The Trump tapes and Tesla sales soar with guest host Stephanie Ruhle

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Hi, everyone.

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

I'm Kara Swisher.

Scott is out this week, and we have MSNBC, anchor and host of the Modern Rules podcast on iHeartRadio, Stephanie Rule, filling in.

And she is coming in hot, as I like to say.

Correct?

Are you coming in hot?

I have no choice.

You get what you get, and you don't get

it.

I'm so happy to be here.

We had just had a lively discussion about Hilaria.

I was drinking Hillary wine this weekend, and we changed.

We sharpied all the things into Hilaria.

It was much better.

It was more exotic as that wine.

We have so much to talk about.

There's so much business stuff to talk about.

There's so much political stuff.

Where should we start?

I think we'll start with, because one of the big stories is going to be obviously these tapes, but let's start.

Hundreds of Google people have formed a union called Alphabet Workers Union.

This marks a big moment for labor organizations in Silicon Valley.

A lot of tech workers are trying to organize.

Obviously, there was a Google walkout over issues around sexual harassment and payoffs to executives who sexually harass people, big payoffs.

Do you think this is going to happen?

That tech is going to have to eventually unionize?

Well, I mean, it's interesting because, you know, the kind of people that are forming this union aren't what you traditionally think of when you think of labor.

But if they are unifying and if they have this this much power, then I guess they'll be able to.

But what I really think the root of all of this is, Karen, is lack of transparency.

Right.

Over the last 20, 30 years, where capitalism has warped itself, where you're not seeing employees and the labor force get to have a seat at the table and be stakeholders.

And it's been all about executives and shareholders, you're seeing that separation.

And so you're seeing workers that have power, i.e., this is Silicon Valley, say, I'm not standing for this.

Think about our own lives and our own careers.

The fact that we have never had transparency into our own incomes versus our peers, that's a huge problem.

If there was more transparency, people wouldn't necessarily need unions.

But right now, there's such little information.

And there's been attempts.

There's been attempts.

You know,

there was been attempts to put up salaries of Google people and how people get, it's so, it's so cloaked.

And what they tend to do, they have all these levels at Google, director one, director two, whatever.

It's really confusing from people who describe it to me.

Although they seem to think it makes sense.

But whenever I hear it, I'm sort of, how do you get to be direct?

Who gets to decide?

And I think some recent firings have shown that.

Like, why did she get fired?

And so it is, it's lack of transparency.

The other thing is they keep them happy with free dry cleaning, great food,

you know, treating them like juveniles, really, children, like overindulged teenagers.

And if you go to any of these campuses, that's been their tactic to keep unions out is keep them super happy with money and with things.

It's really, it's fascinating.

It's been fascinating to watch that take place.

And now they've had it.

They seem to have had it.

But also, there's a balance, Kara.

As an employer, you don't necessarily, you don't want to have yourself in a situation where your employees are unions and you're bound to all of these set rules.

But if you don't find a way to treat your employees better, the more power they have, they're going to say, I'm not going to take it.

So what do you think they're mad about this stuff, like the Defense Department stuff or the social stuff, or is it just a whole bunch of stuff?

It's like there's no transparency.

I think it's a whole bunch of stuff.

I think it's rooted in transparency.

They don't know what they're working for.

They don't know who they're working for and they don't feel good about it.

And even if they knew who they were working for, they're also not getting the upside.

So you're putting in all the parts of the machine to get the engine to run.

And then those on the top are reaping all of the upside.

And they're saying, I'm sick of that.

Also, they also have these weird contractor things whose works for them and people can start to feel the inequity going on.

I think Google has more contractors than employees, which is interesting.

And so do a lot of these companies.

And the other part is they tend to keep them, another way they keep them happy is give them lots of outlets to talk, like all their meme generators and all their, you know, their meetings.

Oh, we're really great.

CEOs listening to you.

I think I always thought it was so much bullshit.

It's how you deal with a teenager to let them think you're listening to what you're saying.

I don't want a listening tour.

I don't want an HR person asking me how I feel.

I don't want an anonymous 800 number.

I want transparency.

I want to know, as an employee, I want to know, here are the rules and these are the rules for all of the employees.

And once I know what those rules are, I'll tell you as an employee, I believe me personally, I'll outwork any of my peers and I'll work to achieve the next level.

The issue so many of us have always faced is we never know the rules.

You and I are both in theory put on the same platform, except you actually have significantly more benefits and advantages than I do.

And people are sick of it.

And that's fair.

Yeah.

What do you think about unionization of these tech companies?

Do you think it's coming?

And also the idea of putting workers on boards, that's sort of, that's a European thing.

It's not, you know, it hasn't really come to this country at all, but you would think tech would be the first place it would happen.

It makes a lot of sense, not and not in sort of a charitable way of like, well, let's give a seat to a worker.

It makes business sense because you should want to know the priorities and the problems of your workforce.

Right.

Because if your workforce is satisfied and productive, it's best for your whole company.

But everything has changed

in the years when activists, investors became so important and shareholders became priority.

Because if your shareholders are your only priority, then it's just about optimizing output for the moment.

And if that's what your priority is, then you're going to be in a short-term hell and you're performing for shareholders and Wall Street analysts, but you're not actually performing for the betterment of your company.

Yeah, I do think there's a big shift happening in that, in that relationship.

So also the Wall Street Journal reports that Roku is intoxicating Quibi content.

It's a failed short-form content streaming platform announced to be shutting down in October.

What does that mean for Roku?

