Trump Has Completed Half of Project 2025

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Welcome, Raising Raging Moderates.

I'm Scott Galloway, and I'm Jessica Tarlove.

Uh, how are you, Jess?

I love that you paused a little.

You're like, What does one say now in the banter section?

How are you?

I am good.

How are you?

I'm good.

Yeah, I'm alone in my place in London.

It feels strange.

It's very, it's kind of weird here.

I mean, you don't become single when your partner is away, but do you have like sexist city called it secret single behavior?

Like, how you live when you're on your own versus how you live when your partner and family is at home?

If it's illegal in any way, don't tell me.

I mean, my life is pretty much a constant exercise and arrested adolescence, so I'm not sure it's any different when the kids are gone, but it's actually, it's a little bit depressing.

I mean, of course, the weather turned very gray and very cold and being here alone.

I have the dogs, which is nice, but I'm trying to get out every night such that I'm just not, you know, pondering around a house.

But I can't stand my family when they're here and then I miss them the moment they leave.

I'm just sort of generally pissed off at all times.

But yeah, this feels especially lonely to be kind of clanging around the house, especially with the boys not here.

I was expecting like, yeah, you know, I don't pick up my clothes and I go to the bathroom with the door open, but that's sad that you're unhappy all the time.

Yeah, generally a little bit, a little bit down.

But anyways, enough of that.

How are you?

I'm fine.

I'm, yeah, good.

Good.

We had a trip planned to London, actually, because I lived over there for a long time.

And so lots of friends there.

And my goddaughter was getting baptized.

And she ended up getting this horrible staph infection.

Have you heard of scalded skin staph?

I have not.

It looks as bad as it sounds.

Basically, like it's terrible.

The whole baby, she's just like, her whole body blistered.

And she was in the hospital for six days.

So the trip got canceled, which is not a big deal.

And the good news is that she's fine, But we have talked about pediatric ERs as being the most depressing and also

the most uplifting place because you see these nurses and doctors and physicians assistants who are, they just do God's work.

And so we are indebted to them for always.

And that's kind of been what my week was like.

So.

God, we're just a bag of sunshine.

Sorry, I know.

Get us out of here.

Get us out.

Get us out.

I didn't mean to do that.

Everything else was.

Let's talk about the ceasefire and the government shutdown.

All right.

In today's episode of Reaching Moderates, we're discussing two weeks in,

the shutdown starts hurting everyday Americans, how Trump has completed about half of the Project 2025 agenda, and what to expect from the No Kings protests

2.0, if you will.

All right, let's get into it.

The government shutdown is really starting to sting.

Museums are closed.

Federal workers are missing paychecks, and small businesses that rely on government activity are feeling the crunch.

Trump, meanwhile, is trying to blunt some of the backlash by using leftover Pentagon funds to keep paying the troops, a move that takes one major pressure point off the table but leaves hundreds of thousands of other workers stuck in limbo.

Democrats and Republicans are still blaming each other for the standoff with no deal in sight.

Jess, what are your thoughts on the shutdown, where it is now, and any thoughts on where it goes from here?

So I saw...

At the beginning that it would be kind of short-lived, honestly.

I mean, Donald Trump had the longest shutdown in his first administration and went 35 days.

And I thought, like, we're definitely not getting anywhere close to that.

I frankly didn't give Democrats, I guess, enough credit for backbone.

And I thought that they would find some way to yes relatively quickly

because Republican pressure and pressure at home as well, because it's, you know, there are people who vote for Democrats certainly in their districts who might be saying like, hey, I need my paycheck or I need the country to work.

Like we had a vacation plan to this national park, the museums, et cetera.

But it feels to me like this is going to go for a long time at this point.

And you see both sides really kind of hunkering down, big change in dynamics.

I think this shift away from are the Democrats going to cave and hat tip to Chuck Schumer, who I think has kept the Senate caucus in line.

And Angus King, who was one of the three Democrats that had voted to keep the government open, now has has changed his mind and now he is siding with the majority of Democrats.

And there's real pressure on Mike Johnson.

We know the public opinion is against the Republicans on this between 10 and 15 points.

They blame the Republicans more.

But you're also seeing individual Republican representatives even do things like go on TV and talk about how poor Johnson's leadership has been, especially that he has the caucus at home on recess.

And they're like, we should be working.

Like Kevin Kiley in California, Marjorie Taylor Greene has been making the rounds to complain about Mike Johnson and the healthcare system in general, which we should talk about because it's not as if, you know, just extending the subsidies solves the problem.

We still have the most expensive health care in the world and it's burdensome no matter what.

There was a private Republican lawmaker call and apparently three more Republicans on that call raised concerns about the House being being out of session.

