Episode 688 Scott Adams - Is California a Third World Country, Kurds, Bill Gates Saving the World

bum-bum-bum hello Tyler come on in here everybody get in here while the lights are still on cuz I'm I'm in a third-world country right now it's called California and in California we don't have electricity all day long no we have electricity sometimes sometimes we don't sometimes you can walk down the street and not step in human feces but not every time we're not some first world country here in California but I've got electricity now for I'm told another few hours so my electricity is scheduled to go off sometime around noon my time and here's the catch there's no estimate of when they plan to turn it back on could be hours could be days are you freaking kidding me well I'm gonna drink coffee and enjoy it anyway and if you'd like to join me it doesn't take much all you need is a cup or mug last time Magellan tanker thermos life's canteen Grail goblet a vessel of any kind fill it with your favorite liquid I like coffee and join me now for the simultaneous hmm oh yeah do you feel the dopamine can you feel it that's pretty good it's pretty good so we got lots of things to talk about today let's jump right in but before we do I would like you to join me for a special moment I've been sort of bringing you along on this journey in which I've been been telling you about my whole book writing experience and I wanted to share this moment with you the moment is this so I got this box from my publisher which I understand to have in it the first printed copies of my new book now if you've never been an author you don't know how exciting it is no matter how many books you write it is very exciting to see for the first time and hold it in your hand the actual printed final book and so I thought I would open up my package and share with you my special moment got a bubble wrap it comes with a little note from my publisher it says Scott congratulations in your finish book ba-ba-boom here it is available for pre-order now on Amazon and everywhere else that you can pre-order a book get yours now um it'll actually be on shelves on November 5th but if you preorder it now it's good for me now it's good for me because it boosts it up the bestseller list and it's good to get there early now compare the final in all its beauty to the what we call the uncorrected proof so this first version is what gets sent out to writers and reviewers and people who might say good things about it so this one comes out early it's like 98% accurate and then this one follows look how much better the final is it's shiny it just looks so much better anyway I hope you all do your pre-orders of that let's talk about let's talk about the news number one piece of news is Turkey and the Kurds here's what you need to know we have no idea what's going on over there if you have a strong opinion about Turkey and the Kurds in Syria you probably shouldn't because we really don't know what's happening it seems to me that the biggest problem over there is that there's no such thing as just curds it if they were just one thing that were the curds that we might all have the same opinion where at least we'd have wise opinions but it turns out you got your bad curds and your good curds did you know that you got your bad ones who are terrorists or trained terrorists you got your good ones who fight terrorists well we love the good ones we don't feel so strongly about the bad ones because they were sort of training terrorists or they are terrorists and apparently there's no there's no dispute about the fact that there are some good Kurds and some bad Kurds so let's agree on that now if we could support all the good Kurds the ones that fought with us I'm sure we would do that here's but we don't know exactly what's going on or what Turkey is exactly doing or why they're doing it or exactly what we're doing and what Assad is doing and exactly what the Russians are gonna do because apparently the Syrians have announced that they're there in the fight basically the Syrians are going to oppose Turkey and what we did was get our fifty-fifty military people out of the way now the part that people don't seem to be grokking which we're just learning is that Turkey was gonna go anyway apparently Turkey was gonna do what Turkey was gonna do on the border whether our 50 people who were not terribly important to their plans were there or not so what the president did is not give them the green light rather they were gonna do it anyway and he got out of the way so in other words there was no reason for our troops to be there because they weren't gonna stop what was going to happen but they could get hurt so there just wasn't any purpose for them to be there if you understand it in those terms and by the way that could turn to be wrong it could easily turn out that what I just said has no factual basis because everything is sort of still fog of war and and you know it's all moving parts right now so there's one there's one future where Turkey simply creates a safe zone and that the Kurds who are already in that area are not too happy about it but we might be happy that there's a safe zone created apparently Turkey was tired of waiting for the United States to be productive in creating this safe zone so they just said well there's gonna be a safe zone you're either part of the problem or you're part of the solution America so maybe you know get out of the way so we don't know if turkey is version of the safe zone is really just a kill zone for Kurds or are they really just trying to protect their own border and they don't have ambitions of wiping out large populations certainly people are gonna get killed because it's a military action but I'm very confused about who's doing what and what will happen will this Pitt Russia against Turkey if it does kind of glad we got another way will Turkey will Turkey cross the line and risk their entire economy to kill X number of Kurds that they can get their hands on maybe I did a little unscientific poll on Twitter and asked people do you think Turkey will essentially sacrifice their entire economy to get some advantage in in wiping out the Kurds just in that one area it wouldn't serve it wouldn't solve their current problem it would just be a certain group of them would they trade their entire economy for a certain group of Kurds or are they smart enough not to do that and they might get close to the lie and they might kill more people than then you know we think should be killed or we would want to be killed it might get more bad guys than good guys we don't know what that's gonna look like or are they just calling Trump's Bluff do they think it's a bluff maybe they say to themselves you know we're never gonna get a chance like this to kill so many Kurds so maybe it's worth the risk of taking taking a you know calling his bluff oh let me pause right here for for a conflict of interest statement I have a large investment in Turkey now it's just a stock investment and it's specifically stock in the Turkish mobile phone company Turk cell yesterday when all the American stocks were down Turkcell was up of all things you know what the President Trump was was threatening to obliterate their economy like he's done before and the Turkish mobile phone company stock went up today it's down a little bit yeah it's just a percent you're there so it's no big deal so anyway the my conflict of interest statement is that I have an investment there which if the president goes through with his threat to whack their economy is gonna be very bad for me not change my life bad but for that particular investment really bad it's an investment I've had for years that I got simply because mobile phone companies always succeed in the long run if they have kind of a monopoly and Turkey is an educated growing economy but they've had problems you know obviously government problems and now this so there's a big I certainly would not recommend that you own that stock nor would I recommend that you sell it because you should not take any financial advice whatsoever from cartoonists so having said that my interests financially are opposite of what I'm going to say right now even though I have a sizable investment in a Turkish company that would be just really hit hard you have Trump moved against the Turkish economy I'm in favor of it you know if we make a threat like that the United States does you have to go through with it you have to do you have to pay that debt so the the the challenge has been made if turkey crosses the line we will break their economy that's gonna hurt me I'm not gonna like that I'm gonna keep I'm gonna hold the investment anyway because it's a very long-term investment you know it's sort of that 20 30 year investment but I don't like it but I still think we have to make good on the threat and I would bet if I had to be a betting person that they will cross alone and then we will have to crash their economy so that you know I'm not gonna say that's a hundred percent but I'd say we're looking at probably a seventy percent chance that the Turkish economy will be obliterated probably a 70% chance because I don't see them holding themselves back and I don't see Trump not making good on the threat so I think I think the die is cast in the sense that they will go too far and we will crash their whole fricking economy that's what I think 70% chance that 30% chance is in the god anything could happen because once you've got the Russians and the Syrians in there and Iran will be in there who knows you know a couple of different Kurd groups Turkey anything could happen all right let's talk about impeachment there's a new story today about apparently john sullivan has the scoop that the the US government new ukraine was planning to look again into verismo holdings in other words somebody in the US government don't know exactly who knew that somebody over in Ukraine in the prosecutor's office was planning to look into Purisima long many months before president Trump brought it up at the phone call brought it up so that would sort of change how you look at the situation but probably won't change it that much and here's why when you say that the US government knew what does that mean doesn't mean Trump knew that Ukraine was gonna look into Bruce Lee is that what it means hmm no it means some at least one person at least one person in the whole world was aware that Ukraine was taking a second look at barista so it doesn't really change what the president knew were sad unless there's additional reporting this says even Trump knew or even his advisors no one should have told them but that's not an evidence all we know is that somebody knew so we've got some dots that aren't quite connecting here but might yeah maybe later they will connect so and what does it mean that they were thinking about looking into it or they were looking into barista is that the same as saying that they were looking into the Biden participation in Purisima it's not it's not and it's probably not that unusual for a major company to be in the target sites of the prosecutor especially in Ukraine where there's so much rampant you know bad behavior so on the surface it feels like it's important to know that when the president asked Ukraine to look into burries m'a you should be important to know that months ago they had already decided to do it but does it really matter if the president didn't know it or if they were what they were gonna look into wasn't exactly about the Biden's which was our primary interest meaning the countries as well surpressed or that they weren't actually acting on their preference to look into it it's possible they said yeah we're gonna look into it and just input a resources on it so I would say that this new reporting is important it's it's part of the puzzle good to know and good work by John Solomon getting that scoop but I wouldn't over interpret it as being some kind of a kill shot for one side of the other I think it's more of a mmm that's interesting let's find out more about that until we do it's hard to have an opinion on it apparently we're pulling out of the Open Skies treaty which I didn't even know existed until yesterday and you're probably saying to yourself what exactly is the Open Skies treaty and why are we pulling out of it well it has something to do with sending surveillance aircraft over other people's territory and the idea is that we're all safer if we can all keep an eye on each other so even Russia for example would allow that we would have some kind of high-level surveillance flights spying on their country they might be doing the same thing with us everybody's looking at each other probably keeps you safer yeah you know a watched situation is gonna be a little bit safer than if there was something you can't keep an eye on that was the thinking and apparently we're pulling out why are we pulling out I don't know beats me was something going wrong I looked at the reporting this morning I didn't see any reason now that doesn't mean there's no reason one assumes that there is a reason but I don't know what it is so if you have a strong opinion about whether we should pull out of the Open Skies treaty you might be reading different news than I am because because I don't see the reason yet and of course there's always accusations that Russia is cheating because they wouldn't let us fly over some zone but I don't know how having new treaties going to make that better so I don't quite know how that all fits together all right the Trump announced that the u.s.

