5/14/26: Trump Glazes Xi At China Summit, Fox News Shocked By China Tech, China Plans Arms Sales To Iran

24:41I don't know. I mean, I just, you know, when I assess it on such a grand strategic level, if you were to think about that, like the meeting of these two superpowers, the defeat really that we've suffered, the inability to change the regime from the air. We knew that that was going to happen. But at the very least, we thought we would be able to militarily wipe them out. Didn't happen. It just did not happen. The drone threat, the asymmetry of these high-tech weapon systems, the lack of our defense industrial base, the inability of our sanctions to properly be able to cripple this country. I mean, look, if we've been doing this now for so long, all the warning signs were there.

25:14The munitions problem, been talking about it literally for years, about whenever it came to Ukraine. Remember the Russia sanctions debate that we often had here on the show? I was like, hey, this is going to be a real problem. if we ever get into a conflict with China because they are able to look and to study all what's happening. They did, they've been able to prove themselves. And then really the more meta point is we spent vaporized probably$50 billion so far. Take a look at that country. It's doing pretty well. And it's one of those where this is not, I don't feel good saying this, but it's just unambiguous.

25:46The quality of life there from 10 years ago is not even comparable to the quality of life increase there, not even comparable to any alleged S &P 500 gains that have happened here. If anything, it's gotten worse. I think it's gotten worse. I think it's gotten worse. Yeah, I think most people would agree with you on that. And even we're going to do this segment later about like American test scores falling off. I mean, that's part of it, right? It's part of a trend of, you know, in previous generations, you could buy a house, you can't buy a house. In previous generations, you can't afford healthcare anymore.

26:18You know, in previous generations. Kids were reading when they were in third grade. Now, not so much. It's on every metric, you just see this backward slide. And the stock market for most people is irrelevant. I mean, if anything, it's a slap in the face. Another reminder that, yeah, the rich are getting richer and you're getting screwed and your kids' prospects are being robbed every single day.

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28:25Find the style and level of protection you want at nyx.com and use code FLOW15 for 15 % off. That's K-N-I-X.com, code FLOW15 for 15 % off. NYX, for your leaks, for your life. I think probably the biggest outcome of this meeting is going to be a lot of Fox News grandmas realizing just how behind we are technologically, how much more advanced China is at this point, because Brett Baer is there on the ground doing all this on-the-ground reporting. One of the big things, they made a big deal about the fact they illegally parked for two minutes and got a ticket right away, which for the law and order people, they should be happy about that, right?

29:02That is my dream. I knew you would like that. If Palantir was doing it here, they'd be celebrating this marvel of efficiency. But since It's China. It's the authoritarianism. That is my dream is to ticket these illegal parkers, red light runners. Some kid rang my doorbell the other day with no soliciting. I'm like, this motherfucker. You know? It's like. Such a crotchy old man. But in any case, he also went to one of these like just little, you said this is sort of like a 7-Eleven competitors. And they have the humanoid autonomous robots there that are like serving the goods. And so this was all broadcast to a Fox News audience.

29:40This is A10. Let's go ahead and take a look at this from Brett Baer. Our food order to a very special worker. This is the Family Mark convenience store in Beijing. Inside is a gaobot robot, the dominance of AI. Beijing is trying to lead the way in AI and also in humanoid robots. It's coincide. This is the first of its kind for this kind of interaction. if you want to order something. Hello, can I get a sausage, please? Okay. Khao Chang, 8.8 yuan. This is the first of its kind, moving a little slow. But Galbat is actually in 50 different pharmacies, warehouses handling 300 ,000 orders around the country.

30:26This is the first of its kind here. And they say there are going to be many different iterations. The question is, it's the same thing that the U.S. is dealing with. Will this replace human workers? So, yeah, I mean, this is an area where they're decidedly ahead of us on the humanoid robot front. And, you know, my understanding in terms of the attitude towards the population in China versus here on technology, they're much more enthusiastic in China. There's not the same level of reticence because here we see the way that, you know, these AI oligarchs are trying to screw us and bragging about how they're going to take all our jobs.

