscope and you're the one who said this it's a brilliant thought it starts with this did you notice that there was some science recently I don't know how recently but there's some science to support the idea that you're born conservative or born liberal you know that one of the defining characteristics is that I guess conservatives are that are more creeped out by yucky stuff they're more easily disgusted and and more easily concerned about security and fear so so there's some some thought that from in terms of your DNA you're born with a certain propensity to be either disgusted by things that are not you know typical or but you also have maybe maybe more concern about security you know about safety now suppose that's true or do you think that's true somebody says Jordan Peterson is talked about this for a long time now let's say that's true now let's also say that the squad and others have been mocking conservatives for a lot of different things is it not true that are these two things not in are these two things and evidence are these facts so you can fact check me now fact one science says that being conservative or liberal is a is at least partly genetic you're born that way partly true is it also true that the the the people on the left mock conservatives in general they mock them specifically but they also mock them in general is that true it is true Geordi is animate Geordi you know where I'm going on this if your political view is that you're mocking people because of things that they can't change in other words genetic traits in this case the genetic propensity to be a conservative you are by your own definition a bigot there would be no difference no difference scientifically there would be no difference between mocking somebody with a handicap and mocking somebody who had a genetic propensity toward conservatism am i right now when somebody pointed that out to me it was the first time I'd even heard that thought it was just today I'm Twitter and I thought that is a hundred percent true there is nothing wrong with that thought you know my first thought was there was just sort of a funny political thing to say you know sometimes they're just clever political things to say that sound right but they're not they're not actually scientifically rational but this is actually a hundred percent scientifically rational if you're making fun of conservatives as a group and that group has a genetic quality that that makes them distinct most of them it doesn't have to be every single one but we does n't work that way if as long as most of them have this characteristic in common if you're if you're mocking them for being uneducated toothless rubes who believe in conspiracy theories or whatever people are saying about conservatives these days even if you're calling them racists you're treating them as a class and it's a class they have a genetic component that makes them a class they are a class because of a genetic component according to science so have we not reached the point where literally everyone is a bigot not always just racist because you could be bigoted against really and you could be bigoted against gender and everything else but have we not reached peak bigotry where absolutely well here what would be the the best situation in the world can I tell you can I tell you the best situation in the world to know that you're in the healthiest best situation I would look for the following things everybody in the world realizing that everybody else in the world including themselves is a bigot just in different ways so that there would be nothing healthier in my opinion there would be nothing healthier for this world than to realize that we're all bigoted sometimes because in my view that's that's the moment of greater understanding I would say that the people who would call themselves woke are a level below where they need to be there's a level above woke that's enlightened woke says we must we must make a separation between these people who are bigots and the good people who are not that's what woke means right there's some people who are not bigots they're the good people and we should put some pressure on the people who are bigots to make them less big in it that's woke the level above woke is enlightened enlightened says being less bigoted is not an option we're all bigoted because because we have a human brain the human brain is not a it's not a rational device the human brain operates on patterns and we're not good at patterns those are the two things you need to know about the human brain it operates mostly on patterns and number two we're not good at it we see patterns where there are none and then we say hey it's a pattern I guess I'll I guess I'll treat this like the next one will be in the same pattern even if it isn't because it's all I have to go on I usually don't have complete information about my reality so I have to look for these little patterns and use them as sort of a proxy or a guide to what's going to happen so I would say that we may have completely accidentally president Trump's actions and our reactions to them have gotten us to the borderline between woke where one person's calling another one a bigot and enlightened where we realize we're we're all bigots we're all bigots because you can't turn off pattern-recognition and number two you're not good at pattern recognition those are the things you need to know now what do you do with it what would an enlightened person do