is putting visa restrictions on Chinese officials who were responsible for quote brutal suppression of Muslims so those sanctions are on individuals in China who summit somehow are complicit and detaining the weaker Muslim minority over there now could there be any better thing that the president could do for reelection is is the president using this issue just to get reelected because what could be better for the president than to be vocally and visibly supporting a Muslim minority yeah that's pretty good right it's pretty good because it works against the whole idea that he's anti-muslim yeah he's putting US interests on the line to protect a Muslim minority in another country I mean that's how do you explain that if he's anti-muslim it's hard to explain because remember he's he's a good buddies with President Xi it would seem easy for Trump to agree with his good buddy I'd better get rid of that problem but instead use decided to back the Muslim minority how do how do the none of the Democrats process that how does that make sense in their movie now in my movie it makes perfect sense because in my movie he was never an anti Muslim at any at any time and sure enough he's acting in a way today on this Weger situation which would suggest he's not anti Muslim so my movie is completely consistent but how does how does the other movie doing where he hates Muslims but he's putting America American interests on the line to protect them in another country it has no strategic value to us whatsoever and he's putting America America's interests on the line you know to support them so politically it's brilliant it might also be good in terms of our trade negotiations but I'll tell you what is really good for you know what is really good for it's really good for cats on the roof now if you got none of the cats on the roof I'm gonna use this this I guess you'd call it a eight it's based on a joke but it's an interesting concept that the joke represents and the the joke is that you know the brother says the cats on the roof and well though I'm not gonna tell the joke but there is a joke it's based on and the reference to cats on the roof is a way to tell somebody without telling them the bad news right away you're softening somebody up for the bad news later which is the cat died but you don't want to say the cat died so you say oh the cats on the roof we're trying to get it down oh the cat fell it's not the vets the vets working on it and then you know the third day say the cat didn't pull through it didn't make it and then the punch line of the joke is that you know your mother's on the roof so softening you up to tell you that your mother is gonna die I feel as though when the president goes hard at China for the we Gers it has you know political benefits as you know just moral benefits because it's supporting a a beleaguered group but it's also a little bit the cats on the roof meaning that the president is softening up in this country the United States for decoupling decoupling is happening I mean we're watching it so you don't have to ask yourself will we decouple from China it's happening we're doing it right now you're seeing companies move away from China you're seeing companies that unless they're crazy they're not going to move into China what what what American company that depends on stockholders who could move into China now it would just be the worst play ever so decoupling is happening it may not be you know cut the cut the cord on day one but it's gonna deep you know we are decreasing our reliance on China over time and that's decoupling so when the president throws this Uighur thing in there it's good on lots of levels you know morally politically but it also softens up the the local people you know the United States and citizens it tells us that we're leaving you know it's sort of like better find your phones because we might be leaving soon so cats on the roof similarly I made that joke because Bernie Sanders came out and he gave a little press conference where he was he was not looking too too healthy but he was you know he was standing and walking and talking and he said he was of course going to pull back on some of the rigors of his campaigning schedule now how do you interpret that I don't see any future in which Bernie works hard and goes all the way and gets the nomination I can't believe that birdie necessarily sees it but he also just doesn't have the kind of personality worth quitting even for a reason that other people would say is a good reason he doesn't really have that quitter personality which is partly why you like him right I have a very positive opinion of Bernie for his hard work his consistency he doesn't seem to have done you know hit by too much in the way of scandal and I believe that he is passionate and believes that what he's promoting policy-wise would be good for people so I have a very high opinion of Bernie on a lot of levels which is different from saying I think that his plans will work but he's moved the entire Democratic Party in his direction it's an amazing accomplishment amazing and I think that someday everybody will have health care and education will be free one way or another maybe just through normal capitalist ways but someday somebody's gonna say you know Bernie pushed us there a little bit faster made it a higher priority but I mean I tweeted it and I said the cat's on the roof and people unfortunately interpreted that as me being that you know Bernie wasn't gonna live that long and that's not what I meant in that context the cat's in the roof meant that when Bernie says I'm gonna pull back on my campaign schedule a little bit of course he's sort of softening us up for understanding that he's gonna put you know a maximum fight into it as much as you can but you should sort of expect him to you know to look at the poll numbers fairly soon it's gonna take a few more poll results they'll probably wait until there are a few more poll results and then you'll say you know I'm not pulling well and I don't have the energy to change it so this is a good time for me to drop out I just think he's looking all I think Bernie wants to do is to go out on his own terms now has burning earned it as bernie earned the right to go out on his own terms yeah yeah yes he put him to work Bernie earns the right to go out on his own terms so if he was staying for a while and have sort of a graceful graceful exit that's determined by the poll numbers I think I feel flexible about that I would not I would not criticize him for that I think he earned that right all right when one more thing about Turkey a lot of people have what I would call a half pinion about Turkey and the Kurds a half pinion is where you're only looking at either all the costs of something were all the benefits of something and you're just ignoring the other half of the equation and so the people who say we should we should not be pulling those 50 people out what are they suggesting instead because remember there's a 400 year history of the Turks and the Kurds being at each other's throats are we gonna stay there for hundreds of years is that the alternative because if it is then we should be able to say that so if somebody says I think it's good that we pulled out they could say the cost is there's a risk to the Kurds that's a pretty big cost to the United States as well because that if if the Kurds get wiped out it's gonna look like we're unreliable as allies and that could hurt us later that's a big deal but the people who say we should stay that make first of all the mistake of thinking would stop the Turks I don't think you will that was the whole point our military has sort of announced essentially the official word from the government is Turkey was going to do their thing either way and our 50 people were just not going to be the factor that stopped them so better to get them out of the way but for those who think it would have made a difference to keep them there or think that we should put more people there so the turkey really is stopped what is your full opinion because you can't say let's keep them there until Tuesday you kind of have to say for hundreds of years because whenever we leave it just goes back to Turkey attacks the Kurds and vice versa so I don't know that there's a valid opinion that says stay unless you finish the thought and say stay probably for hundreds of years if you can say that with a straight face well that's a full opinion now there's sort of a mid-range there where you say we should stay until the situation changes in some way that we can get out but if it doesn't change we will stay there for hundreds of years is that is that what we want to do if it is people should be able to say that and just say this is my full opinion we should stay and if we have to for hundreds of years that's the other opinion that's the opposite of we should we should get out of there all right let's talk about let's talk about interfering in China's domestic affairs are we interfering in China's domestic affairs when we sanction people for their treatment of the wiegert's now I'm in favor of that I'm all in favor of the sanctions and whatever else we do to China but are we interfering with their domestic politics oh yeah at what point do you say that's not legitimate is it is this such a bad situation there's an exception is it an exception I don't know it certainly seems like it's gonna make a difference it certainly seems like it's designed to manipulate their political process how is that not meddling it's like the most meddling thing you've ever seen in your life and why is it that when we do it we don't even notice that is meddling it's like it's like we don't even notice we're meddling the piss out of everybody and guess what their meddling right back I don't know it we're we're a meddling world I don't think there's any such thing as no meddling all right I'd like to tell you how Bill Gates is fixing the world and I think I'm completely serious about this but you'll decide you should watch the special on that netscape called inside bills brain so it's called inside bills brain and says three or four part documentary about Bill Gates and it's a very positive presentation of Bill Gates and I was wondering why Bill Gates gave so much of his personal time to this project because he it's obviously spent a lot of time with the interviewer and did lots of lots of interviews and you walk around with him and spend all kinds of time with him and that seemed opposite of what I imagined Bill Gates was all about now obviously he does lots of public events but it seemed unusual that he would do one that's sort of about him that seemed completely off-brand didn't it and did you wonder about that's like why would Bill Gates be such a big part of this project on the thing that's just sort of about him just the opposite of how you imagined him he just is more about business and getting things done not about self aggrandizement and then I watched it and then I understood it and so on its surface yet there's a way more going on than you think so here's here's the deal so most of its focused on his current and his current life as a philanthropist and the Gates Foundation there's there's not so much about to use Microsoft past if you want that stuff that would be some other content so they talked about his spending billions to try to build you know toilets that don't need running water for the third world and and in sewage processing it's it's hard to watch that part of the documentary because they show you a lot of sewage and it's more than I wanted to look at but it's important to make the point of how important it is apparently there were just lots of people dying in Africa from diarrhea the diarrhea was caused by the fact that their water source and their toilet source were the same place as awful as that sounds right there their sources of water and their sources of bathroom was literally the same place so they were picking up all these bugs because of that unhealthy situation and because they don't have access to good medicine just people were dying from diarrhea so Bill Gates took on probably the hardest problem in the world the most disgusting unpleasant the thankless problem anybody could ever work on and he's made some progress but it's a big problem he did develop a toilet that met those specifications they did develop they built a waste processing plant that doesn't require electricity or running water amazing and they've actually installed it in one one city in Africa and apparently it works so what it does is it creates its own electricity from the waste let's put into it it uses that electricity to process it and and the only output is drinkable clean water amazing but and then the other thing he's working on Bill Gates is Radek ating polio which turned out to be a much harder problem for a variety of reasons and but he's you know putting billions into it he's dead set on getting rid of polio it just is way more work than it looked like and he's gonna put in work but that's not what I'm talking about those two efforts are amazing and if and if that's all he ever did you you know he's a he's just a treasure to the world Bill Gates is if all he did all he did like like you and I are doing that if all he did was eradicate polio if all he did was bring you know clean water to these places in Africa that otherwise wouldn't because of the waste those are gigantic but there's something bigger he's doing something much bigger and I didn't understand the Netflix special until I put all the pieces together and it looks like this Bill Gates also has been working on developing through his company terra.

