9/29/25: Dems Vs Trump On Gov Shutdown, Multiple Shootings Across US, Bibi Brags About Social Media Control

15:55Krystal Ball:Right. That's exactly right.

15:56Saagar Enjeti:And so, yeah, I don't know. And it's funny there. Put that headline back up on the screen because it makes the point. They're like layoffs, deregulation and military deployments. He's literally already doing all of those. So that's why I think, you know, the base in particular feels like where's the threat? Like this is all you're already doing whatever you want with your executive power. You're already acting like a king and have zero checks on you. So this is the only bit of power that Democrats can wield whatsoever. So that's why they're like, you have Chuck Schumer, you have to fight, you have to do something here.

16:33Saagar Enjeti:And, you know, I mean, the problem for Democrats is that their leadership is extremely weak. They're extremely poor messengers. Trump is an extremely effective and relentless messenger. and that's what the shutdown politics end up usually boiling down to. Like who can message the public better? You know, which side? And look, the Democrats have a decent hand to play because they can say, listen, just give us, just make sure Americans' health care premiums aren't going to go up. That's it. Like that's all you have to do and we'll go along with your thing. Why is this so hard? Many of you are saying you want to do this anyway.

17:02Saagar Enjeti:So they have a decent hand to play. Do they have a decent player to play that hand? Really not so much.

17:09Krystal Ball:Yeah, let's go through the history of the government shutdown. So the most recent government shutdown was the one, I believe, under, well, prolonged government shutdown. There's been many shutdowns, you know, 24 hours or whatever. They didn't really matter. But in January 2018, there was a three-day shutdown. That's when they did a filibuster over DACA, but ultimately they caved. So you could see that it wasn't particularly successful. The big one was the 35-day shutdown. I have the timeline right now in front of me. That was December 22, 2018. I remember because Trump was in the White House all alone, and he was like, I'm all alone here in the White House, Democrats.

17:42Krystal Ball:He's like, please. Wild times. But that one, again, was over border security. And even though Trump dragged it out for a month, he ultimately caved because what happens is, and this is all about timing as well. The longer it goes, the executive seems to get some of the blame, even with good politics or good messaging, just because people get sick of no government services. Or, you know, here in Washington, I mean, we feel it the most, right, because we have all these federal government workers. But in general, like the federal government is the biggest employer. You never know. Listen, we're heading into hurricane season.

18:20Krystal Ball:Like you really want to have a shutdown with a hurricane? It could be politically disastrous for the administration. Prior to that, so this was a 2013 shutdown. That was the ACA one. That was 16 days. And then obviously President Clinton had a 21-day shutdown with Gingrich. I'm not as familiar with the details of that one. I've read a little bit about it. But broadly, it looked like Clinton was the victor in that shutdown. In the 2013 shutdown, I think it's pretty unambiguous that Obama was the broad victor on the politics there. If you think with Trump, he was definitely the loser against Schumer and against Pelosi.

18:52Krystal Ball:There's no honest assessment because he literally gave up nothing after 35 days. So that's what I mean. We just don't know where these things would go. I think it'd be smart for the Democrats to shut down. I mean, look, it's not only where the base wants it, but also because the base is already pissed off at Trump for like extraordinary action and he does it anyways, it's like, OK, whatever. And I mean, look, it's kind of in a bidirectional. The Republicans base would also love it, too. They're like, great. You know, now we get to do whatever we want. So I don't see as much. And I don't know. Right now, I put my money on Dems caving at some point, either immediately.

19:25Krystal Ball:I don't know if they'll cave immediately, but a 72-hour shutdown and then they're like, oh my god, Trump just fired 15 ,000 employees. You could see it.

19:34Saagar Enjeti:This is Ashley Akinetti from the Ben and Ashley I Almost Famous podcast. iVeam is built for losing weight and moving forward. iVeam is built for feeling your best and seeing real results. iVeam is a medical weight loss program built for you. Their approach is individualized, virtual, integrative medicine. 99.2 % of patients who've completed the IVIM weight loss protocol achieved meaningful change, dropping an average of 45 pounds. IVIM, built for your wellness journey. IVIM, built for real life. When you sign up right now, you can get a one-month free trial. Start your personalized plan in minutes by visiting IVIMHealth.com.

20:23Saagar Enjeti:That is IVIMHealth.com. Subscription required, medication, labs, and supplements not included. Results based on patients who completed the full IV protocol over 68 weeks. Individual results may vary. Not all patients are eligible. Prescription medication may carry risks and should be used only as directed by your provider. Support for the show comes from Public, the investing platform for those who take it seriously. On Public, you can build a multi-asset portfolio of stocks, bonds, options, crypto, and now generated assets, which allow you to turn any idea into an investable index with AI. It all starts with your prompt.

21:01Saagar Enjeti:From renewable energy companies with high free cash flow to semiconductor suppliers growing revenue over 20 % year over year, you can literally type any prompt and put the AI to work. It screens thousands of stocks, builds a one-of-a-kind index, and lets you backtest it against the S &P 500. Then you can invest in a few clicks. Generated assets are like ETFs with infinite possibilities, completely customizable and based on your thesis, not someone else's. Go to public.com slash podcast and earn an uncapped 1 % bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com slash podcast. Paid for by Public Investing.

21:33Saagar Enjeti:Brokerage services by Open to the Public Investing, Inc., member FINRA, and SIPC. Advisory services by Public Advisors, LLC, SEC Registered Advisor. Generated assets is an interactive analysis tool. Output is for informational purposes only and is not an investment recommendation or advice. Complete disclosures available at public.com slash disclosures.

21:47Krystal Ball:Virgin Voyages presents With Love from the Caribbean.

21:51Saagar Enjeti:Today was snorkeling. Tomorrow is poolside DJs. Tonight is dinner by chefs who take this very seriously. Also, no kids at all, which somehow makes everything better. Sorry you couldn't come, but also you should fix that.

22:07Krystal Ball:A modern, award-winning, kid-free cruise from Virgin Voyages. Explore Caribbean sailings at virginvoyages.com.

22:18Saagar Enjeti:One thing to mention about the previous shutdown that you said, you know, Trump lost and Pelosi and Schumer won. Pelosi and Schumer. Pelosi is a much better tactician, much fiercer, much better messenger. Think and feel however you want about her. She is a much better politician than Chuck Schumer is. I think that much is totally clear. So this now resting on the shoulders of Chuck Schumer and like kind of Hakeem Jeffries is like shouldn't be too confidence inspiring here in terms of, you know, the Democratic base being able to pull off something that approaches a victory. The other thing that's worth saying is let's say that that we're wrong, that it's actually Trump that caves.

22:56Saagar Enjeti:That's like, oh, you know what? I want to make sure everybody has their health care. We're going to do a great thing for the people. We're going to make sure everybody has health care. Right. Let's say that he does that. There is nothing that would require him to keep that deal because you just had a Supreme Court, once again, shadow docket ruling that essentially allowed them to go forward with what's called a pocket rescission, meaning that Congress can authorize, let's say, the ACA subsidy extension, and then he can just decide not to do it. The Supreme Court now hasn't ruled officially fully on the merits of that.