Scott had high hopes for Roku in the past.

He thought it would either get bought or be buying things.

This is an example of them buying things.

Talk a little bit about the streaming world.

What's going to happen here?

Obviously, Roku needs to, everyone needs to bulk up on content.

You know, it's hard to say because as soon as you hear, like, hey, Roku's buying the Quibi content, you know, they must have the money to buy it or it must be so valuable.

Baloney, you don't know what they're paying for it, right?

Like, Cara, a pair of jeans at $700, no way.

But if I can buy those same jeans for 50 bucks, well, then guess what?

I got the hottest ass in town.

We have no idea.

We have no idea what they're paying for this content.

No, we don't.

We know that Quibi spent a whole lot of effort, you know, tap dancing with famous people to make these short form shows.

We don't know if any of these shows are any good, but if Roku, who doesn't have content, can buy it at rock bottom prices, well, kiddie up.

Let's go to the garage sale.

Maybe you found a gem.

Yeah.

So what does Roku do then?

And there's so many of these streaming platforms, obviously.

You know, I just did an interview today published with Bella Bajaria, who's head of global television at Netflix.

Really interesting way they're organizing it.

They've already moved global in the way that these streaming platforms are just sort of getting out of bed.

It's interesting.

Like they make things in London for people in Europe.

They make things and then they can, if they can import it other places, they have been very successful, like Money Heist and some other things.

So how do you look at, you know, who's going to compete here?

You have Disney, you've got, you must be

watching a lot of this over the holidays.

You have Disney, you've got Warner, you've got, how does it shake out now?

Roku is getting into the content business, obviously Netflix, Apple.

How do you look at that?

It's just about who has the best content.

Listen, right now,

what am I, the 10 bazillion person who said content is king?

We're not living in the world anymore where must-see TV was on a Thursday night and it was on NBC.

If you make spectacular content and if you're a platform that can afford to purchase said spectacular content, the eyeballs will come to you and pay you so they can watch said content.

Right.

If while I was on Christmas break, Roku was the platform that owned

Queen's Gambit and

Tiger King and the show with Nicole Kidman.

If they owned all those shows, I would go, great.

Honey, where's my credit card?

Let me put it in so I could buy this Roku.

It's just a matter of who has the money to get the best content.

And right now, from a kid perspective, Disney has a lot to offer.

And from an adult perspective, Netflix sure does.

Yeah.

So what happens?

Is there has to be a single place?

Does it go back to this bundled situation where you get everything?

Because eventually you don't want to be buying 10 different services.

No, I think people are going to figure out at the end of this year or when they look at their credit card statement at the end of a month, what am I actually using?

And you're just going to see some of these platforms start to die off.

Right.

And where the content goes.

All right.

So, Stephanie, I'm so glad you're a socialist now with your worker, worker power.

Worker power, Stephanie.

All you anglers are going to get together and run.

Cesar.

Cesar.

César.

Give us information.

Don't forget, everybody who wants transparency wants it until they're one of the high paid people and then they don't want it anymore.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

That's true.

I think you're one one of the high-paid people, but I'm not sure.

Okay, Stephanie, big story.

Obviously, this week, Georgia will vote on two Senate seats.

Really?

I'm not sure.

When this publishes tomorrow, yeah, that could flip the Senate Democratic or Republicans, keep it Republican.

The special election happens to be on Tuesday between incumbent Republican senators David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler and Democratic challengers John Osoff and Raphael Warnick.

As a reminder, last year at the beginning of the pandemic, after Loeffler was briefed about

the deadliness of the coronavirus, she dumped millions of dollars worth of stock from her portfolio.

It turns out David Perdue loves China.

She also publicly downplayed the severity of the virus.

And then this tape.

Now, Trump is going there tonight.

We don't know what he's going to say, but it's not going to be good.

A lot of the Republicans are worried.

Even Marsha Blackburn was like, that was an unfortunate phone call.

So he called the Secretary of State, Brad Raffensperger, who I did a very long interview, which he said almost the same things he said on this tape with

President Trump.

I'm going to assume by now you've heard the real tape.

Rappensberger, who let's remember, is a Republican who voted for Trump, who donated to Trump.

Yeah, who's very Trumpy.

He's not Trumpy.

He's just, but he is a Trump supporter.

Yeah.

So enjoy, let me, let's enjoy this rent remix made by YouTubers, the Gregory Brothers, first.

All I want to do is this.

I just want to find

11,780 loves

one more than we have.

Have they moved the inner parts of the machines and replaced them with other parts.

Okay, all right, that was so good.

There's so much creativity.

Let me just tell you, TikTok is lit with this stuff.

So, I know we all are making it into funny memes and stuff like that, but it's quite serious.

What do you, what, Stephanie, how do you see this playing out?

Um, and what do you see if all three branches of government turn blue this year?

Nancy Pelosi, very tight race did win the speakership.

Uh, so what do you think?

Uh, I think if all three branches turn blue, what's going to be interesting is how blue.

blue.

So you've got all sorts of, and you know, I often talk Wall Street,

non-Trumpers, but you've got a special Wall Street money pouring into this Georgia election because they want to make sure Republicans control the Senate because they don't want the world to go all blue.

However, if it does, if it does, we're going to get a chance to see.

who the Democratic Party really wants to be.

