Debate Prep, Apple and Meta's Potential AI Partnership, and Guest Brené Brown

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Hi, everyone.

This is Pivot from New York Magazine and the Vox Media Podcast Network.

I'm Kara Swisher.

And I'm Scott Galloway.

Just so you know, I left my makeup in France, so this is what you're getting today, the raw face Kara Swisher.

I know it's hard to take because I am so done up most of the time.

I've told you this before.

I personally think women are much more beautiful or much younger.

I think makeup ages women.

Some of it.

And

I think you look.

I don't like it when you put on makeup when you go on TV.

I think you look best.

You have nice skin and nice features, and I think you want that to come through with very lightweight.

Although I have to say, the CNN ladies who do Chris Wallace makes it look rather natural.

They're really good, but I agree with you.

I don't like too much makeup myself.

Anyway,

a lot to get to today, but how are you doing?

You're back in London?

Is that correct?

Yeah, back in London where it's a sweltering 70 degrees.

It's actually really pretty here.

It's, yeah, it's really lovely.

It almost hit 100 here in D.C.

Crazy.

really heat oh that's awesome crazy heat it's not it's not that bad but it's still like it's calmed down today a little bit but it's a wet heat it's a wet heat wet sopping terrible heat let me say this heat wave across the united states is really debilitating across all right everywhere yeah it's really i'm sure remember when europe got it last year or the european or whatever

these heat numbers are just like i was talking to someone in arizona and it's like nuts the numbers are crazy like i don't know how humanity survives these kind of temperatures and then the load on the energy system especially with ai making all sorts of generative images of us anyway did you have a good time in france oh i i loved it i i i'm i had a fantastic time um i really enjoyed i enjoyed seeing you i enjoyed

i went to see the chain smokers who it ends up are djs not actual all my pals were there with you they said they ran into you at the both concerts the arcade fire i guess yeah and uh but the chain smokers are really lovely guys and they have really hot girlfriends and uh so what's not to like and then i met the kelsey or the casey brothers that cut oh you did you met travis kelsey cool yeah yeah oh no i think i met his brother brother they're both huge guys with beards i can't tell the difference there's a lot of beards but they're really nice guys that is what it seems like with the sea of yahoo whoever you like

jim uh jim is amazing

yeah he um he you know i did a podcast with him because i want to they're they're doing so well under him and then he got a beach front he did a beach front, which did, and I thought it was showing some leg.

He was showing someone.

Did you know he and I?

Sean's like, I love that.

Do you know that he and I are fraternity brothers?

We're both Alpha Rose Ada Beta Tale UCLA.

Wow.

So we slip each other the secret hint.

Hello, brother.

Hello.

Can you believe that?

We have a secret chance.

Oh, I couldn't believe it.

Alex is like,

he goes, we did some things I can't tell you.

Yeah, I can't tell you.

I can't tell you.

It's very secret, but oh my God.

Like, he does that all the time.

But I respect it.

I think he's,

I'm not going to, I'm going to get it wrong.

Alpha Delta Psi.

I think that's what he is.

He might be.

I think he's an alpha to what?

That's not right.

I don't know.

He's going to kill me now.

Is that something?

Beta Theta Pi?

No, Alpha Delta Phi.

Psi.

Alpha Delta Psi.

Anyway.

I don't think that's right.

Well, anyway, Alex, I apologize once again for being a bad parent.

But more importantly, it's the ultimate in caste system and stereotyping, and that is everyone gravitates towards a, they find their tribe.

Like Sigma Chi UCLA were the god squatters who were also good-looking guys.

You know, Phi Caps were the small-town alcoholics that were fun to party with.

Sammys were the hardcore Jews.

ZBT, we were sort of the like more social, I don't know, more, more, I don't know, ready for prime time, some athletes Jews.

And occasionally we'd bring in a non-white just to show how progressive we were.

The betas were total fucking animals

that always threw the most ridiculous like

top offensive parties.

Yeah, essentially.

The Theta Kaiser were like the new wave guys that like all had David Bowie haircuts.

Okay.

Wow.

Good to know.

Wait a minute.

This was literally the best part of your life, wasn't it?

Oh, 100%.

I mean, seriously, the way you all talk about this.

I was the, hold on.

I was the Delta Gamma anchorman.

An entire sorority chose me as their guy in 1986.

Yeah,

because I was funny.

Because I was funny.

Memories.

Oh, my God.

Take me back.

Like the shadow of my memory.

take me back the way we were scott i actually am doing a lot better today than i was then anyway um we've got a lot to get to today i'm very glad for this moment of fraternity between us apple and meta considering an ai partnership uh apple's you know going around as you said as we said the thing uh and biden and trump are getting ready to go head-to-head in this week's debate i don't know if you've heard about it uh plus our friend of pivot the newest member of the vox media uh family brene brown is coming on she hosts the podcast unlocking us and dare to lead and we're going to talk to her about social media, election anxiety, and more, and about vulnerability, Scott, which you are very vulnerable.

I am less so.

Speaking of people who are neat, are vulnerable in a way that is really unattractive.

So, Melinda French Gates gave her first presidential endorsement to President Biden, and it was great.

She had a really nice announcement why she did it.

It was a lot around women's rights.

Musk replied to a tweet about her likely donations to Biden, saying, quote, might be the downfall of Western civilization.

Oh, Elon, you endless drama queen.

He also made similar comments about Mackenzie Scott's charitable givings.

He doesn't like, I don't know why he cares if he gives money and everything else in time that he cares to comment on other people's opinions.

I think it comes down to incentives.

I've been thinking a lot about incentives.

And the incentives,

really the problem with social media and probably

the epicenter of what has really fucked up our society over the last 10 years is the incentives are, you know, for teen girls to sexualize themselves and it's for powerful people with a huge following to say controversial, incendiary, coarse things because you're seen as a leader.

And unfortunately, you're seen as

someone who is puncturing and

tells it like it is when you say really

coarse, just inappropriate things.

The incentives are, I'm sure he got tens of millions of likes for that.

And people are like, oh, he's a leader.

He can't keep that guy down.

Rather than saying, why, you know, she's trying to do that.

She wants to give money if she wants to.

Big deal.

Like, Mr.

Free free speech it's ridiculous i like it's like it's interesting though there's sort of a lineup happening like you have melinda gates i've heard that cheryl on the sly has been giving money to biden a big check um chery sandbert

yeah and obviously reid hoffman's been giving this is on the television he did a very thoughtful editorial on he did that was great uh bloomberg uh did one i'm sure cuban's been been sort of a surrogate for biden quite heavily on twitter you know who's been the most effective

robert derobert jeiro's been really good yeah but these are the tech guys.

It's interesting because there's a real lineup happening here of teams.

And then there's the sort of right-wingers, all in people just did a Trump

licking him up and down in their whatever.

I wouldn't call it an interview.

It was more widely a suck-up thing.

It gotten a lot of

commentary on that, nonetheless.

And then, you know, obviously Musk has lined up for Biden.

I mean, excuse me, is for Trump.

So it's interesting.

And of course, they're all meeting with people like Javier Malai of Argentina.

They just did a picture.

Mark Andreessen was there.

A whole bunch of tech bros were with him.

And of course, they called him, you know, one of our great intellectual philosopher kings.

And they're not really reading the parts about abortion being murder and saying women need to go back in their place.

They don't seem to, they seem to agree.

He's like a libertarian, like wet dream, libertarian tech bro, wet dream, Malai.

Yeah, but just to go back to the supporting a candidate, I also

don't think it's fair.

I saw Dennis Quaid was saying he's probably going to vote for Trump, and the comments were just so aggressive.

And I'm like, okay,

if you believe people should be allowed to support Biden and disagree, but don't go after them, people should be able to support Trump and you should be able to disagree and not.

They should.

I just think their interview was a sucker.

But go ahead.

Go ahead.

Sorry.

I wrote you.

Well, yeah,

I didn't listen to the interview, but

I'm curious.

So you listened to it.

You didn't think it was a very good interview?

No, they didn't follow up on anything.

They forgot to ask him about the felony.

They,

you know.

Yeah, I mean, it just was just like, and your big brain.

It just was, it wasn't an interview.

They're not journalists.

They're a bunch of investors cosplaying it, being

whatever, thought leaders.

I don't care.

We're going to try to get Biden just everybody knows for this interview.

Yeah, I wasn't sure.

I didn't want to say that.

Yeah, we can say that.

We're going to spoil it.

We're going to try to get him.

We're going to get him.