31:00They just have a different social contract. Yeah. That's the thing. That's exactly right. And they have really focused on a very different AI strategy, too, where, yes, they're trying to be at the leading edge. And DeepSeek has been very successful in other models as well. And much more efficiently. It doesn't require the vast amounts of compute and electricity and water and everything that ours is like just this sort of brute force approach. But they've also focused a lot on how do we integrate the technology that we have right now into practical uses so that this is actually being deployed and it's not just some pie in the sky investment for the future for some future prospect.

31:38So in any case, like I said, this is and this is basically what Pate predicted with us yesterday. He's like, you know, what's going to come out of this is all of these reporters and politicians are going to go. They're going to see the gleaming electric vehicles. They're going to see modern cities. They're going to see advanced technology and they're going to be floored by it. And the American public, which has been so propagandized about China or any of our any of our adversaries, will also see some of this on their television sets of like, oh, it's not the U.S. that's leading the world on every technological front at this point.

32:12You go into these cities and you are seeing things that we do not have here. That is a very different dynamic than what most Americans have in their mind about China. It's very true. And, okay, so Family Mart. I mean, if you've never been, so it's a Japanese company, Family Mart. It's kind of like 7-Eleven if you've ever been there. I mean, I just want people to take a look. It's clean. It's nice. There's no, like, you know, there's no coffee stains that are anywhere. When you order, you get what you want. They don't need a security guard. The idea that anybody would steal is preposterous, right?

32:43You know, it's, like, ludicrous that somebody would try to steal from something like that. And if they do, they're going to get caught instantly. Now, there's a very different social contract. Like I was saying earlier, everybody there acquiesces to an immense amount of digital surveillance. So you were talking about the immediate ticketing that's happening. That's just like the tip of the iceberg, the ability to cross the street. Your face is all being scanned. People make a big deal about social credit, but it actually goes much deeper than that, like the ability to transit even inside of the country, your ability to move between cities.

33:14That's all pretty restricted or at the very least like you need permission from somebody. Most Americans would have no ability to acquiesce to that. They have a different culture than ours. They came, a lot of the current people who are alive, their generation, they came from the chaos of the cultural revolution. And then imagine what their grandparents and others people had to live through. Genuine poverty, civil war, Japanese World War II, like immense death and famine. So for them, like order is the thing that must be preserved above all costs because they have lived. I mean, do you know anybody who died in a famine?

33:50No. Over there, you probably do know at least somebody who has a relative who did or who was displaced through mass collectivization or who was bayoneted by a Japanese soldier or by a CCP soldier or by a, you know, I'm totally about, KMT soldier. Something like – their country has been – basically was in chaos from the year, I don't know, 19 – even earlier, maybe the 18-something all the way up until 1970 or so. So you really – I just feel like that sociological imprint of a generation for where they are today and why they value what they value, I'm not judging it. I can fully empathize and understand how they've come to the place that they are.

34:30Well, and I would also say there's no doubt the culture. There are cultural differences and different historical experiences that lead you to a certain place. But also, I mean, we've discussed here people will put up people in general around the globe, including Americans, will put up with a lot of limitations on their sort of libertarian version of freedom. If the government is delivering on, you know, improving the quality of life, improving the country, there is no country in history that has lifted more people out of poverty faster than China. It truly is an absolute economic marvel. And so people, to your point, can see over their lifetime just a dramatic increase in quality of life and cleanliness of the city, modernization.

35:10And so there's an incredible pride there as well at what they've been able to accomplish in a truly remarkably short period of time. I mean, the overwhelming bulk of improvement in poverty statistics around the globe has come just from China. They have been the primary driver of lifting people out of poverty over the past several decades. So, you know, that also changes the way you think about these. You're like, well, they're delivering on these fronts. So, OK, you know, and look, I mean, dealing with getting a parking ticket. I can I can deal with that. I'm not talking about Tiananmen Square or whatever.