with the knowledge that bigotry is universal and it's not something the other guy does what would you do differently when you achieve that enlightenment well if you're a good person in my opinion all right so here's my personal philosophical opinion this is no there's no news or fact here this is my opinion you could choose to reject it or accept it in my opinion the best you can do as a person the most respect I will give you is if you say to yourself yeah we're all bigots sometimes it happens to me and I'm gonna use my my best social reasoning to overcome it I'm gonna try to overcome it if you're saying that you're the best person a person can be a person who says I'm not a bigot and you're a bigot are operating in a lower level of enlightenment if they say you're a bigot and oh my god sometimes I am - you're operating at a higher level and then in order to be responsible to be a responsible citizen of the world operating at that higher level where you say yeah it's all of us but what can I do about it if you're saying what can I do about it you're good at my book you're completely good you're you're just dealing with what you know how do you deal with the fact that the human brain is a pattern recognizing machine and we're not good at it so I think the president has laid bare the fact that everybody is a bigot that's the fact I think we can no longer ignore would you say I would say that the entire conversation about the squad the entire conversation about you know immigration the entire conversation about whether conservatives or liberals are the good ones that entire conversation should be revealing in the clearest possible way that woke is broke and that there's a level above it in the president just completely accidentally I don't think that he had any intention to do what I'm saying but by showing that everything is bigoted and that even if you were to take the position that the country is the the best organizing principle the president consistently says country good people outside the country are on the other team and the so-called good people who think that bigotry is only something that other people have those people have decided to flip out and go crazy and treat the country as if that's this is somehow the same as bigotry so we may have completely accidentally blundered into a new level of enlightenment that I think is important let me give you a positive thing so without getting into details of my personal life I was listening to a conversation from some preteens teens actually some young teens in my local area we're having the conversation and I was listening to it the entire conversation was about race it was people talking about their friends like and they were saying you know this friend is one of these if this friend is one of these and you know these people talk this way and these people have this funny accent and these people have this characteristic and and that my first reaction to it was shocked because all they talked about was race my second reaction was that they all loved each other which was shocking because the way they were talking about race was not really negative in fact you know it was jokingly negative in the way that teenagers joke but it wasn't negative in their hearts you could tell that there was affection and that the race was a conversation and that they were sort of let's just say they were well way to say they were they were interacting with the differences they were they were talking about the differences the you know that this group has these tendencies whatever but none of it seemed mean-spirited it seemed like you know there's there's another it seems like the generation coming up talks about race completely explicitly and all the time because it doesn't mean the same thing it's it's lost its power now I'm not sure that this would be the same everywhere and with every group but it's just one of those little things you see and you say wow you know it looks like it lost its power because the people who are talking were you know it was a mixed group so I hope that's a good thing and I hope it's not I hope I'm not misunderstanding what was going on there but it looks like and I've seen this before by the way it's not it's not the one conversation I've seen it but it seems like the next generation is going to be just having fun with the differences but not taking them to see which would be the gigantic leap forward for civilization I think all right let's talk about some belts this is one of the complaints I think this was on CNN or somewhere I can't I think wasn't CNN there's some analysts said that about Trump and and his comments about the squad someone said that he's playing a risky political game though it may be the only one he really knows how to play and I'm thinking you have to you have to dig pretty deeply to find something to insult the president for if he has a strategy that keeps working yes his strategy keeps working but ok what can we say about a strategy that keeps working it may be the only one he really knows how to play well if there's only one strategy that might work and it's the one that he uses and it works is it really an insightful analysis to say it may be the only one he knows how to play yeah he doesn't know how to play the losing hands he doesn't know how to do the things that don't work what does that even mean everybody knows how to do things that don't work now compare President Trump to a normal politician so Mitch Mc.