Stephanie Beiss of Oklahoma, Jay Obernulte of California, and Julie Federchick of North Dakota.

So that's a pretty wide range of representatives from all over the country and places that you would expect to be pretty die-hard in support of the Republicans and like what Trump wants.

And they're saying, you can't just tell us to sit at home while this is going on.

This is a legitimate state of emergency and this is why people elect us, right, to make sure that the government is running.

So those are kind of my top line thoughts.

Well,

you're the pollster here.

And what I've seen or what's in the data here is that 41% of Americans hold the GOP accountable versus 30% for Democrats.

So it feels as if Democrats

You know, they all lose, but Republicans lose more.

So I don't see the incentive for Democrats to give an inch.

And it feels like they've been very pointed and strategic on focusing on health care.

And yesterday I was on a radio show here in the UK and they asked me who was the leader of the Democratic Party.

And I said it's Marjorie Taylor Greene right now.

That essentially she's the most articulate.

She's personalized the issue, saying my kids' premiums are going to double.

I think we need to come together.

I don't think,

I mean, she's quite frankly just been, A, everyone loves what they perceive as a turn code.

If you want to get the cameras going, just recite the talking points of the other side, right?

I think she kind of, I mean, who would have thought that the sanest person of the Republican Party would be Marjorie Taylor Greene?

I think everyone everyone is totally flummoxed here.

But it feels to me that in Calci,

the betting market or the speculation market is forecasting that it'll be shut 37 days.

I think that what's happened in the Middle East has probably taken their eye off the ball or taken some of their sense of urgency away.

And

I think the Democrats are going to get most or all of what they want here because my sense is every, again, every day this goes on, it cedes advantage from the republicans to the democrats uh so i this feels like at some point mike johnson gets democrats in a room and says all right how do i declare victory and get this done by giving you some or not all of what you want but i would imagine that leader jeffries and senator schumer for the first time in a while actually feel some mojo and some juju here like oh my gosh we're actually winning for once and we're actually seen as leaders what is this strange feeling that i have What is this feeling?

I don't recognize this sensation.

So I think it really comes down to to what extent is Speaker Johnson willing to rally some Republicans to give on these

extensions of subsidies for Obamacare.

So I know my sense is the Democrats are winning here.

Your thoughts?

Yeah, I think a little bit.

I mean, listen, winning a political battle when the government is shut down and that's affecting everyday Americans isn't the same kind of win.

Fair enough.

Good point.

There are people who are out there losing that they're trying to protect.

But yes, I think that they have been able to clearly and articulately advocate for their position, which is this is about protecting Americans' health care.

And I think that if a deal is done, it will be about the ACA subsidies.

I don't think that they're going to get a rollback of the Medicaid cuts from the Big Beautiful bill, which is also part of what they want.

I think that that is kind of the prized possession of the administration and no one's going to be touching that.

You saw Trump come out and say, well, we'll find a way to pay our troops and law enforcement.

An OMB spokesperson said

OMB is making every preparation to batten down the hatches and ride out the Democrats in transigence, pay the troops, pay law enforcement, continue the reductions in force.

and wait.

So that's the key part of this for Rust Vote.

He is having a field day with the amount of layoffs that they can do.

And they had another one of those.

Did you see they fired like a thousand CDC scientists on Friday night and then of course had to rehire most of them back because whoops, we got rid of the wrong guys again.

Makes me think of the early days when they were getting rid of all the weather people.

And then they're like, oh my God, what are we supposed to do here?

You know, we don't have air traffic control.

Nashville Airport has to shut down for five hours a couple of days ago.

I mean,

it's having a very real impact, but it's exactly what.

Rust vote wants out of it.

And I think that Trump, in his constant quest to be able to declare victory about something, if they find a way to move the pay for troops and law enforcement and maybe some nutritional assistance for women and children, which has also been a conversation point, and get that kind of carved out, then he can say, everything else that's bad that's happening to you is the Democrats' fault.

And I'm out here protecting our troops and our police officers should say that Leader Jeffries wants a standalone bill to make sure that the troops get paid.

Maybe they make a compromise, or maybe Trump just wants to take it as kind of an executive action.

He loves to take from his tariff pot of money, which he says is what, $17 trillion.

And there's no accounting of that actually having happened at that level.

But at least that's what he's kind of posing could happen.

I want to double tap.

Is that the phrase?

Double tap

on the Democrats winning part, at least in

this microcosm of the fight, because it's been interesting for me to see how

Democrats Democrats can be up on the generic ballot.

They're winning, you know, on who's to blame for this and they're most favored on who's best to handle health care.