We're going to try to get him.

Yeah, that's not we.

That's you.

If we get him, it's because of you.

Yeah, well, you got to be ready to go.

You need to ask good, tough questions.

That's what we'll do because we'll ask good, tough questions of him.

We do the same with Trump, by the way.

Maybe we should ask Trump.

Should we ask Trump?

I don't see why we wouldn't.

I think we should.

He won't do it because he likes to get licked up and down all day.

If we're going to ask Biden, we should ask Trump.

Yeah, absolutely.

I will do that.

I'll put in a thing that will be thrown into the circular file.

His kids liked my, his kids, Don Jr.

retweeted my Morning Joe segment and said, this is the America we're trying to create.

I'm like, wow.

You're a well-known job.

Don Jr.

Yeah, you're a well-known job.

Don Jr.

Jr.

Yeah.

That's how I think of Scott MAGA.

I think you're open-minded is what you are, but not particularly.

Well, no, but I think he did that because I think that's clearly evidence his cocaine dealer was back from Tulum.

You probably share one.

Anyway.

I don't do cocaine.

I'm very open about my drug use.

I've never done Blow.

I know.

I know you haven't.

I forget the things you've done.

I forgot.

I'm sorry.

I'm going to keep my list.

I think I would have lost my virginity at 17.

Lena, my prom date, wanted to do blow, and I didn't bring any.

I think that was my shot.

I think that was my shot.

I think you've done just fine.

All right, we got to move on.

And just so you know, just for everyone, congratulations.

Musk had another child, by the way, with Neuralink director Siobhan Zillis.

She had twins with Musk, and then she had another child.

Congratulations.

Not living with your children.

That's a real sign of masculinity.

You're definitely being a protector there.

Well, when you have 12, it's a little hard.

You have to have a big house.

He is rich, though.

Anyway, congratulations on your child.

Big thing we've been talking about, you and I texted about, I think AI's power grid needs are exceeding capacity.

Goldman Sachs analysis found that data centers will account for 8% of total electricity use in the U.S.

That's an, I mean, crypto and Bitcoin mining was, yeah, tech giants are confident they can solve the problem, though.

Microsoft's saying it will harness atomic fusion power by 2028.

Both Bill Gates and Sam Altman are investing in nuclear energy.

Meanwhile, coal plants near data center operations that were supposed to be shut down have been extended to fuel demand.

Well, great.

Good, good.

More global warming.

Microsoft, Meta, Google, and Amazon have all said they plan to erase their emissions as soon as 2030.

They've talked talked about that.

You know, the amount of power, you know, you need two things.

You need

obviously the chips and you need the data, but power is the one people don't pay attention to as much.

Yeah, they say it's 10 to 17 times the power for a query on AI versus a query on search.

And even the...

Even the water to cool these data centers, they say that you're going to need essentially the amount of water, the daily water supply for 17 million households just to cool

data system.

Well,

the thing I like about this is that people are re-embracing nuclear power and trying to be very creative.

These guys are very smart.

They're very forward and future looking, and they're not afraid to make money.

And they're not afraid to make big capex investments.

But I think someone told me that

crypto has added the incremental power demand of Argentina.

And it's not unthinkable to think in 10 years, if AI keeps growing, it'll be the incremental power demand of Latin America.

So it's really interesting.

Power is energy, no matter how much energy we produce,

it's like bandwidth.

We can find uses for it much faster than

we can find energy sources.

100%.

They've tried innovative ways.

My ex-wife worked on, I can say this now because she left a long time ago, but they were thinking of doing, she went to Hawaii and I was like, why are you going there?

She said, I can't say.

And at the time, they were going to do a wind farm on Hawaii for power.

And they were going to try to power Honolulu.

Google was doing this.

And obviously, Google's been really out for with this stuff like thermal energy, all kinds of ways to, these data centers are just such a pull.

And, you know, I'd always hear of some...

plot, whether it's thermal or nuclear or wind,

to, you know, at one point, remember they had that sail they were going to put up in the atmosphere that was going to turn a turbine and then was going to create power?

Remember the big sale?

That was another thing.

Google has been at the forefront, but they do have to solve this.

They should be the one focusing on alternative energy sources.

I hope they do more wind farms so it drives Donald Trump crazy because it kills birds, apparently.

But anyway, it's a really interesting thing we should keep in mind.

We focused a lot about it around Bitcoin mining, but AI really is a pull on the energy sector.

It's an area we probably should look at.

I'll get a little experts in here.

Anyway, let's get to our first big story.

Apple just became the first company to be charged under the EU's new competition law, the Digital Markets Act.

EU regulators say the App Store stifles competition for developers and limits options for consumers.

Apple has defended its practices, saying restrictions fees are fair trade for providing a large platform.

Same arguments they've made here.

Obviously, they've been sucked up into litigation here in this country.

Do you think Apple's in trouble here?

They're definitely, these are new European rules.

It's said it's not going to release Apple intelligence in the EU in 2024 due to regulatory uncertainties.

Meta's paused its AI launch in Europe after regulators raised privacy concerns.

So what do you think about that?

I think that's the problem.

There's sort of a collective action problem, and that is, for example, if you don't get every kid under the age of 16 off the social media, the kids that you do take off of social media are actually

end up becoming more depressed because they feel isolated.

And there's a bit of a collective action problem around regulation.

And that is, does Europe end up with sort of a hamstrung version of these products?

And then the companies kind of bind together and start slowballing rollouts and not hiring?

It's sort of the race to the bottom.

And to Secretary Yellen and Biden's credit, they did an AMT based on alternative minimum tax on corporations of 15% across EU and kind of G20 countries.

Because if they didn't do that, everybody just keeps doing their double-dutch sandwich and issuing their IP to the lowest tax state.

And so I think that the EU is feeling a little bit, I don't know, what the term is punished.

I think these, they're collectively, the big tech firms, when I saw this, they're sort of winking at each other and saying, we're bigger than Europe and we'll just start slow-rolling stuff and have two sets of products.

Now, whether that creates an opening for competitive products, we'll see.

I think Mistril, the AI company out of France, is actually going to succeed because you've talked about this company.

But

I'm blathering on here.

What are your thoughts on it?

I haven't really thought it through.

You know, it's more, it's this idea that we do have to have

laws in this country, right?

This is still that Europe is sort of leading the way.

You know, I talked about it to a number of people there in

con, you know, this Europe shouldn't be leading the way on these things.

And obviously, there's lawsuits here in this country having to do with Apple.

And this at some point, this App Store issue will come to a head in this country.

It'll take 109 years, and it has in court with

a bunch of, you know, a bunch of different cases.

But I think the question is: at some point, they can't keep making the idea that they're providing safety on a large platform and it's fair trade and everything else, because they really do have a stranglehold on the market.

And so there must be some, I've always thought Apple would negotiate an end to this, right, rather than do anything.

But I suspect that they're just not going to release it in Europe just because they won't.

You know, they just won't.

And I don't know whether our government has

here, you know, has the heft to really keep pushing through all these lawsuits, whether it's Meta or Apple or,

you know, any of these companies.

And, but eventually, you know, there'll be discovery.

It's just,

it takes so long to stop the juggernaut from happening.

And speaking of which, Apple and Meta, longtime adversaries, might be teaming up in a new partnership.

You remember, there's a lot of testiness between Mark Zuckerberg and Tim Cook.

a couple of years ago about advertising, but the two companies reported talking about integrating Meta's generative AI model into apple intelligence according to the wall street journal ai startups anthropic and perplexity are also in talks with apple perplexity is in a lot of hot water for for scraping like forbes's articles and we talked about that previously um you know i think as we talked about these companies apple will be the

was it the gatekeeper is the right word or what would you how would you characterize it um and you know does it bring more antitrust scrutiny by doing all these um they haven't done one with i probably google they'll probably do a deal with its Gemini model.

I think Metas is an open source model.

They're going to be like

the everything store, I guess, for these things.

I see it as passing out free crack to the kind of the rich kids.

And that is they're saying, okay, if you want, we are the gatekeeper and we have custody of the billion wealthiest and most influential customers in the world, and that's iOS users.

It's so disproportionately influential, iOS versus Android.