Connell of course got dragged into all the controversy and CNN's Manu Raju asked Mc.

Connell what would he say if someone told his wife Elaine Chao Trump's transportation secretary what would Mc.

Connell say have somebody told his wife to quote go back to where she came from which would be Taiwan I guess and here's how Mc.

Connell answers that question so Mc.

Connell is asked this big big old racist your racism question and his answer was that he was a fan of legal immigration Mc.

Connell just like just sucked all the life out of the question it's like what would you say if somebody told your wife to go home what would you say Mitch Mc.

Connell huh huh huh take the bait take the bait Mc.

Connell you do it do it we're gonna get a quote out of you you're gonna be all over the news will you say something stupid Mitch Mc.

Connell what are you going to say to that we're gonna ship your your wife back home what would you say to that Mc.

Connell says ah I'm a big fan of legal immigration and everybody says I'm not even sure that's on topic but okay you just bored us to death and we did not get a quote out of you all right so I saw some speculation that Iran might be might be convinced that President Trump is going to be reelected I don't know how they would be convinced that exactly because the polls clearly say that Biden will win but all the smart people are pretty sure that Biden doesn't have a chance so I don't know how Iran is clever enough to sort that out because it seems like they would look at the polls and say well it looks like every single Democrat who's in the top four could beat this president so we don't have to deal with this guy he's gonna be gone and gone in 2020 but I think that Iran is clever enough that they listen to the right people and the right people are saying there's not gonna be Biden and it looks like Trump is cruising to re-election so what that does is it changes their calculation about who they're going to be negotiating with and it takes off the table the option of waiting until 2020 and getting somebody else to negotiate with who could give them in their view a better deal so the fact that the president's reelection looks like it's there's likely gives the United States a tremendous bargaining advantage and it's created I think Iran is in this weird little zone where they're trying to make noise and they're trying to cause a little bit of trouble but they don't want to cause a lot of trouble because this president has created an impression that he is unpredictable and you don't know when you're gonna cross this line they probably thought they crossed this line you know already buddy but he played it cool and now they're thinking about all right well I know if we do a little more than that are we gonna get you know bombed if we do a little more than we've done but doing less than we've done isn't gonna make any difference so what are you gonna do so I think the president has put Iran in the position where in which their their incentive to negotiate is pretty high and I'll say this again because it's so shocking peace in the Middle East just you know the phrase pieces and at least sounds some ridiculous then you tell yourself well it's that's not even a thing it's a perpetual war zone there will always be a perpetual war zone and on some level that might be true you know at the small level but just think about this at this point in time with this president and some of its luck but some of it is is the way they treat the Middle East and the leaders there etc president Trump has gotten the Middle East not by himself but he's a big part of it yeah the Middle East has reached a point where peace abroad peace for the entire Middle East is down to one guy who's in his eighties that Ayatollah Khomeini so if the Supreme Leader of Iran ever decides to negotiate in in good faith we don't know if he ever will but he's the last person now maybe there's somebody you know behind him you know if if he were replaced maybe you'd be just the same but there's just one position just one person has to change their mind and we're done one person has to say you know I don't think anything that we do is going to change the reality that Israel exists and it's going to keep existing just one person think about that have we ever been this close that one person just needs to change their mind and that one person is under tremendous pressure internally and externally to change his mind some people are asking about turkey Turkey turkey is a weird situation because there are NATO ally at the same time we didn't want them to have anti-aircraft missiles because I guess they're they're taking shipment of some Russian anti-aircraft missiles so I don't quite understand our position on Turkey because either you're a NATO ally or you're not if your NATO ally do we care that you have a way to defend yourself I don't think that buying Russian missiles is our first choice but it's not the worst problem in the world is it are we going to bomb Turkey I don't think we're planning on bombing Turkey so why do we care if they have good anti-aircraft whoo and by the way who is Turkey defending against I don't know the answer to that can somebody tell me who does Turkey think is going to attack them from the air why am I just thinking of this now I don't even know why Turkey has a threat does anybody even know because Isis doesn't have an air force they are an occupied NATO ally somebody saying well I don't know what that means yeah they're they don't need the anti-aircraft missiles because of immigration they don't need it because their neighbors not really do you think Turkey has a risk from Iraq does turkey have a risk from Iran from the air I don't think so I know I guess they need them so is those are the problems that we have that one of our allies is buying weapons from somebody else I don't know if we have the biggest problem in the world but I think we're very close to something like peace in the Middle East one person's away and that person is tipping that person is leaning Turkey can't use our equipment with Russia stuff yeah well I'm sure that we would rather send a cell Turkey our own American equipment and there are probably lots of strategic and other advantages in doing that somebody says I lived in Turkey I know I missed I miss what what it is that you know internal coos Greece everybody has a different idea of why turkey needs anti-aircraft missiles but I guess we're all guessing all right I think we said what we need to say if the only thing that we're worried about today is we're all killing each other bigots then maybe we can reach a higher level and maybe that's this year who knows I'll talk to you later

[Music]