Because if you look at the president, if you look at this last election, Trump lost and far left Democrats lost yeah and sort of these quiet democrats in the middle are winning where some of those quiet democrats in the middle who lost say they lost because of a more progressive yeah to defend the police and socialism thing yeah and so we're going to see who is you know will the centrist portion of the democratic party actually stand up here you know a few weeks ago and the republican party you know this they all there's a bunch of them it was interesting when they released a statement some 10 senators they were half democrat and a couple like quite a few Republicans in there, Romney, the one Collins, Murkowski, Manchin.

It seems like they're forming a little coalition right in the middle to take care of everybody.

That represents an enormous part of the American people, centrists who you often don't hear from because they're just sort of plodding along with their life and you hear the extremes because they're the loudest.

But you mentioned Joe Manchin a few weeks ago.

This is a senator from West Virginia for people who don't know.

A big, big, rich New York Republican who had written a big, big check to David Perdue and got a thank you phone call from Mitch McConnell.

Wasn't necessarily a big fan of Purdue.

He just wants to keep this power divided.

And he said to me, you know, I'm hearing if Democrats win Georgia, Joe Manchin's going to switch parties.

And I said, what?

And I called Joe Manchin on the phone and I said, is this true?

And Joe said, absolutely not.

Why would I need to change parties?

You know, he's a Democrat from West Virginia who voted with Trump a whole bunch of times.

But that shows that Mitch McConnell is preparing big donors to say, well, we might not win Georgia, but we're still going to find a way for me to keep control.

They're not going to keep control.

Joe Manchin is not going to suddenly become a role.

They're going to have to do deals.

They're going to have to make compromises, which is what they're supposed to do in the first place.

Okay, that's it.

Right there.

What they're supposed to do in the first place, what the American people want them to do.

Kara, you and I have worked with people that we hate our whole lives.

But if we work with them, we have to find ways to make dual deals to get our work done.

Somehow, in the last 20 years, our government forgot it's their job to do that.

So,

what happens?

The only thing is, there are some very outstanding, important issues on the left around equity, around all kinds of stuff.

How did they get heard without being drowned out and sort of lumped in with this with the crazy right?

There's a very like you can look at it right now, like Lynn Woods tweets today are insane, just insane, and hateful and stuff like that how do you how do you push for stuff that is that you you know just i was watching uh i just interviewed brian cranston and i was watching his uh all the way with um lg lbj the lbj thing and the the kind of compromise he had to make between the left and the right was i mean it was not the right it was it was racist essentially was really fascinating and we sort of has been lost and i ultimately there's some issues that need major pushing to get through, like a reform of police, like all kinds of stuff like that.

There are, and you know, you and I, not on this podcast, have argued about this before because

I think I'm immature in my thinking.

That I always think, oh, you don't have to burn the house down.

You know, you can, you can do things step by step.

But it's easy for me to say that because I've never needed to burn a house down in order, because I've never been in a situation where I've been

unable to perform my job, live my life, been financially or socially insecure.

This is an opportunity, if Democrats win, for more progressive and more centrist Democrats to actually work together and in some ways get major things done.

But if they can do it where they can also pull Republicans in, and I know you could say, like, why should they pull Republicans in?

Republicans never worked with them.

If they can do that, then they can actually make some real use of this power that they have instead of just causing Republicans to galvanize for the next few years and then kick them back out of office.

The American people just want a functioning government.

Everybody wants to be financially secure, socially free, physically safe.

Well, what's interesting, I was, you know, as you're watching all these other countries give out the vaccine successfully and that we don't, it's just really, it's at this point, you're sort of, you're just sort of wanting functioning government can get you the vaccine like everybody else gets it, essentially, or basic things.

So what do you imagine happening in?

in Georgia.

This will come out before the results.

It's obviously elections tomorrow.

What do you, this will come out tomorrow, but before the results are in.

What do you think if you had to make a guess?

I don't know that this tape is going to do anything to impact the Georgia election.

Like we are such a divided country, Kara, and our media is so divided.

Last night when the tape came out, my mother, who, as you know, is a Trump voter, was at my house for dinner.

And so I immediately said, you know, I turned on the news.

I said, should we listen to the tape?

And there's a portion of the country that's never ever going to hear the tape.

Right.

They can turn back on Fox News or just tune out of it.

Oh, Saxon.

Well, Sax has been covering it in the news part.

They have been covering it quite heavily, which is interesting.

Well, and she tunes in at eight or nine o'clock.

Oh, yeah.

Yeah, that's different.

That's the probably

won't see that.

And she could immediately just change the conversation to talk to me about it.

Am I worried about the gangs in New York, which don't exist?

What Trump is doing is creating absolute chaos.

But I would say for the first time since he won, I can't figure out the method or since, no, no, since he won, I mean, in 2016, I can usually track it and say, like, oh, he's doing this crazy thing because of this.

Here's how he benefits from it.

This, this tape, I don't see how, I don't see how this is a win for him.

And by the way, Ted Cruz, jumping onto this, if Ted Cruz thinks this is his path, that he'll be president, he's going to need to look in the mirror.

Ted Cruz is never going to be president.

He's not liking him.

He's not.

He's not.

He's unlikable.

No.

Unlikable.

And the one person to always watch, I think, in the Republican Party, love him or hate him, is Mitch McConnell.

He is a strategic beast.

He is extraordinarily powerful and he gets his agenda done.

He said to his fellow Republicans, don't do this.

Do not do this.

And I can tell you from New York donors he's been speaking to who, because he wanted big checks for Georgia, since the election, he has been operating as if under the assumption that Joe Biden won the election and he was trying to raise money to help these senators win in Georgia so he could control power.