23:30Saagar Enjeti:But until they do, and God only knows when that will happen, he can do whatever he wants. He is not obligated. And this is very this is completely different. OK, power of the purse is supposed to be with Congress. Supreme Court has, at least for now, greenlit him being able to back out of whatever deal that he strikes here and say, you know what, I changed my mind. I don't want to do the health care subsidies ultimately. So that's an important dynamic to keep in mind here as well as we move into these negotiations.

23:56Krystal Ball:Yeah, let's put A5 on the screen. I've seen this a lot of progressive Democrats passing this one around. Oh, my God. So you can't make it up. In the midst of shutdown planning, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand has circulated an invitation for a, quote, Napa retreat on October.

24:10Saagar Enjeti:The wine cave is back, y 'all. That's what I was going to say.

24:12Krystal Ball:The wine cave, the infamous wine cave. Should the government shut down, the retreat would fall on what might be day 12 of the shutdown. The itinerary features accommodations at the Hotel Utenville with a resort and spa that extends a Tuscan European vibe. I love that. And a wine tour and dinner at the Staglin family vineyards and amidst its wine caves. The plan for the luxury trip comes amidst Trump administration's threat of mass virings for federal workers. A Democrat briefed on the event tells us is also slated to include Representative Haley Stevens, who is campaigning for a state's open Senate seat as a gritty daughter of the Midwest.

24:46Krystal Ball:And that's important. What is it with these Michigan Dems? Slotkin recently talking about, remember when she was on Colbert after our show and she was like, it's just corn fed folks. No, they're not, okay? Like CIA people are not corn fed folks. They're Yale, Harvard graduates, nerds. Yeah, it's a stick, obviously for her. You know, just stop.

25:06Saagar Enjeti:Well, the other thing that's just a little note there is, so this is a DSCC, so that's a Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, and they invited Haley Stevens, who's running in the Democratic primary for that Michigan Senate seat. But she, you know, she's up against two other significant contenders. That would be Abdul El-Sayed and Mallory McMorrow. So this is also the DSCC putting their sum on the scale for Ms. Haley Stevens, who, by the way, has received some$5 million in Israel lobby funding. So just so you know.

25:37Krystal Ball:Yeah, that's, I don't know. Dems need to get their act together with the base. Like, you guys need to fight. And I know, look, it's coming from me, just, you know, whatever. But I don't see like at this point, the Tea Party action people were barnstorming the country in this point in the Obama administration. They were everywhere. Yes. The cope is always like, oh, but that was all billionaire funded. Oh, yeah. There's no Democrats who fund the billionaires. Like, come on. Like, what are you guys doing?

26:04Saagar Enjeti:Yeah, but the billionaires don't want this. But then why not? I mean, it's just like they don't want the. Yeah. Yeah, they don't want the pro-Palestine, tax the rich. That's where the energy is the party, and that's not where the billionaires are.

26:18Krystal Ball:Then get your shit together, because at this point, you need to organize. You need to do something, because you are not currently on track to deliver the type of success that the Tea Party was able to, because that was about money plus grassroots. That's ultimately—and I think the grassroots—everyone always tries to say the Tea Party was AstroTurf. Sorry, it wasn't. It was like actual mass outrage. Yes, there was a lot of money backing it that helped, you know, all that stuff. This is the truth with all grassroots style movements. There's money in all kinds of special interest groups. It's only when you have an issue that actually resonates are you able to do anything.

26:49Krystal Ball:So if the Democratic base does not going to have their billionaires, then do something about it. Like you need to form your political action committees, get out there, create the litmus test for candidates, actually just hammer the shit out of them, create and find your slate of issues. and where you, and then you have to hold the line. You're like, if you do not support that issue, we will not vote for you. Like, if you do not commit immediately to making sure that we're no longer with Chuck Schumer, that we're gonna defund Trump or whatever, pick your issue, then you're not gonna do anything because in the absence, these Haley Stevens people can always come around.

27:25Krystal Ball:This is what the pro-Republican establishment politicians would do. They're like, but I'm fighting against Obama. And they're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, yeah, but we need you to fight against Obama on our terms. You don't just get to say fighting Obama. Same thing here. You can't just say, oh, Drumpf is bad. It's like, is that it, right? Because that's the easiest possible slate. I don't think the Dems have gotten their act together, period. Obviously, it's not going to come from the national level, but I don't even see it at the grassroots level. Like, people need to show up. You know, there's some campaign canaries in the coal mine.

27:53Krystal Ball:You've got Zoran and all of them. He's an extraordinary politician, very different circumstances, very, very liberal city and base. Like what made the Tea Party extraordinary was we're going into the blue dogs and we're blowing them out. You know, we're going into the primaries. We're primaring people. We're making their life hell. Eric Cantor spent more on steak here at a steakhouse in Washington than Dave Brat spent on his entire campaign. Like you've got to fight back against that.

28:21Saagar Enjeti:Yeah. I hear you on all of that. And I do want to see more. But I will say also with Dave Brat, it's not like you would have said, oh, there's this organized like Dave Brat move. It came out of nowhere. That's true. And there are a lot of things like that that are happening. So just to name a few, obviously Zoran, obviously Graham Plattner. We already name-checked Abdul Al-Sayed, who are drawing really hard lines and saying, we're not going to vote for Chuck Schumer. We are pro-Palestine. This is genocide, like going hard. You also have Cori Bush has jumped back into the race. Oh, really? Oh, I didn't see that.

28:51Saagar Enjeti:Yeah, against Wesley Bell, who's one of the top APAC recipients in Congress and constantly shilling for them, just signed a letter against recognizing a Palestinian state. You've got Shoykat Chakrabadi, who was AOC's chief of staff, who's running against Nancy Pelosi. I actually don't think Pelosi has officially announced.

29:05Krystal Ball:Yeah, she has.

29:06Saagar Enjeti:That she's running again. But he just released some internal polling that showed him actually faring pretty competitively with her, which is a shocking turn of events that anyone could even be in the race. So there are more many that I don't even know their names. So you do have these dynamics playing out in primaries. You're right. And I ran in that 2010 Tea Party year. So I can tell you for sure the energy was real, right? There was funding there, you know, from the top. There's no doubt about it. But there was also a genuine like backlash to Obama that was being expressed at that time. There's no doubt about it.

29:41Saagar Enjeti:Here you have also that genuine Democratic base backlash, but somewhat more inchoate and less sort of like organized than it was. Great word choice. No, it's it's worth saying, too. It is still pretty early. Like we're still, you know, the formation of primary fields is happening right now. and part of why Schumer feels like he has to do this, which is not something he wants to do again. He feels like he has to because he feels the heat from his base. There's no doubt that if he runs again and AOC runs against him in a primary, he's going to lose. And he's aware of that polling, I'm sure. He's aware of the way that people perceive him and how they don't see him, because he hasn't, as being any sort of a fighter.

30:23Saagar Enjeti:And so even the fact that they're picking this fight is an expression of how they are feeling pressured by their own base.

30:29Krystal Ball:Very well said. I just people don't if you're too young and you don't remember the Tea Party. Here's what happened. Plus 63 GOP seats, plus six GOP seats in the Senate, plus six GOP governors. The biggest midterm victory for a party since 1938. You have that same type of energy if you want it. And at the state level. Right. And I didn't even get into that. Which set the terms for. It was a thousand state legislators or something. It was massive.