ba-bum ba-bum hey everybody hey John

come on in here good to see you you know

what time it is it's time for a coffee

with Scott Adams the best time of the

day get your dopamine pumping that's the

sound of dopamine pumping and it doesn't

take much to enjoy this moment it takes

very little actually all it takes is a

cup of our glass the stein the chalice

detector - thermos a flask maybe a

canteen a vessel of any kind fill it

with your favorite liquid I like coffee

and join me now for the unparalleled

pleasure of the simultaneous sip get

your simultaneity goin here we go ah

tingly shivers shivers I tell you

Wow Oh what it is what a way that starts

today well I'd like to talk about all

the problems in the world first okay

that was me talking about all the

problems in the world because it turns

out there aren't any real problems in

the world at least if you take it from

the news because the news is talking

about a tweet that's right the biggest

news in the world is a tweet that was

worded in such a way that people feel

bad for other people when I say feel bad

for other people what I'm talking about

is Anderson Cooper feeling very very

very bad that these tweets might make

other people feel bad that's your big

problem of the day that's your headline

news somebody's tweet make somebody else

maybe feel bad we would ask those people

to come on but we couldn't find anybody

who feels bad and although we couldn't

find anybody who actually feels bad

we could find hundreds of people who

feel bad for the people who don't feel

bad now it used to be that if you did

something that would make somebody feel

bad that was the story somebody did

something somebody else feels bad well

there's there's something to talk about

but we don't have that anymore now we

have somebody does something let's say

it's a tweet a provocative tweet and

instead of people feeling bad they

really don't care one way or the other

but there are people who feel bad for

the people who should feel bad but they

don't seem to feel bad because they

don't really care do you know who I

think was the least bothered by the go

back home tweets from the president I

don't know this for sure so I'm just

gonna put this out here I think the

group least bothered by the go back home

was American black people I don't know

that to be true and I'm certainly not

going to put myself in their heads and

I'm not going to you know speak for any

other group I certainly can't do that

but it feels to me like they understood

the point which is it's not about race

it's about loving your country and if

you have a loyalty to some other country

blah blah blah but moreover it was just

a bull trash talk it wasn't even it

wasn't even factually on point

it was just trash talk

that made real people really feel bad

for other people who if you ask them

would say do you know what I have to

worry about a lot more things than that

tweet that's for sure now if I told you

yes I have many times that's a way to

evaluate your filter online let's say

you're looking at the world one way and

interpreting it one way somebody else is

looking at it another way whether it's

this presidential tweet some people say

my god it's it's a racist outrage and

other people

it's just trash darkus nothing very

different filters one of the things that

you can do to test your filter to see

which one is the right one is to see

which one predicts better one of the

filters predicts that the president will

do at a bunch of racist stuff and that

people who were good at spotting racist

stuff will notice that's why you would

imagine if you have one filter the other

filter says no you're just imagining I

did do the simultaneous if you missed it

so the other filter says no he's just

trash-talking like he always does and

you're imagining all the bad stuff which

of those two filters would predict that

Israel would name a settlement after

President Trump is that the filter that

says oh yeah he's I think he's back in

the neo-nazis would Israel not be able

to detect that someone was backing

neo-nazis if he were the President of

the United States yeah I think I think

Israel would be able to detect that so

my filter this says he's just talking

seems to be consistent with observation

what we observe is that Israel says

that's just politics he seems like the

greatest friend Israel ever ever had

which of the filters would predict that

that President Trump would be strong on

prison reform is it the one that says my

god he'll do anything that's bad for

brown and black people or is it the

filter that says it's just politics of

course he wants what's good for

Americans that's his job and he wants to

be evaluated presumably everybody wants

to be evaluated by how they do with

their job so why would he be different

so my filter predicts a hundred percent

of everything that's happened a hundred

percent my filter allows and protects

everything you observe

but if your filter uh-huh if your filter

only predicts half of what happens and

the other half is just inexplicable well

maybe it's time to rethink your filter

on life let's take a little deeper into

this whole go back home tweet you all

know the background I don't need to give

you the background we're talking about

president Trump's tweet that's causing

everybody's hair to be on fire so here

let me show you some of the craziness

that this is cost so over at CNN where

we're opinion and news are treated as

the same thing and I say that because

CNN doesn't do a good job of separating

what is opinion from what is news they

sort of smushed together so the viewer

doesn't quite know what has been

presented as a fact and what is just

somebody's interpretation Fox News as by

anybody's measure lots of different

opinions and some of them you don't

agree with but they do a lot better job

of labeling opinion you know the

Hannity's opinion right you know that

Tucker's an opinion show but listen to

this smooshing this is an analysis by

Stefan do you pronounce it Stefan ste pH

yeah Ian I never know if that's the

right way to pronounce it

Stefan Collinson now it's presented not

as opinion it's actually labeled on the

CNN site is labeled analysis now you're

just a dumb American and you're reading

some some stuff on the CNN news site if

it says opinion what do you think of it

you think okay well it's not necessarily

fact is opinion if it's labeled analysis

what are you the dumb American think

they're doing analysis doesn't really

sound like you're pinyin does it I mean

I think that it allows it to be opinion

II I think the

does allow that but the word seems to be

chosen to to blur the difference between

the opinion and fact from our own

analysis so here's what Stefan calling

sense analysis says he says this is just

part of it in the twilight zone of the

white house

the man who unleashed the fury Trump