Now, that said, this tape is getting a lot of play in Georgia.

You know,

it is getting a lot of play there because they've got Republicans fighting with each other.

The Brad Raffensberger side and the governor and the Attorney General and the general counsel are Republicans, but really are...

are not wanting to be part of the Kelly Lawfler, you know, Dave Perdue thing, which is jumping on Trump's side on these guys, although they've been quiet about this particular new wrinkle.

Yeah, but do you really think the Raffensburgers of Georgia are not going to vote for Kelly Law and David Purdue?

Yes.

Yeah, yeah, but who does it affect?

Does it suppress turnout?

Because that's, I think, the worry that they have is the suppression of turnout.

And Trump addressed that directly.

I don't think it's going to suppress turnout.

I really don't.

Like, this whole Trump is so influential and Trump is a kingmaker.

That whole thing annoys me in that, why is he a kingmaker?

Hillary Clinton wasn't a kingmaker after she lost after she lost the whole world was mad at her yeah we're making trump a kingmaker and to be honest until today i've barely been covering him to me he's a lame duck president he's got no power he's not got no control let's move on this time in obama's presidency or george bush's nobody was talking about them we have no choice but to talk about trump today because these tapes are so absurd but beyond that move on sister and oh stories on oh is he starting a media company?

I don't know, but I'm not about to do an advertisement for him.

I'm done.

All right, Stephanie, let's go on a quick break.

We come back, we'll talk about Tesla's soaring sales and a close personal friend of Pivot on the COVID vaccine.

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Okay, Stephanie, we're back.

Tesla reported that it sold nearly half a million vehicles over the course of 2020, something that

Elon Musk had promised.

That is a huge record despite temporarily closing its U.S.

car plant due to the pandemic.

Tesla's stock has soared more than 700% this year.

It's like Bitcoin, apparently.

Elon Musk called it a major milestone, and indeed it is.

And that during the height of the pandemic, he wasn't sure the company would make it.

The audio industry at large languished during 2020.

Researchers forecast that 2020 demand for vehicles would drop 14% to below 2019 levels.

So what up, Stephanie?

How do you cover this as a business reporter?

Here's why Tesla did really well, because you know who didn't languish or suffer during the pandemic?

Rich people.

Rich people did better than ever.

Rich people, even if you weren't super rich, if you could work from home, at the very least, you were saving more money because you weren't commuting to work, you weren't paying to park.

I mean, I'm wearing the same sweatpants I've had on for six days.

And people who are sitting in their houses said, Let me just wave in a Tesla, right?

A Tesla is this luxury that doesn't feel for rich people, that doesn't feel like you're buying a Porsche.

It feels more practical than that.

It's cool.

And why not?

Wealthy people had money to burn and they burned it on Teslas.

They burned it on Teslas.

So, what do you but this valuation is kind of crazy?

It's a kind of a nutty, or maybe it's not.

What's what's next, do you think, for them?

Have they reached that point?

Because he is making these now.

That's one of the things that's important is the making of them.

But, Carol, all these valuations are out of whack.

And you can thank, pick your company and you can thank the Fed for that.

There's nothing to do but buy stocks from an investor standpoint.

And Tesla is cool and flashy and exciting and theoretically the future.

So people don't need them to be producing every Tesla out there.

They just have to buy the story.

And he has certainly sold the story.

Right.

And so what happens to it?

Does anything bring it crashing down there?

Is there not?

Or is this like Amazon, what Amazon sort of rode their valuation to when it actually had a valuation?

I mean, it would be tough to compare anything to Amazon because Amazon ended up doing so much, selling so much.

It basically filled in to its valuation.

That's right.

I don't, I don't, I, I, I don't foresee Tesla doing that because how many Teslas can you actually sell?

But for the time being, betting against Tesla has made poor men and fools that are short sellers.

Scott has done that.

Remember when he said that?

I mean, do you, what, but what, is there anything that does bring it down?

Is there any automaker that can keep up?

Because these numbers for people are not buying other cars.

Tesla sales up when the sales of regular vehicles are down.

What, what can they do if you were an automaker?

Listen, another automaker could get in the space in a bigger way, but you know, Tesla also kind of cornered the market in branding.

The best car, right?

The best car.

It happens to be the best car.

I've written a lot of these.

But that's the other thing.

What they have that backs it up, it's an excellent vehicle.

It's an excellent vehicle.

It's cool.

And while it's expensive, it's not a gazillion dollars expensive.

So it's in that range that there are a lot of people who can afford them.

And for the time being, it doesn't seem that there's anything that can stop it.

And for investors who were with Tesla from the beginning, the Ron Barons of the world, they always bought into Elon Musk's story.

And listen, he is a character.

He's an extraordinary story.

It's an extraordinary company.

Is this valuation crazy?

Sure, but I'm not smart enough to say there's anything that's going to stop it.

And those early investors, the Ron Barons of the world, have become gazillionaires off of Elon Musk.

And they know better than me.

And was Elon's push to reopen factories ultimately a net positive?

Obviously, it it was.

It has been.

He's reached his numbers.

Yeah, but if he hadn't, I don't know that it would have been such a bad thing.

And did Elon Musk, listen, did it serve him to be a COVID naysayer to say that this thing was going away?

It didn't serve him.

I think a lot of people watched the things that he said about COVID and thought he was a jerk for saying them, but he doesn't care.

Look how rich and successful and worshipped he is.

Does he care that you and I are saying, gee, he really shouldn't have said that?