And I think what they're doing is they said we're going to work with multiple players and we'll give them a little taste of crack on what it's like and they'll try out their their LLMs with the like most sophisticated most influential biggest spending group right and then I think where this is headed is all to the same place it was headed with search and then they're going to say all right we're going to flip the model and say who wants sole access

or maybe they'll go you know put them all there and hide them yeah or or do like you know these sponsorships thing where you know the

the Olympic Games is brought to you by our diamond sponsor, Exxon, and our platinum sponsor, you know, but they're, I think the, I think Apple, someone, I don't know who it is, but someone who's in charge of strategy at Apple comes to Tim Cook with really thoughtful scenario planning.

And I think what they're doing here is saying, okay, give everyone a taste of what it's like to hang with the cool kids.

And we're basically the end game here.

What works best for us, right?

What works best for us.

100%.

Yeah, because they have to have a safer environment for sure.

But I think where this is all headed is in 12 or 24 months, they're going to have a Google-like licensing agreement where they're going to just create billions, if not tens of billions of high-margin licensing revenues to these LLMs that are all looking to stand out.

Because if you're, say you're anthropic, right?

And you're kind of losing that, you're falling behind to ChatGPT.

I mean, how much would it be worth to you if your company goes public at say a $150 billion market cap?

Would you be willing to take a 5% dilution that would be $7.5 billion and give it to Apple for two years exclusive access to the billion most influential consumers in the world?

I think that's how they're positioning themselves.

By making them the default position.

I'm just looking at my search engine.

For some reason, my search engine changed to DuckDuckGo.

I must have done it.

You did that.

I must have done it.

I don't recall doing it.

But it usually is Google.

Google was the default one.

On there right now, I'm just looking at it as Yahoo Bing and

Ekosia, which I don't even know what that is.

but it's sitting there.

I'm going to go try it, I guess.

So, you know, Apple's not paying the first deal, which was widely touted, Apple with OpenAI.

Apple's not paying OpenAI, obviously, to feature ChatGPT.

It's like a big marketing event for OpenAI in Apple Intelligence, nor is OpenAI paying Apple, but at some point, you know, who's getting paid.

They're not Apple.

Apple is.

So I suspect that's going to be the same financial relationships.

Apple is the kingmaker here in a a lot of ways.

It's a smart there.

You know, it's interesting because all these media companies are negotiating with these people for using LLMs.

And then they'll get a small amount of money.

This is where the big money is going.

This is where the big fucking money is going.

I just interviewed Craig Peters from Getty today.

We had a great discussion about this because he's suing some people.

He's cooperating with some people.

But it's really hard because, you know, he's a media company.

So his shares are way off.

You know, his customers are

in a free fall.

His form, all the media companies.

And so it's hard.

It's hard to compete as a media company.

So this is who's going to make the money is the Apple.

Apple's going to get richer.

Well, and I think analysts immediately went to the white meet here and they saw the same thing that we're seeing.

And they said, okay, Apple's positioning themselves for another enormous licensing deal, similar to Google.

And the stock's up 10% since they announced Apple Intelligence.

It has.

Let's see.

And I don't think it's

really.

Yeah, it's hit an all-time high.

And I don't think it's on the back of, wow, this is a great product.

I think it said, oh, we see what you're doing.

You're not going to spend tens of billions of dollars trying to build your own LLM.

You're just going to go to the highest bidder.

It's cost savings costs and then everything else.

And you're going to reap all this money.

You're going to say, all right, you guys jump on your price swords, and we're going to...

we're going to start a bidding war and all of this is going to hit the bottom line.

So

in their stock was you'll think of Apple intelligence, not all these individual people.

Because I guess I do think of Google Maps when I get to another.

Although I've heard that Apple Maps are gotten a lot better, so I may go see how that experience is.

They've added $300 million in market capitalization since the Apple intelligence.

And it's not because people think Apple intelligence is so cool.

I think it's because they sense they're about to become the new gatekeepers to the deepest pockets in the world.

All right, Scott, let's go on a quick break and we get back.

Look ahead to this week's presidential debate, and we'll speak to a friend of Pivot, Brene Brown.

Hello, Daisy speaking.

Hello, Daisy.

This is Phoebe Judge from the IRS.

Oh, bless, that does sound serious.

I wouldn't want to end up in any sort of trouble.

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Over the next couple of weeks, we're releasing episodes about a surprising way to stop scammers.

The people you didn't know were on the other end of the line.

And we have a special bonus episode on Criminal Plus with tips to protect yourself.

Listen to Criminal wherever you get your podcasts and sign up for Criminal Plus at thisiscriminal.com slash plus.

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Scott, we're back.

Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump are set to face off on Thursday for the earliest presidential debate in modern history, by like a lot.

The debate hosted by CNN, moderated by Jake Tappa.

Jake Tappa and Dana Bash will be the first time Biden and Trump have gone head to head or have been in the same room since our last debate in October of 2020.

I don't think they like each other.

A Marist poll from last week shows a dead heat between the candidates.

And actually, Giden was up a little bit.

He's been going up a little bit, including a Fox News poll, which is making

former President Trump lose his mind, which is not very far to go.

So let's talk about strategery, Scott.

Now, here you are going into this debate.

I talked about it a little bit on the Chris Wall's show this week, but what is the strategery?

Just for some more background, RFK Jr.

did not make the cut for the debate, falling short in ballot qualification and polling.

He's making a lot of noise.

The debate rules, just for people to know, and then I love your thoughts on this.

No live audience, no props allowed on stage.

Microphones will be muted when it's not a candidate's turn to speak.

I believe they have two minutes.

Biden won the coin toss and selected his podium position on the right side of the screen.

Trump then chose to have the last word in closing statements.

So what do we think?

Give me a what Biden should.

This is the question we have on Chris Wallace.

I thought it was a good one.

Does this setup help?

Which one?

If you are the marketing guy here figuring out sort of the optics of it, which one do you think this set helps?

Oh, it's total Team Biden in terms of advantage.

Trump is so quick and outrageous on his feet and so plays to the crowd and tickles people's sensors and all that.

Him constantly interrupting people, it just throws the other person off, you know, off kilter.

So them shutting off the mic is totally advantageous to Biden.

Is it?

There would be some crazy, I think Democrats tend to be a little bit more civil than maybe MAGA people.

He's not going to show up with a bunch of people who've accused.

I mean, do you remember the bullshit?

Yes, remember?

Bill Clinton?

Surgeon Clinton?

Yeah.

So he creates a sideshow and a carnival, which throws the other person off their feet.

And the strategy here is really simple.

Okay, let's talk about the economy.

I wouldn't go to the.

Let me get.

What is the one thing Biden should avoid and one thing he should lean into?

And what is the one thing Trump should avoid and lean into?

If I were Biden, I would stay away from the Trump court cases.

I think that people will go there on their own.

And

I don't think he ⁇ I think he wants to talk about the economy and bodily autonomy and how he is actually taking action against immigration.

I would go very, very almost conservative and hard right on immigration and say, now, if the Republicans would only help me solve the crisis at the border, and I would talk about the economy.

I would talk about numbers.

I would be very kind of adult, almost like an economist.

And I would end the debate with the following.

Awkward pause.

My last question to our viewers tonight after thanking CNN is,

do you have daughters?

And I would just leave the air empty for a few seconds.

Very good.

I like that.

Many people think he should not, you know how Reagan did that fantastic rejoinder invite, I'm not going to let my age take advantage.

He's not witty like that.

And so he, should he have a joke in his pocket, though, about his age if

Trump goes?

Because Trump's got some cognitive dingety-dongs happening constantly now.

Yeah, I mean, he should have a couple.

He should have pre-packaged two or three.

And when someone brings up age, he should come up with, you know, say, look, look,

we're both probably consumers of catheters.

I would make jokes to remind everybody that the guy across the stage from me is also really fucking old, folks.

So, yeah, you hate us both,

whatever you want to talk about.

But him not having a hot mic, and if I were Trump, I would talk a lot about what's happened on universities when Democrats take over institutions and what's happened in democratically controlled cities.

That's where I would focus

if I were

crime and chaos, sort of the Nixony kind of thing.

Well, the most demon, I mean, the arguments they should make, and this is what media they should roll every day, is this is what happens when democratically controlled leadership takes over an institution.

Look at what's happened at our elite universities.

This is is what happens when Democrats get control of a city, even if it has a ton of money.

This is what happens.

Go downtown San Francisco.

Is this what you want the country to be?

I realize that's not fair.

I realize you love San Francisco.

That is just from a perception standpoint.

Okay, yeah, go ahead.

It's changed.

But go ahead.

I agree with you.

I agree with you.

I agree.

I agree.

It might be wonderful.

I'm just talking pure perception.

Yeah, I agree.

