10/23/25: US Gaza Master Plan Revealed, Hannity Demands Venezuela Regime Change, WH Demolitions, Graham Platner Tattoo

18:23Saagar Enjeti:This is Special Agent Regal, Special Agent Bradley Hall. This MSS officer has no idea the U.S. government is on to him. But the FBI has his chats, texts, emails, even his personal diary. Hear how they got it on the Sixth Bureau podcast. I now have several terabytes of an MSS officer, no doubt, no question, of his life. And that's a unicorn. No one had ever seen anything like that. It was unbelievable. This is a story of the inner workings of the MSS and how one man's ambition and mistakes opened its vault of secrets. Listen to The Sixth Bureau on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

19:10Krystal Ball:In 2023, a story gripped the UK, evoking horror and disbelief.

19:16Saagar Enjeti:The nurse who should have been in charge of caring for tiny babies is now the most prolific child killer in modern British history.

19:25Krystal Ball:Everyone thought they knew how it ended. A verdict? A villain. A nurse named Lucy Letby. Lucy Letby has been found guilty. But what if we didn't get the whole story? The moment you look at the whole picture, the case collapses. I'm Amanda Knox and in the new podcast Doubt the case of Lucy Letby we follow the evidence and hear from the people that lived it to ask what really happened

19:49Saagar Enjeti:when the world decided who Lucy Letby was no voicing of any skepticism or doubt it'll cause so much harm at every single level of the British establishment of this is wrong

20:02Krystal Ball:listen to Doubt the case of Lucy Letby on the iHeartRadio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts Hi, this is Jo Winterstein, host of the Spirit Daughter podcast, where we talk about astrology, natal charts, and how to step into your most vibrant life.

20:20Saagar Enjeti:And I just sat down with a mini driver. The Irish traveler said when I was 16, you're going to have a terrible time with men.

20:28Krystal Ball:Actor, storyteller, and unapologetic Aquarian visionary. Aquarius is all about freedom loving and different perspectives. and I find a lot of people with strong placements in Aquarius

20:40Saagar Enjeti:like are misunderstood. A sun and Venus in Aquarius in her seventh house spark her unconventional approach to partnership. He really has taught me to embrace people sleeping in different rooms, on different houses, in different places, but just an embracing of the is-ness of it all.

20:56Krystal Ball:If you're navigating your own transformation or just want a chart-side view into how a leading artist integrates astrology, creativity, and real life, This episode is a must listen. Listen to the Spirit Daughter podcast starting on February 24th on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

21:17Saagar Enjeti:Let's get to Venezuela. There's a lot of moving parts, but the major breaking news, President Trump from the Oval Office yesterday saying that he will soon notify Congress that land strikes on Venezuela must begin. Let's take a listen. Legal authority if they do come. Yes, we do. We have legal authority. We're allowed to do that. And if we do buy land, we may go back to Congress. But we have this is a national security problem. They killed 300 ,000 people last year. Drugs, these drugs coming in. They killed 300 ,000 Americans last year. And that gives you legal authority. We have a national security.

21:55Saagar Enjeti:Really, I will say this. when you look at the people we're dealing with and we know them we know the people coming in we know the boats we know everything else we're allowed to do it it's in international waters if we don't do it we're going to lose hundreds of thousands of people now they'll be coming in by land a little bit more because they're not coming in by boat anymore there are no boats in the water there are no more boats we know the boat almost immediately you know it's pretty unusual or when you see somebody with a fishing rod and five engines on the back of a boat. You know, you don't need that to go fishing.

22:31Saagar Enjeti:Wait, wait, wait. And we will hit them very hard when they come in by land. And they haven't experienced that yet, but now we're totally prepared to do that. We'll probably go back to Congress and explain exactly what we're doing when we come to the land. We don't have to do that, but I think, Marco, I'd like to do that. You may respond to that. So, yeah. Now we are going to come to the land. Let me just explain a little bit because the sea campaign has actually heated up over just the last 24 hours. There was a new announcement of a strike on drug traffickers, but actually in the Pacific or alleged drug traffickers, I should say, that was actually in the Pacific Ocean.

23:13Saagar Enjeti:So this is now a two ocean front war. Now, I mean, what you look at from the expanding nature, not only of the boats, but of the rhetoric in terms of striking the land would obviously be a massive escalation. The reason why he says he has to notify Congress is all of this is currently being done under a drug interdiction mission. But none of it has actually been justified, presented with evidence. There is frankly – I mean, look, Ryan and I are working on a big Venezuela story right now. I can't give away all the details. The one tidbit I can offer is that there is not one shred of evidence internally that fentanyl is on any single one of these boats.

23:50Saagar Enjeti:Not one piece of evidence that fentanyl is on these boats, which is, again, I mean, this is the rhetorical justification of the strike. By the way, what he says there about the boats. Again, small tidbit that we can offer. These boats would have to stop and refuel some 20 times in order to get to the United States. The current intel is that they're not heading to the U.S. is that they're most likely heading to different places in the Caribbean, namely Trinidad and Tobago. By the way, everything I just said, Rand Paul also just echoed on TV, so I'm not giving anything in particular really away.

24:23Saagar Enjeti:I'm just telling you that that's from based on our reporting. That's what we can able to offer you. So this is all part of a regime change operation. There's just no other way to describe it. Maduro quite literally offered up everything by Trump's own admission, in addition to numerous reported outlets about some of the behind the scenes talk. So this is, I mean, look, this is where things are trending right now. Trump genuinely believes the best way to get access to Venezuelan oil is to overthrow the government. The drug thing is a pretext. It has nothing to do with that. It has to do with minerals, which we'll show you here in a little bit, but it's scary.