expressed disgust at the vial at the

quote vile horrible statements said by

the woman he targeted over the color of

their skin so on a CNN site labeled

analysis they slip in this unsupported

statement he targeted over the color of

their skin what what at what point that

the president targets somebody over the

color of their skin it's presented like

well that's obvious is you know that

there's no point in supporting this fact

everybody can see it that's not an

evidence do you know who else president

Trump told to go back home the British

ambassador correct me if I'm wrong did

he not send the British ambassador

packing and call him stupid come on

it just happened he just told the

British ambassador to go back home he

didn't use those words but is that the

important part he told him he said he

was stupid incompetent had never met him

and why he probably met him but doesn't

doesn't didn't even know who he was I

told him to go back home yeah I had the

British ambassador did anybody say that

the president is prejudiced against

British people no so to me what Stephan

Collinson did here by putting this

sentence in his analysis said by the

women he targeted over the color

their skin to me that's a racist

statement isn't it and my point being

that if all you're doing is talking

about whether or not somebody acted

about race and the frame is raised and

everything's race and race race race

isn't isn't that making things worse you

know the president has expressly said

that if you're in the United States he's

gonna be your best friend you're if

you're if you're a citizen of the

country he's gonna be your best friend

and supporter and cheerleader and if

you're not you're on the other team and

he doesn't hate you

but he's gonna compete against you and

make sure that his team does better than

the other teams now that's the frame

that he's continually and clearly put on

all of his political actions the critics

continually and expressly this is not an

interpretation of mine they continually

frame things as racial issues there's no

way that isn't the race aside there's no

way now the Republicans don't make a big

deal of calling the other side racist

because it's just not their deal but we

have certainly reached the point where a

hundred percent of us are racist we

actually have a situation yesterday I

tweeted about it I think I had 5,000

retweets on it and I said that the you

know breaking news the racist press is

reporting to the racist public that

racist President Trump or no that racist

Pelosi is accusing racist Trump of

saying bad things about the racist for a

congresswoman

there's nobody in that story who hasn't

been accused of racism a hundred percent

of all the people in the news have now

been accused of racism there's nobody

left there's nobody left I'm gonna drink

some black coffee right now and just try

to experience the

whatever this is the cognitive

dissonance we're all experiencing and I

drink this coffee this black coffee as a

salute to the black citizens of this

country who we support 100% I'll drink

to that

to that point let me ask you this

hypothetically you're a black citizen of

the United States you've got two friends

one of your friends is a registered

Democrat one of your friends is a

register registered Republican which

one's gonna help you get a job which

one's gonna do you a favor

well maybe both but I'll tell you have

you ever met anybody who let's say an

African American who who became a

Republican have you ever seen an

african-american Republican who said

that other Republicans treat them poorly

have you ever seen that no you've never

seen that because Republicans have very

clear rules I'm not a Republican by the

way all right so I'm not a Republican

not a conservative I always tell people

and left to Bernie but I have to admit I

like Republicans better because they

have a set of consistent rules that seem

pretty fair to me and they try to live

by them and treat other people by the

rules the rules are the Constitution if

you follow the Constitution you're good

with me if you follow the laws you're

good with me

and on top of that I'm not religious but

for a lot of conservatives if you if

you're religious you doesn't matter

which one if you've got you know a faith

that informs the way you live well then

you're okay too

Republicans make it very easy to like

you how hard is it to be liked by a

Republican it's really really easy you

just have to do legal things and work

that's it it in order to be loved by

Republicans just try you don't even have

to succeed you just have to try you have

to follow the law you know sort of love

your country that helps but that's not

even necessary you know maybe you

shouldn't talk about it so much if you

don't love your country but all

Republicans ask is just follow the same

rules and try you don't even have to

succeed and we'll love you I'll say we

because I adopt that I adopt the

philosophy of if we're all here trying

do it our best following the same set of

rules and respecting the same set of you

know principles that that were all good

I can't imagine what it would be like to

be a person of color can be in the

Democrat orbit because over there you've

got to be good with a lot of different

things yeah it's it's sort of eight

shells over there well I was I was good

on this but did I become a misogynist

accidentally and if I have I definite

everything fairly in just the right way

well I think that something important

has happened because this tweet it seems

to me that the charges of racism against

each other have uncovered a truth that

like the the dog that wasn't barking

it's a truth that we should rejoice at

during the time that we have been

talking nonstop about whether the words

go back home are really racist or just

trash talk while we've been discussing

that how many real examples of racism

have been reported in the news right

think about it how many actual examples

of somebody I didn't get a job got

rejected from something I know there was

a racial murder you know I'm sure that

these things were happening somewhere

around the kind

trait but we just have been jabbering

non-stop about a couple of words in the

tweet because it's the worst thing

happening is there anybody here who well

let's say that is there anybody here who

has negative feelings about I'll just

make an example any any person of color

so long as they're following the rules

meaning the Constitution the rule of law

working hard is there anybody here who

has any bad feelings about anybody who

does those three things you know respect

the Constitution follow the law work

hard even if you don't succeed

everybody here respects that I'll bet

I'll bet there are zero exceptions and

this is a pretty you know this is we've

got what 2.3 thousand people watching

this live I'll bet there are zero people