35:43You're totally right. And that's where look, I mean, this is where it's complicated. We did pay for most of that. A lot of that came at the expense of us. And that's why the Trump 2016 campaign was so invigorating to be like because he was the first person to say, We paid for this. Because, you know, that neoliberal talking point was the one that we would hear all the time. Oh, well, global poverty has gone down. It's like, yeah, but we're poorer. They're the ones who are richer, not us. But what we want, I think at this point, we've lived through this idea that China was like some backward state.

36:11And I'm being honest. I remember my first year of professional politics was 2015. That is when the Made in China 2025 plan came out. We scoffed at it. There were commissions here in Washington. What a joke. So all of it came true. All of it came true. Yeah. And actually a lot more than it came true. Then 2020 happened. Remember, we would talk to Peter Zihon and others. People predicted demographic collapse. And there's some of that. Or, you know, commercial real estate. And listen, it's a country of$1.4 billion. So to say that they don't have problems is ludicrous. Like they have plenty of problems on the intern.

36:43But we're saying from our perspective, to see the life of the average citizen, especially the more upwardly mobile ones, if you were to call it the Chinese dream, They can generally own a home. Yes, there's a crazy commercial real estate market, but their day-to-day life, it's not so bad. And I would just say like ours, it's bad. Like we covered yesterday, people are working more hours for less pay, high gas prices. In terms of your consumer experience, what's the last revolutionary product that you bought? For me, it was probably iPhone 4. Remember 2010? It was 16 years ago, all right? Actually, I have a Tesla.

37:18That's pretty cool. So Tesla 2. So I don't know. That came out. When did it come out? Like 10 years ago, the Tesla Model 3? Yeah, but I mean, that's a great example because they're kicking our ass in EVs. Like they've surpassed Tesla in terms of what they can do. If you look at the past 10 years for them, you've got Greeley. You've got Xiaomi. You've got Tesla. You've got BYD. You have WeChat. You have HandPay. You have the high-speed rail going 300 miles per hour. And then I'm not even talking about all these crazy infrastructure projects where imagine in the hinterlands of the United States, It's like some backwards-ass town in Nebraska getting brand-new bridges and beautification and people coming from Washington being like, look at what we're doing for you.

37:58I mean, it's easy to criticize as a dog and pony show, and some of it is more shoddily built. I'll grant you that. But we're not even trying over here, okay? They've just got rust in the middle out there. The story in most of our country is year-after-year degradation and decline. You know, cities that were like, you know, for people who are older, who they can remember what, you know, maybe Detroit was in its heyday. Yeah, I've only seen pictures. Yeah, you know, we see. And, you know, Detroit is doing a little bit better than it was at its worst. But so I don't want to I'm not trying to trash Detroit here.

38:27But you can see what our cities were in all of our infrastructure. You know, you fly into an airport here, it looks shitty, right? You get on a train, you're going to have problems. Yeah, I mean, it's it's you you go around this country. and mostly what you see is decline. And for Chinese people, they go around their country, most of what they see is improvement. They see, and that comes at certain costs as well, but you see a lot of change and positive improvement. To your point about them even surpassing the made-in-China expectations, if we could put A5 up on the screen, this was, I saw this from Arno's feed.

39:02He retweeted this. It says, one of the most consequential charts, in my opinion, China will go from being almost completely reliant on chips from external sources to almost completely self-sufficient in just 10 years. So one of the things that, you know, we've really held on to is like, OK, well, we have the premier chips technology. And so we're going to sort of marshal our resources that we're going to limit how many chips go. And there's still a lot of, you know, dispute and debate over how much to sell chips to China, et cetera. And so while we were with trying to withhold this technology, especially under the Biden administration, They're like, all right, well, we're going to really push developing our own.

39:36And our AI products are going to really focus on what they can do with chips that we produce here domestically. And so on a number of fronts, the thought with China previously in the past was always, oh, well, they can copy what we can do. But they're never going to be leading edge on anything. And that is just not the case anymore. Deep Seek is very competitive. But again, you saw the humanoid robots where they're kicking our ass. EV, they're kicking our ass. solar panels, they're kicking our ass. And the solar energy part, I would talk a little bit more about that in a bit. But the renewable energy piece, if you actually want energy independence, that is the way to go because oil is a global market.