People who've never been there for some reason think it's a hellscape right now, unfairly or fairly.

And also, to be fair, like Portland and Seattle are really, I have been to those cities recently.

They've changed a lot.

They have.

They have.

I agree with you.

So, so one of the things that, what should Trump not do?

Because some people think he will be calmer when he can't be jacked up.

That's the thing.

And so he'll be the, if you recall, the first debate with Biden, and this is a long time ago, he was, you know, cuckoo for Cocoa Puffs, really, you know, stand back and stand by, interruptive, crazy.

And all Biden had to say is, come on, man.

You know, he kept doing, and Biden sort of won that debate.

The second one, he looked like he was drugged and calmer.

So some people think no live audience, no props, microphones muted will make him into reasonable Trump.

Yeah, I don't, I don't know.

I mean, I would never advise.

It's like Michael Jackson used to show up with one glove and grab his crotch.

I don't think any amount of prep would have told him to do it.

And yet it was genius at the time.

You're like, okay, it works for him.

I don't know how to advise Trump because every piece of advice I would have would be try and act more sane because that's people's fear around you.

And try not to be all over the place.

Try and focus on, try and come across as people,

you want to look at points of distinction and then press on those points of distinction.

The reason Biden will, if Biden loses this election, it'll be because of the following.

The people see him as too feeble to be commander-in-chief.

That is the only reason he will lose.

And so you want to press on that.

And so Trump wants to come across as distinctly more robust and young.

And part of that is cognitive capability.

So if I was preparing Trump, I would say you need to have command of the issues.

You need to come across as somewhat sane.

You need to come across as youthful and vigorous, laugh, poke fun of yourself, and have real command of the data.

You need to draw sharp relief between you and the old man.

That's my point.

Yeah, the problem is, like everywhere he goes,

he's missing words now.

He's doing a lot of stuff and obviously as a family history, this

of dementia.

But one of the things that I think is problematic, and I spoke to a lot of people in that CEO summit.

Now, look, they're going to back Trump because it's good for them and tax cuts, let me just say.

And someone who was there saying they thought he was crazy, they're still going to back him, right?

He was losing words.

He was going off on tangents.

This was a crowd that was welcoming to him,

this CEO group, the business roundtable, and

was willing to overlook the insurrection kind of stuff for a tax cut.

And

I talked to a number of people who are like, whoa, like, whoa, like that kind of thing.

So I think that's where he, I don't know how much he has control over that or is willing to do that.

I think one of the things he cannot do is talk about losing the election.

That's he, whether

he's fine.

He cannot

look backwards, but he can't get off of that.

You stole the election.

You stole the election.

If he does that, it's a huge opportunity for Biden.

And Biden needs to be ready to go and go, okay, 43 cases, zero credibility.

Just X, Y, Z, what's the difference between every difference between us and every other nation?

We have people who concede electrons, you know, and Biden has to be ready to really drive a training.

I think Trump can't help that.

I think it animates everything.

I think he does.

And then the other thing he's saying, the last thing I'd say is he's all saying that Biden's getting a shot in the ass, which means Trump is getting a shot in the ass, right?

Like everything he says, I'm like, oh, that's what you're doing.

I mean, Trump looks like he's taking every drug in town.

Like, it feels like a Zempic.

It looks like he's juicy.

Biden needs to practice the age-old adage about being interviewed.

Don't answer the question they ask, answer the question you want to ask.

At some point, he needs to say the following.

Trump threatened to try to ban TikTok and carve it up.

We have actually banned it or investing it with a plan that will pass muster that makes sense.

Biden constantly, you know,

Trump talks about safety in the Middle East.

We sent two aircraft carriers over there, and

we have so far sequestered this from becoming a more regional conflict.

He needs to say, okay, Trump talks a big game, but

we actually, you know, we have some overlap here.

You agreed you thought TikTok was a national threat.

I want to give you credibility for it.

We've actually done something about it.

You talk a big game about being an ally to Israel.

We're actually the real ally here.

One of us has deployed an aircraft carrier there.

Right, yeah.

Yeah, I think that's true.

I think one of the interesting things going into this is the money raising.

Now, Trump is, they thought this would happen, but he's raised $141 million in May.

Biden raised $85 million.

He was way ahead, Biden.

$53 million came in for Prump 24 hours after the hush money verdict, of course.

He's really done very well by being a felon.

There's also, I think that'll ultimately even out and depends on where they spend it.

I don't know what else to say.

I don't think there's going to be a big deficit between them.

Trump VP

speculation, he's making a circus of it.

He revealed this weekend he knows whose pick will be, although he hasn't told the person yet.

The future VP candidate will most likely be at the debate, according to Trump.

Current top contenders include Senators J.D.

Vance, Marco Rubio, and Tim Scott, and North Dakota Governor Doug Bergham.

I think I've settled on Bergham at this point.

You know, he's managing to carry the water for him and seems not as nuts as the others.

I think he doesn't like Marco Rubio.

I think he thinks J.D.

Vance will take attention from him.

Tim Scott looks like a toady,

so much so.

So I suspect it's Bergham.

South Dakota Governor Christy Noom appears to be out of the running.

She indicated on Meet the Press over the weekend she is not.

No, he doesn't have a dog.

He doesn't know.

He doesn't have any pets.

So any, just make a guess, and then I'll ask you a last question about the Supreme Court's decision.

I don't know.

I think it's probably going to be Bergen, but just one last thing.

If I were on the Trump team, I would hammer over and over.

Just to be snarky,

I would go, 100%.

I'd be like, well, President Harris.

And he's like, you better get used to that.

This guy's going to be dead.

If he really wants to go gangster, you'd say the following: You're not voting for Joe Biden, you're voting for President Harris.

Just wrap your head around that because she's deeply unpopular.

Yeah, I think you're right.

I hate to say it, but I think that would work really well.

We'll see if he comes up with it.

Meanwhile, we're still waiting for the Supreme Court's decision on the Trump immunity case.

What in the world are they doing over there at the Supreme Court?

The next batch of opinions will be released on Wednesday.

They've got a lot to go, and they've got a very short term to do it in.

The day before the debates, we get a decision then.

The immunity decision, I think they're probably like wrangling over it, right?

I think Alito's been hurt probably with the flag situation.

But

in terms of power, but I suspect they're trying to come.

I have this feeling that Amy Coney Barrett's just not going along with the boys at this point on this kind of thing.

But who knows?

She seems to have formed relationships with the other women on the court, which is interesting.

What do you think of this?

Not on abortion, obviously, but what do you think?

Has this affected?

I don't know.

The thing you said that was sort of interesting is that what you just made an argument for was lifetime appointments.

I think they should do what they do in Brazil.

And the Supreme Court there has mandatory retirement age of 75.

Oh, my God.

Think about it.

You have to leave when you're 75.

What generally happens is, or what you hope happens, is that people just become apolitical and show a fidelity to the Constitution or the beliefs or what have you, and they're not going to be intimidated by anyone.

I haven't seen that.

I've always thought Justice Barrett,

I don't know.

I think that's a wishful thinking that she's siding with.

I know, I know, but lately she has been, I don't know, it's just interesting.

I think she's gotten hanging around other people, and she's so smart.

Like, let's be honest.

I mean, godly or not, she's a smart, sharp as a tack.

Yeah, she's crazy.

It'll be, I don't, I don't know.

I just think she's probably with

Judge Jackson, who's also, oh, Jesus, what a brain.

I suspect that's the thing that appeals to her.

Even religious gals who are brainy love the brainy part more than anything, ultimately.

I don't know.

That's my wishful thinking is that they're all having like they're like hanging and and squatting up or something.

I don't know.

We'll see.

By the way, you said something that strikes me.

So try and clear your mind in just first answer.

Biden Harris,

Trump Bergen,

or Tapper Bash?

Who would you rather be president and vice president?

Seriously.

Dana Bash.

Are you kidding?

I love Dana Bash.

I think Dana's fantastic.

I think Jake is fantastic.

I'm not exaggerating.

I know you could do a better job.

Probably.

And maybe I'm being sexist because I immediately thought of Jake Tapper as the president and Dana as the number two.

But quite frankly, I think they're both super impressive, thoughtful people who know how to.

Jake Tapper for president.

If they were on the ticket, if they were on the ticket,

they got my vote.

I'd vote for Cuban.

I told you I'd vote for Cuban.

Those two should be on stage.

I want Cubes.

I'm not asking the question.

I want Cubes to run.

That's what I want, just because I want to go.