But the other main issues that matter to voters, like the economy, like immigration, they still prefer the Republican Party.

Like Trump is underwater on it.

But I've been thinking about, you know, if the election were held today, kind of examples.

And

I still don't think that it would be a slam dunk that Democrats would come away with anything close to a big majority.

And that's kind of, it's not kind of concerning to me.

That is concerning.

I think that we would win the House, but maybe buy a couple seats and you want it to be a really definitive win so that you can actually manage to get things done because you're going to lose a few people in every vote.

So what do you make of that?

situation with Republicans still being favored on who's best to handle the economy, et cetera?

Aaron Powell, I think the unfortunate reality is that America would rather have an autocrat who's perceived as strong than Democrats who are perceived as weak.

And I think the basic axiom of American politics can best be described by what David Trump said, and that is if liberals won't enforce borders, fascists will.

And America wants that.

America would rather see an overreaction, coarseness and cruelty to weakness.

And by the way, I'm not advocating for that.

I'm not sure it's the

right thing to do.

But America is voting.

America seems more outraged by Jimmy Kimmel being taken off the air than they are about a mass secret police force

terrorizing neighborhoods.

So the Democratic Party right now is pretty much leaderless.

There are some governors who are getting some interesting attention, you know, Governors Newsom, Pritzker, Moore.

And I find everyone's talking about Bashir because nobody knows who he is.

So everyone's looking for an empty vessel that'll be the great, kind of the great great hope here.

But yeah, I think Democrats are, as everyone says, is lacking an orth star here.

And it feels like there's an incredible vacuum or void, if you will.

So, yeah, it feels like politically

we have a choice between coarseness and cruelty and weakness.

That's kind of what's on the menu.

Anyways,

with that note.

Wait, before we go, I want to talk to you about your interview with Dan Senor, who was exactly the person I wanted to hear from.

So first off, I think the world of Dan Senor.

He was actually my sister's roommate when they were in D.C.

right out of college.

And I met him and he was this young, nice kid.

And I didn't like him because he was Republican, and that's the kind of judgmental person I am.

And then 30 years later, we reconnected over Israel and or over the topic.

I went on his podcast and I've become,

you know, real friends with him, which isn't easy at my age, Jess.

It's not easy.

But anyways, we've been going back and forth on each other's pods.

I thought one of the more interesting things he said, he kind of broke down why now?

Why did all of a sudden everything come together for the peace plan?

And he kind of outlined five different things, which really struck me and three of them I never even considered before.

Anyways, let's listen to a brief clip of our discussion with Dan Senor.

So what exists of Hamas now is basically a political organization in Gaza that has a sort of ragtag militia, which is different from what it had before October 7th, which was a political organization in Gaza and a very sophisticated military.

Now, that political organization will still try to stay in power and still try to terrorize.

Let's take a quick break.

Stay with us.

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Welcome back.

Jess, remember Project 2025, the far-right governing blueprint Trump claimed to know nothing about during his 2024 campaign.

Yeah.

I remember that.

Remember that?

Well,

he and his budget director, one of the plan's main architects, have already put nearly half of it into action.

The roadmap is dismantling checks and balances and handing sweeping power to the presidency.

Project 2025 did move voters in 2024, so how should Democrats talk about it heading into 2026 and 2028?

What do you make of Project 2025

in terms of how to position it?

It's bad.

It was bad when we we found out about it.

It was bad when you could print all 900 pages out.

And it's bad seeing it come to fruition.

I try not to dwell on the mistakes of the past so much.

Like I want to learn from them, but I've been sad already for a long time.

So I don't want to go back to, you know, the highs of Brat's summer to the lows of election night or the lows of.

many points actually between August and election night where I thought, oh, we're going to lose.

But one thing in particular always sticks out to me, and that is the fact that Project 2025 was being used as a talking point by Kamala Harris and top surrogates all over the country, and it was being hugely effective.

So much so that Tony Fabrizio, who's Donald Trump's pollster, talked about how salient it was and that it was concerning even Republican voters.

And they're going, well, what's this thing?

And they weren't necessarily believing Trump, which they shouldn't when he says, I know nothing about this.

Well, of course, my administration is stocked with people that wrote the thing and they're my advisors and they came from, you know, my first term and basically my whole inner circle has their name on this thing, but I know nothing about it.

And then we inexplicably stop talking about it.

And I know that there's always this push and pull between, should you be talking about democracy issues or should you be talking about bread and butter issues?

But the beauty of Project 2025 is encapsulated in its evilness, actually, in that it's all of it at once.

So it is a democracy issue, but it is also a bunch of economic issues tied together.

And we are seeing that playing out right now.