Power a generation four nuclear plant that would fix all of the problems of traditional nuclear power those problems are it could melt down so they they made a design the camp if it loses power it just turns off it can't melt down by its design it doesn't have the ability to MIT to melt down secondly it uses for fuel spent waste from other nuclear reactors and it could use it for hundreds of years just the stuff that's already waste so it reduces nuclear waste it doesn't have the risk of meltdown by design and you're ready it's economical that's the trifecta now you save yourself great let's start building them remember this is completely designed so it's been designed on supercomputers and stuff they have to actually build it but it's completely designed there are there's no stuff left to design so Bill Gates was planning to build the first one in China because China is very Pro nuclear they're building a lot of their own and he got approval to do it in China and then trade war then President Trump declared a trade war which I know and that nuclear project got killed because it just isn't possible to do it in China right now it's the most important thing in the world if you believe in climate change if you don't believe in climate change as being a problem it's still the most important thing in the world here's why if you could bring down the cost of electricity and provide it to all the people who don't have it especially the poor then what you do for poor people and for the economy in general is huge and what it does for reducing pollution because you could get rid of your coal plants and the ones that are really killing people is gigantic we're talking about saving millions of lives you if there's no climate change because if you get rid of the polluting sources I think there were a hundred thousand people a year or something or killed by coal if you just sort of generally calculate how much extra pollution it is and how many extra people died there are just millions of people dying from pollution and more millions of people dying that didn't need to from poverty and having low-cost energy would go a long long way toward reducing poverty so here's our situation and you're probably starting to put some some you're starting to connect the dots a little bit but let me finish the picture so Bill Gates does a special that's unusually personal and completely out of character why okay so connect the puzzle why does he do this special and then you find out that his plan to save the world yeah I'm exaggerating but maybe not much by having clean safe economical nuclear power has been thwarted by politics what is the one thing that Bill Gates is really good at it's not politics that's not his strength what he did is what he's good at he put a ton of money into a risky thing that was entrepreneurial it required innovation and technology and damn it he made it work he actually made it work Bill Gates invented clean economical safe nuclear power and he can't get a test site running now just to be clear we don't know that if he built it it would work just the way it was designed it might take an iteration or two to get it right but they're pretty confident they got it right or close enough that a few tweaks will get you there so now do you understand why Bill Gates allowed a very personal that Netflix special about him he used this to solve the politics so here's what happened he puts out this special and he simply makes it entertaining and he puts a lot of personal stuff in and so we'll watch so then I turn it on and I watch and I say are you freaking kidding me that the only thing stopping us from having economical safe nuclear power is that he can't get through the licensing process in this country and then I said to myself well how could I help and so I sent a message to Mark Snyder our resident nuclear experts slash advocate and they said do you know anybody at Terra power I could talk to you maybe I could help because if all we need to do is convince people to do something differently well I'm good at that maybe I could help and so mark contacted somebody on Linked.

In who was an executive at Terra power and with the intention of asking him to connect with me now I haven't made that connection I don't know if I will but look at all that all the dots lined up Bill Gates solved the engineering and the economics of safe nuclear power and he can't get the licensing and in his own country he had to go to China to even get approval now do we have a president who could solve that problem yup now you say to yourself close Scott Scott Scott nobody can solve that problem even a president couldn't solve that problem because the problem is just problem with red tape and this the states and it's not really a federal problem anyway it's about the states and it's the bureaucracy and there are reasons and variables and and even the president couldn't solve it it's that hard to solve well we don't have an or president we are blessed or cursed depending on your point of view with the most unique president in the history of presence and there's one thing that this president can do that other presidents can't do what he can do is the stuff you can't do who was it who could move her our embassy to Jerusalem nobody and then Trump did it who could get elected president with no experience in politics nobody well but then Trump did it who could remove us remove our troops from Syria nobody it's impossible well Trump just did it who could start a major trade war with China and convince to this country that maybe we should stop doing trade with them at all nobody except Trump just did it how many times you have to see something they can't be done and then watch the Trump do it right in front of you he's the president who can do it so here's what it comes down to you and I because you're you're part of my my system right now you and I are gonna try to find somebody a terra.

Power to talk to you maybe you find somebody maybe I find somebody and we're gonna find out if we understand the problem right because that's the first thing you know I want to understand if the real problem is that there's an entity or groups that are dragging their feet if we can find a person whose job it is to make this happen and they're not getting it done that person probably needs some help maybe they need a bigger staff maybe they need more freedom from mistakes maybe they need somebody to you know do some kind of an executive order or to clear out some paperwork we're gonna find the person and it might be just one person maybe a few but maybe just one we're gonna find the people or person who is stopping Bill Gates from solving the biggest problem in the world if you think it's climate change or even if you don't we all we just still need clean power so Bill Gates found a way to weaponize the topic just right because it's hard to imagine how hard it is to change people's minds about nuclear power imagine how hard it would be to break that red tape the way to do it is to focus an immense amount of energy at exactly the right point like a laser you know you got a lot of energy but it's no good unless it's focused and what Bill Gates did was he just by doing the Neph like netflix thing I'm pretty sure that his real intention was not the self aggrandizement in other words I don't believe that Trump that Gates did it Bill Gates so that we would have a better impression with Bill Gates now it did have that effect I mean you watch that special and you come away thinking he might be the greatest person who ever lived he might be the smartest - you actually will think that when you walk away you think I don't know you might be the greatest human of all time I actually went away from the special thinking that's like well you know it's kind of hard to rank all humans but he might be the best of us he might be and he just created a situation where if we helped in the right way we can solve his last remaining problem which is he can't get it approved in the United States I think we can do that for him he set it up I mean he set it up all we have to do is execute so let's find a terra.