24:57Saagar Enjeti:It's scary.

24:58Krystal Ball:There are a few things to pick up on from his comments. So let's be clear. What they're doing is random murder in terms of attacking these boats. I mean, the few details that we've had at this point, some of the people who were murdered who have been identified were like random fishermen. So maybe some of them are drug traffickers. We don't know that any of the literally any of them are. And they have now killed dozens of people without offering a shred of evidence that these are even the individuals that they claim. And Soghar and Ryan's reporting that they have zero evidence internally that any of these boats have fentanyl on them, even though that is what they are telling the American public, that is in and of itself a bombshell.

25:36Krystal Ball:That's number one. Number two, when he says they're going to come to the land, maybe we'll go to Congress. We don't have to go to Congress. Maybe we'll go to Congress. Let's be really clear about what that means. So right now, we have random murder of potential fishermen in the Caribbean and the Pacific. What he's proposing is random murder of people here on the land. That's what that expansion means. So they are trying to claim the power to unilaterally just murder random people that they announce to the public are drug traffickers without providing evidence. That is the power that they are trying to claim.

26:16Krystal Ball:Maybe they'll go to Congress and maybe they won't because Trump doesn't seem to think that they have to. So that's number two. Number three, let me read to you what Pete Hegseth tweeted out in response to announce this latest murder at sea. He says, because some of the language here is very important. So he says, today at the direction of President Trump, the Department of War carried out yet another lethal kinetic strike on a vessel operated by a designated terrorist organization, DTO. Yet again, the now deceased terrorists were engaged in narco-trafficking in the Eastern Pacific. We're just supposed to take their word for that, by the way.

26:49Krystal Ball:The vessel was known by our intelligence to be involved in illicit narcotic smuggling, was transiting along a known narco-trafficking route, and was carrying narcotics. Three male narco-terrorists were aboard the vessel during the strike, which was conducted in international waters. All three terrorists were killed, and no U.S. forces were harmed in this strike. These strikes will continue day after day. These are not simply drug runners. These are narco-terrorists bringing death and destruction to our cities. These DTOs are the Al-Qaeda of our hemisphere and will not escape justice. We will find them and kill them until the threat to the American people is extinguished.

27:23Krystal Ball:So that language there saying these are the Al-Qaeda's of our hemisphere, that is the pretext, the linguistic pretext that they're trying to use and convince you of to allow them this unconscionable power grab. That's the way they're framing it. And I think, you know, the regime change part is terrifying. Like everyone should be very concerned about that, but it should also be very concerning to you what they're already doing and the powers that they're claiming for not only these attacks on boats, but now trying to claim for here domestically on U.S. soil.

27:57Saagar Enjeti:Yes, you're exactly right. It is literally just GWAT logic, GWAT rhetoric. And in some cases, the new rhetoric is actually more extreme than the GWAT because at no time during the war in Iraq, even when we were spreading democracy, apparently, uh, to Iraq and Afghanistan. Did people come to the airwaves and say that Iraq should be the 51st state, but did not put that past Lindsey Graham and Sean Hannity on Fox news. Let's take a listen. I had a chat with you this weekend and I thought you had a pretty darn good idea. And you said you were going to share it with the president. I want to know if you did.

28:31Krystal Ball:And that is this, this opposition leader in Venezuela that won the Nobel prize that said it really deserved to go to Donald Trump. Uh, sounds like a pretty good leader to me for the people of Venezuela and the end of narco-terrorism and a better relationship with the U.S. Or if they choose maybe the 51st state. I don't know. Sounds good to be.

28:52Saagar Enjeti:Sounds good to me. 51st state of Venezuela. So, you know, we can't simultaneously be for mass deportation of Venezuelan migrants. What does Trump always say? He's like, they opened up the asylums, they opened up the jails, and they sent them here. So we're going to send them back and then we're going to create them and turn them into a favor. And then they're all going to be citizens. OK. OK. That's not to mention the fact that it would cause mass illegal migration even if there was some sort of regime collapse. Again, I don't want to get too ahead of the story Ryan and I are working on. But we have some bombshell stuff that we can report.

29:29Saagar Enjeti:The intel stuff, frankly, is some of the least interesting. But the point I just want to stick to is there is no evidence that Maduro is actually like a large scale drug trafficker, number one. Number two, there's no fentanyl on any of these boats. Number three, these boats, all the current intelligence, not even show that they're necessarily heading for the United States. Number four, all of the powers that are being claimed by the administration are ones that the George W. Bush presidency and the Obama presidency use as sweeping powers to be able to drone strike and kill whoever they want. And five is actually Congress because the thing is is that nobody is really doing anything about this inside of Congress.

30:07Saagar Enjeti:Like look, I always say this. The true threat to America is real bipartisanship. The stuff that everybody just comes 98-0 votes on, things like regime change in Iraq, Afghanistan, Ukraine, and you only have a few shitsters like Rand Paul and Thomas Massey willing to speak out. That's the real danger to the country. I don't see any large-scale demonstration or – people like – look, I'll give credit where due, but let's be honest. It's like a minority congressman, a minority caucus in a minority ruling party of the House has no power to do anything. There's no stand-up about authorities here. It's very scary, and it's moving much quicker.

30:50Saagar Enjeti:Again, I really don't think that the media is covering this properly. Like, nobody points to the fact—the United States senators think Venezuela should be a 51st state combined with regime change operation should freak everybody. It should be front page international news. Yes. And everyone's just like, oh, yeah. I mean, we just struck two—it's a two-ocean war now. Like, when's the last time the United States even did a two-ocean strike? I don't even know.