30:52Saagar Enjeti:And which that the terms for redistricting, which ended up being, you know, it continues to be consequential.

30:58Krystal Ball:Very well said. And that's my point is I don't I just don't see that. Yeah, here. OK, I have it here. 20 state legislative chambers, which flipped, which was specifically important for the 2010 census for redistricting. That's what power actually looks like. I just don't see it yet. It could be right. It could come. You can have some organic. But there's a big difference, let's say, between a 25 point swing and a 60 point swing. Like to make it extraordinary and to just like punch the administration like if you want it in the face. But I don't know. Right now there's not enough seriousness of taking control.

31:32Krystal Ball:I think it largely has to do with the establishment and the way that they think because fundamentally like to their money, bottom line, issue set, etc., it really is an existential threat. But you got to keep in mind it was very similar for the Republicans too. Like for a lot of these establishment Republicans, the way that they did business back in 2009 was completely disrupted and destroyed. Like you can only teach them by hitting them. There's no other way. So we'll see. I don't know. I personally, again, I think the Dems are going to blink. I just think that they're so married to like the federal government as an idea that the mere prospect of mass firing – like you're going to put it against – you know, you're going to put it past Trump to fire 25, 30, 40, 50 ,000 workers.

32:14Krystal Ball:Like he will, right? And they're going to freak out about that. That's a big part of the 2018 shutdown, part of the reason that Trump caved, but the big Democratic message was, oh, these federal government employees are not getting their paychecks. It's devastating. So there's like a religious marriage between the bureaucrat and the Democratic Party that I'm not sure at the institutional level. I don't know if they're willing to stomach what it takes to actually go through it. No. We'll see.

32:39Saagar Enjeti:I think, like I said, I don't think Schumer wants to do this fight. He's forced into it. And so I think probably his plan is like, let me put up some sort of show of resistance. And then once, you know, I get cred with the base for having allowed a shutdown to go through or stood up to Trump or whatever, then I'm going to find some way to walk back from this ledge. That would be my guess of his plan.

33:03Krystal Ball:But don't you think a 72-hour cave is worse than just a shutdown? If you're going to cave, then just cave.

33:06Saagar Enjeti:I don't think he—I don't even have to say I don't think. I know that these Democrats are totally out of touch with where the base is and what they want and how sort of radicalized they've become in this moment. And part of their radicalization is about what Trump is doing. And part of it is about the failures of their own media apparatus and their leadership. And I say I know that they're out of touch with this because in particular, you know, one of the manifestations of this frustration is obviously on Israel. And you still see them all out there trying to find some middle ground and tiptoe around it.

33:39Saagar Enjeti:And Hakeem Jeffries still not endorsing Zoran. I mean, it's completely insane. And it's like, you all have no idea how loathed you are by your own Democratic base. I mean, Zoran outperformed Hakeem Jeffries by like 20 points or something ridiculous in his own district. And I don't think they've internalized that. And I'm not sure what it's going to take for them to internalize that. I don't know what their Dave Brat moment is going to be. But one of those is coming where they're going to realize like, oh, we really are in trouble here with our own people.

34:11Krystal Ball:You know why I hope so? Because politics should matter. You know, the expression of your voters should actually matter. And, you know, the one thing I think you can say about the Republicans is like they mostly do what their base kind of wants them to do. And they don't really care that much about, you know, the media or whatever. And there's just too much institutional elite worship. And fundamentally, like, that's where my war is with these, you know, the kind of that bipartisan Mitch McConnell, Chuck Schumer type style leadership. These people need to go. They're largely the ones responsible for even the reason like where we are, where we are today.

34:42Krystal Ball:So, yeah, I would like to see them be punished and punished badly. And because the voice of people actually should matter and political leadership is supposed to be broadly reflective. and there's actually no way to solve existential questions if you don't actually tackle them and if you just kind of put your blinders on and look past it and pretend that it's all fake. So we'll see. I am an accelerationist though, so that's me. Are you? A hundred percent. I've always been. I've heightened the contradictions. I think it's good.

35:11Saagar Enjeti:This is Ashley Akinetti from the Ben and Ashley I Almost Famous podcast. iVeam is built for losing weight and moving forward. iVeam is built for feeling your best and seeing real results. iVeam is a medical weight loss program built for you. Their approach is individualized, virtual, integrative medicine. 99.2 % of patients who've completed the iVeam weight loss protocol achieved meaningful change, dropping an average of 45 pounds. iVeam, built for wellness journey, IVM, built for real life. When you sign up right now, you can get a one month free trial. Start your personalized plan in minutes by visiting IVMHealth.com.

36:00Saagar Enjeti:That is IVMHealth.com. Subscription required, medication, labs, and supplements not included. Results based on patients who completed the full IVM protocol over 68 weeks. Individual results may vary. Not all patients are eligible. Prescription medication may carry risks and should be used only as directed by your provider. Support for the show comes from Public, the investing platform for those who take it seriously. On Public, you can build a multi-asset portfolio of stocks, bonds, options, crypto, and now generated assets, which allow you to turn any idea into an investable index with AI. It all starts with your prompt from renewable energy companies with high free cash flow to semiconductor suppliers growing revenue over 20 % year over year.

36:44Saagar Enjeti:You can literally type any prompt and put the AI to work. It screens thousands of stocks, builds a one-of-a-kind index, and lets you backtest it against the S &P 500. Then you can invest in a few clicks. Generated assets are like ETFs with infinite possibilities, completely customizable and based on your thesis, not someone else's. Go to public.com slash podcast and earn an uncapped 1 % bonus when you transfer your portfolio. That's public.com slash podcast. Paid for by Public Investing. Brokerage services by Open to the Public Investing, Inc., member FINRA, and SIPC. Advisory services by Public Advisors LLC SEC registered advisor.

37:15Saagar Enjeti:Generated assets is an interactive analysis tool. Output is for informational purposes only and is not an investment recommendation or advice.

37:20Krystal Ball:Complete disclosures available at public.com slash disclosures. Virgin Voyages presents with love from the Caribbean.

37:28Saagar Enjeti:Today was snorkeling. Tomorrow is poolside DJs. Tonight is dinner by chefs who take this very seriously. Also, no kids at all, which somehow makes everything better. Sorry you couldn't come. but also you should fix that.

37:44Krystal Ball:A modern, award-winning, kid-free cruise from Virgin Voyages. Explore Caribbean sailings at virginvoyages.com. Let's get to the shootings.

37:56Saagar Enjeti:Okay, very grim situation unfolding over the weekend. Four separate mass shootings. Let me give you the top line for all four, and then we can take a look at, I guess, the most deadly one, which was a shooting at a Mormon church. So four dead and eight wounded there. Perpetrator was also killed in gunfight with cops. You had two killed and five injured in a casino in Texas. You had one dead and others injured in a neighborhood in Pennsylvania. And you had a gunman who killed three people and injured five others at a packed North Carolina waterfront bar. That suspect has been taken into custody.