I mean, the dismantling of our system of checks and balances has been so swift that you see, you know, judges even with cases of whiplash at this point, right?

Like that they can't get into courtrooms fast enough to stop some of what they are doing, you know, consolidating all the power in the presidency, you know, check, check, check, check, check.

That's what we're seeing.

And you have a neutered Congress and Mike Johnson has taken that willingly.

There was a big piece about that this weekend, you know, that Mike Johnson basically, you know, signed me up to be emasculated in every way possible, that you need these willing foot soldiers to be able to execute something like this.

And Mike Johnson is the the star pupil, to say the least.

And so I think that in talking about Project 2025, I know that the title itself does mean something to people, but I think that we should be talking about it piece by piece and how it is affecting individual Americans' lives.

Like this is what Project 2025 looks like for you.

So it looks like the firing of thousands of CDC scientists who are there to keep you safe.

It's raising tariffs unilaterally that are breaking the bank for you.

It is a president indicting his political enemies, striking boats in international waters that you say are carrying narco-traffickers.

Did you see this?

That Colombia is now saying it wasn't a Venezuelan boat.

It was a Colombian boat and there were Colombians on it.

It's also, and this story, it doesn't surprise me, but scary, scary stuff that now the Pentagon wants to essentially bar free press access.

They're threatening retaliation against reporters that seek out information that hasn't been pre-approved for release.

So they're basically saying it's not just about you roaming the halls.

You can't even be collecting information, which is the whole point of being a reporter.

And to the credit of almost every single outlet except One American News, like even Newsmax said, we're not signing on to this.

Like this is unacceptable.

It completely flies in the face of a free press.

But that's how Project 2025 lives.

And I think that we need to be talking about it, what we're going to talk about, militarizing our streets.

Like that's Project 2025 as well.

So let's unpack it specifically.

So Project 2025 was created by the Heritage Foundation, which is a very prominent right-wing think tank.

And many of Project 2025's authors, despite Trump supposedly not knowing anything about it, have been nominated to work in the Trump administration, including Russell Vought, who leads the Office of Budget Management, CIA Director John Radcliffe, Brendan Carr, Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, Tom Homan, the Borders Are,

Paul Atkins, Chairman of the U.S.

Securities Exchange Commission, Peter Navarro, Counselor to the President of the United States.

And the document, essentially, Project 2025 could be broken down into sort of four basic policy aims.

One, restore the family as the centerpiece of American life.

What would be interesting there is for them to define family.

I think you know how they define family.

Effectively, Ozzie and Harriet.

Dismantle the administrative state.

I think that means get rid of of governments.

Well, anyways, I don't know what they mean.

Defend the nation's sovereignty.

Fire everybody.

Pretty much.

Defend the nation's sovereignty and borders.

Okay.

Secure God-given individual rights to live freely.

Again, big questions around what God are we talking about and what individual rights.

I don't think those individual rights include things like bodily autonomy.

But anyway, if you dig deeper, there are some more alarming.

stances in the document.

It labels the FBI as a bloated, arrogant, increasingly lawless organization.

I think a lot of us would argue that the FBI is the primary agency upholding the law.

Suggests that the health and human services should, quote unquote, maintain a biblically based social science-reinforced definition of marriage and family.

I find that very troubling.

Proposes slashing federal money for research and investment in renewable energy.

Suggests banning pornography and shutting out tech and telco companies that allow access to adult material.

Okay,

so

this is,

it sounds to me like this is pretty much a slow creep and is happening or that it's a kind of a creeping takeover.

And if I'd read these things nine months ago, I would have thought, oh, the American public will never put up with this.

And it feels like.

Bannon called it flood the zone.

I would argue that what's taking place here, a better term for it, would be blitzkrieg.

And that is there's just so much going on and

progressive kind of liberal democratic values are being attacked on so many fronts that they're a bit flummoxed and flat-footed as to where to respond.

And if you look at Project 2025, it feels as if they've made real progress against many of these objectives.

Your thoughts?

Yeah, they're feeling really good.

And I've spoken to people who work in the administration.

Obviously, I work with a lot of conservatives that are close to the administration.

They're riding pretty high on this, even if Trump's approval ratings in key areas are down from where he started and substantially even, you know, down minus 15 on the economy.

Republicans still leading on who the American public would rather manage the economy, but you know, that's a big fall, minus 16 on trade, minus 27 on inflation.

You know, those are all really bad things.

But I feel like there has to be a real focus on the tangible issues that Americans can see and feel in order to explain what's going on.

And I do think that immigration is a linchpin of that,

the terrorists and what's going on with the economy as well.