here zero out of thousands I'll bet

there are zero people who would feel bad

about any person of color any any gender

any any other anything as long as you

follow the rules same rules everybody

else is following that's it you know

we'd love it if you like if you loved

your country but it's optional just

follow the rules and try just try but if

you're over on the Democrat side I don't

know what the standards are over there

must be harder see you then has just

completely gone into crazy land they

actually had white nationalist Richard

Spencer on because they I guess they

thought they could get him to say some

quote that sounded like positive for

President Trump and then they would

paint president Trump with Spencer

so it was Spencer's the white

nationalist I guess and here's what he

said so Richard Spencer complained on

CNN that Trump quote wasn't going far

enough saying he gave the movement

nothing so in other words the leader of

the white nationalist movement is saying

that Trump is giving them nothing

CNN invited invited him on to guess some

you know some love of Trump I guess so

that they can paint Trump by this this

guy's reputation and the guy says he's

given us nothing yes that's exactly

right he's given you nothing but he goes

on outside racist tweets and what'd he

say they seem like they came from a

drunk uncle

so Richard Spencer says the only thing

we had gotten from the president is in

in Spencer's opinion quote out racist

tweets and look like they came from a

drunk uncle now here's the problem who

do who do see you then who does see you

then agree with who's on the same team

as CNN well I don't think they planned

it this way but I can tell you two

people who have the same view of life

CNN and apparently Richard Spencer who

also sees the president streets tweet

says racist so somehow the left has

managed to align themselves with white

nationalists because they're they have

the same opinion of these tweets and

they can't even get the white

nationalists to go a little step further

and say but he's done things right it's

not just the tweets that we don't you

know look suspicious he's actually done

things right and the white nationalist

says that he hasn't done anything for us

not a thing that must have been the

saddest day on CNN when they couldn't

get the white nationalists to do

anything except have the same opinion

and CNN

not a good look CNN does it seem to you

that now that everybody's a racist

meaning that literally just everybody's

racist and by the way I don't say this

with hyperbole when I say that the the

squad looks racist to me I mean they

look racist in the sense that they're

framing things in racial terms and they

think that something should be done

differently

because of something-something race I

think that's racist now here's you you

want to hear the funniest thing that I

heard this morning I wish I could give

credit did I tweet it I wish I could

give credit because it's so brilliant so

if you're if you're on this periscope

and you're the one who said this it's a

brilliant thought it starts with this

did you notice that there was some

science recently I don't know how

recently but there's some science to

support the idea that you're born

conservative or born liberal you know

that one of the defining characteristics

is that I guess conservatives are that

are more creeped out by yucky stuff

they're more easily disgusted and and

more easily concerned about security and

fear so so there's some some thought

that from in terms of your DNA you're

born with a certain propensity to be

either disgusted by things that are not

you know typical or but you also have

maybe maybe more concern about security

you know about safety

now suppose that's true or do you think

that's true somebody says Jordan

Peterson is talked about this for a long

time now let's say that's true now let's

also say that the squad and others have

been mocking conservatives for a lot of

different things is it not true that are

these two things not in are these two

things and evidence are these facts so

you can fact check me now fact one

science says that being conservative or

liberal is a is at least partly genetic

you're born that way partly true is it

also true that the the the people on the

left mock conservatives in general

they mock them specifically but they

also mock them in general is that true

it is true Geordi is animate Geordi you

know where I'm going on this if your

political view is that you're mocking

people because of things that they can't

change in other words genetic traits in

this case the genetic propensity to be a

conservative you are by your own

definition a bigot there would be no

difference no difference scientifically

there would be no difference between

mocking somebody with a handicap and

mocking somebody who had a genetic

propensity toward conservatism am i

right now when somebody pointed that out

to me it was the first time I'd even

heard that thought it was just

today I'm Twitter and I thought that is

a hundred percent true there is nothing

wrong with that thought you know my

first thought was there was just sort of

a funny political thing to say you know

sometimes they're just clever political

things to say that sound right but

they're not they're not actually

scientifically rational but this is

actually a hundred percent

scientifically rational if you're making

fun of conservatives as a group and that

group has a genetic quality that that

makes them distinct most of them it

doesn't have to be every single one but

we does n't work that way if as long as

most of them have this characteristic in

common if you're if you're mocking them

for being uneducated toothless rubes who

believe in conspiracy theories or

whatever people are saying about

conservatives these days even if you're

calling them racists you're treating

them as a class and it's a class they

have a genetic component that makes them

a class they are a class because of a

genetic component according to science

so have we not reached the point where

literally everyone is a bigot not always

just racist because you could be bigoted

against really

and you could be bigoted against gender

and everything else but have we not

reached peak bigotry where absolutely

well here what would be the the best

situation in the world can I tell you

can I tell you the best situation in the

world to know that you're in the

healthiest best situation I would look

for the following things everybody in

the world

realizing that everybody else in the

world

including themselves is a bigot just in

different ways so that there would be

nothing healthier in my opinion there

would be nothing healthier for this

world than to realize that we're all

bigoted sometimes because in my view

that's that's the moment of greater

[Music]