What did you?

He doesn't care.

No, he doesn't care.

So you look, and his moving to Texas, I've been talking to a lot of people moving places in Silicon Valley.

It's sort of the big crisis there.

Will it matter?

He'll just have a nicer group of people to deal with in Texas or a more malleable group of people.

I mean, listen, when people move for tax reasons, especially super rich ones, it always makes me scratch my head, right?

When you meet gazillionaires that don't even have a country of residence anymore because they mess with their tax status so much that they live on their super yachts.

I always think that is like the most whacked out thing ever.

Like even would you ever move far away from your kids if it improved your tax status?

No.

No.

But mega, mega rich people do.

They're trying to make fetch happen in a lot of these places like Miami and Austin and stuff like that.

I always am like, if that was the case, Monaco would have been the center of tech a long time ago.

Like everyone would have moved themselves there or wherever, in whatever region has the best tax breaks.

But it's an interesting thing that's happening because of the pandemic.

People are reconsidering their location.

Well, absolutely.

I mean, because of the pandemic, do you need to live in that urban center in that small apartment?

No, but that's different from Elon Musk picking up and leaving and really damaging an entire economy in portions of California to relocate.

I mean, Austin, Texas is a pretty great place to live, though.

Yeah.

All right.

But speaking of which, you want New York to come back because that's where you operate your Stephanie ruralness of it all.

Okay, we have one of of my favorite friends of Pivot, my brother, Dr.

Jeff Swisher, who's been on before.

He's a doctor in San Francisco.

He's been dealing with the COVID crisis.

The brains of your family.

Yeah, the brains.

There he is.

We talked to him right as the U.S.

was starting lockdowns in March.

Now let's talk about the vaccine, Jeff.

So Stephanie had the COVID.

She got it from the conference at the journey.

You look good though.

You look great, as always.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Yeah.

So we're going to talk about that.

So you got the vaccine.

Tell us about your experience and a little bit about the rollout.

And then Stephanie will have a hundred questions about that.

So I got the vaccine two weeks ago.

My second dose is coming up in a week from today, next week.

Actually, that's an interesting topic.

We can talk about a little bit about the second dose.

So my experience was just like getting the flu vaccine.

It was a similar experience.

The way the rollout has been happening at my hospital is we got a set number of doses.

And obviously, I'm at a big hospital, so we have a storage facility for lots of doses.

And so

we,

within our own hospital, created tiers in which people who were first responders

and then subsequent people will get the vaccine.

But the first tiers were people who had direct patient contact

with COVID patients.

So it would be emergency room doctors, ICU doctors, myself, anesthesiologists, and then surgeons.

And and of course, OB nurses, et cetera, would be the people who would have contact with people who have not yet potentially been screened for COVID.

So you're taking the second one then, correct?

Yes, the second one is coming up.

What is your issue with the second one?

I don't have an issue.

I mean,

I think the data shows that the immunity

given with the second dose goes up from 80% all the way up to 95%

with most recent dose.

But there is a debate right now.

In fact, Bob Wachter, who's the chairman of medicine at UCSF yesterday, I think had an article in the Washington Post about the fact that, in order to increase the number of vaccine available to everybody, that maybe we should not do a second dose and just do a first dose to try to get as many people immunized as possible.

And then Monsef Salawi, who you interviewed on your Sway podcast, which was a great podcast, by the way,

he's actually potentially suggesting for the Moderna vaccine that instead of getting 100 micrograms, which is the standard dose for the Moderna vaccine, that it goes down to 50 or half the dose and then get two doses of that because it seems to generate.

Go ahead, Stephanie.

But doesn't that worry you that this just confuses people more?

We're having a hard enough time getting people to buy in to take the vaccine.

And now suddenly going, well, take it, but you can take a 50% dosage.

Then how do you know how to conduct yourself?

Because do you have the vaccine?

Can you go back to your normal life?

or are you still living some sort of modified quarantine life yeah yes i do i do think it uh uh confuses people i think though the most important thing is just getting the vaccine i mean how do people like you how does my sister how uh how do they get the vaccine it's one thing for doctors and hospitals we have an infrastructure in our hospital to provide the vaccine to people the problem is i think there's a huge confusion as to who and how you get the vaccine i mean look at testing.

Testing was a nightmare.

It still is.

And it still is a nightmare.

It's becoming more of a nightmare as the virus is kind of rearing its head again in the second, third, third wave.

Again, keep in mind that we're still on the third wave of the first spike.

And so this isn't going away.

It's not going away.

Then how do we figure this rollout out?

Because you read stories about senior citizens in Florida, you know, a thousand cars showing up, you know, for 500 possible vaccines.

Like, how do people even know what to do or how to do it?

Well, we have a huge failure at the federal government level.

I mean, from the very beginning of this thing,

the federal government has literally obfuscated, denied,

you know, gaslit everybody about this whole virus from the get-go.

And still, I mean, since, you know, the election, I mean, it's happened before then, but since the election, Donald Trump and his narcissistic sociopathy is concerned about you know staging a coup and not helping people out in this country.

So, what could the feds do?

What could they do?

Because they're blaming the states, they said they have the doses, they're not handing them out.

What's the problem on the state level in terms of getting them to people?

Who's responsible?

I mean, so you know, fortunately, some states are much better equipped than others with good departments of public health.

And you have to even go even more granular, you have to go down to the individual cities and the departments of public health.

So, for instance, San Francisco, San Francisco Department of Public Health is very well run.