Power executive who will talk to us confirm exactly where the problem is and then we'll do what we can to put the energy from the government if President Trump could be helpful I know that you would at least listen to the listen to the story now here's the fast way to do it put Bill Gates and Trump in a room together with nobody else just you know there could be other people but you know the point is those two people had room to talk a nuclear power don't you think that Bill Gates sitting room with President Trump could get a nuclear plan approved I mean maybe they have to put it in someplace remote you know maybe it's not the ideal location or something but don't you think they could get that done I think they could so that's positive if those of you who are following me on Twitter might know that I keep trigging triggering this cognitive dissonance trap and then watching people fall into it and the trap goes like this Piers Morgan was saying something at Twitter that I responded to about transgender athletes and I keep saying this I say wouldn't it be better if instead of having leagues for women and leaks for men and then the transgenders are you know are something we have to fight over wouldn't it be better to just say anybody can play at whatever level their abilities allow so that would mean that the only people who play in the NBA are very tall best of the best men and all the rest of the men in the world don't get to play in the NBA so a hundred percent of woman women would not play in the NBA under that model and 99.999 percent of men would also not play in the NBA now there would be no women's league under this model it would just be leagues and if you were lower down in the leagues and some of them might have men and women and transgender athletes etc and it would be fine because whatever league they're playing in would be competitive with the people on that team now what is the biggest complaint that people say when I say what I just said which is get rid of men's sports and get rid of women's sports and just have as many leagues as you need so everybody can find a slot where they work what's the biggest complaint people say Scott you idiot I got called an idiot about 20 times this morning alone you idiot you idiot Scott well I have to I have to go full day like this this is what they say to me when I say don't have men's and women's teams just have you know as many leagues as you need so everybody can find one that they fit into they say to me don't you know Scott that men are biologically larger that women Scott if they're playing on the same team the men will just hurt them and it won't be fair to which I say that has nothing to do with my idea because in my idea you don't join the team except the one that you won't get hurt and the people are roughly as good as you are they might be men might be women could be anything they're just the same level so what do people say when I say no no there wouldn't be any women's team that has a transgender athlete on it there would just be teams what do they say Scott Scott don't you understand that men are bigger than women I don't know what to do with that I can say a thousand times yes my preferred solution is that everybody plays with people who are their same level in all cases and somebody will still say I'm an idiot because then a 200-pound man will be playing against a hundred pound woman to which I say no never that will never happen because they wouldn't play on the same team so the reason that I enjoy this topic is because it triggers people like crazy and the triggering I find amusing and educational because you watch where their blind spot is and they can't see it but it's easier to see from the outside and here's the blind spot that triggers people there has never been any good reason for male and female separated leagues so that's that's the reason that people can't see what's so obvious in front of them so they're not disagreeing or agreeing with my opinion they actually can't see it because they're starting from a place that there must be male sports and female sports and somebody said you know the whole reason for that so that you know women don't get hurt they're not you know competing in these male sports and getting hurts and I said that's not the reason in the comments tell me the reason for male and female sports what's the reason why is the reason we have it now because I said we just get rid of it the reason is just politics the reason is power and politics women as a group wanted it so they there were enough women to get what they wanted what if all the men who were under five feet tall decided to organize and say no every school and every professional sport should also include people who are under five feet tall and we want our own leak because we can't compete with large land and we can't even compete with large women were under five feet tall so shouldn't we have our own league to which I say well it makes as much sense as anybody else having their own league but you don't have the power the only reason that short men don't have their own sports leagues is because they don't have any power they're not organized nobody cares at all so once you dispense with the fact that there should be male sports and female sports there was never a reason for that and now people said to me put Scott that means that a woman can never win first place how is that fair that the only person getting first place like the best of the sport is gonna be a guy how is that fair to which I say how was it fair now I'm not in first place if I become a professional boxer do I have a chance of being first place if I join the NFL do I have do I have a first chance at being the on the team 99.999% of all men can't make the team if we're talking about the high level teams and the hundred percent of women can't is there really a problem if men and women are so similar that 99.999% of men are in this situation that's the same as a hundred percent of women is that it's different I mean it's different by point zero zero one but still there are only a few special people who get to be number one at all does it really need to be a number one man and a number one woman and secondly the market would adjust and you would still have the best woman in the world people I used the Serena Williams example so I'll use that let's say we got rid of men's diss and women's tennis and it was just one ranking that would put serene that let's say let's say she's number 400 in the world maybe it's a thousand whatever it is do you think there would be no interest and watching Serena play if she was exactly the same person she is now but instead of being number one in the women's league she's number 600 in the league I think there's still a market because that whatever reason you wanted to watch her play before why is that change I I would think it would be exciting to watch a woman compete whether she's competing against a man or a woman if you if you're handicapping it in your mind for the fact that you know you know that if it were Nadal or a man that they would be even better now let me give you this analogy when my stepdaughter used to play soccer in high school I would go and watch those games and they were super entertaining more entertaining than professional sports I loved watching high school and junior high girls compete it was great it was every bit as fun and entertaining as watching a professional man's team play so why would that change like I would still enjoy watching them play at any level so yes it would be it would be worse for a very small number of women the ones who could be the best in their sports it would be worse for them too instead of being number one to be number 600 but do you care I mean if it's let's say better for some transgender folks but worse for Serena Williams it's about a push I know seems about the same fairness wise anyway I haven't seen it yet in the comments but I guarantee you there's somebody in the comments who's gonna say to me Scott you're so stupid because that means large men would be playing with small women and hurting them no no not saying that alright somebody says it would be worse for all women how tell me one way that it would be worse for all women again I'll use my stepdaughter as an example she did not play it on this school team she played in a recreational league and so instead of sitting on the bench on the school team she got to play every game and and do well against people her level in a recreational league was that bad for my stepdaughter that she didn't get to be on the school's team sitting on the bench no she made friends she had discipline she learned sports she had teamwork she got every benefit you could get at the level she was playing it was a competitive fun to watch it was everything there was nothing missing sure there are a few few people who would not get to be the star of high school on the team who cares just the one person who didn't get that right so yeah I won't say it's unfair I will say it'll be different and some other people would get advantages and some others would not so we we sort of fetishize sports like they're far more special than they are they're not that special you can have a recreational league that you played just for fun and you get all the benefits all of them in fact better benefits because you're more likely to play the entire game and if you try to get in the competitive the sport only a few people get to be starters all right somebody says which is better for self esteem by far the recreational leagues there are some people who would have better self-esteem by competing at the highest level on a woman only team all the rest are better off playing on a team with people that are friends and the same level so the only reason I like this topic is because it triggers people into a hallucination of what I'm saying so that they can maintain their disagreement but the thing that causes the blind spot is that they can't see there was never anything but a political reason that there were ever two different leagues one for men and one for women it never made sense from the beginning it was simply something that people wanted so they got it they had the power they wanted it they got it and I'm not even saying there's anything wrong with that I'm just saying that you know well let me be more clear about that there are things that make sense at a certain time and place I think it was good and beneficial the women got their own leagues and then got to compete and it got to be athletes and and all that so I think the way it is and the way was designed to be totally positive I also think you need to rethink things now and then and we've reached a point where there's everybody understands that women can be athletes right it wasn't long ago that the idea of a woman playing a sport would just seem like at a place but we're not in that place we were way beyond it now everybody understands there are male athletes female athletes transgender athletes they're just athletes so once you're once your society has moved past the question of hey can a woman play a sport whoa I didn't know women could play sport whoa once you've moved past that into everybody play sports then you can design a system that doesn't have to solve a social problem having female only sports solved a social problem that is solved so you don't need to solve the problem that is already solved we already understand women can play sports duh all right once you get that it's all easy okay that's all I got for now I've got to go to a lot of work because my electricity's can go off at noon apparently literally I live in this stupid third-world country called California and I'll tell you we don't know for sure if the electricity will go off it has to do with it has to do with how much wind there is some other places the state but if it does we have to get rid of our governor we have to change our government if if my if my power goes out I'm suddenly going to be very active in California politics which I've never cared about never cared about it but if my power goes out today from bad management I'm gonna get real interested in the governorship not running but getting somebody in there who can do the work so that's we're on that and I will talk to you all later

[Music]