understanding I would say that the

people who would call themselves woke

are a level below where they need to be

there's a level above woke that's

enlightened woke says we must we must

make a separation between these people

who are bigots and the good people who

are not that's what woke means right

there's some people who are not bigots

they're the good people and we should

put some pressure on the people who are

bigots to make them less big in it

that's woke the level above woke is

enlightened enlightened says being less

bigoted is not an option we're all

bigoted because because we have a human

brain the human brain is not a it's not

a rational device the human brain

operates on patterns and we're not good

at patterns those are the two things you

need to know about the human brain it

operates mostly on patterns and number

two we're not good at it we see patterns

where there are none and then we say hey

it's a pattern

I guess I'll I guess I'll treat this

like the next one will be in the same

pattern even if it isn't because it's

all I have to go on I usually don't have

complete information about my reality so

I have to look for these little patterns

and use them as sort of a proxy or a

guide to what's going to happen so I

would say that we may have completely

accidentally president Trump's actions

and our reactions to them have gotten us

to the borderline between woke where one

person's calling another one a bigot and

enlightened where we realize we're we're

all bigots we're all bigots because you

can't turn off pattern-recognition

and number two you're not good at

pattern recognition those are the things

you need to know now what do you do with

it what would an enlightened person do

with the knowledge that bigotry is

universal and it's not something the

other guy does what would you do

differently when you achieve that

enlightenment well if you're a good

person in my opinion all right so here's

my personal philosophical opinion this

is no there's no news or fact here this

is my opinion you could choose to reject

it or accept it in my opinion the best

you can do as a person the most respect

I will give you is if you say to

yourself yeah we're all bigots sometimes

it happens to me and I'm gonna use my my

best social reasoning to overcome it I'm

gonna try to overcome it if you're

saying that you're the best person a

person can be a person who says I'm not

a bigot and you're a bigot are operating

in a lower level of enlightenment if

they say you're a bigot and oh my god

sometimes I am - you're operating at a

higher level and then in order to be

responsible to be a responsible citizen

of the world operating at that higher

level where you say yeah it's all of us

but what can I do

about it if you're saying what can I do

about it you're good at my book you're

completely good you're you're just

dealing with what you know how do you

deal with the fact that the human brain

is a pattern recognizing machine and

we're not good at it so I think the

president has laid bare the fact that

everybody is a bigot that's the fact I

think we can no longer ignore would you

say I would say that the entire

conversation about the squad the entire

conversation about you know immigration

the entire conversation about whether

conservatives or liberals are the good

ones that entire conversation should be

revealing in the clearest possible way

that woke is broke and that there's a

level above it in the president just

completely accidentally I don't think

that he had any intention to do what I'm

saying but by showing that everything is

bigoted and that even if you were to

take the position that the country is

the the best organizing principle the

president consistently says country good

people outside the country are on the

other team and the so-called good people

who think that bigotry is only something

that other people have those people have

decided to flip out and go crazy and

treat the country as if that's this is

somehow the same as bigotry so we may

have completely accidentally blundered

into a new level of enlightenment that I

think is important let me give you a

positive thing so without getting into

details of my personal life I was

listening to a conversation from some

preteens teens actually some young teens

in my local area we're having the

conversation and I was listening to it

the entire conversation was about race

it was people talking about their

friends like and they were saying you

know this friend is one of these if this

friend is one of these and you know

these people talk this way and these

people have this funny accent and these

people have this characteristic and and

that my first reaction to it was shocked

because all they talked about was race

my second reaction was that they all

loved each other which was shocking

because the way they were talking about

race was not really negative in fact you

know it was jokingly negative in the way

that teenagers joke but it wasn't

negative in their hearts you could tell

that there was affection and that the

race was a conversation and that they

were sort of let's just say they were

well way to say they were they were

interacting with the differences they

were they were talking about the

differences the you know that this group

has these tendencies whatever but none

of it seemed mean-spirited it seemed

like you know there's there's another it

seems like the generation coming up

talks about race completely explicitly

and all the time because it doesn't mean

the same thing it's it's lost its power

now I'm not sure that this would be the

same everywhere and with every group but

it's just one of those little things you

see and you say wow you know it looks

like it lost its power because the

people who are talking were you know it

was a mixed group so I hope that's a

good thing and I hope it's not I hope

I'm not misunderstanding what was going

on there but it looks like and I've seen

this before by the way it's not it's not

the one conversation I've seen it but it

seems like the next generation is going

to be just having fun with the

differences but not taking them to see

which would be the gigantic leap forward

for civilization I think all right let's

talk about some belts this is one of the

complaints I think this was on CNN or

somewhere I can't I think wasn't CNN

there's some analysts said that about

Trump and and his comments about the

squad someone said that he's playing a

risky political game though it may be

the only one he really knows how to play

and I'm thinking you have to you have to

dig pretty deeply to find something to

insult the president for if he has a

strategy that keeps working

yes his strategy keeps working but ok

what can we say about a strategy that

keeps working it may be the only one he

really knows how to play well if there's

only one strategy that might work and

it's the one that he uses and it works

is it really an insightful analysis to

say it may be the only one he knows how