And I think the experience of having been the epicenter for the AIDS crisis has allowed San Francisco to been,

it's been allowed us to be a lot better about dealing with epidemics.

And I think as a result of that, they have a model, a paradigm in which to deal with these kind of things.

Other states do not.

The other, it's all, it also comes down to money, but really it's got to come from the top.

Organization has to come from the top with clear directives and a clear distribution system so that we can get the vaccine to have a lot of people.

Okay, but I'm a simpleton.

Why wouldn't the federal government want to do that?

Right?

If you're Trump, first of all, it didn't make sense after he got COVID.

He could have made a pivot and said, now I've experienced this and shown empathy and done something big.

These $2,000 stimulus checks, had he had them signed with his face on it in October, he probably would have won the election.

But as it relates to the vaccine, he can take somewhat of a victory lap with Operation Warp Speed.

I mean, who was it?

Geraldo Rivera said, let's call this the Trump vaccine.

Why wouldn't the federal government that wanted to have 20 million Americans vaccinated by January 1st, but instead had 4 million, why wouldn't they want to make this how they're going out as a big win?

Well, because he doesn't believe he's going out, number one.

And the other thing is that you said the word that he literally lacks, which is empathy.

The man is literally incapable of empathy.

He doesn't have it.

And I think as a result of that, in the fear, I mean, you know, I don't blame Trump.

He's mentally ill.

But I mean, I do blame him, but he's, but I do blame all the other people in the federal government who are literally terrified of this guy and about, you know, his base, his base, you know.

I think that the problem is, is that we don't have clear leadership.

And I think as a result of that, there's going to be thousands, thousands, and thousands of more people who are going to die of this.

I'm just saying, if I were Trump, and even if I didn't have empathy, even if all I had was sheer brutal political will, I'd be popping up Donald Trump vaccination centers in every town in America with my face on the front door.

And every person who would walk in and get their life saved because of the vaccine would get a big sticker with Trump's face on it.

Like, I don't understand.

He had a chance to make this a victory.

Okay, there's a million dollar idea.

We'll just get little vaccine Trump stickers that you can stick on your arm.

The band-aid has the space on.

Right.

But wait, so what is going to improve distribution?

What do you imagine?

When do you expect the vaccine to be spread wide enough to resume in-person events?

Like, how does this roll out now?

16 days from now, someone else takes over 18 days from now.

Well, I'm hoping that there is a plan.

I am pretty convinced that the Biden team, the transition team, does have a plan for this.

I think they're stymied.

until January 20th.

I think it's just going to be difficult for that message to get out.

And the reason why isn't Trump doing it?

Because it's counter to the message that he gave from the very beginning.

So there's a cognitive dissonance in Trump.

You know, we have a problem with, you know, in this country, we have a problem with heuristics, right?

We have a huge heuristic problem in the sense that we have, you know,

the way that we

know what that one means.

How you know what you know, essentially.

I mean, basically.

It's not a doctor thing.

It's not a doctor thing.

It's how, it's basically, you know, we get information from lots of sources, the internet, from social media, et cetera.

And as a result of that, what we think we know, we typically don't know.

And because of the prior spread of all the bad information, it's like literally stopping

a giant freighter and turning it around.

And that's just not going to happen.

Well, how do you do that?

Because there was a doctor I saw on Twitter.

She was treating a patient.

And he's like, don't tell me I have COVID because you just want to make money off of me.

Have you experienced that from people?

Do you get people?

No, not in my hospital.

I've heard about that, you you know, up in Idaho and in Wisconsin and places like that.

Because again, they listen to one source of news media and, you know, whether it's always...

She was a doctor when that happens because it's probably happened a lot with other things.

Oh, yeah.

I mean, look, sure, people are in denial all the time.

I mean, about, you know, cancer diagnosis.

And it's a cultural thing as well.

I mean, there's a lot of cultures in which you're not supposed to talk about, you know, disease, et cetera.

I mean, just remember our...

you know our you know grandma when you know she was from italian background and you know you don't get cancer, you have to say it like three octaves lower than what it actually is.

Yeah.

Yeah.

So imagine that multiplied by social media.

And denial is a very powerful thing.

Well, it's interesting because our mom was like, there's a lot of COVID deaths now.

She literally said that to me on the phone the other day.

I said it last night.

Every time I talk about the spread, she tries to push on me, oh, but the deaths are down.

And I'm like, no, hospitals have learned to handle this really well, but you know, you have to roll out the, here's the numbers.

And she still like like finds a new topic.

Yeah.

So how do you, what do you expect of this surge post-holiday season, Jeff?

And how do you, how, how, when do you imagine it will turn around?

Okay, so I think we're going to start to see,

unfortunately, a big surge coming up in the next two to three weeks.

We already saw it post-Thanksgiving.

So my hospital in particular was doing really well.

I mean, and so was SF General.

So are the other hospitals in San Francisco after that initial surge in May, June.

And then it tapered off a little bit and we were actually getting under good control.

And then since Thanksgiving, the numbers have just started rising, not just at my hospital, but at the other hospitals in San Francisco.

And look at Los Angeles in Southern California.

It's terrible.

I mean, they've maxed out their ICU capacity.

So I live in Marin County, just north of the Golden Gate Bridge,

and the Marin hospitals are ICUs are full.

So they're basically shunting people now to city hospitals and other places like that in terms of the ICU capacity.

And remember, when we talk about ICU capacity, we're not just talking physical beds.

We're talking about people who know how to staff those beds.