bum-bum-bum hello Tyler come on in here

everybody get in here while the lights

are still on cuz I'm I'm in a

third-world country right now it's

called California and in California we

don't have electricity all day long no

we have electricity sometimes sometimes

we don't sometimes you can walk down the

street and not step in human feces but

not every time we're not some first

world country here in California but

I've got electricity now for I'm told

another few hours so my electricity is

scheduled to go off sometime around noon

my time and here's the catch there's no

estimate of when they plan to turn it

back on

could be hours could be days are you

freaking kidding me

well I'm gonna drink coffee and enjoy it

anyway and if you'd like to join me it

doesn't take much all you need is a cup

or mug last time Magellan tanker thermos

life's canteen Grail goblet a vessel of

any kind fill it with your favorite

liquid I like coffee and join me now for

the simultaneous hmm

oh yeah do you feel the dopamine can you

feel it that's pretty good it's pretty

good so we got lots of things to talk

about today let's jump right in but

before we do I would like you to join me

for a special moment I've been sort of

bringing you along on this journey in

which I've been been telling you about

my whole book writing experience and I

wanted to share this moment with you the

moment is this so I got this box from my

publisher which I understand to have in

it the first printed copies of my new

book now

if you've never been an author you don't

know how exciting it is no matter how

many books you write it is very exciting

to see for the first time and hold it in

your hand the actual printed final book

and so I thought I would open up my

package and share with you my special

moment got a bubble wrap it comes with a

little note from my publisher it says

Scott congratulations in your finish

book

ba-ba-boom here it is available for

pre-order now on Amazon and everywhere

else that you can pre-order a book get

yours now um it'll actually be on

shelves on November 5th but if you

preorder it now it's good for me now

it's good for me because it boosts it up

the bestseller list and it's good to get

there early now compare the final in all

its beauty to the what we call the

uncorrected proof so this first version

is what gets sent out to writers and

reviewers and people who might say good

things about it so this one comes out

early it's like 98% accurate and then

this one follows look how much better

the final is it's shiny it just looks so

much better anyway

I hope you all do your pre-orders of

that let's talk about let's talk about

the news number one piece of news is

Turkey and the Kurds here's what you

need to know we have no idea what's

going on over there

if you have a strong opinion about

Turkey and the Kurds in Syria

you probably shouldn't because we really

don't know what's happening

it seems to me that the biggest problem

over there is that there's no such thing

as just curds it if they were just one

thing that were the curds that we might

all have the same opinion where at least

we'd have wise opinions but it turns out

you got your bad curds and your good

curds did you know that you got your bad

ones who are terrorists or trained

terrorists you got your good ones who

fight terrorists well we love the good

ones

we don't feel so strongly about the bad

ones because they were sort of training

terrorists or they are terrorists and

apparently there's no there's no dispute

about the fact that there are some good

Kurds and some bad Kurds

so let's agree on that now if we could

support all the good Kurds the ones that

fought with us I'm sure we would do that

here's but we don't know exactly what's

going on or what Turkey is exactly doing

or why they're doing it or exactly what

we're doing and what Assad is doing and

exactly what the Russians are gonna do

because apparently the Syrians have

announced that they're there in the

fight basically the Syrians are going to

oppose Turkey and what we did was get

our fifty-fifty military people out of

the way now the part that people don't

seem to be grokking which we're just

learning is that Turkey was gonna go

anyway

apparently Turkey was gonna do what

Turkey was gonna do on the border

whether our 50 people who were not

terribly important to their plans were

there or not so what the president did

is not give them the green light rather

they were gonna do it anyway and he got

out of the way so in other words there

was no reason for our troops to be there

because they weren't gonna stop what was

going to happen but they could get hurt

so there just wasn't any purpose for

them to be there if you understand it in

those terms

and by the way that could turn

to be wrong it could easily turn out

that what I just said has no factual

basis because everything is sort of

still fog of war and and you know it's

all moving parts right now so there's

one there's one future where Turkey

simply creates a safe zone and that the

Kurds who are already in that area are

not too happy about it but we might be

happy that there's a safe zone created

apparently Turkey was tired of waiting

for the United States to be productive

in creating this safe zone so they just

said well there's gonna be a safe zone

you're either part of the problem or

you're part of the solution America so

maybe you know get out of the way so we

don't know if turkey is version of the

safe zone is really just a kill zone for

Kurds or are they really just trying to

protect their own border and they don't

have ambitions of wiping out large

populations certainly people are gonna

get killed because it's a military

action but I'm very confused about who's

doing what and what will happen will

this Pitt Russia against Turkey if it

does kind of glad we got another way

will Turkey will Turkey cross the line

and risk their entire economy to kill X

number of Kurds that they can get their

hands on maybe I did a little

unscientific poll on Twitter and asked

people do you think Turkey will

essentially sacrifice their entire

economy to get some advantage in in

wiping out the Kurds just in that one

area it wouldn't serve it wouldn't solve

their current problem it would just be a

certain group of them would they trade

their entire economy for a certain group

of Kurds or are they smart enough not to

do that and they might get close to the

lie and they might kill more people than

then you know we think should

be killed or we would want to be killed

it might get more bad guys than good

guys we don't know what that's gonna

look like or are they just calling

Trump's Bluff do they think it's a bluff

maybe they say to themselves you know

we're never gonna get a chance like this

to kill so many Kurds so maybe it's

worth the risk of taking taking a you

know calling his bluff oh let me pause

right here for for a conflict of

interest statement I have a large

investment in Turkey now it's just a

stock investment and it's specifically

stock in the Turkish mobile phone

company Turk cell yesterday when all the

American stocks were down Turkcell was

up of all things you know what the

President Trump was was threatening to

obliterate their economy like he's done

before and the Turkish mobile phone

company stock went up today it's down a

little bit yeah it's just a percent

you're there so it's no big deal

so anyway the my conflict of interest

statement is that I have an investment

there which if the president goes

through with his threat to whack their

economy is gonna be very bad for me not

change my life bad but for that

particular investment really bad it's an

investment I've had for years that I got

simply because mobile phone companies

always succeed in the long run if they

have kind of a monopoly and Turkey is an

educated growing economy but they've had

problems you know obviously government

problems and now this so there's a big I

certainly would not recommend that you

own that stock nor would I recommend

that you sell it because you should not

take any financial advice whatsoever

from cartoonists so having said that my

interests financially are opposite of

what I'm going to say right now

even though I have a sizable investment

in a Turkish company that would be just

really hit hard

you have Trump moved against the Turkish

economy I'm in favor of it you know if

we make a threat like that the United

States does you have to go through with

it

you have to do you have to pay that debt

so the the the challenge has been made

if turkey crosses the line we will break

their economy that's gonna hurt me I'm

not gonna like that I'm gonna keep I'm

gonna hold the investment anyway because

it's a very long-term investment

you know it's sort of that 20 30 year

investment but I don't like it but I

still think we have to make good on the

threat and I would bet if I had to be a

betting person that they will cross

alone and then we will have to crash

their economy so that you know I'm not

gonna say that's a hundred percent but

I'd say we're looking at probably a

seventy percent chance that the Turkish

economy will be obliterated probably a

70% chance because I don't see them

holding themselves back and I don't see

Trump not making good on the threat so I

think I think the die is cast in the

sense that they will go too far and we

will crash their whole fricking economy

that's what I think 70% chance that 30%

chance is in the god anything could

happen because once you've got the

Russians and the Syrians in there and

Iran will be in there who knows you know

a couple of different Kurd groups Turkey

anything could happen all right let's

talk about impeachment there's a new

story today about apparently john

sullivan has the scoop that the the US

government new ukraine was planning to

look again into verismo holdings in

other words somebody in the US

government

don't know exactly who knew that

somebody over in Ukraine in the

prosecutor's office was planning to look

into Purisima long many months before

president Trump brought it up at the

phone call brought it up so that would

sort of change how you look at the

situation but probably won't change it

that much and here's why when you say

that the US government knew what does

that mean

doesn't mean Trump knew that Ukraine was

gonna look into Bruce Lee is that what

it means hmm

no it means some at least one person at

least one person in the whole world was

aware that Ukraine was taking a second

look at barista so it doesn't really

change what the president knew were sad

unless there's additional reporting this

says even Trump knew or even his

advisors no one should have told them

but that's not an evidence all we know

is that somebody knew so we've got some

dots that aren't quite connecting here

but might yeah maybe later they will

connect so and what does it mean that

they were thinking about looking into it

or they were looking into barista is

that the same as saying that they were

looking into the Biden participation in

Purisima it's not it's not and it's

probably not that unusual for a major

company to be in the target sites of the

prosecutor especially in Ukraine where

there's so much rampant you know bad

behavior so on the surface it feels like

it's important to know that when the

president asked Ukraine to look into

burries m'a you should be important to

know that months ago they had already

decided to do it but does it really

matter if the president didn't know it

or if they were what they were gonna

look into wasn't exactly about the

Biden's which was our primary interest

meaning the countries as well surpressed

or that they weren't actually acting on

their preference to look into it it's

possible they said yeah we're gonna look

into it and just input a resources on it

so I would say that this new reporting

is important it's it's part of the

puzzle good to know and good work by

John Solomon getting that scoop but I

wouldn't over interpret it as being some

kind of a kill shot for one side of the