But the visuals of the troops going through our cities, peaceful protests in the face of being pepper sprayed by a CPB officer who has certainly no business being in Chicago, which is very, very, very far from the border, as Governor Pritzker pointed out to us last week when he joined, I think is meaningful.

And also, these stories of Americans that are getting detained are coming fast and furiously.

Tim Miller, our pal over at the Bulwark, did a great interview with a U.S.

citizen, George Ratgus, who's a veteran and was held for three days in detention.

He said, they put me on suicide watch and they put me in a cell.

I'm naked in like a hospital dress with just a concrete bed, a mattress, a thin mattress, and they leave the light on 24-7.

There's a glass door and officers just always standing.

Psychiatric nurse comes and checks on me once a day.

And so from Friday morning to Sunday afternoon, when I'm released, I'm literally in that cell naked, just in that room with the light on.

Like this is a nightmare.

This is an American who served our country.

We have a 39-year-old DACA recipient who was detained.

and died in ICE custody.

And then you have the judges all over the country, a lot of them Republican appointees that are calling bullshit on the administration's claims that cities like Portland and Chicago are lawless messes.

Portrayal of Portland from the administration is, quote, untethered to the facts.

The judge that ruled against the deployment of troops to Chicago said that the Department of Homeland Security's version of events was simply unreliable and suffered from a lack of credibility, and also noted that the deployment itself could fuel the civil unrest, which is the point.

Right.

They're like, if there isn't a problem, I'm going to go and make one.

And you're seeing, you know, the visuals of Christy Noam standing on the roof of the ICE facility with all of the animals, the dress up that they're playing in Portland.

You know, and then the naked bike ride.

They're calling it nude-tafa, I think maybe.

Nudie Tafa or something like that.

Portland, just keep being Portland, obviously.

But, you know, we were skeptical of the idea that focusing on the Kilmara Brego-Garcia case was going to move the needle.

And Senator Van Holland basically just said, F it.

Like, I'm going to Seacot and I'm going to check on my constituent.

And it ended up being the first time that there was a real dent in Donald Trump's approval rating on immigration.

And I'm not saying it's turned into a free fall moment, but it certainly was a bit of a damn breaking.

And right now, a Maryland judge is actually on the verge of telling the government that they can't detain Abrego Garcia any longer because they haven't shown a compelling reason for him to continue to be.

And also, three African nations have told the Trump administration, we're not taking him.

Like this idea that you can just send people wherever you want or pay them off for it isn't going to fly.

And I think the fact that that case is still percolating and it was such a symbol for the overreach and the cruelty of this administration, and it remains salient is an indication that we really need to be leaning into

what kind of lawless behavior.

they're engaging in, but also what kind of cruel behavior.

An American citizen who served the country spending three days in detention.

I'm glad you brought it up.

I think, look, the most influential person in America I know is the president, and globally, I would argue.

I think tied for second is Jeffrey Epstein and Jensen Huang.

I think that essentially an attempt to keep Jeffrey Epstein's name out of the news has resulted in the Trump administration.

lobbying every 48 or 72 hours a series of actions and stories that just push.

I mean, we saw it again with these ridiculous China tariffs, which had no,

there was massive market manipulation, a dramatic uptick in options activity.

Just a few minutes before he announced these tariffs, a few people cashed out with multi-million dollars, sometimes over $100 million gains, and then he walks it back.

I think that, again, my thesis is there's a group of people armed with AI that know every 71 to 74 hours, as soon as Epstein starts to creep back into the news cycle, come up with a series of ridiculous actions that will take the media's gaze off of Abstein.

And then number two, Jensen Huang, essentially, America is a giant bet on AI right now.

And I continue to believe that the most dangerous metric ever invented was the NASDAQ and the Dow and the SP index because the S ⁇ P being up 14%, I believe has provided cloud cover for Trump's actions.

And that is America has become so much about stuff.

specifically your ability to acquire stuff versus character versus family versus patriotism that as long as the markets continue to go up and people are under the impression that they're going to have more money and access to cheap calories and access to Netflix, that if the market is up 14%, that must mean the president on the whole is doing something right.

And essentially, the reason the market is up 14% is 75% plus of the market's gains come from 10 companies led by NVIDIA.

And if Jensen Huang wasn't, and now Jensen is implementing a series of circular, kind of incestuous deals that feel very like late stage 99 to me.

That if the market had been down 14%,

I believe that Trump wouldn't have had the cloud cover to go into Portland.

Some people would argue, well, we would have been more likely to do it to create a distraction.

But the most powerful men outside of Trump right now are Epstein trying to keep anything, trying to keep him out of the news cyclist dictating, whether it's Mike Johnson dismissing Congress early or not swearing in an elected congressperson because he's worried about the number of votes to release the Epstein file.