Yeah, because I just want to, you and I will be staying together in Lincoln bedroom.

It'll be nice.

He will.

He'll be in the race for 2028.

When he starts bragging about paying his taxes, he's clearly positioning himself for a run.

And I hope he's very articulate about all kinds of issues.

Super smart, super impressive.

Yeah.

Probably.

There'll be

2028, unless Trump wins and ruins democracy will be really interesting on both parties.

It'll be really,

it'll change here

and maybe we'll all be a little better.

Who knows?

All right, let's bring in our friend of Pivot.

Brene Brown is the host of two Vox Media podcasts, Unlocking Us and Dare to Lead.

Brene, welcome to Pivot and the Vox Media Podcast family.

I'm so glad to be with y'all.

I've been listening and y'all have recently been in the south of France.

I wish I had been there with you.

Well, next year, next year, we'll all go together and we'll

get on Scott's

zodiac and ride around and everything.

Oh my god, I'm so in.

You know, Scott had said he was going to take me on it and also attack Meta Beach, and he ended up sort of just wandering up to the Pinterest beach there.

So it was a lesson.

It was an accident.

Yeah, yeah.

Anyway, so let's start.

So you took a break from podcasting for over a year and recently returned.

So you said you returned in part because you missed the conversation.

So talk about that because many people don't walk away from talking.

Okay.

Wow, we're just going right there.

Yeah.

I,

you know, my mom

died on Christmas morning.

I guess six or seven months ago after a very shitty battle with dementia.

And during that period of time,

I noticed how susceptible and vulnerable I was to the

influencer industrial complex online.

Like, you know, you can't, when you have a parent with dementia, it's very, and you're, you know, you're my age, you're, you forget a song lyric and you're like,

fuck, it's here.

I'm next.

And so

I would be scrolling on Instagram and it would, and of course it knows exactly what I'm thinking about and what I'm doing.

And it would say, you know, do you have a family member with dementia?

Are you worried about it for yourself?

One tablespoon of castor oil, you know, prevents dementia, you know, and I just

realized, even as a social scientist, how vulnerable I was to that.

And then inevitably, I'd be scrolling and I'd see myself.

And it would be this nuanced conversation that was clipped down in a way that made me seem so certain

and so sure sure about something that I almost couldn't stand seeing myself as a part of that.

Because, I mean,

I think there is something on social media around advice giving that is so predatory.

And I just, I needed a break.

I just needed to step away from it.

And I needed to, I needed to step away from talking.

And it's interesting because I have, I get asked to do podcasts all the time, but now we don't do them if they include video, if we don't have clip approval.

Oh, smart.

That's interesting.

Well, this is like perfect.

Scott, I got to bring you in right now.

This is sort of Scott's area of discussion where he talks about this all the time, the vulnerability of this experience online.

Scott?

Well, I was actually going to go,

I don't get to that, but I always describe the two most seminal events in my life were birth and death, the birth of my sons and the death of my mother.

I'm just curious, having lost your mother recently, and it sounds like that was not a,

I don't want to call it a bad death, but an extended hard death for the people around her.

How have you changed your approach to life?

Are you more, you know, what has changed in terms of the way you see the world on a day-to-day basis, how you allocate your time and your approach to life since the death of your mother?

Yeah, I mean, it was a shit death.

It was a jagged edge death.

It was a death by a million pieces, you know.

I think even when she died, I was shocked that she was never going to come back and be okay again.

Yeah, it's so final.

Yeah, it's weird.

And then it's, and it creeps up on me in really different ways.

Um,

like my son just graduated from high school, and

I was like, oh my God, my mom's going to love this picture.

And I'm like, oh, God.

I think,

I don't know.

I don't think it's a coincidence that that happened.

And my first, the first book I bought, besides some like spiritual contemplations on grief, was the book 4,000 Weeks.

Have y'all know that book?

I don't.

Tell us about it.

Oh, it's really interesting.

He was a productivity writer, I think, for one of The Guardian or one of the UK newspapers.

And he was the one saying, you know,

you know,

task box, you know, you know, box things up, do this, the Pomodero method.

He did all that.

And then at some point,

he said,

shit, we only have 4,000 weeks if we're lucky.

And the more productive you are, the more bullshit you have to do.

And this productive, this productivity thing is such, and this is where I loved his work.

The productivity piece is such

armor around protecting vulnerability and the fact that our time is finite

and we really have best case scenario 4,000 weeks.

And so I think I started doing a lot of work with a coach and my therapist around

what's important to me and what's not.

And my discernment button was broken.

And so now I'm really trying to become very discerning about,

and that's hard for me, firstborn, code names yes you're big pleasing right you're pleasing oldest of four yeah

yeah it's interesting it's interesting i'm gonna drink i i actually do that with some people when it whenever i decided they're wasting i have a very big sense of death as you know um constantly and one i was i tell a story one person i was working with i was like i i just don't you I don't want to talk to you anymore because you're taking up minutes of my life.

Like, I'm very aware of the minutes that, you know, negative things take on me or things I don't like.

And I stop them because I am very aware of the moments, which I think social media and online is one of them, like 100%, some of which I like, some of which I enjoy.

And in like videos, for example, I like a lot of funny videos.

But most of the time, it's very difficult for people to, because so much rushes to fill.

And one of the things you were talking about was the negative effects of social media.

You do talk about that for years, and particularly loneliness.

And, you know, we've been hearing a lot of ideas lately on how to reduce those harms.

The The Surgeon General proposed warning labels.

New York Governor Kathy Hochuls just signed a bill regulating social media algorithms for kids.

I'm just curious, how do you, for yourself, and do you think any of these solutions?

Because a lot of the time suck is social media and advice giving.

And I agree with you on the predatory aspects of it.

This is how you should live.

Here's five areas to say, you know, that will make your life happier, et cetera.

I mean, I think, I mean, it's a multi-pronged predator predator because it's not just the time suck of scrolling.

It's what we're ingesting knowingly and unknowingly while we're scrolling.

And it's about

talking about the biggest discernment button that we're up against, talking about breaking every sense.

of our connection to self in desperate pursuit of a counterfeit you know connection with others, that's social media.

I mean, you want to lose yourself.

It reminds me of like when I was really young and I was, you know, you'd be dating guys in college.

They're like, What, what, what music do you?

I mean, I'm gonna date myself here, but like, who's your favorite band?

They're like, Boston.

Oh, mine too.

What's your favorite book?

Dune.

More than a feeling.

Yeah, more than a feeling.

Oh, my God.

Yeah.

Well, Boston is actually one of my favorite bands, but

you know, and then somewhere down the line, you're dating this guy for like three months and you're like, shit, man, I don't like any of this shit we're doing.

I don't like your music.

I don't like where you like to eat.

But talking about losing the connection to who you are and your capacity for discernment.

Discernment.

I like that, Scott.

Do you,

I'm just curious.

You talk a lot about vulnerability.

You have a huge social media following.

Have you found that social media and your presence on social media has been accretive to your mental health or damaging to your mental health?

And how have you responded in terms of your own approach to something?

Sounds like damaging.

Oh, devastating.

Yeah.

Just devastating.

I'm not, I'm not built for this at all.

I am.

Okay, but you have five million followers on Instagram, so you have embraced it.

So, how do you modulate it and cope with it?

Um,

asking for a friend, but go ahead.

Yeah, no, I um, let me just tell you for sure.

So,

I

have a, I have five million followers on Instagram.

If I pulled up my phone right now and went to my followers and scrolled down to the bottom, I would get a note from Instagram that said somewhere between 100 and 300 of those are suspicious and should be deleted en masse.

Like, I don't know who these people are.

And if I had to do it over again, I would have done things so differently.

I don't post on the feed anymore.

I only post in stories because there's no comments.

you know, I paid a lot of money for a moderation team external.

And I'll tell you why.

I had to do that because I could not protect the mental health of the internal moderation team in our organization.

I couldn't do it.

I couldn't protect them.

I mean, these, these were things like.

So you're damaging the mental health of a bunch of people in the Philippines?

Sorry, I couldn't resist.

No, no.

In fact, we were actually really careful about that.

This was a U.S.

company,

very nuanced, but it only lasted, I think we're out of the contract now.

It's not real.

I mean, I'll tell you this.

When I got into,

I got into desktop.

I have to be careful legally here because I'm still under, I got into desktop with Spotify publicly.

You did.

I did.

And during that period of time, I probably received a hundred death threats.

A hundred death threats?

Oh, this is the death step you had, Scott.