40:15It doesn't matter that we produce more oil here and we're not exporter, et cetera, because we're still subject to the global price pressures of this global market. So when there is a constraint like there is in Strait of Hormuz, obviously we're still affected. So in any case, this is just a long way of saying, on any number. And I remember seeing a report about all of these sort of frontier technologies. In many instances, they are leading the way at this point. Now, there are some areas where we still have an edge. Silicon Valley still does incredible things. There's no doubt about that. It's still a lot of American innovation.

40:46But the old notion that all China can do is steal technology and copycat with a poor quality product, that's dead and gone. That's 2008, 2015. There was a period where that was true. It is true. And a lot of it is built on their bag. In fact, the story of Tesla, what they did, they see there. I have to respect them. They're like, Oh, Elon, come on over. You can build giga Shanghai. And what does he do? He builds giga Shanghai and he builds the entire flywheel for EVs. And then what they do is they go, all right, now we're going to use that flywheel and all that supply chain for our stuff. And we're going to massively subsidize it.

41:20And then also though, at the same time of massive subsidization is we don't just pick winners and losers. We make it so that everybody gets to ruthlessly compete, which means that you rise to the top. That's how you get the best stuff. But they built the infrastructure. If you look at their energy sources, you know, I mean, we shouldn't get too carried away. Like 50 % of their stuff still comes from coal. But, you know, they've got 14 % hydropower, 10 % solar, 10 % wind, 5 % nuclear. You look at the trajectory, though. And that's what's incredible. Exactly. And the thing is, is that China is kind of like what's happening in Texas right now.

41:52I'm not sure if you've seen. I have, yeah. Where Texas has more new renewables than California. Why? No red tape, right? For them, they're like, build whatever you want. We don't care. They're not going to celebrate it, but you can build it if you want to. China is a little bit like that in terms of the red tape exists, but there's no ideology whenever it comes to energy. If it turns, if you get electrons, you're good to go. Well, and they have prioritized solar development in particular, which is why they're the top manufacturer globally. Yeah, and they have the whole supply chain. They have the industrial base.

42:23Another way the Iran war has benefited them. Yeah, and they don't care. countries around the world, including Cuba is actually doing like a whole renewables revolution in a remarkably short period of time because they're like, OK, we can't be screwed over by these oil shipment, you know, embargoes anymore. So, yeah, the Iran war has created an increased logic for people around the world of like, OK, well, we need to get in on this. Yeah. My last piece is just this is the most novel situation the United States ever been. The United States has never been or at least even in terms of global politics, really for us, We have never been an apex power with a peer competitor, which is not only like a peer competitor in terms of military force, but in terms of economic and soon potential soft power force.

43:07We've never faced that. The Soviet Union was always a military juggernaut. It was never even remotely comparable in terms of their system's ability to produce soft power elements or to produce economic marvels or miracles. Really what they were great about was just their sheer size, weight, and political control. Originally, that's what China was. Like you were saying, the 08-2015 period, it is not the same country. I would say that this is much more like the pre-World War I tides of a great, you know, the sun never sets on the British Empire, being confronted by this new Germanic power, which is very similar in terms of its science and its economic might.

43:51And not necessarily as militaristic, but its ability to be a genuine competitor if it wanted to be. And that was a very novel situation for the continent. And I don't see – that's as close as a parallel as I could get. There's not as many surrounding empires in terms of multipolarity. But bipolarity itself, it's not even really a question I think at this point. And Iran has really put the nail in the coffin. I mean it's just fascinating to see it all come to a head. I did not think I would live to see – I knew it would witness history. We've witnessed plenty here. Oh, yeah. This really is a – I mean it doesn't feel like – it's not as sexy as bombs going off and all of that.

44:31But if you take a step back and you see this and this uniting the superpowers in the midst of Iran, it's a crazy situation. There will be many books written about this 80-day period. Yeah, and we should mention Ukraine and Russia as well where we embroiled ourselves in – and this shows you also that it's not just Trump. although I think Trump has certainly expedited our decline and the Iran war really helped to tie the end of the empire here into a bow. But, you know, we went in thinking, OK, we're going to have this proxy war with Russia and they're weak and it's just a gas station and we'll be able to hobble them with our sanctions, etc.