31:11Krystal Ball:And maybe just—maybe the opposition party should have something to say about that, you know? I mean, you have a few outliers like Ro Khanna. But by and large, they are silent. I mean, it's just disappointment doesn't even begin to describe it. It really is like they barely exist. And so part of the reason why the media doesn't cover it in the way that it is is because in the way that it should is because they aren't getting those signals from the opposition party of like, holy, this is really bad and making the case against this. So the American people know what's going on and can evaluate for themselves whether or not they'd be like to be in a regime change war against Venezuela or like to be blowing up random fishermen in the Caribbean or like to have those powers brought here to domestic soil.

31:53Krystal Ball:And so, you know, there's it's astonishing to me how little fight they have, how afraid they are of taking him on on, you know, anything outside of these few narrow issues. And so that's part of why you don't have a mass upset over this in the population because there are so few voices that are actually speaking out against it at this point.

32:15Saagar Enjeti:Yeah, I mean, also, let's say about MAGA too. This is part of why I think Venezuela is more dangerous than Iran, and this will sound crazy like the operation, is that there is no organized rhetoric, language, or project that takes invading Venezuela as a serious thing and opposes it. So on Iran, not nearly enough people spoke up, in my opinion, but there was an organized effort on the right to speak up and to say that this is a bad idea to pursue regime change in Iran and to not allow the Israelis to go full on and actually do it. Now, they still might, but to be clear, at the time, there was a real organized effort, and the White House felt some pressure.

32:53Saagar Enjeti:On Venezuela, they feel nothing. A huge part of the MAGA commentariat actually believes the fentanyl claim. I don't know why. I mean, listen, Ryan and I will put a story out soon. it just tells you it's complete bullshit. You don't need to hear it from me. You can hear it from a lot of other people. There's no fentanyl in Venezuela. DEA statistics say there's no fentanyl in Venezuela. But they're like, these people killed my cousin or whatever from heroin overdose. It's like, guys, no, they didn't. I'm sorry. I'm sorry that happened to you. But your literal emotions are being weaponized by the government for a legitimate neocon wet dream of overthrowing Venezuela.

33:28Saagar Enjeti:So the fact that there's no organized project actually seems to me Like it's going to be more likely because what MAGA likes is the expansion of administrative power and strikes. It always feels good to blow up drug traffickers again. Again, there's not necessarily any evidence behind that. But they don't have a theory for how this can go badly. Like you can't simultaneously oppose mass migration, which I do and which a lot of them ostensibly say. You can't talk about Trendyra, Aragua and Venezuelan takeovers of neighborhoods and say that deposing the regime of Nicolas Maduro is going to do anything about that.

34:01Saagar Enjeti:Same thing. We have allies, neighbors in the region, Colombia. These are thriving big countries, Central America, and also who we are reliant on to make sure that they stem the crisis before it even comes here. Where do you think they're all going to go? In the same route that they did under Biden, they're going to flood the border. So just think about it. Maybe they won't make it here. They're going to make it to you. And so there's an entire theory that is so obvious but has not yet been articulated. and all they're hearing instead is Pete Hegseth, Fox News, and Trump and others being like, oh, this is actually the highest and best use of our military.

34:37Saagar Enjeti:It's honestly scary. The internal dynamics, I'll just say it. I mean, not that anybody listens to me, but you're getting taken for a ride. Like this is complete BS. It's crazy. 100%. Every claim on fentanyl, drugs, I'm telling you, it's false and they know it's false. They stumbled on the drug thing after months to convince Trump because originally they're like, oh, he stole the election. Trump's like, I don't care if he stole the election. He's like, I do the same. They're like, he's bad. He's a murderer. So? I mean, what? We don't have murderers that we do diplomatic relations with? Who gives a shit what's going on in Venezuela?

35:13Saagar Enjeti:But eventually they came down to drugs. He seems to believe it based on this fake indictment from 2020 and this new, what is it? The$50 million bounty. Bounty. Scary, man.

35:24Krystal Ball:Unbelievable, yeah. Yeah, it is terrifying how easily people can just be talked into war. Like, all you have to do is hit whatever their policy erogenous zone is. Oh, they're narco-terrorists, fentanyl. And without any sort of critical thought, they're ready for the next regime change war. And zero thought about what the consequences of that will be. Zero thought about whether any of what they're being fed is truthful. Crazy. It's very disturbing to see. In 2023, a story gripped the UK, evoking horror and disbelief.

35:58Saagar Enjeti:A nurse who should have been in charge of caring for tiny babies is now the most prolific child killer in modern British history.

36:07Krystal Ball:Everyone thought they knew how it ended. A verdict, a villain, a nurse named Lucy Letby. Lucy Letby has been found guilty. But what if we didn't get the whole story? The moment you look at the whole picture, the case collapses. I'm Amanda Knox, and in the new podcast, Doubt, the case of Lucy Letby, we follow the evidence and hear from the people that lived it to ask what really happened when the world decided who Lucy Letby was.

36:35Saagar Enjeti:No voicing of any skepticism or doubt. It'll cause so much harm at every single level if the British establishment of this is wrong.

36:44Krystal Ball:Listen to Doubt, the case of Lucy Letby on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

36:54Saagar Enjeti:China's Ministry of State Security is one of the most mysterious and powerful spy agencies in the world. But in 2017, the FBI got inside. This is Special Agent Regal, Special Agent Bradley Hall. This MSS officer has no idea the U.S. government is on to him. But the FBI has his chats, texts, emails, even his personal diary. Hear how they got it on the Sixth Bureau podcast. I now have several terabytes of an MSS officer, no doubt, no question, of his life. And that's a unicorn. No one had ever seen anything like that. It was unbelievable. This is a story of the inner workings of the MSS and how one man's ambition and mistakes opened its vault of secrets.