38:35Saagar Enjeti:So I'll give you some details on all of these. But let's go ahead and start with this Mormon church shooting, which was absolutely horrific. You can put these images up on the screen. You can see the church was not only—so a pickup truck rammed into this church. The killer then shot indiscriminately at people. We don't have a lot of details about the exact sequence of how this unfolded. Law enforcement is also saying there were IEDs which were recovered from the scene. As I said before, the death toll has now risen to four killed and eight wounded. This was a Mormon church that was in Michigan.

39:12Saagar Enjeti:So truly horrifying series of events here. Let me go ahead and show you some images of the truck that rammed into the church here. You can see it there. People noted right away, of course, the American flights in the truck bed. And then also there was an Iraq War veteran license plate on that truck. And sure enough, we actually put before up on the screen. It turns out that the alleged, we'll say, killer here, who also was, like I said, killed by law enforcement in a gun battle pretty quickly after this all unfolded. By the way, law enforcement is getting a lot of credit for their rapid response, preventing even additional loss of life from this horrific situation.

39:53Saagar Enjeti:So looks like this was an Iraq War veteran. Thomas Sanford ID'd as the gunman who attacked this church killing to and setting it ablaze. Don't know a ton about him. He does have a young child, roughly 10 years old. He is married, served in Iraq for, I think, roughly four years overseas. Let's go ahead and take a listen to a little bit of what law enforcement had to say. This is B3.

40:16Krystal Ball:During this incident, what we know right now is that a 40-year-old suspect from Burton, he's a male, he drove his vehicle through the front doors of the church. He then exited his vehicle, firing several rounds at individuals within the church. Ten gunshot victims have been transported to local hospitals at this time, including one who has been deceased. Officers who were trained immediately responded to the area. One was a DNR officer, and then one was a Grand Blank Township officer. where they met the suspect and they engaged in gunfire with that particular individual, neutralizing that suspect.

41:04Krystal Ball:And that suspect is no longer with us. As I said, it is a 40-year-old male from Burren.

41:10Saagar Enjeti:So as of an outsider, we have no idea about the motive here. Of course, everyone quick looked to see what this guy's political affiliation was. He appears to be Republican, but it also appears like this is someone who was a veteran of one of our wars who apparently lost his mind. I mean, they're starting to talk to people who knew him, haven't been able to, the press hasn't been able to get in touch with the family. Like they're not responding. No surprise there. But the people they were able to speak to were like, I would never in a million years think that this guy would do that. One thing they're looking at, I have no idea whether this is related or not, but the day before this shooting and attack occurred, Russell Nelson, the oldest ever president of the Mormon church died at the age of 101.

41:53Saagar Enjeti:And then this is obviously an attack on the Mormon church. Police are looking into whether that's linked in any sort of a weird way. But it appears that this is, you know, someone who was mentally ill.

42:03Krystal Ball:There was an interview posted late last night of a local politician who was canvassing the area and he actually interacted with the suspect per his testimony. And what he said is that when, listen, anybody who's involved in public life, you and I have been in this situation before, you get to meet the, you know, bottom 2 % of the population who are like mentally ill and schizophrenic, who have kind of crazy ideas. And he apparently cornered this local politician and had that classic side of mental illness where on the surface, perfectly nice guy, within two minutes is talking about how LDS is the Antichrist, the Mormons.

42:40Krystal Ball:So, you know, it looks like a class. Listen, I mean, the Mormons are a classic target, unfortunately, for a lot of people involved in like these wars over Christian theology. And it's a very easy target in particular for somebody if you're mentally ill and if you're steeped in all of this. And look, pure speculation, but it's not a leap to say somebody who served in Iraq. If you look at the suicide rate, mental illness rate, and the effect of what all that takes, not to mention it didn't seem to be doing particularly well, like was living in substandard conditions. So you put all that together with what happened, and it's a very tragic incident.

43:17Krystal Ball:Especially the Mormons always have been targets for people like this, and it's really sad. I mean, it's just these are people who are gathering. Some of the people who were shot were literal children. It's Sunday. It's supposed to be like a sacrosanct place. So it's a horrific tragedy, but it's one of those where when you put it together broadly, and I was not here for the ice shooting. You guys did a good job. But the point around it is just look at these guys. It's like rampant mental illness throughout the country. And in the veteran case, I mean, look, we all agree, I think, that nobody does nearly enough.

43:52Krystal Ball:It's highly inefficient. Even though the VA spends a ridiculous amount of money per patient, the services and the administration that they do, it's a disaster. Most of the veterans I speak to almost always have a substandard experience. It's very easy for guys like this to slip through the cracks. And it's obvious. I think it's pretty obvious to me that that's probably what happened here. You know, 0408, some of the worst years to serve in Iraq. Then you have, you know, a prolonged period of time. Mental illness can happen very quickly. It can be exacerbated, as we've talked about at length, about drug use, online, just periods of time.

44:28Krystal Ball:You know, you can snap. And the slide through that is not a surprise. And the fact that this local politician is saying, I canvass this guy, and within minutes he's telling me about how Antichrist and LDS gives us a little bit of an insight, right?

44:41Saagar Enjeti:Yeah. Yeah, well, and that wasn't the only murderous shooting, mass shooting by an Iraq War veteran over this weekend. So we can put this next B-5 up on the screen. This was at the North Carolina waterfront. So they say a lone gunman killed three people, injured five others at a packed North Carolina waterfront bar late Saturday. Police are describing it as a highly premeditated attack. This guy, who now calls himself Nigel Max Edge, he changed his name to that, who's 40 years old, detained by the Coast Guard, charged with three counts of first-degree murder, five counts of attempted murder, five counts of assault with a deadly weapon.

45:13Saagar Enjeti:Another, and he's another veteran of our war on terror foreign wars. So, you know, we don't know that much about this individual yet, what he was doing and saying. Police are calling this premeditated. We don't have a motive for this one either. But again, fits with, you know, the pattern of, look, we send these, you know, mostly men overseas and have been commit these horrific acts that haunt them. They come back home. They have very little, like, support in terms of reintegration into society. And then downstream from that, you have, you know, horrific acts like this. This is not to, like, I'm not trying to, like, smear or besmirch veterans whatsoever.

46:00Saagar Enjeti:Quite the contrary. It's not their fault.

46:01Krystal Ball:They were put in a disastrous situation.

46:03Saagar Enjeti:Yeah, I'm saying that we should be, we should pay a lot more attention to that. First of all, we shouldn't get into these foreign wars. And even outside of these individual violent incidents, there is a long-term societal correlation of after you have a war, when people come back, there's a spike in violence. There's a spike in crime. Not to mention that then, you know, you have in our culture, it's a mass gun culture. One of the things that are in common with all of the mass shootings we've been talking about lately is all of these men were very proficient with firearms and been around them, you know, highly trained on them, et cetera.

46:36Saagar Enjeti:And, you know, that's one of the dynamics here as well. But, you know, what's interesting is there's been very little journalistic interest in the question of what the blowback has been from what we did to these individuals when we sent them overseas to for, you know, the Iraq and Afghanistan war in particular. I had to go back to there was a 2008 New York Times investigation, and they identified 121 homicides that were linked to Iraq and Afghanistan veterans from 2001 to 2008. And they found that was an 89 percent increase in such cases during wartime compared to before we went to war in Iraq.