It was because Scott had a similar death step.

Yeah, no, I mean, and things like, I'm going to kill your children in front of you.

And a lot of, it was mostly like bald eagle avatar things.

And we have, because of the size of the followings that we have on the different platforms, we have liaisons that we work with.

And, you know, when we call, they're just like, you are in the crosshairs of some very serious bots, probably Russian, and we can't stop it.

And so I went off Twitter three or four years ago.

Yeah, I did a year ago.

Yeah, I went like way before the Elon Musk bullshit.

I was just like,

you know why?

As part of the Spotify desktop, I did an interview with a First Amendment specialist from the ACLU.

And in that interview, he called Twitter a dopamine casino,

which I thought was like.

We call it a Nazi porn bar, but go ahead.

Or the sewage system of a sewer.

Yeah, yeah.

I mean, that's.

Are you comfortable talking?

I had a dust up with

Spotify.

I'm curious what your, if you're comfortable, and you don't have to bring it up again, but what the content of the crux of the dust up was.

I was just, I was caught in the,

everyone thought it was actually like some kind of weird beef with me and Joe Rogan, but it was, I was caught up in what is the responsibility of a platform around mis and disinformation.

We're the same person.

I pulled Prof G off of I had a close,

just so you know, I'm very good at turning everything back to me,

but I lost someone dear to me to COVID, and I just couldn't handle their lack of fact-checking around

bringing on total quacks to say mRNA vaccines altered your DNA.

And I thought, okay,

I don't deny their rights to First Amendment, but I don't have to paint their fucking fence.

And I pulled my, my podcast off.

Anyways, your turn.

No, that's what was happening.

And my husband's a physician.

And we buried friends during the pandemic.

And

I, look,

sometimes

today's conspiracy theory is the science of a decade later.

Right.

And sometimes it's just dangerous bullshit.

That's right.

And I wanted to understand.

And I think it actually came down to because there was no beef between any, me and any other podcast host.

It just happened to be,

you know, that happened to be happening a lot on certain podcasts where they'd have guests on.

And then it just actually came down to a question of what is the responsibility of a podcast host

to vet and let audience know this information has not been confirmed.

This is, you know, I don't know what the, I don't know what it is, but I am a huge First Amendment person.

But and you have First Amendment rights.

And I have them too.

Yeah, that's it.

Not to support economically a platform that is allowing misinformation to go viral.

That's true.

So interestingly, Renee, you just did a whole podcast series on AI, social media, and tech very much in Pivot Wheelhouse.

Was something I'd love to know what surprised you in these kinds of things.

You talked to me about this.

You said, I'm about to do this.

And it was, I think, it was just before you were doing it.

So tell me what you learned from it.

As someone who is not an expert by any means but certainly understands the social as the social uh

you know society part of it i mean if i did a qualitative analysis of pivot shows

the learnings would be the same as this eight this was an eight episode heady deep dive yeah and the learnings would be the same one

technology got there before policy

And it's dangerous.

Two, the biggest concern is the alignment issue.

Who's at the table when you're developing AI?

It's just going to scale an equity at mass.

It's not a machine that controls for

disparity or it's, it's just, it's not that.

And so I think S.

Craig Watkins, who has a joint appointment at UT Austin and MIT, has been studying AI for 20 years.

And

his question was probably one of the ones that really stuck in my mind, which is, who's at the table sitting with the computational mathematicians and the coders?

Are the ethicists there?

Are the people with lived experiences that you're going to impact there?

Are the liberal arts people there?

And so to me,

I mean, I'm a big policy person.

I'm a government person, actually.

I trust that that's a system that works when done well

and works better than nothing at all, regardless of how it's done.

But I think

it's the technology is so far ahead of policy

that everyone I talked to

said at some point, we're going to go, oh my God, did we really let this happen?

And I, and I'm with y'all, I'm bullish on a lot of it.

I love a lot of it.

We're, we have an AI internship program this summer to see where we can deploy generative learning and, you know, large language models.

Like, I, I love it and it's going to help, but it's going to hurt in the process if we don't get the right people at the table when it's being developed.

As did original technologies of every sort.

It's a really interesting thing.

You know, all of them, electricity always hurts the more vulnerable and then doesn't.

I just have one other question, Renee.

I love talking to you, by the way.

And I know you and Scott have so much in common.

Earlier in this episode, we discussed the upcoming presidential debate.

This election has been called the anxiety elections.

In a recent Yahoo Yuga poll, 60% of respondents describe themselves or very or somewhat anxious about the upcoming presidential election.

It's the same people.

What do you tell people about that?

Like, how do you,

what is the coping mechanism given?

We have no choice.

It's all, it's the same show again that we don't like, right, in general.

It's disturbing for one candidate for many of us.

It's and the other side, too.

You know, they feel like, you know, I just, Doug Bergham just called Biden a dictator, which seems insane to me.

So people are using such strong terms and, you know, end of democracy, et cetera, et cetera.

Your thoughts.

I mean, I listen to y'all's podcast all the time.

I don't think I've ever, I don't know that I've ever actually missed an episode.

I listen to it when I work.

Yeah.

That's how we met.

You called me.

Yeah.

I really love it.

And I learn a lot and I disagree with a shit ton.

And I have a question for Scott before I get off.

Okay, good.

Fantastic.

I was going to say, I know who you disagree with.

No, I don't disagree.

I have more nuanced questions.

All right.

You'll get to ask that.

But anxiety, general anxiety about this particular thing, which is coming, you know, it's coming at us so hard right now this week.

This is this is the same thing about AI.

And AI has been around for a long time, but I think the democratization of AI is what we're really talking about.

We're talking about this election.

We're building on a very cracked foundation.

So by and large, I mean, I spend 90% of my time in organizations working with leaders about what's happening.

People are not okay.

We are still not okay from the pandemic.

We're still not okay from the long overdue.

I don't even want to call it a racial reckoning.

This is still happening.

We're not okay.

And so, if you take a foundation, if any crisis like the pandemic is going to expose fault lines in systems and in countries, our fault lines are exposed right now.

We're holding on as hard as we can, you know, as tight as we can.

And this thing is coming barreling toward us.

I think people that are into the geopolitical scene look at Europe right now

as a very

scary

tale of what's happening, especially just the right-wing reaction to immigration primarily.

We've got two candidates that have very low trust factors on both sides.

And

here's what I think is happening everywhere.

If I just take one second,

we are experiencing at the greatest level in my lifetime,

an amazing lack of a sense of lack of agency.

And so people think that hope, I mean, I'm thinking about what you talk about, Scott, about the data you reference a lot about young men.

So we think hope is an emotion.

I'm hopeful.

like it's a sense of possibility and potential but hope is actually not an emotion

hope is a cognitive behavioral process and this is all cr Schneider's work

and hope is three pieces it's

goal pathway and agency a person who scores very high on levels of hopefulness a has the capacity to set a goal

b has a capacity to develop a pathway The best way to understand the nuance of pathway research is a person with high levels of hope is not afraid of plan B, C, D, Q, or Z if plan A goes to shit.

A pathway is someone who can really say, here's my goal.

If this doesn't work out, I'm going to keep going.

I'm going to try this next.

And then the last part of hope, so you've got goal, pathway is agency.

I believe in my capacity to create change, to do something for myself.

I've never seen the levels of hopelessness that I see right now

in people.

And I don't know if it's goal,

like if people are just shrugging and saying,

what difference does it make?

I can't even, I can't even, I can't even contemplate a goal.

I don't know if it's pathway, if people just don't see the plan B when the A goes to hell, or if it's agency,

I don't know that I am capable of making change in my own life, much less the world.

And so when we talk about the anxiety election,

I think we're a collective group of folks with high levels of hopelessness, diminished agency.

And

I think that's what's scary for us.

Does it matter?

Like when people say it doesn't matter, or people are pissed off about, you know, people are pissed off about a certain Biden policy.

And there's a, there's plenty to be pissed off about.

And the bear hug thing, I'm over.

And I mean, it's just, it's just, there's so many things to be upset about.

But man, what a privileged position in my mind to say, I'm not going to vote.

You must, you must be,

you must have some money tucked away.

Yeah.

You must not be fighting oppression every single day.

What a privileged position

to pick a moral superiority position and not vote.

I can't even tell you.

I actually threatened my sons.

It was my son's first election.

And my other one, I was like, you must vote or we will not be going to college.

I mean, this is a guy, this is a guy coming after, this is a guy weirdly taking credit for, you know, ending reproductive rights and women's autonomy of their bodies.