37:44Saagar Enjeti:Listen to The Sixth Bureau on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

37:51Krystal Ball:Hi, this is Jo Winterstein, host of The Spirit Daughter Podcast, where we talk about astrology, natal charts,

37:58Saagar Enjeti:and how to step into your most vibrant life.

38:01Krystal Ball:And I just sat down with a mini driver.

38:03Saagar Enjeti:The Irish traveler said when I was 16, you're going to have a terrible time with men.

38:08Krystal Ball:Actor, storyteller, and unapologetic Aquarian visionary. Aquarius is all about freedom loving and different perspectives. And I find a lot of people with strong placements in Aquarius are misunderstood.

38:22Saagar Enjeti:A sun and Venus in Aquarius in her seventh house spark her unconventional approach to partnership. He really has taught me to embrace people sleeping in different rooms, on different houses, in different places, but just an embracing of the is-ness of it all.

38:36Krystal Ball:If you're navigating your own transformation or just want a chartside view into how a leading artist integrates astrology, creativity, and real life, this episode is a must listen. Listen to the Spirit Daughter podcast starting on February 24th on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

38:58Saagar Enjeti:I can't be the only one which is watched with great alarm as the entire White House East Wing will now be demolished in favor of Donald Trump's announced presidential ballroom. Here he is laying out the reasoning. Let me just, before we even play it, though, let me describe this. Of course, he had announced his plans for the ballroom, whatever. OK, so he's going to build this new ballroom on the White House campus. However, what actually comes out now is that in order to build said ballroom, you have to demolish the entire historical part of the East Wing. Demolition pictures began to leak online.

39:31Saagar Enjeti:They eventually told them, hey, stop taking pictures of it if you work in the government and leaking it to the press. Then they said, oh, only the facade itself will be destroyed. No, now they're coming for the whole thing. Here's Trump laying it out. In order to do it properly, we had to take down the existing structure. The way it was shown, it looked like we were touching the White House. We don't touch the White House. that's a bridge at last bridge going from the white house to the ballroom. Then you get into the lobby of the ballroom and then you go into the magnificent, the main room. And it's something that has gotten incredible reviews.

40:06Saagar Enjeti:Something that's gotten incredible reviews. Shall we, let's review it. We'll all review it together. Let's play it. Let's, let's put it up here on the screen. Yep. Here's the video. That's the East wing. That's a bulldozer. they're taking it down this is from above the fence again this is the historic East Wing part of the White House where millions of tourists have gone I've walked this halls a lot of times it's really nice if you ever had the ability to go to the Christmas tour or anything like that that's it all right there in favor of this whatever this is this gigantic new footprint the East Wing the ballroom.

40:50Saagar Enjeti:Look at that. Look at that. I'm sorry. You know, yeah, I don't even have words. It's like the tackiest shit I've ever seen in my entire life. I mean, just look at some of these renderings. On the left, you can see the tiny little West Wing where the Colonnade, the Rose Garden, which by the way has already destroyed the Rose Garden as well. Rose Garden is here. On top of what you can see for the West Wing, the Oval Office, the magisterium of like the understated part of the Oval Office in favor of a Gilded Age Breaker-style mansion of a ballroom which will be used for how many times in a year, it's grotesque.

41:23Saagar Enjeti:I mean, look, I mean, the one benefit is that nobody's paying for it, like in terms of the taxpayers. Apparently it's going to be some$300 billion. But even that, it's being sponsored by some major corporation. I mean, the thing that just galls me about this is the taste. It's so disconnected from American public history, architecture, anything that even remotely calls back to our reverence for our history. And, of course, their cope is like, oh, well, Harry Truman remodeled. Yeah, it's not the same. It's just not. By the way, that one actually was in conjunction with the White House Historical Association.

42:02Saagar Enjeti:It was done because the White House was falling apart, not because we need a fucking ballroom so that you can entertain more than 900 guests. they even say they're going to modernize it, which makes me literally want to have a brain aneurysm. If you've ever been to the East wing, the entire point of the place is that it has deep history. If you want to put AC vents or something like that, okay, fine. But nobody, I mean, I'm just imagining glass sliding doors and fluorescent lighting in the East wing. And it's going to give me an overall brain aneurysm. Just looking at all of this. Now, here's the final question.

42:35Saagar Enjeti:Do you agree with Neera Tanden's take that the images of the white house could swing the election. I was like, look, Nira, Nira, you're after my heart. I am one of those people. I am a White House swing voter. But even I am not naive enough to say that people give a shit about the East Wing or the West Wing. I only honestly, let's be honest, it's kind of an insider thing to even care because 99 % of the US population has never even been inside of the East Wing. I've probably been there 10 or 15 times. The Blue Room, the Red Room, You know, all of these gorgeous places, even the photos don't really capture it.

43:12Saagar Enjeti:You know, when I go in this place, I'm like, wow, FDR did a fireside chat here. You know, this is where the famous George W. Bush interview and all that happened. I guess Americans just don't care. Trump certainly doesn't care at all. But I don't know. Maybe I can hopefully inspire some reverence for our great architecture in favor of whatever this is.

43:28Krystal Ball:It makes me feel very conservative.

43:30Saagar Enjeti:Good. I'm glad to have you.

43:31Krystal Ball:I mean, I do feel it. Glad to have you. I don't know if I listen. I don't know. Maybe Nir is right. Who knows, right, what lands with people. And there is something clearly Trump finds it to be somewhat of a political problem because, number one, he lied and said that the East Wing wouldn't be touched. It wouldn't be touched at all. There will be no demolition. It'll just go up alongside of it, like no demolition whatsoever.