47:15Saagar Enjeti:So they were able to establish somewhat of a at least correlation and an uptick. And, you know, you had similar instances after the Vietnam War as well that were, you know, tracked closely, too. So you have mass, you know, mental illness exacerbated in the veterans population because of what they've seen and what they've done and what they've been through and the total lack of support and complete neglect. And this is also not to let off the hook. These killers, by the way, we're just analyzing here the societal trends. and, you know, we end up with this explosion of violence and looking around and going, why does this only happen with us?

47:52Saagar Enjeti:I don't think it should be a mystery when you consider the combination of a combustible gun culture, rampant, untreated mental illness, and a society that's kind of coming apart at the seams.

48:01Krystal Ball:Of course, I don't think you can deny any of that. I mean, I know the gun culture thing is one of those where people really latch onto and I get it, but, you know, if you look at it practically, like we've talked about, the Charlie Kirk shooting ad nauseum, It's a bolt-action rifle. It's never getting banned under, quote-unquote, it's not going to be banned under even the most extreme liberal gun control law.

48:23Saagar Enjeti:I am fairly hopeless about any sort of gun control measure that would really deal with the problem for exactly the reasons you're stating. But in analyzing all of these things and why we have these mass shootings in other countries, don't. You have to name it as a factor because, I mean, part of why Tyler Robinson is able to allegedly take that shot is because he's raised in that culture. He's very comfortable with weapons. He knows what he's doing. He's a proficient marksman, et cetera. So that's, I'm just pointing to those facts. I think it's fair. Obviously, these are military trained.

48:55Krystal Ball:No one's going to deny that having 400 million guns in the country does not make it unique. I think it's just, frankly, a constant. It's not going to change. And I mean, we've had a lot of debates here. I don't really think it should change. But, you know, to echo what Charlie Kirk once said, when you have a nation with the Second Amendment, you do accept a certain level of violence that is not going to be seen in other societies. That is a simple constant. Now, of course, you know, everyone always liked to post that as some sort of own. It's like, well, you know, if you have other countries, they don't have like even close, they have, you're worried about authoritarianism and fascism and all of that in America.

49:28Krystal Ball:It's like, well, look at a lot of other countries which are Western but with no guns. It's very, very different in terms of their culture and the level of subservience that those people put up with from the government. So that's part of what the check is supposed to be. Now, all kinds of debates about AR-15s and, you know, magazines, et cetera, most of which I think is silly and broadly doesn't work. But dealing with what we – dealing with where we are right now, the veteran piece, the mental illness piece. But also, look, I mean I was not able to join for that ICE shooting, but I thank you for bringing up on my behalf.

49:59Krystal Ball:Drug use and weed use was a big part of it, and everybody just wants to move past it. And listen, it's one. It's not all of it. But, oh, it just turns out this eye shooter is, quote, obsessed with weed. I've been trying to tell people that the reflections of what we see from legalized marijuana, from just this culture of degeneracy, turn on football. You know, I've been watching football this season because I can't leave my house from the baby. Everything is just Arby's, gambling and booze. It's like, oh, do we do anything else in this country other than get fat as shit and watch TV and drink alcohol?

50:32Krystal Ball:Well, apparently that's not what anyone, I mean, the few spare bucks that you should probably save, you're going to put on your shitty parlay, which you're 100 % going to lose. It's like an opiate of the masses, quite literally. And that leads to a lot of downstream hopelessness. I've talked about this with gambling. If you look at the data, legalized gambling, and in particular, when a home team loses, the data tells us that domestic violence goes up. That's what we're dealing with here. And then now put the actual like money and stakes and all that. Part of the population in 330 million people, 1 % is a lot of people.

51:08Krystal Ball:That's millions of people. They're going to go crazy. That's part of the issue. And everyone's like, well, just because 1 % is going to do it badly. It's like, no. But sometimes the 1 % is so bad that we actually should consider what the societal norms and all of this discussion around it. Like with alcohol, most people can drink responsibly. One out of seven people cannot drink responsibly. It causes all kinds of crazy downstream effects. Are we willing to accept hundreds of thousands of DUIs and deaths and drunk driving, et cetera? Me? Not really. I think we should do a lot more to actually reduce alcohol consumption or the health effects.

51:41Krystal Ball:Obesity.

51:41Saagar Enjeti:Well, weed has done more than anything to reduce alcohol consumption.

51:44Krystal Ball:Okay. Yeah. Oh, fantastic. It's so great. Now we just have violent schizos who are shooting ICE detainees. What a great trade that we all make. Both should go down.

51:55Saagar Enjeti:That's my point. There are parts of what you're saying that I agree with. And I think, you know, I view it from, you know, from a leftist lens of, first of all, addiction is very profitable, right? That's why the food and the algorithms and the gamble, like everything is set up to addict you and keep you locked into whatever that thing is. So that's number one. And, you know, I see a lot of these things as being downstream from the policy and societal choices. So, you know, I don't know, like the ice shooter, I don't know that his weed use was related. It could also be that's attempted self-medication is often the case as well.

52:34Krystal Ball:That's not self-medication then. If you're taking something that literally makes a certain percent of its users go violent schizo, then that's not medication.

52:40Saagar Enjeti:I'm not saying it's like effective self-medication. But that is what a lot of people who struggle with weed addiction, they feel it is self-medicating. They're trying to check out of a life that feels horrific to them. And so in any case, to say the weed is the cause of the violence, well, the weed could be a correlation because you have someone who's struggling with mental illness and isn't getting treated and they're treating themselves. And that's what I'm trying to point out. But in any case with these two dudes, we don't have any sort of weed connection that we're aware of. I'm just waiting.

53:14Saagar Enjeti:So I think it's going to come out. But, you know, if you like, there's a big temptation to sort of draw a circle around all these things and try to see because we've had this rash of them and try to, like, tell a story about it. You know, it's a very natural human impulse. And it could be that there is no real story to tell about all of these disparate shootings and murders. But if I had to try to tell a story, you know, they all seem to spring out of sort of the societal ills that we're struggling with, right? Disaffected young men, political extremism, the blowback from our endless wars and what we subjected these young men and women to when we sent them overseas to fight and die in these immoral, pointless wars that only made things worse.

54:03Saagar Enjeti:All of those sort of chickens are coming home to roost is what it feels like right now. And, you know, to add one that'll, you know, serve some of your points, there was also put B6 up on the screen. There was also a shooting at this casino in Texas. This one, we really have no idea what the, this is Karyon Jones 34, what the motivation was, what's going on here. I don't have any more information for you, but, you know, you could imagine what might have been going on, why someone would be angry at a casino. You know, that's certainly a possibility. And then did we put B5B up just so people could see the picture of the.

54:42Saagar Enjeti:Yeah, this is the guy that's accused of murdering the people at the North Carolina waterfront. Now, his story in terms of his service, he was actually injured, I think shot four times in a friendly fire incident and suffered severe, you know, like brain damage because of this. He was actually, as it says here, he once escorted this American Idol star to the country music awards because he was, you know, sort of like a minor cause celeb because of the injuries that he had suffered, etc. And then after that, you can just imagine like a sort of downward spiral and how you – I mean I can't really imagine how you end up in this situation where you're murdering people.