This guy is having a ton of power from the grave.

And also, America is essentially a bet on AI right now.

And if AI doesn't continue to garner and register the type of outrageous valuations it's garnered to date, you're just going to see the cloud cover disappear for Trump's activities here.

So it's strange.

I think that a dead man is influencing America, and Jensen Huang, Sam Altman, Sachin Adela, and the continued march of the Magnificent 10 is the cloud cover for this administration.

Any thoughts?

Well, I had Adelita Grijalva, the congresswoman that you mentioned, who's not getting sworn in.

I interviewed her yesterday for the YouTube channel.

I said, well, why do you think you're not getting sworn in?

And she said, well, I'm the 218th vote.

I mean, the difference between myself and the three other members of Congress that have been sworn in since the special, they were all sworn in within 24 hours.

And And aside from them being three Caucasian men and I am a Chicana from Arizona, the only other issue is I am the 218th signer to the discharge petitions to release the Epstein files.

And they have shown a willingness to do absolutely anything in their power and sometimes things not in their power to avoid doing that.

And I'd recommend everyone check it out.

She's

She seems great and has a lot that she wants to accomplish.

And she also is a representative of a border constituency.

she has a 700 000 constituents 60 latino and the stories that she is telling about what it's like with customs and border patrol officers and ice there and she saw someone just get pulled into a car she was just pumping gas with her son you know out of an unmarked vehicle they don't even have the resources if they did want to be in properly marked vehicles, they couldn't because they are moving so fast and furiously that they haven't even, you know, waited for the right kind of gear, though it does suit their purposes for them to just look like scary men to carry out these kind of pickups.

And that's really interesting about,

we're all just a big bet on AI, because I know Andrew Ross Sorgan was interviewed and asked about, will there be a crash?

It feels like the stock market is just completely impervious to what's going on on the ground or what people are feeling about their lives.

And if it is being propped up by these 10 companies, do you think that a crash does come ever or we'll just continue on this kind of, you know, fast food diet or whatever, you know, the fake calories of it all and manage to keep going like this?

I mean, no, I'm, I'm enjoying it in terms of the returns, but it does feel fake.

Well, first off, just

to lighten the mood a little bit, if you want to enjoy yourself, take an Oedipal and watch a very talented Andrew Ross Sorkin explain to an 83-year-old Leslie Stahl the stock market and ask yourself, oh, it's really surprising that broadcast news or cable news is dying.

We're always being undone by bubbles.

There was the internet bubble in 2000, the housing in 2008.

Are we in another bubble, an AI bubble or something like that?

I think it's hard to say we're not in a bubble of some sort.

The question is always: when is the bubble going to pop?

One symptom of a bubble is when the market goes up and up, but the underlying economy, the real economy, goes soft.

And that appears to be happening right now.

All this hullabaloo about CBS and who's going to run it.

Folks, regarding CBS, nobody fucking cares.

CBS is irrelevant.

Like Margaret Brennan and Face the Nation has some relevance within the Beltway.

60 Minutes continues to get a lot of clips.

They continue to do a great job.

CBS Sunday morning is really nice to see two squirrels who come back and ride a bear to go see some old lady in Alaska who feeds them hamburger helper.

I like that show.

But it's just so hilarious that we think CBS has any fucking meaning in this economy, in this society.

Anyways,

the question around AI, there's this notion of fragility or what makes a robust economy.

And essentially, it comes back to diversification.

So the fast food industry is a robust industry.

If McDonald's goes out of business, the biggest player, you're going to have no problem getting a lot of calories for a fairly low price.

It is a robust.

The banking industry in the United States is not robust.

If JP Morgan has some rogue trader in Singapore who figures out a way to bypass all compliance in their pursuit for returns, and Jamie Dimon calls Trump and says, oh, gosh, you're not going to believe this.

Some rogue 28-year-old has put us under and we need a bailout.

They're too big to fail at this point.

That means the U.S.

banking sector is probably not that robust.

Some people would argue it is looking at Silicon Valley Bank going out of business and the market was fine.

It was pretty resilient.

I would argue that it's probably

not that robust.

And what we have now is an economy that is looking increasingly fragile because you have 10 companies representing 40% of the SP by value.

The SP represents 50% of total market capitalization.

And I'm writing about it this week from my No Mercy, No Malice newsletter.

And I think the kind of how the end begins is the following.

And that is all of these circular deals, so NVIDIA invests $100 billion in OpenAI with the agreement they're going to take that $100 billion and invest it back in NVIDIA chips.