43:50Saagar Enjeti:Which I was concerned about, but I was like, OK, whatever. Maybe.

43:53Krystal Ball:Yeah, he's a builder, maybe. So, number one, he felt the need to lie about it and continues to lie about it. Number two, he felt the need to cover up the pictures and demand that no one take a picture of this because. So he certainly has some sense that this is at least not a great political look. Is it going to swing the next election? I guess we'll never know. We'll have to do some sophisticated political regression analysis to figure out if this was the factor. Maybe we'll see his approval rating fall off a cliff and be able to point to this renovation, demolition, whatever. But it does make me feel very conservative.

44:25Krystal Ball:Good. It makes me feel because, I mean, I do feel this sense of, like, this isn't your—this is all of ours. Like all of our nation's history, like all of these historic things that occurred in these spaces. And you just feel the power of a king to just knock it down without asking anyone's permission, without going to the public and seeing if that was something that people are interested in. Like, forget the money, but just, you know, you've now destroyed a space that cannot be rebuilt. And I can't remember. I wish I remember who was saying this, but there was another progressive who was saying, like, why does this bother me so much?

45:01Krystal Ball:and their analysis. And I think this could be the I think there could be something to this is that it is a physical representation of like Trump and his long legacy that is now going to be left. And I think that's what that's why he wants it as well. And so, you know, when it was just one term and this was some of the emotions that I think we all grappled with when Trump got reelected, when it's just one term that can kind of be an aberration. You know, Hillary is a bad candidate and there was backlash to obama and all these kind of weird you know russia and whatever was going comey and whatever was going on when he gets re-elected a second time you're like oh this is not an average and wins the popular vote yeah this this is actually where our country is now and so i feel like this is sort of a physical manifestation of that which is why i find it i do find it really i think that's fine from like some left point of view i'll just give

45:52Saagar Enjeti:you a more value neutral one yeah which is that uh it's the white house it doesn't belong to you doesn't belong to anybody, is that you are at the mercy of history in a certain sense, as in you assume the office, the office doesn't assume you. And that's really what it's about, is that the point is, is that the office is supposed to be bigger than everyone else. All previous renovations.

46:10Krystal Ball:You're a guest in our house.

46:11Saagar Enjeti:I know this genuinely, this sounds cringe and quaint at this point to even talk this way, because this is how they talk on MSNBC. But it is unironically true at a very base level of, no, it's the people's house. It is the White House. Now, previous renovations that have happened include Harry Truman. By the way, it was super controversial when he added the Truman balcony. It was not, people were not happy about it. They basically added it for the pleasure of the president. I guess it's been 60, 70 years, so we can get over it. At this point, I'm still not over it. But it's one of those where the whole point is, if you've ever been there, it's not that nice.

46:47Saagar Enjeti:And that's actually, I used to hate it whenever I would work there. But I have come to appreciate the charm of the fact that it is kind of a dilapidated office building. I don't know if you saw this. There's this viral photo of Nick Saban, who was the coach at Alabama. And he had this beautiful wooden office with all of these books and things behind him. And it just looked so vintage as if a place where a person works. And then his successor, I think his name is Kalen DeBoer, came in and turned it into like a glass T-Mobile store. And by the way, the team isn't doing as well under the new code.

47:24Saagar Enjeti:But there was something about that which was just so physically jarring for many people. And that's kind of how I feel about this entire thing is just looking at it, it seems disconnected. And actually, frankly, even that ballroom is just so reminiscent of the worst architectural design of US history. But if we are living in a second Gilded Age, maybe it makes sense. I mean, it does fit with that.

47:46Krystal Ball:I think that's the other part that bothers me too is some of the money is coming from the like extortion that he's doing on these, you know, tech platforms. And I think some of the like YouTube fealty money is going to one of the things that I saw. Yeah, I think so. Double check that. But that was the headline that I saw. And so it but OK, what are what is his time and focus and attention going to building out this hideous, gaudy, like, you know, golfy meets Versailles meets Mar-a-Lago ballroom for a bunch of rich elites who can come and suck up to him and pay tribute and bring their gold bars or whatever it is to get their, you know, their goodies.

48:27Krystal Ball:And so even like the purpose of it is gross, let alone the visuals of it. So, uh, yeah, it does, it does bother me. I am, I, the pictures of it are visually jarring. Is it going to sway the election near? I don't know about that. I'd like to believe it, but I don't know.

48:43Saagar Enjeti:Us in Northern Virginia.

48:44Krystal Ball:You never know. You just stand up. You just never know.

48:47Saagar Enjeti:Look, what I would hope is it inspires a love of history. And part of the reason why watching the transformation of the Oval Office and of the ballroom or the East Wing and all of this is because at least previous presidents, some, had a deep reverence for the things that actually happened in that room. And I've told this story before, but one of the things that really hit with me whenever I interviewed Trump, it was maybe the first or second time, is the first time I ever went into the Oval Office. I was like, that's the Jack Kennedy shot, right, you know, at the desk. And I thought about Nixon and Kissinger preying on the floor right before his resignation or Eisenhower and where he would play his goal.

49:25Saagar Enjeti:You know, all these things you've read about for years and years and years. And then I'm looking at this man. I'm like, he doesn't think about any of that. He doesn't even know about it. Maybe, I don't know. Probably not. But, you know, or Jackson, like is this portrait of Jackson? I'm thinking about even the Oval Room itself, such an unusual shape and the evolution of how that kind of came to be, the Resolute Desk, the HMS Resolute. These are all the things that are like rolling through my mind. Now, that can be bad. It doesn't necessarily translate to political success or to great leadership or any of that.