Correct.

Looking to go again and go harder.

He's doubling down.

Yeah.

Okay.

I have a question.

And

I really want an answer that is I can get

my head and heart around.

Y'all were talking about the Texas stock market.

And I think you just completely nailed the marketing that's going to go with that.

I mean, it's got like succeed from the union written on it a little bit.

Like we're just going to, we're going to become so independent of everything.

Where can I find, Scott,

an index

that shows

what a state does for business?

Because

you've been complimentary of how Texas has handled some business stuff around shareholder value and things like that.

But we also rank, you know, 50th out of 50 in uninsured women.

It's a hard state to live in.

We have a grid.

People froze to death here a couple of years ago.

I mean, I unfortunately have a lot of first-hand knowledge because my husband's a pediatrician.

Where's the index that doesn't separate what you do for shareholder value with how you actually treat the citizens of your state?

I love this question, Scott.

First off, that's a really generous question because there's an assumption there that I would have some insight.

I'm curious.

I think you would.

Okay, so so I would argue, and I'd hate to defend Texas, that the best index is net migration.

And Texas continues to draw more people despite all its problems.

People with options can choose any one of 50 states, and more and more people are choosing Texas.

Now, would I choose Texas to send my daughter to college if it wasn't a UT school?

I don't know.

But to your point, these indices are really dangerous because when you see the S ⁇ P and the NASDAQ at all-time highs, you're under the illusion that America is doing well.

No, the NASDAQ and the NYC are just wealth indices for the top 1%.

We need an index around obesity.

We need an indices around self-harm.

And those indices should be on CNBC every day.

Nobody knows how many people have died of opioid overdoses or deaths of despair in the last week, but everyone knows what the NASDAQ does every day.

As a person who's not familiar with Texas, whose only impression of Texas is data, I get, Texas has almost as many Fortune 500 companies as New York.

A lot of the exterior metrics are very flashing green light for Texas.

But

I want to acknowledge I don't know Texas.

I don't feel like I'm in a position to really evaluate some of the more thoughtful things that you're discussing.

I would never live in a state where if my daughter, my wife, my girlfriend had to leave the state to seek,

terminate a pregnancy.

That for me is a deal killer in terms of moving to a state.

But having said that, there's more U-Hauls going into Texas than leaving right now.

But who's in them?

Well, that's a fair question, but you're seeing the bottom line is the city, Houston's about to overtake Chicago, it is the third most populous city in the world.

And

real estate price,

I just think it's hard to ignore that on a lot of metrics, Texas is doing really well.

But is there,

have we not come to the place in our human development collectively

where we can combine instruments of measurement yeah that are you know what i mean like that are

the suicide rate and the self-esteem rate with the shareholder growth rate at the same time yeah because i'm what i'm wondering i i mean

i'm wondering if the correlation is inverse Brene, you live in Texas?

Yeah, I do.

Fifth generation Texan.

Okay, so the rhetoric would be, Brene, you're a wealthy woman.

You You have a lot of influence.

You have a lot of options.

And every day you exercise the option to stay in Texas.

So answer the question, why do you stay?

I mean,

proximity to family, number one.

Fifth generation?

Yeah, fifth generation.

My people are here.

Number two, and if you're not, if I'm not with my people, it doesn't matter what's going on like you know um but i think number two is

greg abbott

patrick the folks running texas right now

are part of the

it's it's part of the trump thing too for me and i wrote about this in 2015 i it's part of the

white male power over

the last stand of that not not white male power.

I've got, I'm raising a son, he's an amazing person, but it's a type of power specifically of power over, not power with and power to, but power over.

And I think one of the reasons I stay

is I don't believe,

it's the same reason why

You don't get to own America.

You don't get to own patriotism.

You don't get to own God,

you know, and these folks don't get to own Texas.

That's not who we are.

We're as much Molly Ivins and Ann Richards as we are these jackwagons,

you know, and so well, you're taking Texas back, yeah, yeah.

But I think part of it is that, I mean, it's very difficult because

Governor Richards, enormous leader, a huge emperor, great, but great Texas, but I will tell you,

if

I think the progressives and the left

terribly underestimate the level of organization and control of the right.

I mean, we are gerrymandered to the hilt.

All right.

I 100% agree with you that people need more agency.

And I love what you said about,

I generally believe we're siblings from another mother.

I'm actually older than you.

If there was one thing you could do, and I love what you said, that government matters and you like programs, if there was one program you could implement, Magic Wand, to give agency back to young people, and I don't want to say especially young men, but all young people that would lift up votes, including young men.

What would that one program be?

Oh my God.

Am I really ready for the shit that's going to come my way when I say this?

Let me think about it for a second.

Yeah, I'll do it.

Yeah, you know what?

Mandatory national service for 18 to 20 years.

100%.

I love this woman.

I see this.

I love this woman.

I mean, I don't, I'm not talking about military service.

I'm talking about old school any of healthcare, senior care.

Yeah, all of it.

Invest in our country.

And part of

the mandatory service would be, I mean, you have to understand, like, I, you know,

I have a really hard time.

I, I've, for 20-something years, I've taught just PhD and master's students.

I just taught my first undergrad class a couple of years ago.

I did not realize the level of

uncertainty avoidance in especially young men,

the inability to neuro biologically and nervous system w nervous system handle the just awkward looking looking people in the eye.

I mean, we did reading the room.

Reading the room, just

like, you know, can I break up with, you know, my kids?

Can we break up over text?

Absolutely not.

We're going to this funeral.

Oh my God, but my friend is like crying.

It's awkward.

Yeah, you're going to look him in the eye and you're going to cry with him.

And you're going to build build the neural pathways to handle the discomfort of what it means to be in deep connection with other people.

And

that's what's missing.

People, we really are biologically changing our capacity

for

connection because of our intolerance for discomfort.

And love is hard.

And friendship is hard.

And roommates are hard.

And

job job interviews are hard.

And

the anxiety people feel that keep them so avoidant, they stay at home, that's also real.

There's a reason romantic comedies are two hours, not 15 minutes, right?

This shit is hard.

This shit is

just

the ability to look someone in the eye who's in pain and not diminish it and not try to make it better, but just be with people.

And I don't, you know, people blame the kids.

We're talking about a generation that we raised.

That's correct.

That is correct.

This shit is real.

Brene.

I love you.

I'm so glad to introduce you to for a lifelong love affair.

Yes.

Next podcast.

Yes, I know.

Brene Brown.

I can see it.

Let's do it.

Yeah, you can change him, Brene.

You can take him.

All right.

Brene, be sure to check out her other box meeting.

We're thrilled you're back and we're thrilled thrilled you're back for the conversation.

Ignore everything else, but your conversations are always amazing.

I appreciate them myself.

She did a great job for me when it was in Chicago.

We had a wonderful conversation.

You're just a national treasure.

Unlocking us and dare to lead.

Brene Brown and Scott Galloway.

I'm so glad to introduce you.

Thanks, Brene.

Hi, y'all.

Thanks.

Scott, is she great or what?

Yeah, I mean, well, one, I agree with absolutely everything she said, but also

I respect and I think there's a lesson here on communication.

I'm a huge fan of the pregnant verging on awkward pause.

She does that.

I love that.

It's saying, I take you seriously.

I take the question seriously.

And the response you're about to get is thoughtful.

And I didn't learn that.

until I was in my 40s around public speaking and just regular discourse, that when someone asks you a question, it's not a prompt to just start making noise, that you should think about the question.

And if you don't have an answer, if it's not an easy one, it's okay to take some time.

And she does it to a dramatic effect.

She's smart.

She's doing it.

I don't want to say it's performative, but I do the same.

She does it to create a little bit of drama.

But excellent person.

Excellent person.

Knock, knock.

Who's there?

Impatient Cal.

Impatient Cal who.

Where did that come from?

It's a perfect joke.

Impatience to jump in, et cetera.

Can I tell you a Claire joke?

What did the cookie say to the doctor?

I know the answer.

I like that jokes, but go ahead.

What?

I feel crummy.

When I asked my wife to say something that would make me feel bad and good at the same time, what did she say?

What did she say?

Your penis is bigger than your brother's.

Oh,

I took a nice cookie joke.

I asked for it.

I asked for it.

I tell you a nice cookie.

Stuck your chin.

You're a cookie joke.

You're stuck.

Oh, damn it.

All right.

All right, Scott, one more quick break.

We'll be back for wins and fails.