55:27Saagar Enjeti:But you can certainly imagine a downward spiral for this individual who already was suffering with this brain injury.

55:33Krystal Ball:We're not absolving any of these people. Yeah, definitely not. It's like we're trying to look at the – yeah, on the gambling point. I mean look, Vegas – anybody who lives in Vegas will back me up on this because I've spoken with people and I was telling you guys about it. The amount of suicides in Vegas parking lots and hotel rooms is shocking. The LVPD and others mostly try to cover it up because they don't want to affect tourism. But the amount of violence, as I just talked about, domestic violence, when people miss their parlays and they end up beating their wives. Lots of alcohol use. Alcohol and weed use combined.

56:04Krystal Ball:And, oh, shocking. People start to commit crazy crime. Same thing. You know, there's just something about people who get driven to the brink. I've seen it. If you ever been to a casino and you see somebody who is gambling out of literal like with a look on their face of like absolute sheer desperation, it's like, bro, you got to get out of here. What are you doing? But, you know, instead, what does a casino do? That's the most profitable customer, right? Not the guy who's just sitting there betting the pass line having some fun. This guy who's just hoping for the big one and then ends up losing their entire paycheck.

56:38Krystal Ball:Again, we don't know all of the circumstance, but yes, violence in casino, these people have security and all that for a reason because people are crazy. And that's just my final PSA here on gambling because I was just looking 52 % of bettors in the US, which is some 100 million people. I've now gambled more than$50 per month in this NFL season. That is quite literally statistically, if you're watching this in your medium household income, that's your margin, all right, which is crazy in a country like today. But$600 per year of your after-tax income is quite literally your safety margin. So do you really want to be blowing that to a company?

57:13Krystal Ball:Which Dave Ramsey, I recently saw him say this. He goes, these people are buying the most expensive advertising literally in the history of the world. You think they're doing that with charity dollars? It's your money. All right? And so in the meantime, people just get addicted to the thrill. It has the highest rate of suicidal ideation of any addiction, more so than heroin addicts, more so than everyone else. It's the easiest one to cover up, right? It's like the keeping up with the Joneses thing. You have no idea how financed the cars are in the driveway. And then there's a silent life of desperation in the back.

57:47Krystal Ball:And then people just break. So stay away from it. That's all I can tell you, especially if you have kids. Please, please keep them away. It's bad. It's permeating everything in our culture. Yeah, true. All right, let's get to TikTok, shall we?

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1:00:11Krystal Ball:Virgin Voyages presents With Love from the Caribbean.

1:00:15Saagar Enjeti:Today was snorkeling. Tomorrow is poolside DJs. Tonight is dinner by chefs who take this very seriously. Also, no kids. At all. Which somehow makes everything better. Sorry you couldn't come. But also, you should fix that.

1:00:31Krystal Ball:A modern, award-winning, kid-free cruise from Virgin Voyages. Explore Caribbean sailings at virginvoyages.com. Prime Minister Bibi Netanyahu is here in Washington for this week. He will be having an unprecedented fourth visit to the White House. Congratulations to him. But while in the United States for the United Nations General Assembly meeting after having a mass walkout while his speech, he took some time out of his busy day to meet with U.S. content creators specifically to brief them about the propaganda war over Israel. He was asked specifically, how should Americans or how should American pro-Israel forces fight back against the rising tide of what they call anti-Semitism?

1:01:18Krystal Ball:And here he now speaks about how one of the most important things is the new purchase of TikTok. Here's what he had to say. We have to fight with the weapons that apply to the battlefields in which we're engaged.

1:01:32Saagar Enjeti:And the most important ones are the social media. And the most important purchase that is going on right now is class. Followers.

1:01:40Krystal Ball:Followers. TikTok.

1:01:44Saagar Enjeti:TikTok. Number one. Number one. And I hope it goes through because it can be consequential. And the other one, what's the other one that's most important?

1:01:54Krystal Ball:X.

1:01:55Saagar Enjeti:X.

1:01:57Krystal Ball:Very good. And, you know, so we have to talk to Elon. He's not an enemy. He's a friend. We should talk to him.

1:02:05Saagar Enjeti:Now, if we can get those two things, we get a lot. And I could go on on other things, but that's not the point right now. We have to fight the fight. Okay? to give direction to the Jewish people

1:02:16Krystal Ball:and give direction to our non-Jewish friends or those who could be our Jewish friends. The most important purchase that's going on right now is TikTok. I hope it goes through because it's going to be consequential. So, Crystal, I once again ask, will you join me in calling for the ban of TikTok? It was important even on the whole China data thing, but one of the things that people underestimated is that what Trump saw with his victory after 2024 was all the kids here, but it's the power of the algorithm. And what obviously the worry about that was with China, but now because it's Trump, he's like, oh, we'll preserve TikTok, but we'll make sure that a bunch of pro-Israel forces are involved in the purchase.

1:03:00Krystal Ball:And it's undeniable that TikTok is very good at shaping culture, which is why the Chinese banned TikTok in their own country, just to be very clear, for people who don't understand that. And now what they're looking at it is they've already installed this censorship head over there. They get to keep their business. Everybody's, everyone is going to keep scrolling. Don't deny yourself. It's like we just talked about weed addiction and gambling addiction and all that. It's exactly the same thing downstream of the hours a day that people are burning on TikTok and scrolling. Well, now it's gonna have the same propagandistic efforts kind of behind the scenes.

1:03:35Krystal Ball:It's now probably the most overtly politically controlled social media platform alongside Twitter. No, I would say a long time. I was going to say X is right there too. The only reason why I think it's more consequential is Twitter is for elites. So it's very important at shaping elite culture and conversation. Only a couple hundred million people use Twitter globally. Like in the United States, it's a couple hundred million people on TikTok. Like actual people who have no Twitter account, don't even know what's going on over there. They're not involved in the wars over whatever, some sort of political going on.

1:04:08Krystal Ball:They're scrolling. That's where a lot of their information is coming from. So by far, in my opinion, the most consequential at a small D democratic perspective for shaping whatever the future conversation is. Yeah.

1:04:17Saagar Enjeti:So now instead of owned by China, it's going to be owned by Israel.

1:04:19Krystal Ball:OK, well, great. Could have banned it.

1:04:21Saagar Enjeti:Great stuff. Should have banned it. Definitely worse. I mean, I just I guess I don't see it as any worse than than X or other social media. I mean, I think it's all poison. Like, that's where I am. I don't know what the answer is. Like, I don't know the complete ban is the answer, but I'm kind of like at a loss as to what to do about all of these things that are set on colonizing our mind. right colonizing our attention um that's what they're like that's the commodity that they trade in and um with dystopian outcomes frankly but the ones which we can't resist you know we were talking about the gambling addiction like the the scroll both of tiktok and you know youtube shorts and twitter oh yeah it's all modeled off of slot machines like to keep you endlessly scrolling That's the whole idea is the endless scroll.