49:53Saagar Enjeti:But in that moment, I was like, oh, he doesn't care about any of that. And, you know, it's clear, obviously, in this is that, you know, imprinting this view of like who America is is kind of in his own form. So yes, you're right in that it is a physical thing of Trump's legacy. But more broadly, I think it is, I don't know. I think it's like a loss of history and a venerance of something. You can't get that back. You can't get back the East Wing. And however it does, they say they're going to modernize it. I don't want it to be modernized. It needs to stay relatively the same. That's kind of how we treat most of these places.

50:28Saagar Enjeti:It's like if anybody in Washington has ever been to the Hart Senate Office Building, it's a glass construction box. It looks like shit. Compared to the Russell Senate office building, it's marble. When you walk the halls, you see signs like, this was John F. Kennedy's office. This was LBJ's office. That's how it should be, in my opinion, just to ground people down to at least something that they are remotely connected to. Yeah. I don't know. Yeah, I agree with you. It makes me very sad. It makes me very, very sad. Especially for the future generations. You know, I had a dream. My wife and I, we'd done multiple tours, and we were talking recently, like, oh, we could take her to the White House.

51:01Saagar Enjeti:You know, and I'm like, no, she won't get to see it.

51:04Krystal Ball:That's right.

51:04Saagar Enjeti:It took that away from me.

51:05Krystal Ball:Yeah. One thing I will say about Nira's point is I think if it was like Obama or Biden who did it, the Republicans would be able to make it. The right would be able to make this effective campaign issue.

51:16Saagar Enjeti:Yes, you're absolutely right.

51:16Krystal Ball:Can the Democrats pull that off? I don't have that level of confidence.

51:20Saagar Enjeti:I agree. I agree. China's Ministry of State Security is one of the most mysterious and powerful spy agencies in the world. But in 2017, the FBI got inside. This is Special Agent Regal. Special Agent Bradley Hall. This MSS officer has no idea the U.S. government is on to him. But the FBI has his chats, texts, emails, even his personal diary. Hear how they got it on the Sixth Bureau podcast. I now have several terabytes of an MSS officer, no doubt, no question, of his life. And that's a unicorn. No one had ever seen anything like that. It was unbelievable. This is a story of the inner workings of the MSS and how one man's ambition and mistakes opened its vault of secrets.

52:14Saagar Enjeti:Listen to The Sixth Bureau on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

52:21Krystal Ball:Hi, this is Jo Winterstein, host of the Spirit Daughter podcast, where we talk about astrology, natal charts, and how to step into your most vibrant life.

52:31Saagar Enjeti:And I just sat down with a mini driver. The Irish traveler said when I was 16, you're going to have a terrible time with men.

52:38Krystal Ball:Actor, storyteller, and unapologetic Aquarian visionary. Aquarius is all about freedom loving and different perspectives. And I find a lot of people with strong placements in Aquarius

52:51Saagar Enjeti:like are misunderstood. A sun and Venus in Aquarius in her seventh house spark her unconventional approach to partnership. He really has taught me to embrace people sleeping in different rooms, on different houses, in different places, but just an embracing of the is-ness of it all.

53:06Krystal Ball:If you're navigating your own transformation or just want a chart-side view into how a leading artist integrates astrology, creativity, and real life, this episode is a must-listen. Listen to the Spirit Daughter podcast starting on February 24th on the iHeartRadio app,

53:23Saagar Enjeti:Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your podcasts.

53:26Krystal Ball:In 2023, a story gripped the UK, evoking horror and disbelief.

53:33Saagar Enjeti:A nurse who should have been in charge of caring for tiny babies is now the most prolific child killer in modern British history.

53:41Krystal Ball:Everyone thought they knew how it ended. A verdict, a villain, a nurse named Lucy Letby. Lucy Letby has been found guilty. But what if we didn't get the whole story? The moment you look at the whole picture, the case collapses. I'm Amanda Knox and in the new podcast Doubt the case of Lucy Letby we follow the evidence and hear from the people that lived it to ask what really happened

54:05Saagar Enjeti:when the world decided who Lucy Letby was no voicing of any skepticism or doubt it'll cause so much harm at every single level of the British establishment of this is wrong

54:18Krystal Ball:listen to Doubt the case of Lucy Letby on the iHeartRadio app Apple Podcasts or wherever you get

54:24Saagar Enjeti:your podcasts. Crystal, what are you taking a look at?

54:29Krystal Ball:So guess what, guys? Graham Plattner's tattoo has made me more ride or die for him than ever. Let me explain my thinking here. So as Ryan and Emily covered yesterday, Maine Democratic Senate candidate Graham Plattner is under fire for a variety of old Reddit comments and an extremely poor tattoo choice. So here's that tattoo revealed in a pic of Graham drunkenly serenading the crowd with Miley Cyrus's wrecking ball as a gag at his brother's wedding. Honestly, it's a good song. You guys should listen to it. Graham says he got the tattoo with a few of his buddies in the service during a drunken night of shore leave in Croatia.

55:02Krystal Ball:And it turns out it's not just a cool looking skull and crossbones, but a Nazi insignia. Well, yesterday we received the update that he has already had that tattoo covered. Let's take a listen.

55:11Saagar Enjeti:I think that racism and anti-Semitism are a long scourge on our society and a long scourge on our politics. And I think it has no place in our world. For that reason, I have gone and gotten it covered up. Last night, I went to a tattoo parlor, and I got this to cover up the skull and crossbones. It's a Celtic knot with some imagery around dogs, because my wife Amy and I have two wonderful dogs that we love a lot. This far more represents who I am now than even the skull and crossbones did, which I thought that it was.