other I think it's more of a mmm that's

interesting let's find out more about

that until we do it's hard to have an

opinion on it apparently we're pulling

out of the Open Skies treaty which I

didn't even know existed until yesterday

and you're probably saying to yourself

what exactly is the Open Skies treaty

and why are we pulling out of it well it

has something to do with sending

surveillance aircraft over other

people's territory and the idea is that

we're all safer if we can all keep an

eye on each other so even Russia for

example would allow that we would have

some kind of high-level surveillance

flights spying on their country they

might be doing the same thing with us

everybody's looking at each other

probably keeps you safer yeah you know a

watched situation is gonna be a little

bit safer than if there was something

you can't keep an eye on that was the

thinking and apparently we're pulling

out why are we pulling out I don't know

beats me

was something going wrong I looked at

the reporting this morning I didn't see

any reason now that doesn't mean there's

no reason one assumes that there is a

reason but I don't know what it is so if

you have a strong opinion about whether

we should pull out of the Open Skies

treaty you might be reading different

news than I am because because I don't

see the reason yet and of course there's

always accusations that Russia is

cheating because they wouldn't let us

fly over some zone but I don't know how

having new treaties going to make that

better so I don't quite know how that

all fits together all right

the Trump announced that the u.s. is

putting visa restrictions on Chinese

officials who were responsible for quote

brutal suppression of Muslims so those

sanctions are on individuals in China

who summit somehow are complicit and

detaining the weaker Muslim minority

over there now could there be any better

thing that the president could do for

reelection is is the president using

this issue just to get reelected because

what could be better for the president

than to be vocally and visibly

supporting a Muslim minority yeah that's

pretty good right it's pretty good

because it works against the whole idea

that he's anti-muslim yeah he's putting

US interests on the line to protect a

Muslim minority in another country I

mean that's how do you explain that if

he's anti-muslim it's hard to explain

because remember he's he's a good

buddies with President Xi it would seem

easy for Trump to agree with his good

buddy I'd better get rid of that problem

but instead use decided to back the

Muslim minority how do how do the none

of the Democrats process that how does

that make sense in their movie now in my

movie it makes perfect sense because in

my movie he was never an anti Muslim at

any at any time and sure enough he's

acting in a way today on this Weger

situation which would suggest he's not

anti Muslim so my movie is completely

consistent but how does how does the

other movie doing where he hates Muslims

but he's putting America

American interests on the line to

protect them in another country it has

no strategic value to us whatsoever and

he's putting America America's interests

on the line you know to support them so

politically it's brilliant it might also

be good in terms of our trade

negotiations but I'll tell you what is

really good for you know what is really

good for it's really good for cats on

the roof now if you got none of the cats

on the roof I'm gonna use this this I

guess you'd call it a eight it's based

on a joke but it's an interesting

concept that the joke represents and the

the joke is that you know the brother

says the cats on the roof and well

though I'm not gonna tell the joke but

there is a joke it's based on and the

reference to cats on the roof is a way

to tell somebody without telling them

the bad news right away

you're softening somebody up for the bad

news later which is the cat died but you

don't want to say the cat died so you

say oh the cats on the roof we're trying

to get it down oh the cat fell it's not

the vets the vets working on it and then

you know the third day say the cat

didn't pull through it didn't make it

and then the punch line of the joke is

that you know your mother's on the roof

so softening you up to tell you that

your mother is gonna die I feel as

though when the president goes hard at

China for the we Gers it has you know

political benefits as you know just

moral benefits because it's supporting a

a beleaguered group but it's also a

little bit the cats on the roof meaning

that the president is softening up in

this country the United States for

decoupling decoupling is happening

I mean we're watching it so you don't

have to ask yourself will we decouple

from China

it's happening we're doing it right now

you're seeing companies move away from

China you're seeing companies that

unless they're crazy they're not going

to move into China

what what what American company that

depends on stockholders who could move

into China now it would just be the

worst play ever

so decoupling is happening it may not be

you know cut the cut the cord on day one

but it's gonna deep you know we are

decreasing our reliance on China over

time and that's decoupling so when the

president throws this Uighur thing in

there it's good on lots of levels you

know morally politically but it also

softens up the the local people you know

the United States and citizens it tells

us that we're leaving you know it's sort

of like better find your phones because

we might be leaving soon so cats on the

roof similarly I made that joke because

Bernie Sanders came out and he gave a

little press conference where he was he

was not looking too too healthy but he

was you know he was standing and walking

and talking and he said he was of course

going to pull back on some of the rigors

of his campaigning schedule now how do

you interpret that I don't see any

future in which Bernie works hard and

goes all the way and gets the nomination

I can't believe that birdie necessarily

sees it but he also just doesn't have

the kind of personality worth quitting

even for a reason that other people

would say is a good reason he doesn't

really have that quitter personality

which is partly why you like him right

I have a very positive opinion of Bernie

for his hard work his consistency he

doesn't seem to have done you know hit

by too much in the way of scandal

and I believe that he is passionate and

believes that what he's promoting

policy-wise would be good for people so

I have a very high opinion of Bernie on

a lot of levels which is different from

saying I think that his plans will work

but he's moved the entire Democratic

Party in his direction it's an amazing

accomplishment amazing and I think that

someday everybody will have health care

and education will be free one way or

another maybe just through normal

capitalist ways but someday somebody's

gonna say you know Bernie pushed us

there a little bit faster made it a

higher priority but I mean I tweeted it

and I said the cat's on the roof and

people unfortunately interpreted that as

me being that you know Bernie wasn't

gonna live that long and that's not what

I meant

in that context the cat's in the roof

meant that when Bernie says I'm gonna

pull back on my campaign schedule a

little bit of course he's sort of

softening us up for understanding that

he's gonna put you know a maximum fight

into it as much as you can but you

should sort of expect him to you know to

look at the poll numbers fairly soon

it's gonna take a few more poll results

they'll probably wait until there are a

few more poll results and then you'll

say you know I'm not pulling well and I

don't have the energy to change it so

this is a good time for me to drop out I

just think he's looking all I think

Bernie wants to do is to go out on his

own terms now has burning earned it as

bernie earned the right to go out on his

own terms

yeah yeah yes he put him to work Bernie

earns the right to go out on his own

terms so if he was staying for a while

and have sort of a graceful graceful

exit that's determined by the poll

numbers I think I feel flexible about

that I would not I would not criticize

him for that I think he earned that

right

all right when one more thing about

Turkey a lot of people have what I would

call a half pinion about Turkey and the

Kurds a half pinion is where you're only

looking at either all the costs of

something were all the benefits of

something and you're just ignoring the

other half of the equation and so the

people who say we should we should not

be pulling those 50 people out what are

they suggesting instead because remember

there's a 400 year history of the Turks

and the Kurds being at each other's

throats are we gonna stay there for

hundreds of years is that the

alternative because if it is then we

should be able to say that so if

somebody says I think it's good that we

pulled out they could say the cost is

there's a risk to the Kurds that's a

pretty big cost to the United States as

well because that if if the Kurds get

wiped out it's gonna look like we're

unreliable as allies and that could hurt

us later that's a big deal

but the people who say we should stay

that make first of all the mistake of

thinking would stop the Turks I don't

think you will that was the whole point

our military has sort of announced

essentially the official word from the

government is Turkey was going to do

their thing either way and our 50 people

were just not going to be the factor

that stopped them so better to get them

out of the way but for those who think

it would have made a difference to keep

them there or think that we should put

more people there so the turkey really

is stopped what is your full opinion

because you can't say let's keep them

there until Tuesday you kind of have to

say for hundreds of years because

whenever we leave it just goes back to

Turkey attacks the Kurds and vice versa

so I don't know that there's a valid

opinion that says stay unless you finish

the thought and say stay probably for

hundreds of years

if you can say that with a straight face

well that's a full opinion now there's

sort of a mid-range there where you say

we should stay until the situation

changes in some way that we can get out

but if it doesn't change we will stay

there for hundreds of years is that is

that what we want to do if it is people

should be able to say that and just say

this is my full opinion we should stay

and if we have to for hundreds of years

that's the other opinion that's the

opposite of we should we should get out

of there all right let's talk about

let's talk about interfering in China's

domestic affairs are we interfering in

China's domestic affairs when we

sanction people for their treatment of

the wiegert's now I'm in favor of that

I'm all in favor of the sanctions and

whatever else we do to China but are we

interfering with their domestic politics

oh yeah at what point do you say that's

not legitimate is it is this such a bad

situation there's an exception is it an

exception I don't know it certainly

seems like it's gonna make a difference

it certainly seems like it's designed to

manipulate their political process how

is that not meddling it's like the most

meddling thing you've ever seen in your

life and why is it that when we do it we

don't even notice that is meddling it's

like it's like we don't even notice

we're meddling the piss out of everybody

and guess what their meddling right back

I don't know it we're we're a meddling

world I don't think there's any such

thing as no meddling all right I'd like

to tell you how Bill Gates is fixing the

world

and I think I'm completely serious about

this

but you'll decide you should watch the

special on that netscape called inside

bills brain so it's called inside bills

brain and says three or four part

documentary about Bill Gates and it's a

very positive presentation of Bill Gates

and I was wondering why Bill Gates gave

so much of his personal time to this

