anies and intellectual property theft and all that, apparently there's some information we haven't seen yet that would suggest that China is backing Black Lives Matter. Now I ask you, does that sound likely? Does it seem likely or unlikely to you that China might have at least tried—I don't know how successful they were—but at least tried to encourage Black Lives Matter to do a little more protesting? Because here's the calculation you should look at when trying to decide if that's true.

Number one, would they think of it? Of course. Of course. So you don't have to wonder, hey, did China have that idea? Had they considered it? Did anybody suggest, hey, maybe you should back the protesters who are making the United States look bad? Of course they thought of it, because if this situation were reversed, we would have thought of it. I mean, I'm sure we've backed dissidents and protesters in other countries. That's pretty basic.

The second thing you should ask for is what would be the penalty for getting caught? And we already know the penalty for getting caught. It's nothing. This consulate closed, but they have other consulates. The penalty is basically nothing. One consulate got closed. It's not as if they don't have computers and hackers and thieves in other consulates. I don't know how much difference does it make if you live in Houston versus you've got a consulate somewhere else. So I don't think there is any risk. It just costs a little money, right? They've got to move a consulate. But it's not like anybody died. It's not like we completely decoupled over this. It didn't tell us anything we didn't already know. No risk.

So if there's no risk but there's a potential big reward, and there could be if they're destabilizing the United States, of course it's happening. In the situation where they think of it, there are lots of people involved. You know, in China there's lots of people involved and there's a big payoff and a small risk. It'll happen every time. Every time it's going to happen. I mean, mischief will happen under those conditions.

So CNN continues to be funny in trying to be serious. So Kaitlan Collins, who's one of their loyal anti-Trump voices, she was mocking him in a written article, I think there was a video piece, because he decided to cancel the Republican National Convention, which of course she would agree with because CNN is sort of anti-large gatherings unless they're protests. And then she says that he would cancel his convention despite pushing for schools to reopen. Now the implication is that that would be inconsistent. Why would the president not think it was safe to have a convention if he does think it's safe to send kids to school? Is that a fair comparison?

You know, I complain all the time that people who come up through a journalism or some specific profession, if they don't have a broad understanding of how to make decisions and how to compare things the way an economist or an engineer or scientist would, that they say consistently dumb things but don't know it. And I don't think anything could be dumber than saying I don't understand the consistency. If the president thinks that a bunch of older adults packed into a room is dangerous, why doesn't he think that the group who basically doesn't get coronavirus—why wouldn't he think they're dangerous? They couldn't be more different situations. They couldn't be more different.

Now, is it true that opening schools will also cause spread of the coronavirus? Yes. Yes. Everybody knows that. The president knows that. Nobody's denying it. It's just that we think that's a level that's controllable if you're comparing it to the presumed benefits of getting kids back to school. That there is a risk, but it's one that the president decides is worth it. I don't know how CNN can pretend that they can't see the difference there. And they're looking for these little gotchas.

Five Seattle news organizations were ordered by a judge to turn over their video and photos for protests. So law enforcement wanted to get a hold of all the video and pictures of protests so they could find out who to arrest, etc. News organizations resisted, and now the King County Superior Court said that they have to give it up. Interesting. So all of the news organizations just became weaponized by the police. Will that change? I don't know. So can the news organizations continue to send news crews who will take pictures and video, knowing that those pictures and video will go directly to the police and then the news organizations will be part of what's disbanding Black Lives Matter? Very ticklish position to be in, wouldn't you say?

I saw somebody asking me about what's his name, Portnoy and Barstool. Barstool Sports. He did an interview with President Trump. People are saying, and I would agree with him—I like to use that Trump phrase, people are saying—that that's the best interview with the president that they've ever seen. And I would say I would agree. In terms of entertainment and in terms of humanizing the president and just having fun with it, probably the best one. I would say it's the best interview with the president I've seen.

Now the president was very good at avoiding the questions. So it was this weird situation. Yeah, Dave Portnoy. It was this weird situation where Dave would ask a question such as, you know, do you always use the power handshake with world leaders? Wouldn't you like to know the answer to that question? It was like he asked the question that I've thought about for so long and nobody's ever asked it. Now of course the president completely ignored the question and just talked about handshakes and coronavirus and how world leaders love him and stuff, which was perfectly executed media spin, if you will. In other words, the president is just really good at turning the question into whatever he wanted the question to be, which is what you actually learn when you take media training. You learn how t