55:46Krystal Ball:So now the tattoo is obviously still hideous visually, but no longer hideous symbolically. So what are we anti-fascist leftists and progressives to do with all of this? Well, the first and most important question to answer is, is this man actually a secret Nazi? Obviously, if the answer was yes, that would be disqualifying. But from the available evidence, the idea he's actually a Nazi seems utterly preposterous. Here, the likely, by the way, Palantir hacked Reddit leak is very useful. We can read through a wide variety of Graham's often impolitic comments, which he made when he thought he had internet anonymity and no expectations of running for public office.

56:21Krystal Ball:So what do we see in those comments? Well, some comments on sexual assault and race that are definitely not progressive, for which Graham has expressed regret, and some comments proclaiming himself a psychedelic-taking communist and Antifa super soldier, which would make him about the furthest thing possible from being a Nazi. For what it's worth, he was also a Michael Brooks fan, crediting the late socialist commentator with his political shift and mourning his untimely death. So between the fact that we actually have access to his edgiest shitposts, and none of them are far right, and the fact that I am personally married to a man who accidentally got a Metallica tattoo, while sober, I might add, but he thought it looked cool, so he just went for it, I do believe Graham's Croatia-Sure-Leaf story and think we can confidently reject the theory that he is somehow a secret Nazi.

57:06Krystal Ball:For me, this makes the question of whether to continue supporting Graham or not extremely simple and also vitally important. In fact, I genuinely believe that this Graham-Plattner question is at the heart of what course the Democratic Party is going to take for the future. Will establishment Democrats continue to limit the field to the most professionally boring and uninspiring people on the planet? Or will the Democratic base reject their smear tactics and force a new anti-oligarch direction? Because if you are opening the gates, a broader range of candidates who haven't just been planning presidential runs since they were like five, like total psychos, you're going to get some warts.

57:43Krystal Ball:You're going to get some weird tattoos, some off-color remarks, some very messy life trajectories. The reward, though, is you get a party that doesn't give America the ick. As Emma Vigelin puts it, quote, censorious hall monitor liberalism that refuses to accept growth in people unless you're a corporate centrist and all is forgiven, just ask Cuomo supporters, is far more of a threat to the Democratic Party's chances in the future than anything dug up on Graham Plattner. And it's more than the Democratic Party's chances which are at stake here. Status quo neoliberalism has failed to deliver for people, and those failures are exactly what enabled the rise of fascism.

58:19Krystal Ball:The question of whether the Democratic Party base can elevate new candidates with new profiles and most critically new politics is existential for the party and for the country as a whole. So Graham's tattoo also raises the question of what do we even consider to be a scandal? They want you to believe that a bad drunken tattoo is more scandalous than bad policy backing billionaires at the expense of ordinary people and support for genocide at the expense of our souls. We have to fight that view with everything that we have. In Maine currently, there's a choice between two leading candidates on the Democratic side.

58:53Krystal Ball:You've got the sitting governor, Janet Mills. She's the choice of Chuck Schumer and the DSCC. As governor of Maine, she has opposed a millionaire's tax. She vetoed adding higher income tax brackets. She opposed hiking corporate taxes, but she did implement a cigarette tax, which will disproportionately hit the working class. Now, she did pick a fight against Trump, which I appreciate, but if it's not matched with a willingness to confront capital, it is not nearly enough. Mills also opposed local Israel divestment efforts in Maine. She threatened to veto statewide divestment efforts, she's been silent on the genocide and just generally toes the lockstep pro-Israel line.

59:33Krystal Ball:She also happens to be the least popular Democratic governor in the entire nation and would end her Senate term well into her 80s. Do you really believe that that is the type of candidate that Democrats should rally behind for the future of the party, let alone the country? Now, Graham supports a billionaire minimum tax, strongly supports Medicare for All, wants to surge federal government direct housing construction to deal with housing affordability, wants to end the forever wars, and especially to end the genocide and bring peace and justice to Palestinians. Now, with no public profile or political office, he has built a grassroots movement both in Maine and around the country of people who are inspired by his model of politics.

1:00:13Krystal Ball:This was just last night, by the way. He routinely garners hundreds of cheering supporters to his events. So guys, is he a risk? Sure. Could Courtmore come out? Sure. But Maine Democrats have tried to beat Susan Collins with standard issue safe choices before, and all of them very safely lost. There is also, I should mention, another candidate named Jordan Wood in the race who is responsible for a network of scam packs and running exploitative fundraising tactics who has probably done more to harass Democratic voters and scam the amount of money than perhaps any other individual. He's at 1 % right now, by the way.

1:00:47Krystal Ball:So I'm encouraged by what I've seen so far in response to TattooGate. Congressman Ro Khanna, Senator Sanders, Senator Heinrich, they're all standing behind Graham. Even a sort of centrist-ish Democrat, Ruben Gallego, did not throw Graham under the bus. Here are Bernie's most recent comments. Clip is a little long, but I couldn't cut any because you guys need all of this pure quintessential Bernie. I do have a question about your endorsement of Graham Plattner.

1:01:09Saagar Enjeti:It was the American health care system, no?

1:01:11Krystal Ball:Well, it's something he talks about a lot, right?

1:01:12Saagar Enjeti:Let me just say a few words. Number one, I am impressed that the media is so concerned about the tattoo that Mr. Plattner has. Meanwhile, as a result of Trump's massive cuts to Medicaid, the estimate is that if we don't change that, 15 million people are going to lose their health insurance, 50 ,000 people a year are going to die. Maybe equivalent to the importance of Mr. Plattner's tattoo. In terms of Mr. Plattner, this is a guy who served four terms in combat. He was a Marine, four tours of duty. He was a machine gun. He saw friends die. He came out of that war, as he has acknowledged, with PTSD, got good treatment at the VA, got his life together.