45:04Obviously, that doesn't work down either. And the Iran war has only aided Russia and we've actually eased some of the sanctions to ease the pressure on our own gas prices here and oil prices around the globe. Apple Vacations, where your story starts. Apple Vacations semi-annual sale is here, and it's the perfect time to plan your next beach getaway. Enjoy up to$250 off international and Hawaii vacations, up to$150 off domestic trips and hotel savings up to 70 % off. With instant savings of$300,$500, or even$700, your escape has never been more rewarding. Book by May 28th at applevacations.com or contact your local travel advisor.

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47:47I think we can all see now, if that was a thought, that was an incredibly foolish thought. Because it is very clear that, well, yes, the Iran war is not great for China. They are paying some price for it as well. It is vastly, vastly worse for us. Now, we did get out of this, and I think this is significant, a Chinese government saying, you know, in their readout or coming out of these meetings, that they do not support a toll in the Strait of Hormuz. Everything else, as we covered before, was sort of ambiguous about what they said about Iran. But take a look at this. Put B1 up on the screen. New report for The New York Times says that Chinese firms are plotting secret arms sales to Iran.

48:26It's according to U.S. officials who are talking to The New York Times. So keep that in mind in terms of where it's coming from. But I'll just read you a little bit of this. Chinese companies have been discussing arms sales with Iran, plotting to send the weapons through other countries to mask the origins of the military aid. U.S. has gathered intelligence that Chinese companies, Iranian officials, have discussed the arms transfers. Not clear how many, if any, arms have been shipped or to what degree Chinese officials have approved the sales. New disclosure is likely to intensify pressure on President Trump to raise the issue while he is in Beijing this week.

48:58So obviously this would be a very significant development. We know China's already been assisting Iran. Iran is important to them at this point. And Professor Pape raised with us yesterday. OK, just imagine now all the advanced Chinese tech, like AI tech, also being transferred to Iran and the way that's only going to further strengthen their position, the Iranian's position, as a world power. So you've really forced China, Russia and Iran. You've really forced these three countries together via our own foolish foreign policy. It is also very interesting with China. You know, one of the things that they've been doing is they actually haven't been importing nearly as much oil as normal.

49:36That's one of the reasons why the price of oil actually isn't higher, is I believe that they've cut it by nearly a quarter. And I think one of the reasons that they're doing it is to tell other regional allies. They're like, hey, we've been using a lot of our SPR, Strategic Petroleum Reserve. They have one of the largest in the world of strategic petroleum. And in effect, we're also getting you a discount by not bidding up the price even higher than where it should be. I also think it's very interesting about all of this stuff that China has access to, which we not previously, he talked about in the 08, 09 area.

50:07Now, to say they didn't have spy satellites is ridiculous. But to say that they had cheap spy satellites, which they're able to deploy on behalf of others, which then enable a great damage to the U.S., is a very new phenomenon. So if you listen to this, since the beginning of the war, China has given Iran intelligence and access to a spy satellite that has tracked the positions of U.S. forces in the region. They have supplied dual-use components that they need to produce drones, missiles, and other weaponry, providing these dual-use components like semiconductor sensors, voltage converters can also be used in civilian manufacturing, draw less scrutiny than arms sales.

50:40The reason why I thought that that was really important is let's compare it to the U.S. industrial base. So, for example, the UAE and all of these other countries are buying more THAADs, more Patriots. Well, they have the supply chain to be able to support their industrial base, their civilian base, and to be able to export. We don't even have the industrial base to supply ourselves for one year of production, let alone support the UAE and Saudi Arabia. Why do the UAE is doing all these secret shading meetings with BB? Because they need Iron Dome missiles. They need their drones. I mean, from the U.S.

51:17perspective, our supply chain to build this stuff from the ground up, it's impossible without all of these. It's impossible to produce just what we need, let alone to be able to support the rest of the world. That's what we used to do when we were a global manufacturing powerhouse in the post-NAFTA era. No, you made an important point earlier about Silicon Valley. But that actually is the great weakness of the U.S. economy. It's the reason why our stock market is higher and our economy sucks. It's because we design things. We're very, very good at high-end design. I mentioned yesterday, this Apple laptop, when you open up the box, designed in Cupertino, right?