$100 billion in incremental business to NVIDIA

creates $55 billion in operating margin, that 55 points of operating margin or $55 billion in earnings times a PE of 50.

That's like a $1.25 trillion technical increase in notional valuation off of a $100 billion investment.

So AOL was pulling pulling this sleight of hand back in the late 90s, investing in e-commerce companies in exchange for them spending all that money on AOL such that they could continue to report growth that justified what was an exceptional artificially inflated valuation.

This is late stage 99 circular deals.

There's an amazing graph pulled together by Bloomberg showing that these deals have now become very, very popular.

So what happens here, the string or the rope that gets pulled is there's more reports from big companies saying the adoption layer, if you will, is not taking off the way we thought.

And that is companies have signed up for AI, made huge investments, but they're not seeing the ROI they had expected.

They announced a pullback in spending.

NVIDIA gets cut in half.

And effectively, if you have the Magnificent X get cut in half, the Magnificent X could get cut in half and they still wouldn't look cheap.

That would be a 20% decline in the value of the SP, a 10% decline in the total market cap of all stocks globally.

And then it would disproportionately, I don't want to say hurt because they're pretty resilient, but it would disproportionately affect the top 10% who are now responsible for 50% of consumer spending, which again, see above

fragile economy or anti-resilient.

And the thing about rich people is that when they make money, it's great because they can spend a lot more because they feel wealthy because of the effect of the stock market.

But the downside is that wealthy people can take their spending down 20, 30, 40%.

Middle-class homes can't take their spending down that much because they're spending money on essentials.

But if the wealthy all of a sudden feel less wealthy because the stock market, they wake up and the market is down 20% and some of the tech they're in is down 40%,

they can take their spending down 30, 40%,

which would immediately take us into a recession or a global recession.

So I think that we have what is becoming an increasingly concentrated economy, an increasingly fragile or anti-resilient economy.

And again, I come back to the statement, America has become become a gigantic bet on AI.

And it is fueling everything.

It's fueling the markets.

It's fueling cloud cover for Trump.

But I do believe, and I want to be clear, when guys like me are saying that we're on the precipice of the bubble popping, that usually means the market's going to go up another 20 or 30 percent in the next two years.

But I am, and I, this is not financial advice because it's a political show, but what I am actually doing with my own personal finances is I'm rotating out of U.S.

and tech stocks into European and Latin American stocks.

So you always want to be in the market.

market, you want to be in low-cost funds, but America, the largest economy in the world right now, I think it's accurate to say it's a bet on AI and the sustained crazy frothy market valuations.

I definitely think we could see a significant drawdown here that would have global implications.

Anyways, with that, let's take one more quick break.

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The world is changing faster than ever.

Now, with The Economist Insider, a new premium video offering, we're giving you unprecedented access to the debates shaping our world.

I have sat around that table at NATO.

There is an incoming missile attack now.

Could you answer the question?

I'm sorry, we've got very little time left.

With a few surprises along the way.

I can't promise we'll have a cocktail every time, but we'll try.

So, don't just be an economist reader.

Get on the inside track with the economist insider.

Go to economist.com to join the conversation.

Okay, welcome back.

Before we go, the No Kings protests are back and the GOP is already sounding the alarm.

Speaker Mike Johnson described the upcoming rallies as hate America and pro-Hamas.

Though organizers just dismissed this as fear-mongering, backed by labor unions and progressive groups, the movement says it's a peaceful protest against authoritarianism and a government shutdown.

Jess,

are you going to participate in the No Kings movement?

What do you think of these protests?

I think it's a very good thing, and I am thinking about going.

On Saturday, I was talking to one of the organizers about whether he thought that it would be peaceful, first of all, and then also good for kids.

You know, you do always see the cutest posters, right, with a little kid holding up, you know, a sign that's either funny or saying like, what about my rights?

Right.

Like, I'm going to be here for a long time.

You guys are aging out of the process, but we are the ones that are left behind with the messes that are created.

So I would put it above 50% odds that I will be there on Saturday in the main one in Manhattan.

scheduled already over 2,000 of these protests.

Something that is very different though from the first time this happened during the summer is that there will be a DC protest.

And remember how it was like the counter-programming to Trump's military parade.

So they didn't have a DC version.

That won't be the case.

And we do know how aggravated Trump gets when something is going on in his backyard.

So I'm sure that that will make an impact on him.

It seems like the administration is very scared about this, listening to Mike Johnson and Secretary Duffy was also talking about it, you know, already telling you like these are paid protesters or they're Antifa or, you know, whatever excuse they can come up with.

It's been long enough that we know that the people who show up at these town halls are not partisan plants.