to play yeah he doesn't know how to play

the losing hands he doesn't know how to

do the things that don't work what does

that even mean

everybody knows how to do things that

don't work now compare President Trump

to a normal politician so Mitch

McConnell of course got dragged into all

the controversy and CNN's Manu Raju

asked McConnell what would he say if

someone told his wife Elaine Chao

Trump's transportation secretary what

would McConnell say have somebody told

his wife to quote go back to where she

came from

which would be Taiwan I guess and here's

how McConnell answers that question

so McConnell is asked this big big old

racist your racism question and his

answer was that he was a fan of legal

immigration

McConnell just like just sucked all the

life out of the question it's like what

would you say if somebody told your wife

to go home

what would you say Mitch McConnell huh

huh huh take the bait take the bait

McConnell you do it do it we're gonna

get a quote out of you you're gonna be

all over the news will you say something

stupid Mitch McConnell what are you

going to say to that we're gonna ship

your your wife back home what would you

say to that McConnell says ah I'm a big

fan of legal immigration and everybody

says I'm not even sure that's on topic

but okay you just bored us to death and

we did not get a quote out of you all

right so I saw some speculation that

Iran might be might be convinced that

President Trump is going to be reelected

I don't know how they would be convinced

that exactly because the polls clearly

say that Biden will win but all the

smart people are pretty sure that Biden

doesn't have a chance so I don't know

how Iran is clever enough to sort that

out because it seems like they would

look at the polls and say well it looks

like every single Democrat who's in the

top four could beat this president so we

don't have to deal with this guy he's

gonna be gone and gone in 2020 but I

think that Iran is clever enough that

they listen to the right people and the

right people are saying there's not

gonna be Biden and it looks like Trump

is cruising to re-election so what that

does is it changes their calculation

about who they're going to be

negotiating with and it takes off the

table the option of waiting until 2020

and getting somebody else to negotiate

with who could give them in their view a

better deal so the fact that the

president's reelection looks like it's

there's likely gives the United States a

tremendous bargaining advantage

and it's created I think Iran is in this

weird little zone where they're trying

to make noise and they're trying to

cause a little bit of trouble but they

don't want to cause a lot of trouble

because this president has created an

impression that he is unpredictable and

you don't know when you're gonna cross

this line they probably thought they

crossed this line you know already

buddy but he played it cool and now

they're thinking about all right well I

know if we do a little more than that

are we gonna get you know bombed if we

do a little more than we've done but

doing less than we've done isn't gonna

make any difference so what are you

gonna do so I think the president has

put Iran in the position where in which

their their incentive to negotiate is

pretty high and I'll say this again

because it's so shocking peace in the

Middle East just you know the phrase

pieces and at least sounds some

ridiculous then you tell yourself well

it's that's not even a thing it's a

perpetual war zone there will always be

a perpetual war zone

and on some level that might be true you

know at the small level but just think

about this at this point in time with

this president and some of its luck but

some of it is is the way they treat the

Middle East and the leaders there etc

president Trump has gotten the Middle

East not by himself but he's a big part

of it

yeah the Middle East has reached a point

where peace abroad peace for the entire

Middle East is down to one guy who's in

his eighties that Ayatollah Khomeini so

if the Supreme Leader of Iran ever

decides to negotiate in in good faith we

don't know if he ever will but he's the

last person now maybe there's somebody

you know behind him you know if if he

were replaced maybe you'd be just the

same but there's just one position just

one person has to change their mind and

we're done

one person has to say you know I don't

think anything that we do is going to

change the reality that Israel exists

and it's going to keep existing just one

person think about that

have we ever been this close that one

person just needs to change their mind

and that one person is under tremendous

pressure internally and externally to

change his mind some people are asking

about turkey Turkey turkey is a weird

situation because there are NATO ally at

the same time we didn't want them to

have anti-aircraft missiles because I

guess they're they're taking shipment of

some Russian anti-aircraft missiles so I

don't quite understand our position on

Turkey because either you're a NATO ally

or you're not if your NATO ally do we

care that you have a way to defend

yourself I don't think that buying

Russian missiles is our first choice but

it's not the worst problem in the world

is it are we going to bomb Turkey I

don't think we're planning on bombing

Turkey so why do we care if they have

good anti-aircraft whoo and by the way

who is Turkey defending against I don't

know the answer to that can somebody

tell me who does Turkey think is going

to attack them from the air why am I

just thinking of this now I don't even

know why Turkey has a threat does

anybody even know because Isis doesn't

have an air force they are an occupied

NATO ally

somebody saying well I don't know what

that means yeah they're they don't need

the anti-aircraft missiles because of

immigration they don't need it because

their neighbors not really do you think

Turkey has a risk from Iraq does turkey

have a risk from Iran from the air I

don't think so

I know I guess they need them so is

those are the problems that we have that

one of our allies is buying weapons from

somebody else I don't know if we have

the biggest problem in the world but I

think we're very close to something like

peace in the Middle East

one person's away and that person is

tipping that person is leaning Turkey

can't use our equipment with Russia

stuff yeah well I'm sure that we would

rather send a cell Turkey our own

American equipment and there are

probably lots of strategic and other

advantages in doing that somebody says I

lived in Turkey I know I missed I miss

what what it is that you know internal

coos Greece everybody has a different

idea of why turkey needs anti-aircraft

missiles but I guess we're all guessing

all right I think we said what we need

to say if the only thing that we're

worried about today is we're all killing

each other bigots then maybe we can

reach a higher level and maybe that's

this year who knows I'll talk to you

later