51:50But where is it manufactured? In Shenzhen, right? It shipped to me from Vietnam, right? I tracked the UPS stuff whenever I got it. Well, what does that tell you? The components are here. The design is here. In China, they now have a system where they have both the design and the manufacturer. That's where you're a strong country. This is what happened to Intel and to many of these others. They stripped away their manufacturing capacity. They kept the design because the design is the profits. That's where the money rolls into the banks. But when push comes to shove, to be Russia, you made a joke about the gas station.

52:24And it was – I mean it's kind of true. But does it matter if all you need is gas and bullets? It turns out you don't really need much else. Like when we pulled out McDonald's, they're like, OK, whatever. Well, and here's what – China, Iran, and Russia all to obviously varying extents, and these are very different countries. But the fact that you had this adversarial relationship with the U.S., either with active sanctions or with the threat of sanctions hanging over the countries, created a real awareness and necessity of a level of self-sufficiency. So even Iran has, you know, they are able to manufacture their own goods, right?

53:01They're able to spin up their drones quickly. And certainly, you know, Russia has a large industrial base. China is the largest industrial base in the entire world. And so another technology where they are head and shoulders above us is drones. So the concept of, you know, we played earlier the Thucydides trap comments from Xi, where he's warning about the potential of war between a preeminent power and a rising power in the way that creates tensions and can lead to an inevitability of war if it's not handled properly. I mean, just think about how that would go for us. given their manufacturing prowess, given the fact that in our war of, you know, 40 days against a middling power at best, that we're already running low on various stockpiles and can't help out our allies and are leaving them high and dry and our bases are obliterated and our soldiers are having to flee, et cetera.

53:55I mean, how do you think this would go? It's preposterous to think about. And the Chinese know that, we know it. That's why for Taiwan, I mean, the Chinese, they don't really have to do anything because the reality of the global power balance has become so manifestly clear. And Iran has been obviously a really central part of that. Let me go ahead and put up on the screen the second element here, which we mentioned before. And I think the Americans will see this as significant. You've got this agreement on opposing Hormuz Toll. But as we discussed before, the rest of the language, very ambiguous.

54:31Okay, we oppose a militarized straight. Okay, well, who's the military? That means they oppose our military being in the straight as well. And I'm sure they do, right? It's very important. China is a trading nation, very important that they're able to trade freely around the world. That's significant for their export economy, no doubt about it. So you have that. And otherwise, you had very little public discussion on Iran. And if Trump thinks that China is going to come in and bail them out because they're in such dire straits over the war. I think he's an absolute fool. And the very fact that he has to go to China to try to bail us out is humiliating to begin with.

55:12So it's quite an astonishing circumstance that we find ourselves in here. When we talked to Colonel Wilkerson earlier in the week, Emily and I did that interview. He said, he was like, I'm 50-50 on whether Trump even goes because of the weakness of the position going in. Now, Trump being megalomaniac obviously thought he could get in the room and sweet talk and get some kind of a deal. And he'll certainly be able to spin some sort of a victory narrative out of here, right? Oh, we got this deal and he'll just make shit up too. He's not afraid to do that. But I think that's an indication of how much our position was damaged by recent moves by Trump.

55:49This meeting had to be pushed off already that it would even be a possibility of, I don't know if we should even go forward with this. Yeah, it's really not good. And I also think what's fascinating about all of this is what you can see with the arms sales, the movement, the way that they're even talking around Iran. Like they don't – they mention the militarization of the strait. They say they oppose the toll. Do they really? I mean it's one of those where they may say it in principle but in the status quo, would they do anything about it? Well, and it's like, oh, we're not charging a toll. We're charging a safety surcharge or whatever.