1:05:08Saagar Enjeti:And yeah, I mean, it's brain poison. And I just, the one thing I will say, like I think if Bibi really thinks that this is going to help him win the propaganda, like the propaganda war for Israel is already lost. That battle is over. It's done. Now they have to operate in the realm of just like pure power politics, like cracking down on anyone who dissents, you know, using their main ally and most important ally, only ally that matters, the United States of America, to do their bidding in terms of cracking down on our own population, backing them in their endless wars. Like, that's where they're at.

1:05:46Saagar Enjeti:They've already lost the sort of soft power competition in terms of global opinion. I don't think that their ownership of TikTok is necessarily going to change that. In fact, if anything, it's going to further piss people off and enrage them that they feel that heavy hand of censorship now coming down from their favorite platform?

1:06:04Krystal Ball:I would hope so. I'm not yet quite sure about our current population and in particular with some of the calls right now for open censorship. Here we have Israeli politician Yair Galan openly says the next step is strict controls on social media, in particular going after Twitter and saying that they need to ban what he considers to be anti-Semitic voices. Let's take a listen.

1:06:26Saagar Enjeti:The next thing I will do, we will do, is to put restriction on the social media in a way that not allow to make brutal propaganda in the social media. because this is a worldwide problem and it should be initiated by the United States of America, the place where all the big firms are settled. Facebook and X and all the rest. This is a major problem for democracy all over the globe and we need to treat it seriously.

1:07:14Krystal Ball:We need to take it seriously. Facebook, X, they all need to be banned. I mean, does anybody else just think it's so crazy that Bibi comes to America and assembles a group of social media influencers, including his own son? Is that the only interaction that he has with his own son? Oh, I didn't know. Yeah, you're not saying, oh, what? So your son, who, by the way, lives here in America, why, for what reason? What's his visa status? Anybody want to call ICE over that one? You know, how exactly? Isn't he draft age eligible? Shouldn't he be fighting in Gaza if he's so patriotic and amazing? And he's sitting over here on our soil, presumably on a, you know, some sort of friendly visa, being guarded by the literal Israeli shin bet as he lives in a penthouse apartment in Miami and firing off tweets from his sunny little balcony about how they need more censorship of Tucker Carlson and Candace Owens.

1:08:06Krystal Ball:It's just so naked. It's so unbelievable. And I hope that you're correct that the propaganda war and all of that is lost. But I don't know. I still, like, even with all of the sentiment moving, at a basic level, the politics have not changed. Like, at the power level, the Trump administration, they could care less about the rising tide of, look, even amongst Republican younger voters, it's like the sentiment is lost. They just don't care. They're like, look, this is what we are going to do. The average Republican politician still doesn't care. The average Democrat politician will pay a little bit of lip service.

1:08:43Krystal Ball:But at a power level, they're not doing anything about it. Slotkin here on our show, maybe I'll vote for it. Maybe I won't. Goes on Stephen Colbert. Then says she would have voted against it if she was there. But we'll never know because she wasn't there. It's like, what's going on here? It's like, does any of this even matter?

1:08:59Saagar Enjeti:No, the hard power, like they still have a lock on a lot of, certainly the Trump administration. No doubt about that. And most Democrats. But, you know, let's to the point of whether or not they're winning the propaganda war. Should we take a listen to a little bit of the propaganda? And you can tell me if you find it. Tell me if you find this persuasive or not. This is C3. These are some of the influencers who were gathered at this meeting to get a get a sense of some of the content they're putting out to the tick tock world. We were asking him the hard questions that a lot of people from our generation have been raising concerns about, for example.

1:09:34Saagar Enjeti:And the same way he listened to us and took in our criticisms, I'm truly hoping that you guys will listen to the answer. AIPAC. AIPAC is something that I see all the time. Number one, AIPAC is not an Israeli organization. It has no ties whatsoever to the government of Israel. It's not foreign lobbying. It's a lobbyist group that happens to be lobbying for a certain group of people, right? And this is not unique to Israel. There are multiple countries that do this, and there's multiple different groups that do this. For some reason, people just attach on to AIPAC despite the fact that AIPAC makes up less than 5 % of the lobbying.

1:10:10Saagar Enjeti:So if you have a problem with lobbying like me, that's totally fine. I'm against AIPAC because I'm against lobbying. But you can't just hone in on one specific group. If you're going to be against it, then be against it for everybody. Moving on from that, we were asking questions about these rumors that Israel has been going out and funding people. And no, none of us were paid for that meeting. But I wish, Bibi, if you want to write the$150 million check, go for it. But we asked. We asked about funding. And as he explained, Israel is not offering to fund anybody. They're not trying to get involved in American political advocacy groups.

1:10:44Saagar Enjeti:That has never happened. And if you're concerned about this, who you should be concerned about is Qatar. The last thing that we really touched on was the aid. People don't know this, but Netanyahu's first address to Congress was to say that they didn't want aid. Jimmy Carter, who is a notoriously anti-Israel president, is actually who started this because he saw that Israel was building up their air force and he didn't want them to. So he gave them aid that they could only use to buy military weapons from us and they had to agree to shut down their manufacturers. So now they're dependent in a way on this aid for military operations that America doesn't want them to lose because we use it as a leash on them.

1:11:22Saagar Enjeti:So, Sagar, I just pulled this up on TikTok. Here are the top comments. Number one, on the payroll confirmed. Number two, that AIPAC paycheck must be insane. Number three, did she just say that AIPAC's not an Israeli lobbying group with four question marks? As a conservative, that man is a war criminal. How much are they paying you? As soon as she said AIPAC was an Israeli lobby, I scrolled. Sellout confirmed. Unfollowed. We're not buying it. Et cetera, et cetera. Yeah, I mean, look, I don't know.

1:11:48Krystal Ball:I just, I feel very dark about how this is all playing out right now. And the reason why is that as disturbing and preposterous as all these influencers and all that are, they have currency. I mean, they're meeting with the prime minister of Israel.

1:12:05Saagar Enjeti:You know what it makes me think of, though, Sagar? It makes me think of, you know, we covered the chorus dark money scandal with the Democrats where they're paying this like, you know, one of the influencers does some American girl doll like pro-DNC memes. You listen to most of these people's content and you're like, OK, good luck. or the DNC started their own podcast. Ken Klippenstein loves posting the views on it. Like, just because you put money behind a thing doesn't mean anyone is going to buy what you're selling. Doesn't mean anyone's going to be like, and like I said, if anything, people watching that were just like, screw you, basically.

1:12:38Saagar Enjeti:It had the opposite of the intended effect. We've got one more we can show you too, which is if anything, I mean, this is the best one. This is wild. This is C4, take a listen. Imagine supporting people who start wars just to lose the wars so they can cry about it and then try it all again.

1:12:54Krystal Ball:You must see anti-Semites are literally obsessed with Jews. Now walk with me. While you must see anti-Semites are stacking eviction notices, Jews are out here stacking up businesses.

1:13:06Saagar Enjeti:Jews control all the industries. Maybe if you spent more time taking notes from successful people, you wouldn't have to spend your nights and weekends spreading hate from your anonymous account with an anime profile picture.

1:13:16Krystal Ball:Do you work as hard as Jews? Do you network like Jews? No, because you're too busy cheering on a group of musty terrorists who smell like dirty earring backs. And if we're going to keep it real, you're really mad because your income is giving side hustle.