1:02:13This is a man who served his country, who suffered, who had some difficult moments,

1:02:20Saagar Enjeti:who said things that he should not have said, and he has apologized for them. But I think if this country is about anything, it's about understanding that every person, Me, you, everybody else has gotten dark moments in our history, and we go on. I think the issues that Graham is talking about, the need to deal with massive income and wealth inequality, health care is a human right, raising the minimum wage are the issues that are going to resonate in Maine, resonate all over the United States of America.

1:02:53Krystal Ball:So you're standing by your endorsement? Absolutely. Can I ask you about the tattoo? Do you think it's necessary that he gets it removed or covered up? Look, yeah.

1:03:01Saagar Enjeti:Once again, we are dealing with a collapsing health care system. As a result of Trump's policies, 50 ,000 Americans may die unnecessarily every year. And you were asking me about whether or not a guy should get a tattoo removed. Sorry.

1:03:16Krystal Ball:He said he was going to remove it. Classic Bernie. I also spent a good bit of time reading through the replies from the Normie Dem Pod Save audience under their interview with Graham. I didn't see a single negative one. In fact, I've actually seen more nervous lefties than liberals, possibly because of our past John Fetterman trauma, which I do understand. But let's be real, guys. Fetterman did have ideological red flags in the present day, not based on some old post. The biggest red flags were on Israel, of course, and also that whole trying to murder a random black guy in his neighborhood situation.

1:03:46Krystal Ball:Also worth remembering, though, that Fetterman has literal brain damage, which apparently made him basically a different person. So it does seem like a pretty unique situation. The other intelligent critique I've seen from lefties is just basically, listen, guys, we got to pick our battles, and the Nazi tattoo guy is just not worth it. Journalist Adam Johnson, for one, tweeted this, quote, Do you think it's wise to piss away capital defending someone with a Nazi tattoo, someone with little pedigree on the issues that matter, and was a Blackwater merc? Does this feel like a good use of our time and energy?

1:04:16Krystal Ball:To that, I would respond, yes. This is the absolute best use of our time and energy. It is an essential use of our time and energy, and I will die on this hill. And to be honest, the shit posting, but mostly leftist Reddit posts actually kind of laid my fears on the Blackwater front. And that was the most concerning aspect of Graham's lore for me personally. But on the political capital front, with respect, I think this analysis is just wrong. It's not how political capital works. There's not like a well of capital the left holds in reserve, which we have to budget across a variety of candidates and causes.

1:04:45Krystal Ball:In fact, when we go in for a candidate and stick with them and succeed, our political capital and our political power grows. We didn't abandon Zoran when he wouldn't condemn globalized Intifada and was relentlessly smeared as an anti-Semite and a jihadist. And standing with him, even when he was under fire, only grew our collective power. In the same way, you cannot capitulate to Trump. You cannot capitulate to the establishment Democrats who helped to bring us Trump. A reckoning is happening right now in the Democratic Party. They know it and we know it. The leadership has lost control of the Normandy liberal base, making the kind of political revolution that Bernie dreamed about actually may be possible.

1:05:22Krystal Ball:They are out there asking Cory Booker and Gavin Newsom about AIPAC. They forced reluctant leaders to back a shutdown. They didn't want to do it. But if the Democratic establishment is able to get us to abandon Graham, they will use this playbook over and over and over again on every candidate who poses even the slightest challenge to the pro-oligarch consensus. And guess what, guys? Not all of those candidates are going to be as impeccably and improbably squeaky clean as Zoran Mamdani appears to be. People are messy. if you are going to be a party of people and not a party of creepy skin robots, you're going to have to live with some dirt or, in this case, some ink.

1:05:59Krystal Ball:And, Sagar, we got a poll out this morning. I think we have it.

1:06:03Saagar Enjeti:And if you want to hear my reaction to Crystal's monologue, become a premium subscriber today at breakingpoints.com. All right, we've talked far, far too long. So enjoy the show. We'll see you on Friday show tomorrow.

1:06:30Saagar Enjeti:This is Special Agent Regal, Special Agent Bradley Hall. In 2018, the FBI took down a ring of spies working for China's Ministry of State Security, one of the most mysterious intelligence agencies in the world. The Sixth Bureau podcast is a story of the inner workings of the MSS and how one man's ambition and mistakes opened its vault of secrets. Listen to The Sixth Bureau on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

1:07:00Krystal Ball:What if mind control is real?

1:07:02Saagar Enjeti:If you could control the behavior of anybody around you, what kind of life would you have?

1:07:06Krystal Ball:Can you hypnotically persuade someone to buy a car? When you look at your car, you're going to become overwhelmed with such good feelings. Can you hypnotize someone into sleeping with you?

1:07:16Saagar Enjeti:I gave her some suggestions to be sexually aroused.

1:07:19Krystal Ball:Can you get someone to join your cult? NLP was used on me to access my subconscious. Mind Games, a new podcast exploring NLP, aka neurolinguistic programming. Is it a self-help miracle, a shady hypnosis scam, or both? Listen to Mind Games on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

1:07:40Saagar Enjeti:You can scroll the headlines all day and still feel empty. I'm Ben Higgins, and If You Can Hear Me is where culture meets the soul. Honest conversations about identity, loss, purpose, peace, faith, and everything in between. Celebrities, thinkers, everyday people, some have answers, most are still figuring it out. And if you've ever felt like there has to be more to the story, this show is for you. Listen to If You Can Hear Me on my iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. This is an iHeart Podcast.

1:08:13Krystal Ball:Guaranteed Human.