56:26I've at least, you know, seen them and their public statements. They talk around in circles, which is why you have to parse what they say very, very carefully. All diplomatic languages like that. Yeah. And one of the things that I think, you know, you really do highlight in what's happening over there also. And this is, look, you have to contrast our internal systems. Like the internal system of China is one of near total power consolidation with Xi Jinping. Now, often that can go very awry. He changed the, whatever, not the Constitution, whatever it is, you know, to be able to remain president for life.

57:00He's recently gone after the equivalent of the Secretary of Defense, who I think was just, I think he was just condemned to death. Like, the internal repression within the CCP, I'm not even talking about, you know, for the Chinese people, has immense, has gone up immensely under his reign. You would think often that makes somebody weaker. Right now, it seems as if he's pulling things off. Remember, we're looking at things from afar, reading the Western press. Like, it's not that easy to actually get any real sense. But what we can also contrast that, though, is our system where, look, one of the benefits of it is the openness and the challenge.

57:36But what we actually have is just an inability to resolve, like, the biggest questions, like war. And this brings me to before, let's put this up here on the screen, where even though three Republican senators broke with their leadership and voted to announce or advance the War Powers Act, that we had John Fetterman, who was the only Democrat to vote against the War Powers, bringing it to a 49-50 vote. if Fetterman had actually voted for it, it would have forced J.D. Vance to come to the chamber and to actually break the tie, which would have been a political disaster for the administration and the vice president forced to come and to actually - Well, and it would be a real disaster for him too.

58:22Right. Given that he's been trying to distance himself a little bit from this policy for his own political prospects in the future. Thanks, Fetterman. Look at that. Yeah. So Fetterman, I mean, yeah. Wow. in terms of how he could ever explain that one. But I don't know. I just look at that, you know, that this level of chaos in our country, where war is the biggest question. It should be the biggest one. It's what decides the fates literally of nations. And to have it so that we can't even get, you know, our Congress and others can't even get their act together to force themselves to fulfill their own constitutional duty is just such a, such a like, I don't know.

59:00It shows the deep weakness of our system. And it makes you really wonder. We're like, well, you know, on the long timeline, authoritarianism usually doesn't go well. But I'm like, maybe I'm wrong. I don't know. Like, maybe this one actually will. Iranian state media is apparently reporting this morning that Tehran has been allowing Chinese ships through the strait under Iranian-managed protocols. And no accident that that would be happening now. So, again, to the context of, like, the doublespeak, it's like, well, for China, they're like, it is open. What are you talking about? Our ships are getting through just fine.

59:30just have to follow the Iranian protocols. So, you know, and I think it's meant to send a message and it's very significant coming at this timing. One other point that I wanted to raise because I do think it's significant. You mentioned before how China, they don't have an ideological approach to like solar versus wind versus gas and oil. It's all just like, OK, well, what's going to be good for our country? And they have calculated very much that renewable solar in particular is a huge development opportunity and also, again, helps to create that independence because then you're not reliant on oil from the Strait of Hormuz or buying oil from the U.S., etc.

1:00:07Now, again, as you're pointing out, it's not like they've completely transitioned their economy over, but they have already hit peak carbon emissions and are going in the opposite direction and are integrating solar in a rapid, rapid pace. I mean, the trajectory is really quite astonishing. changing. Meanwhile, here in the U.S., Trump just has an ideological opposition to all renewables, regardless of whether it's good for the country or bad for the country. He just does not like renewables. Part of this is, of course, he's in the pocket of the oil and gas industry. He went, you'll recall, on the campaign trail, had a big meeting with them and promised them billions of dollars if they help him get elected, etc.

1:00:44So he has a corrupt ideological commitment to that. But it results in sort of foolish moments like this from where Doug Doug Burgum was being questioned in Congress yesterday and, you know, was spinning some nonsense about how, oh, well, solar only works when the sun is shining, which that's obviously when you gather power. But there's been a lot of advances in terms of battery technology to even out the power distribution. This is B3. Let's go ahead and take a listen to this. Could I respond quickly on one thing? the Lazard analysis that suggests that this is the cheapest form of energy all of these projects you're describing in Nevada have one thing in common when the sun goes down they produce zero electricity and this nation over rotated towards intermittent forms of energy and the idea that we could add intermittent and shut down baseload is what put our grid at deep risk and the idea that it's the cheapest If you want to add intermittent, you have to keep everything else.