So nurses, ICU doctors, et cetera.

So when you hear about hospital beds being filled, it's not the physical bed itself.

It's the ability

to take care of the patients.

And yes, we have learned a lot about how to take care of COVID patients.

And

with better medications and simple medications like dexamethasone, remember, one of the reasons that COVID kills people is one of the ways it kills people is a hyperimmune response.

And dexamethasone suppresses the immune response.

And so, knowing that, maybe not intubating people as quickly as we did before, what's called proning, putting people on their stomachs instead of on their backs, all these things have led to a better outcome for those people who do get sick with COVID.

But still, the mortality is not diminished on this disease.

Go ahead, sir.

How much does the confusion make it worse for people?

Right?

I think of right now, since I got COVID, all the people who tweet at me and say, Why aren't you using your platform?

You know, you seem perfectly fine.

Your family got better.

Why aren't you using your platform to tell the world it was only the flu?

And there's lots of able-bodied people like me who may have had flu-like symptoms, and they're trying to push this narrative that we don't need the world shut down, it's only the flu.

But this sickness that I had, had I not isolated, I would have made my parents sick where it wouldn't have been the flu for them.

How much does it contribute?

How much does the confusion contribute to the situation getting worse and worse?

Okay, so this is a class, you asked about heuristics, this is a classic example of what's called representative heuristics, right?

So you as an example, or Trump is an example of somebody who got COVID, oh, you got better.

But the problem is, is that that is a tiny percentage of the people who got COVID.

A lot of people who got COVID are dead.

You know, more than 350,000 people are dead because of COVID.

And so when you have someone like you with a big platform or Trump with a big platform to give the message that, you know, you'll get better, you know, it's just like the flu.

It's not like the flu.

The flu does not cause a vascular inflammation.

It does not cause a hypercoagulability syndrome.

It does not cause people to basically develop pulmonary emboli.

I mean, this is how people die.

I mean, that representative who died down in Louisiana died because he probably developed pulmonary emboli.

I don't know, I don't, obviously for HIPAA reasons, I don't know why he died, but I can predict a 46-year-old man who dies like rapidly from COVID probably developed hypercoagulability, a pulmonary embolism, and died.

You know, that's how people die.

So

you have to understand that this is not like the flu.

This is a very, very, very bad virus that can, in certain circumstances, do horrible things, totally different than the flu.

Right.

So what do we do going forward?

So name the three things.

We got to wrap it up, but what are the things that have to happen with people who have to continue to do realistic things

realistic things i mean look i live should we test anymore what's the point well testing is helpful if you uh you know if you suspect that you may have covet yeah testing is good because then you can isolate yourself and you can contact trace and figure out who might have been exposed to you uh absolutely but the most important things are the simple things number one wear a mask uh 100 do not have social gatherings even if it looks like it might be fun to get together with you know five or six of your neighbors don't do that uh you know we set up a whole outdoor thing for Thanksgiving and Christmas, a big outdoor open-sided

canopy and fire things.

And we stayed 10 feet away from each other and we wore masks

for that.

And we only had four people,

but 10 feet apart.

I mean, I can send you the pictures.

It was crazy.

But the simple things are the things.

So wear a mask.

Do not gather in groups.

Do not go inside to eat in restaurants.

Do not travel.

Do not do all the things that we love to do, but we can't until we get this under control.

It's going to take a long time to get this vaccination.

How long?

A long time.

I mean, look, how many people a day are being vaccinated right now?

Not enough.

A million?

Not enough.

Half a million to a million.

So 230 million people hit 70%.

And you hear a lot about herd immunity.

I think people should stop talking about herd immunity because it's A, misunderstood what it means.

And B, it may or may not work with this virus particularly well.

The three main questions I think that are going to be persistent about the virus is: one, if you do get vaccinated, could you still theoretically pass it on to other people?

There's potentially some evidence showing that nasopharyngeal, you know, a colonization of the virus, may not prevent you from giving it to other people.

It may keep you from getting sick, so that's important.

But certainly, in terms of spreading it, I mean, I always looked at this virus, it's like, you know, dandelions in the field.

You know, one dandelion spreads its seeds out, you know, all over the field, and then you have a thousand dandelions, which then spread their seeds out in the field.

It's the same thing with a virus like this, and that's how they work.

So the only way we can stop it is stop the dandelions from spreading by So you don't get on a plane, you don't jump on a plane once you get the vaccine or Stephanie's had COVID.

She doesn't all of a sudden say, I'm partying, or whatever.

No, definitely not.

So can you actually clarify that?

Because I think that's a huge confusion for people.

People keep saying to me, like, oh, the silver lining, now you're superwoman.

You can go anywhere.

You can do anything.

You know, there's people who say, I just want to get it and have my family get it so I can move on.

Can you explain why that's not correct?

Yeah, it's not correct because we don't know the extent of the immunity,

how immune people actually are, the duration.

I mean, so length and strength, right?

How long the immunity lasts with the vaccine, we really don't know how long it's going to protect you for.

You have to get a flu vaccine every year.

We don't have enough data yet to know how long this immunity lasts.

The second thing is the strength of the immunity.

Because a vaccine is 90% effective, that means 10% is not.

And the other thing is just the simple things are we want to keep the spread down.

So, you know, stop doing all the things that we love to do.

And it's not going to be till September, you know, probably,

I would say 2021 is pretty much a COVID year too, the entire year.

And I think it's, you know, I gave a podcast along, you know, in March or April to a bunch of kids about this, and they were like, what, two weeks?