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Mike and Alyssa are always trying to outdo each other.

When Alyssa got a small water bottle, Mike showed up with a four-liter jug.

When Mike started gardening, Alyssa started beekeeping.

Oh, come on.

They called it truce for their holiday and used Expedia Trip Planner to collaborate on all the details of their trip.

Once there, Mike still did more laps around the pool.

Whatever.

You You were made to outdo your holidays.

We were made to help organize the competition.

Expedia, made to travel.

Charlie Sheen is an icon of decadence.

I lit the fuse and my life turns into everything it wasn't supposed to be.

He's going the distance.

He was the highest paid TV star of all time.

When it started to change, it was quick.

He kept saying, no, no, no, I'm in the hospital now, but next week I'll be ready for the show.

Now, Charlie's sober.

He's going to tell you the truth.

How do I present this with any class?

I think we're past past that, Charlie.

We're past that, yeah.

Somebody call action.

AKA Charlie Sheen, only on Netflix, September 10th.

Okay, Scott, let's hear some wins and fails.

I'll go first.

The Ten Commandments thing in Louisiana.

I mean, what is we spent years getting this shit out of classes?

Like, they're fucking back these people.

They're like, they're like mold.

I don't know what else to say.

Look, you can be religious.

God love you.

You know what I mean?

But keep it out of schools.

That's the whole, like, I just can't believe they're doing this.

It's going to lose

as it did before.

And then we're going to spend all our energy on something that has already been litigated, but they just refuse, which makes me know that they're coming back for gay marriage and everything else.

Just like, what is

wrong with you?

Like, just let people be their own thing.

If you're not, if you're not Christian, you, it's offensive to you.

You should respect respect other people's religions.

That's the, I mean, honestly, I just, I don't know what to say.

And a win, I think, getting Megan Rapino and Sue Bird onto the Vox Media Podcast Network.

I think that was great.

They were at lunch with us in France.

And also, they threatened to overtake us.

Megan was right there saying she's going to kick our ass, which was nice, typical.

You left before the picture taking, but we took a lovely picture together.

And so we're thrilled to have all these badass ladies at the box.

And also, Andrew Iguodalu is there.

And Pri, as usual, our best friend Pri.

So just really nice to add.

I'm glad Brene's back.

And I'm thrilled Megan and Sue are also there because great, great thinkers, also very different.

They're not immediately going to go to left or right.

They're just very thoughtful.

And world-class athletes.

World-class.

These are

incredible.

Incredible athletes.

Incredible.

Anyway, those are my wins and fails.

Nice.

Okay, so I have a couple wins and one fail.

The U.S.

Senate passed a bipartisan bill 88-2, that never happens, to accelerate the deployment of nuclear energy capacity by speeding permitting and creating new incentives for advanced nuclear reactor technologies.

It will now go to Biden for his signature.

He's expected to sign it.

I don't understand.

Nuclear was the worst managed brand in the world, and it's really hurt us.

We started closing nuclear facilities in California.

Germany decided with the green movement that for some reason, I mean, this is, you got to pick your poison.

There's no perfect energy, but this is an outstanding, fairly clean source of energy.

And as evidenced by the fact that we're just going to have so much more appetite for energy, I think it's great.

I love the my favorite bumper sticker is more people have died in Ted Kennedy's car than in any nuclear power plant in America.

And that's from the 70s.

I don't know if you remember that or the 80s.

Anyways, I'm a huge fan of nuclear.

I just think it's

get on it.

Another win, this is just, I just read this and I was just so blown away by how smart the guys are at Netflix.

They've announced earlier this week two permanent Netflix.

house experience venues.

Houses, yeah, we talked about that.

And they're creating 50 live experiences across the globe.

They're going to try and emulate competitors a little bit.

They've done Stranger Things pop-ups.

Yeah, pop-ups.

Yeah.

But I think it's a great idea.

It's a great idea.

So

if you think of strategy, you want scenario planning and okay, this works or this doesn't work.

Well, if it doesn't work, it's great marketing.

And that's how they're positioning it.

They're not saying we're going, we're trying to compete with Disney, we're opening parks.

They're saying we're going to do some temporary experiences.

Two, you want to look at pain points.

And the existing pain points around Disney, a $10 billion EBITDA franchise is that one, it's probably five or 10 grand for a family of four.

And two, it's even more time expensive.

You really need two or three days.

You go to a giant suburb of Orlando or Tokyo or Paris, and it's the seventh ring of hell and you're trapped there for two days spending five to ten grand for a family of four.

And they've said, okay, we can open in urban locations.

We can buy now abandoned malls for pennies on the dollar or lease them, I should say.

And we can have Stranger Things.

We can have Bridgerton.

I mean, they're just going to do.

And if it doesn't work, it was good marketing and they let it fade to black.

Stein one and two year leases at great terms.

And if it does work, they could end up with the same sort of flywheel that everyone talks about Disney.

And if you think about Disney parks, when you think about the amount of EBIT that they spent off, and I would argue when you go to Disneyland, it's really not a ton different than if you went 20 years ago.

No, it's not.

It's kind of the same rides, the same lines are too long.

The food, that's my big beef with Disney, is the food.

And they've been able to,

in my opinion, capture unearned margin because of the modes.

I just think this is so smart on behalf of Netflix.

Anyways, Netflix House is strategically just a great win.

And then my loss is, I think Democrats, if we're going to try and, if we're going to win this election, we need to have sober conversations with ourselves.

And I think that essentially the jury that found Hunter Biden guilty was right.

He was guilty.

The jury that found

Donald Trump guilty was right.

He was guilty.

But it was...

It was a misallocation.

Neither of those cases should have been brought.

The reason they were brought was one was an unpopular former president and one is an unpopular president's son.

And I think that Democrats don't want to admit and they need to acknowledge that the case in New York was a disaster for us, both in terms of the polls, both in terms of fundraising.

And I feel as if there's a lack of sober conversations around what the data says and what's working and what isn't working around the election.

And so my general loss is that I get the sense that Democrats put hands over their, you know, hands over their ears and over their eyes and don't have have an honest conversation around what is really going to be required to win here.

We're constantly looking for excuses for Biden and rationalizations as opposed to really being in a war room and saying, okay, this is what is actually going down and what has happened.

So it's more or less, I feel as if when I talk to Democrats,

both in the White House and in the campaign, that they're not honest with themselves.

They don't have a sober conversation around what the data reflects here.

Anyways,

the the the key to winning a war is you have to put yourself in the shoes of the enemy and empathize with them and be very honest about what the data says and i think what happens with generals and what's happened with putin and every general with the loses a war is the incentives are to tell the general and the president what they want to hear and i think that's going on here i don't think democrats have realized just what a terrible 90 days this has been for us.

We have gone from outraising,

leading in all the swing spates, to now they are outraising us and they have pulled that.

We were not leading.

We were not leading, but go ahead.

In the in the swing states we were?

No.

No, by a lot.

But go ahead.

90 days ago?

Yeah.

Okay.

So anyways, my fail is that I don't think the

whatever you call it, the village elders of the Democratic Party.

Yeah, I think we're in denial about what's going on in the world.

Tough love is what you're saying.

Tough love.

Tough love.

Data-driven love.

We got to kill.

We got to kill.

We got to kill.

Be killed.

That's a great one.

That's a great one.

I agree with all of them.

And you and I are going to have Bridgerton moment experience, and we're going to dress up and do the minuet.

It's going to be great.

I got to think they have ethnically ambiguous people in corsets who just rip off their clothes and start fucking.

I'd pay for that.

I would pay for that.

All right.

On that note, on this note, we want to hear from

you.

Watch this season.

It's so good.

We want to hear from you.

Send us your question.

Penelope Featherington.

Send us your questions about business, tech, or whatever's on your mind.

Go to nymag.com slash pivot to submit a question for the show or call 855-51-PIVOT.

Okay, Scott, that's the show.

We'll be back on Friday for more.

What a good show.

And I'm so glad to introduce you and Brene Brown.

Read us out.

Today's show is produced by Lara Neyman, Zoe Marcus, and Taylor Griffin.

Ernie Andrew Todd engineered this episode.

Thanks also to Drew Burrows and Mil Severio.

Nashak Kurwaz, Vox Media's executive producer of audio.

Make sure you're subscribed to the show wherever you listen to podcasts.

Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media.

You can subscribe to the magazine at nymag.com slash pod.

We'll be back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business.

What is a key attribute of someone who is successful?

They feel as if they have a sense of agency.