1:13:28Saagar Enjeti:Period. How are you going to hate from outside, Shabbat? You can't even get in. Wow.

1:13:34Krystal Ball:So they have their own sassy gay black guy. Oh, my God.

1:13:38Saagar Enjeti:Well, and I love the way - Who is that influencing?

1:13:40Krystal Ball:I don't know. It's being paid. I mean, look, it's perverse and it's sick, but pretty clearly they're finding - Is that reaching an audience? Probably not. But they're obviously, look, they're doing it for something. Like they're making some money perpetuating this stuff. I believe that some of these people were present at the Bill Ackman summit. That was there with Charlie Kirk. Both of them were. Both of those two were. Right. And that's my point is like it still does come with access to power. That's what makes me feel dark really about the entire thing. At the end of the day, people's salaries are getting paid.

1:14:12Krystal Ball:Do I think that influences anybody? No, I certainly don't. I think it's pathetic and ridiculous. But they're getting meetings with the Israeli prime minister. one of the things is when you look at Israel is that at the end of the day, believe in hard power. So for them, this influencer briefing, everybody can laugh it off. I don't laugh it off because clearly they still think it's important. And maybe it's a signal to the future TikTok people that these people need to be boosted in the algorithm or something. And you and I know like there is enough kind of mindless scrolling and lack of information, lack of just attention or whatever that to casually just stumble across and get, quote, the truth.

1:14:47Krystal Ball:clearly the Israelis believe this is like an existential and very important mission for them. Yeah. Will it work? No, I don't necessarily think so. But I don't know. I wouldn't put it past them. I trust their judgment in respect of controlling the conversation.

1:15:01Saagar Enjeti:I don't. I mean, I'm glad to not. Because I just think that they have so cocooned them. It really is, I'm not equating the two, but it does remind me a lot of the DNC. Like, they're so high on their own supply. They're so cocooned in their own bubble. And so insulated from their critics because they just immediately write anyone off who has anything negative to say is an anti-Semite and they don't let it penetrate. And so I think they are completely disconnected from the way that they have just become reviled around the world, around the world and reviled in the U.S. in a way that has never been the case.

1:15:37Saagar Enjeti:And so, you know, I mean, that like that thing was a mess. That was a disaster. I don't think there's one person who looked at that and was like, oh, you're right. Not to mention it was anti-Semitic. Even as they're trying to like stand up against anti-Semitism, they're like the Jews control all the industry and are really good with money. It's like, what are you doing here? So in any case, I mean, there's always going to be shameless hacks who suck up to power no matter what. That's what these people are. They know that they can get into these meetings if they toe the line. They may genuinely have some like ideological belief about it or whatever.

1:16:11Saagar Enjeti:But more importantly, there's always going to be sycophants who circle power. And that's what's going on here. It is very dystopian. Don't get me wrong. The consolidation of media power in Trump aligned hands and in pro-Zionist hands. That is very disconcerting. And the amount of, you know, sway that they can use these social media platforms. They're out there saying like, look, we're going to tell Elon what to do. And he's probably going to do it because he's our buddy. Is also really wild and dystopian. So I don't want to downplay it. I just want to say that I think that their Hasbara efforts have been laughably pathetic.

1:16:47Saagar Enjeti:No one is buying their bullshit anymore. Very few people are buying their bullshit anymore, I should say. And we all have access to reality now. Like, you're not going to be able to stop the flow of the videos of the horror coming out of Gaza. And by the way, your own soldiers post their own war crimes so we can see it directly from them as well. We can listen to the statements that you make about how you're trying to manipulate all of us and buy up the media platform so that there's no dissent. We can listen to them saying in Hebrew, you know, we can hit the translate button and hear them talking about how there's no innocence and how they want to displace everyone and exactly what the plan is.

1:17:24Saagar Enjeti:So, you know, I think I think it would be very hard for them in this environment to just hide reality and hide the truth and to turn back the clock and then persuade people. Oh, you know what? I was wrong. It's not a genocide. like actually this is the most moral army on the planet or whatever nonsense.

1:17:40Krystal Ball:Yeah, listen, I hope you're right. Let's go to C5, please, up here on the screen, which shows the list of the influencers that always, like I said, yeah, you're not in Yahoo.

1:17:48Saagar Enjeti:No, there you go, personal list. Yeah, you're not in Yahoo. He's so crazy.

1:17:50Krystal Ball:You invite your own son. He's an influencer? He's not an influencer. He's a Nepo baby living on our country to port his ass. Please, send him to Gaza, all right? You know, one of the hallmarks of a society, like one of the things that, it's easy to romanticize it, as horrible as it was, But in the First World War, something I've always respected about the British and the Germans and all their societies is that when the leaders went to war, they actually sent their own sons because they believed in it. Like you had the prime minister of the UK whose son was literally killed in combat. You had crown princes and others in the field of battle.

1:18:24Krystal Ball:The average life expectancy for a British soldier almost entirely taken from the upper cross like the lords and others who supported the war was like I don't even remember exactly the timeline. But it was very, very short. But my point is just that nowadays, you know, it's the norm of the chicken hawk meme where you have the congressman and everybody else. This kind of relates to our shootings block who support the war. Their kids get to go to college, get exempt. We don't even have a draft anymore, but it's like very few of them ever sign up for military service. And then it's like the working class men and women of the country who actually have to go abroad and face the consequences.

1:18:56Krystal Ball:That's like the post-World War II status quo. So there is something very sick about that. And clearly that's also present in Israeli society as well. And by the way, to that point, Paramount has now released a new trailer for something called Red Alert, a four-part miniseries depicting the real-life stories of the victims of October 7th massacre in Israel. Why does that matter? Because Paramount was bought by whom? David Ellison, the guy who wants to hire Barry Weiss over at CBS News. Paramount Skydance, now owned entirely by David Ellison, who also just made an all-cash bid for Warner Bros. Discovery, including HBO Max.

1:19:29Krystal Ball:So you're going to have two Hollywood studios that are all under control. Who the hell knows what's going to get released nationwide? I don't know. I mean, that's where, again, the ability to shape culture is that from TikTok to the literal movie studios, it's going to be very, very interesting to see what the divide on that and whether it can hold and who actually controls everything. I tend to believe a lot of it is a lot more top-down than people think to be able to push this stuff out into the ether. But potentially the internet will still be more powerful.

1:20:02Saagar Enjeti:Yeah, I mean, I just would say, like, they're becoming more overt and more heavy-handed. But, like, the Western media has been aggressively pro-Israel forever. And certainly, you know, the way they framed October 7th, post-October 7th, our involvement, et cetera. So it's not like they haven't been trying on the propaganda front and still, like, you have this massive revolt against what they're doing. Democratic Party is lost. Independents are lost. Republicans are divided. Young Republicans are increasingly lost. So I think it's probably too late to put those pieces back together, but they are certainly going to try.

1:20:40Krystal Ball:They're trying. We'll see. Yeah, I don't know. I mean, maybe it'll be a boon for independent film or something, but then how do you get it distributed? See, that's the issue with Hollywood. It's so bottlenecked and so controlled. That's probably the thing I worry about the most. And also, just don't screw up HBO. Please, please, please. It's like, let us just have our tasks. All right, great show. Shout out to that.

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