I'm like, no, you know, I was then saying November, but now I'm going to say November of 2021 or beyond.

I know,

it's the new reality.

Sorry.

Sorry to be a bummer, Stephanie.

Great.

Happy New Year.

Happy New Year.

All right, Jeffrey, as usual.

He is the smart one, isn't he, Stephanie?

He is.

He is the smart one.

All right, Swisher.

Thank you so much.

All right.

Take care.

Nice seeing you all.

Bye-bye.

All right, Stephanie, the Swishers rock as usual.

I mean, I'm totally depressed.

We're going to be, this is 2021.

It's going to be another year of COVID.

It is.

One more quick one.

I think it's going to be a little less, but he's just trying to be prudent.

Let's be prudent.

And if the Biden administration does ramp it up, it could move faster.

At least we can start to get outside in least.

Anyways, we'll be back for wins and fails.

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All lowercase.

Okay, Stephanie, wins and fails.

What is your wins and fails?

I won the week because Scott's out.

Duh.

Come on.

What's a win and fail?

You got to go to Hilaria.

I've got to go.

I mean, mean, I'm probably going to have to go Hilaria Baldwin.

I mean, it was obviously a win for the gossiping universe that

we are.

This ridiculous story of Hilaria Baldwin

and as some call it, a 10-year grift.

I think we've moved on from that story, but what a disastrous fail this was for her.

Someone who leads a very charmed, privileged, fabulous life, who, to me, for no apparent reason, got herself in this this disaster.

Total fail for her.

Who won?

Let's hopefully we all won this week.

We're turning the page.

It's a new year.

Let's all get better and smarter.

Are you not worried about the coup?

I'm not worried about the coup.

I think this coup

is,

listen.

I'm not a political historian and I feel it.

I hear people talking about what this is doing to the health of our democracy.

I get all of that, but I'm painfully pragmatic.

What I actually think this is this week is a ridiculous show, and I'm glad it's going to be over soon.

Interesting.

See, I'm worried living in DC.

I'm worried about this rally.

My kids are like, I'm going down there.

I'm like, no, you're not.

These people are dangerous and stupid, both dangerous and stupid, and carry weapons.

And so, you know, it's a really, I'm nervous about this.

I'm worried about this.

Are you going to be in DC for it?

I am in D.C.

right now.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I'm in D.C.

So I'm worried about violence.

I am.

And I don't think, I think people don't don't realize how this stuff gets, you know, I think the, the mayor of Washington is worried about it.

I think everybody's worried about it.

And they are apparently going to dress different.

They're going to go to different parts of the city.

And I don't even think they have the organizational ability to get themselves out of a paper bag, but they're just violent.

They're just dumb, violent people who just have been fed and, you know, an endless, like what you saw from Trump.

That wasn't crazy compared to some of these other people.

They utterly and completely believe it.

And that's the one thing that takeaway I have from that listening to the entire thing and I did was he believes this bullshit.

But here's the good and I

think

the good thing about this Kara is let's see all the crazy.

Put it out in the light.

And when you see it, that's how you can start to eradicate it and say this is nonsense.

And where you can get rational people and say, realize this has gone too far.

For all of these well-to-do people in New York or business people who have quietly said, oh, listen, he's a showman, he's crazy, but like, you know, some of these policies work for me.

What the president is doing right now goes far beyond good or bad policies.

It's flat out dangerous.

And hopefully, cooler heads will prevail and say enough is enough.

May I ask you one list?

Why isn't business spoken up?

Because this can't be, I mean, obviously, the stock market's doing great, but there's more to it than that.

They want a stable business environment, right?

This is their great goal.

So I'm curious why so few business people have said anything.

Are they just tired of it after four years?

You remember when he was tweeting at businesses, it had an impact.

Now it really doesn't.

Why have they sort of stopped commenting?

Because they don't have to comment.

And business leaders are risk managers.

They're not moral or ethical or community leaders.

They're risk managers.

And they don't technically have to address this.

So privately, they hate it.

Privately, they do the thing I hate most.

They call people like me and say all the things that they want to say and hope that someone like me will say that publicly, but I won't.

And they're not saying anything because they don't want to bring more headaches for themselves.

And truthfully, it's totally irresponsible.

Because if you have the benefit of being a leader in our country right now, then you should actually care about our long-term positive future.

So who is the leader?

Who is the leader?

I want to, that's my last question.

Who in the future becomes the leader?

Gara, right now, there's no one person to specifically point to but if there's one thing that social media has given every no-name person it's given all of us a voice so if collectively we all start to act better and smarter for ourselves and those around us then we're going to realize oh the far right the far this they're the most powerful because they're the loudest stop making them so loud be loud

you think that's going to work listen the center has been quiet for way too damn long.

And we've all been quiet because our lives were good.

Well, our lives and our futures will not be good, and nor will our children's.

So it's time to stand up and make the world better and smarter.

Ah, Stephanie, the activist.

I love it.

Anyway, thank you so much for coming on.

Thanks for having me.

You are hilarious.

You are hilarious.

Hilarious.

Okay, that's the show.

Thank you for being my co-host this week.

I'll be back later this week with another great round of guest hosts.

Don't forget to send your questions to pivot at boxmedia.com to be featured on the show.

Today's show was produced by Rebecca Sinanis.

Ernie Interdot engineered this episode.

Also, thanks to Hannah Rosen.

Thanks again to our guest host, Stephanie Ruhl.

She rules having me.

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