project because he it's obviously spent

a lot of time with the interviewer and

did lots of lots of interviews and you

walk around with him and spend all kinds

of time with him and that seemed

opposite of what I imagined

Bill Gates was all about now obviously

he does lots of public events but it

seemed unusual that he would do one

that's sort of about him that seemed

completely off-brand didn't it and did

you wonder about that's like why would

Bill Gates be such a big part of this

project on the thing that's just sort of

about him just the opposite of how you

imagined him he just is more about

business and getting things done not

about self aggrandizement

and then I watched it and then I

understood it and so on its surface yet

there's a way more going on than you

think

so here's here's the deal so most of its

focused on his current and his current

life as a philanthropist and the Gates

Foundation there's there's not so much

about to use Microsoft past if you want

that stuff that would be some other

content so they talked about his

spending billions to try to build you

know toilets that don't need running

water for the third world and and in

sewage processing it's it's hard to

watch that part of the documentary

because they show you a lot of sewage

and it's more than I wanted to look at

but it's important to make the point of

how important it is apparently there

were just lots of people dying in Africa

from diarrhea the diarrhea was caused by

the fact

that their water source and their toilet

source were the same place as awful as

that sounds right there their sources of

water and their sources of bathroom was

literally the same place so they were

picking up all these bugs because of

that unhealthy situation and because

they don't have access to good medicine

just people were dying from diarrhea so

Bill Gates took on probably the hardest

problem in the world the most disgusting

unpleasant the thankless problem anybody

could ever work on and he's made some

progress but it's a big problem he did

develop a toilet that met those

specifications they did develop they

built a waste processing plant that

doesn't require electricity or running

water amazing and they've actually

installed it in one one city in Africa

and apparently it works

so what it does is it creates its own

electricity from the waste

let's put into it it uses that

electricity to process it and and the

only output is drinkable clean water

amazing but and then the other thing

he's working on Bill Gates is Radek

ating polio which turned out to be a

much harder problem for a variety of

reasons and but he's you know putting

billions into it he's dead set on

getting rid of polio it just is way more

work than it looked like and he's gonna

put in work but that's not what I'm

talking about

those two efforts are amazing and if and

if that's all he ever did you you know

he's a he's just a treasure to the world

Bill Gates is if all he did all he did

like like you and I are doing that if

all he did was eradicate polio if all he

did was bring you know clean water to

these places in Africa that otherwise

wouldn't because of the waste those are

gigantic but there's something bigger

he's doing something much bigger and I

didn't understand the Netflix special

until I put all the pieces together and

it looks like this

Bill Gates also has been working on

developing through

his company terraPower a generation four

nuclear plant that would fix all of the

problems of traditional nuclear power

those problems are it could melt down so

they they made a design the camp if it

loses power it just turns off it can't

melt down by its design it doesn't have

the ability to MIT to melt down secondly

it uses for fuel spent waste from other

nuclear reactors and it could use it for

hundreds of years just the stuff that's

already waste so it reduces nuclear

waste it doesn't have the risk of

meltdown by design and you're ready it's

economical that's the trifecta now you

save yourself great

let's start building them remember this

is completely designed so it's been

designed on supercomputers and stuff

they have to actually build it but it's

completely designed there are there's no

stuff left to design so Bill Gates was

planning to build the first one in China

because China is very Pro nuclear

they're building a lot of their own and

he got approval to do it in China and

then trade war then President Trump

declared a trade war which I know and

that nuclear project got killed because

it just isn't possible to do it in China

right now it's the most important thing

in the world if you believe in climate

change if you don't believe in climate

change as being a problem it's still the

most important thing in the world here's

why if you could bring down the cost of

electricity and provide it to all the

people who don't have it especially the

poor then what you do for poor people

and for the economy in general is huge

and what it does for reducing pollution

because you could get rid of your coal

plants and the ones that are really

killing people is gigantic we're talking

about saving millions of lives you

if there's no climate change because if

you get rid of the polluting sources I

think there were a hundred thousand

people a year or something or killed by

coal if you just sort of generally

calculate how much extra pollution it is

and how many extra people died there are

just millions of people dying from

pollution and more millions of people

dying that didn't need to from poverty

and having low-cost energy would go a

long long way toward reducing poverty so

here's our situation and you're probably

starting to put some some you're

starting to connect the dots a little

bit but let me finish the picture so

Bill Gates does a special that's

unusually personal and completely out of

character why okay so connect the puzzle

why does he do this special and then you

find out that his plan to save the world

yeah I'm exaggerating but maybe not much

by having clean safe economical nuclear

power has been thwarted by politics what

is the one thing that Bill Gates is

really good at it's not politics

that's not his strength what he did is

what he's good at

he put a ton of money into a risky thing

that was entrepreneurial it required

innovation and technology and damn it he

made it work he actually made it work

Bill Gates invented clean economical

safe nuclear power and he can't get a

test site running now just to be clear

we don't know that if he built it it

would work just the way it was designed

it might take an iteration or two to get

it right but they're pretty confident

they got it right or close enough that a

few tweaks will get you there

so now do you understand why Bill Gates

allowed a very personal that Netflix

special about him he used this to solve

the politics so here's what happened he

puts out this special and he simply

makes it entertaining and he puts a lot

of personal stuff in and so we'll watch

so then I turn it on and I watch and I

say are you freaking kidding me that the

only thing stopping us from having

economical safe nuclear power is that he

can't get through the licensing process

in this country and then I said to

myself well how could I help and so I

sent a message to Mark Snyder our

resident nuclear experts slash advocate

and they said do you know anybody at

Terra power I could talk to you maybe I

could help because if all we need to do

is convince people to do something

differently well I'm good at that maybe

I could help and so mark contacted

somebody on LinkedIn who was an

executive at Terra power and with the

intention of asking him to connect with

me now I haven't made that connection I

don't know if I will but look at all

that all the dots lined up Bill Gates

solved the engineering and the economics

of safe nuclear power and he can't get

the licensing and in his own country he

had to go to China to even get approval

now do we have a president who could

solve that problem yup now you say to

yourself close Scott Scott Scott nobody

can solve that problem even a president

couldn't solve that problem because the

problem is just problem with red tape

and this the states and it's not really

a federal problem anyway it's about the

states and it's the bureaucracy and

there are reasons and variables and and

even the president couldn't solve it

it's that hard to solve well we don't

have an or

president we are blessed or cursed

depending on your point of view with the

most unique president in the history of

presence and there's one thing that this

president can do that other presidents

can't do what he can do is the stuff you

can't do who was it who could move her

our embassy to Jerusalem nobody

and then Trump did it who could get

elected president with no experience in

politics

nobody well but then Trump did it who

could remove us remove our troops from

Syria nobody it's impossible well Trump

just did it

who could start a major trade war with

China and convince to this country that

maybe we should stop doing trade with

them at all nobody except Trump just did

it how many times you have to see

something they can't be done and then

watch the Trump do it right in front of

you he's the president who can do it so

here's what it comes down to you and I

because you're you're part of my my

system right now you and I are gonna try

to find somebody a terraPower to talk to

you maybe you find somebody maybe I find

somebody and we're gonna find out if we

understand the problem right because

that's the first thing you know I want

to understand if the real problem is

that there's an entity or groups that

are dragging their feet if we can find a

person whose job it is to make this

happen and they're not getting it done

that person probably needs some help

maybe they need a bigger staff maybe

they need more freedom from mistakes

maybe they need somebody to you know do

some kind of an executive order or to

clear out some paperwork we're gonna

find the person and it might be just one

person maybe a few but maybe just one

we're gonna find the people or person

who is stopping Bill Gates from solving

the biggest problem in the world

if you think it's climate change or even

if you don't we all we just still need

clean power so Bill Gates found a way to

weaponize the topic just right because

it's hard to imagine how hard it is to

change people's minds about nuclear

power imagine how hard it would be to

break that red tape the way to do it is

to focus an immense amount of energy at

exactly the right point like a laser you

know you got a lot of energy but it's no

good unless it's focused and what Bill

Gates did was he just by doing the Neph

like netflix thing I'm pretty sure that

his real intention was not the self

aggrandizement in other words I don't

believe that Trump that Gates did it

Bill Gates so that we would have a

better impression with Bill Gates now it

did have that effect I mean you watch

that special and you come away thinking

he might be the greatest person who ever

lived he might be the smartest - you

actually will think that when you walk

away you think I don't know you might be

the greatest human of all time I

actually went away from the special

thinking that's like well you know it's

kind of hard to rank all humans but he

might be the best of us he might be and

he just created a situation where if we

helped in the right way we can solve his

last remaining problem which is he can't

get it approved in the United States I

think we can do that for him he set it

up I mean he set it up all we have to do

is execute so let's find a terraPower

executive who will talk to us confirm

exactly where the problem is and then

we'll do what we can to put the energy

from the government if President Trump

could be helpful I know that you would

at least listen to the listen to the

story now here's the fast way to do it

put Bill Gates and Trump

in a room together with nobody else just

you know there could be other people but