1:01:45And so we have to have a discussion about the total cost of grid, not the cost of the incremental, because it's true on an incremental basis. You may have an incremental source, but it doesn't work. Chairman, I request unanimous consent to enter into the record this amazing new technology that apparently the Secretary is unaware of. It's a battery. China's figured it out. That's why they're cleaning our clock on clean energy, but I want to enter that into the record. It's battery. battery. China's figuring it out. This very much reminds of Trump has a whole bit about like imagining watching TV and then the sun goes down or the wind stops.

1:02:20Well, I guess we can't watch our favorite show. Like this is not reality. Obviously, there's technological fixes for this. So, you know, his ideological opposition to renewables is foolish. And we talked yesterday about how, you know, men are actually suffering a lot in the Trump economy. One of the industries that was previously growing, that is male dominated, is renewable manufacturing and implementation. And they just have completely taken an ax to that, partly because I think it is largely because he's in the pocket of the oil and gas industry. My thing is, I'm not ideological on energy. I don't care where it comes from.

1:02:53I care if it's cheap and if it's abundant. And so if that's gas, fine. If it's refineries, which I look, we're not oil is not going anywhere soon. I still think we need new oil refineries. That's fine, too. If it's solar, cool. Yeah, we should. But let's be honest about how filthy it is to construct those panels. Same with wind. Sometimes we massively subsidize. And it does have some issues. It's not as efficient. Hydropower, geothermal where needed. Good to go. Obviously, I'm a nuclear guy. I think what I've really thought through, though, with regard to the Iran war is that if you actually want to have resilience and energy independence, renewables are actually the only option.

1:03:28Unless you're going to completely nationalize oil and keep it here domestically, et cetera. As long as you're participating in the global economic order where oil is a global commodity, then you're always going to be vulnerable to a supply shop. I agree. So if you're completely dependent on fossil fuels, it makes your country much more vulnerable and much more fragile. And that's what's really sort of set in for me with the Iran war here. We have the worst of a fossil fuel system, though. So, for example, you know, the fact is, is that a third of California oil comes from the Middle East, even though we're a net energy exporter.

1:04:01because we're a net energy exporter to a global market. We never designed our country for resilience in the event that we would have to shut things down for a national export ban. Listen, in Russia, they never did that, right? They just refined their own oil. Same in China, it's a little bit differently, but they have it set it up for the, they have more flexibility within their system because they are relying on foreign exports. I don't disagree. Look, I'm a thousand nuclear power plant guy. I think there should be a nuclear power plant in every garden in the United States. I mean, energy would cost nothing.

1:04:36It's perfectly safe. It's definitely safer than natural gas and oil. It would cost, yes, hundreds of billions. We did just vaporize, oh, I don't know, 50 billion over Iran. So don't come bitching to me about the cost. Nobody cares. Whenever it's a trillion five for the Pentagon, as opposed to all of this new energy infrastructure, which, by the way, will last, oh, I don't know, 50 years before you even have to do anything. to it. So look, my own personal diatribe aside, that's the easiest way to just get it so that it's everywhere. It would be a great jobs program. I can't even imagine the Jetsons reality of what such cheap and abundant power would be like.

1:05:13It would be awesome. Revolutionary. No, it would be. Did you see this report about how there's not enough money for army training? I'm like, where are you people spending all this? I know where it came. It's oil because their fuel surcharges went up for all. It's ridiculous. Yeah. So because of the limited amount of funds that they have, they actually have had to. Because think about it. I mean, do you know how much diesel, a tank, and some of these other things consume? It's astronomical. So because of the spike in fuel, they've had to spend vast amounts more on oil and other, like diesel and other things.

1:05:43So that means they've had to cut training programs. That's the country. I'm going to bet that the military-industrial complex, they're not facing any cuts. This is the authoritarian in me. I go, why are we paying market price for diesel? Fucking take it, all right? It's our diesel. What are we doing here? Anyway, all right, let's move on. Inflation.

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