you know the point is those two people

had room to talk a nuclear power don't

you think that Bill Gates sitting room

with President Trump could get a nuclear

plan approved I mean maybe they have to

put it in someplace remote you know

maybe it's not the ideal location or

something but don't you think they could

get that done I think they could so

that's positive if those of you who are

following me on Twitter might know that

I keep trigging triggering this

cognitive dissonance trap and then

watching people fall into it and the

trap goes like this Piers Morgan was

saying something at Twitter that I

responded to about transgender athletes

and I keep saying this I say wouldn't it

be better if instead of having leagues

for women and leaks for men and then the

transgenders are you know are something

we have to fight over wouldn't it be

better to just say anybody can play at

whatever level their abilities allow so

that would mean that the only people who

play in the NBA are very tall best of

the best men and all the rest of the men

in the world don't get to play in the

NBA so a hundred percent of woman women

would not play in the NBA under that

model and 99.999 percent of men would

also not play in the NBA now there would

be no women's league under this model it

would just be leagues and if you were

lower down in the leagues and some of

them might have men and women and

transgender athletes etc and it would be

fine because whatever league they're

playing in would be competitive with the

people on that team now what is the

biggest complaint that people say when I

say what I just said which is get rid of

men's sports and get rid of women's

sports and just have as many leagues as

you need

so everybody can find a slot where they

work what's the biggest complaint people

say Scott you idiot I got called an

idiot about 20 times this morning alone

you idiot you idiot

Scott well I have to I have to go full

day like this this is what they say to

me when I say don't have men's and

women's teams just have you know as many

leagues as you need so everybody can

find one that they fit into they say to

me don't you know Scott that men are

biologically larger that women Scott if

they're playing on the same team the men

will just hurt them and it won't be fair

to which I say that has nothing to do

with my idea because in my idea you

don't join the team except the one that

you won't get hurt and the people are

roughly as good as you are they might be

men might be women could be anything

they're just the same level so what do

people say when I say no no there

wouldn't be any women's team that has a

transgender athlete on it there would

just be teams what do they say

Scott Scott don't you understand that

men are bigger than women I don't know

what to do with that I can say a

thousand times yes my preferred solution

is that everybody plays with people who

are their same level in all cases and

somebody will still say I'm an idiot

because then a 200-pound man will be

playing against a hundred pound woman to

which I say no never that will never

happen because they wouldn't play on the

same team so the reason that I enjoy

this topic is because it triggers people

like crazy and the triggering I find

amusing and educational because you

watch where their blind spot is and they

can't see it but it's easier to see from

the outside and here's the blind spot

that triggers people there has never

been any good reason for male and female

separated leagues so that's that's the

reason that people can't see what's so

obvious in front of them so they're not

disagreeing or agreeing with my opinion

they actually can't see it because

they're starting from a place that there

must be male sports and female sports

and somebody said you know the whole

reason for that so that you know women

don't get hurt they're not you know

competing in these male sports and

getting hurts and I said that's not the

reason in the comments tell me the

reason for male and female sports what's

the reason why is the reason we have it

now because I said we just get rid of it

the reason is just politics

the reason is power and politics women

as a group wanted it so they there were

enough women to get what they wanted

what if all the men who were under five

feet tall

decided to organize and say no every

school and every professional sport

should also include people who are under

five feet tall and we want our own leak

because we can't compete with large land

and we can't even compete with large

women were under five feet tall so

shouldn't we have our own league to

which I say well it makes as much sense

as anybody else having their own league

but you don't have the power the only

reason that short men don't have their

own sports leagues is because they don't

have any power they're not organized

nobody cares at all so once you dispense

with the fact that there should be male

sports and female sports there was never

a reason for that and now people said to

me put Scott that means that a woman can

never win first place how is that fair

that the only person getting first place

like the best of the sport is gonna be a

guy how is that fair to which I say how

was it fair now I'm not in first place

if I become a professional boxer do I

have a chance of being first place if I

join the NFL do I have do I have a first

chance at being the on the team 99.999%

of all men can't make the team if we're

talking about the high level teams and

the hundred percent of women can't is

there really a problem if men and women

are so similar that 99.999% of men are

in this situation that's the same as a

hundred percent of women is that it's

different I mean it's different by point

zero zero one but still there are only a

few special people who get to be number

one at all does it really need to be a

number one man and a number one woman

and secondly the market would adjust and

you would still have the best woman in

the world people I used the Serena

Williams example so I'll use that let's

say we got rid of men's diss and women's

tennis and it was just one ranking that

would put serene that let's say let's

say she's number 400 in the world maybe

it's a thousand whatever it is do you

think there would be no interest and

watching Serena play if she was exactly

the same person she is now but instead

of being number one in the women's

league she's number 600 in the league I

think there's still a market because

that whatever reason you wanted to watch

her play before why is that change I I

would think it would be exciting to

watch a woman compete whether she's

competing against a man or a woman if

you if you're handicapping it in your

mind for the fact that you know you know

that if it were Nadal or a man that they

would be even better now let me give you

this analogy when my stepdaughter used

to play soccer in high school I would go

and watch those games and they were

super entertaining more entertaining

than professional

sports I loved watching high school and

junior high girls compete it was great

it was every bit as fun and entertaining

as watching a professional man's team

play so why would that change like I

would still enjoy watching them play at

any level so yes it would be it would be

worse for a very small number of women

the ones who could be the best in their

sports it would be worse for them too

instead of being number one to be number

600 but do you care

I mean if it's let's say better for some

transgender folks but worse for Serena

Williams it's about a push I know seems

about the same fairness wise anyway I

haven't seen it yet in the comments but

I guarantee you there's somebody in the

comments who's gonna say to me Scott

you're so stupid because that means

large men would be playing with small

women and hurting them no no not saying

that alright somebody says it would be

worse for all women how tell me one way

that it would be worse for all women

again I'll use my stepdaughter as an

example she did not play it on this

school team she played in a recreational

league and so instead of sitting on the

bench on the school team she got to play

every game and and do well against

people her level in a recreational

league was that bad for my stepdaughter

that she didn't get to be on the

school's team sitting on the bench no

she made friends she had discipline she

learned sports she had teamwork she got

every benefit you could get at the level

she was playing

it was a competitive fun to watch it was

everything there was nothing missing

sure there are a few few people who

would not get to be the star of high

school on the team who cares just the

one person who didn't get that right so

yeah I won't say it's unfair I will say

it'll be different and some other people

would get advantages and some others

would not so we we sort of fetishize

sports like they're far more special

than they are they're not that special

you can have a recreational league that

you played just for fun

and you get all the benefits all of them

in fact better benefits because you're

more likely to play the entire game and

if you try to get in the competitive the

sport only a few people get to be

starters all right somebody says which

is better for self esteem by far the

recreational leagues there are some

people who would have better self-esteem

by competing at the highest level on a

woman only team all the rest are better

off playing on a team with people that

are friends and the same level so the

only reason I like this topic is because

it triggers people into a hallucination

of what I'm saying

so that they can maintain their

disagreement but the thing that causes

the blind spot is that they can't see

there was never anything but a political

reason that there were ever two

different leagues one for men and one

for women it never made sense from the

beginning it was simply something that

people wanted so they got it they had

the power they wanted it they got it and

I'm not even saying there's anything

wrong with that I'm just saying that you

know well let me be more clear about

that there are things that make sense at

a certain time and place I think it was

good and beneficial the women got their

own leagues and then got to compete and

it got to be athletes and and all that

so I think the way it is and the way was

designed to be totally positive

I also think you need to rethink things

now and then and we've reached a point

where there's everybody understands that

women can be athletes right it wasn't

long ago that the idea of a woman

playing a sport would just seem like at

a place but we're not in that place we

were way beyond it now everybody

understands there are male athletes

female athletes transgender athletes

they're just athletes so once you're

once your society has moved past the

question of hey can a woman play a sport

whoa I didn't know women could play

sport whoa once you've moved past that

into everybody play sports then you can

design a system that doesn't have to

solve a social problem having female

only sports

solved a social problem that is solved

so you don't need to solve the problem

that is already solved we already

understand women can play sports duh all

right once you get that it's all easy

okay that's all I got for now I've got

to go to a lot of work because my

electricity's can go off at noon

apparently literally I live in this

stupid third-world country called

California and I'll tell you we don't

know for sure if the electricity will go

off it has to do with it has to do with

how much wind there is some other places

the state but if it does we have to get

rid of our governor we have to change

our government if if my if my power goes

out I'm suddenly going to be very active

in California politics which I've never

cared about never cared about it but if

my power goes out today from bad

management I'm gonna get real interested

in the governorship not running but

getting somebody in there who can do the

work so that's we're on that and I will

talk to you all later