And we know that people that are going to come out for no kings protests are real Americans that are concerned about the direction of the country and this authoritarian overreach.

I don't know how many millions.

It was estimated between four and six million participated over the summer.

We'll see where that kind of comes out.

I would imagine that it would be more and hopefully much more.

And I think to our ongoing conversation about not seeing as much outrage as you would expect, especially considering how mad people were about Jimmy Kimmel versus an American Army Ranger that's held in a cell for three days, that if we don't see a really massive turnout, that it portends something very bad for what's going to go on over the course of the next three years.

I'm not talking about violence.

I would never condone any sort of violence.

But if the American populace isn't moved to participate in their First Amendment right to peacefully protest and to make their voices heard, I think that we have an even bigger uphill battle than we thought.

And it will further embolden the administration to carry down the path that they're on.

As I've been talking, I psyched myself up.

I'm going.

I'll be at the No Kings protest on Saturday.

I don't know if I'll have any children with me or if I'll have a good sign.

Yeah,

it's just so hypocritical, oxymoronic, stupid to somehow justify sending national, sending troops into American cities, but somehow finding a way to disparage peaceful protests.

And these protests are just,

I mean, I can tell you there's going to be a lot of music, a lot of people handing out food.

I think these protests are going to be some of the safest places in America.

You're around a group of people who are, generally speaking, politically engaged, care about America, out with their kids, out with their loved ones.

They're just not in a mood to like, you know, commit violence.

Any violence here will be a confrontation that is inspired by, quite frankly, the administration.

I just don't.

And also, this is a semi-serious question.

I understand what the Heritage Foundation is.

We mentioned them.

I understand what Hamas is.

I understand what the IDF is.

I literally have no fucking idea what Antifa is.

Like, who is it?

Is there an office?

Is there a leadership?

Is it, it feels like a poltergeist or like a total snuffleuffagus meant to scare people?

Or

does Antifa even really exist as an organization?

So this is difficult.

This has been going on for years.

And he just has a box somewhere.

Like, if I wanted to write a letter to him, if we wanted to invite someone to the king of Antifa.

If we wanted to invite someone to interview them about Antifa, who would we even reach out to?

I don't know about their organizing office.

There are definitely people who are members or kind of associated with it, but it's such a broad thing.

You know, Antifa is just anti-fascist, and we know that there are a lot of reasons.

That's the Marines.

That's the United States Marines.

That's Antifa.

It's a bit of where the wind blows,

but Republicans have been hot and bothered about Antifa for years.

And

is this like the basement in that pizza place?

It just doesn't exist.

Yeah, where Hillary is slinging pizzas and holding children hostage.

Yeah.

She has been looking fabulous.

She does.

Someone's on the GLP one.

Someone's.

No.

Someone's single and ready to marry.

Don't do that.

Oh, my God.

She's so GLP-1ing, and I'm here for it.

She looks great.

I didn't really think that.

She looks great.

They just had their 50th wedding anniversary.

I know.

I saw this for you.

Single and ready to marry.

I know.

There is actually a very funny, I don't even know if it counts as a meme, but there's a side-by-side of her when she's young and Sidney Sweeney.

And they look a lot alike.

And it's driving the right crazy.

I am not going to even comment on that.

Okay.

You don't want to comment on that.

You comment on everything else.

It's dangerous territory even for me.

Okay.

Step aside.

Let's put Secretary Clinton in an American Eagle commercial and see what happens to the stock.

She has good genes.

She does.

Smart, impressive woman.

So you're not weird for not knowing what Antifa is.

And I'm someone who even has to follow this and really struggles to talk about it definitively.

But Donald Trump did just host a roundtable with journalists that cover Antifa and have had confrontations with them.

And it basically comes down to like anyone that they don't like at the moment.

And you see how it's thrown around, you know, Mike Johnson, it'll be Antifa, Secretary Duffy, it'll be Antifa, you know, Tyler Robinson, the guy who allegedly killed Charlie Kirk, Antifa.

So it's broad and unspecific and is used to scare people, which is the administration's absolute favorite thing.

And it takes the heat off the fact that there are actually very organized groups with ideologies that you can point to that are committing terrible acts of violence.

And we don't want to talk about those kinds of things.

We want to talk about rando leftists that don't like Elon Musk and Molotov cocktailed some Teslas

or are trying to, you know, get the ICE facility in Portland closed down.

So ask me what my favorite horror film is.

What's your favorite horror film?

Well, I'm glad you asked, Jess.

It's actually a toss-up.

Aliens, which is probably my favorite sci-fi and the best sequel ever made.

James Cameron took the reins elegantly and deftly from Ridley Scott of the original Alien.

But my favorite horror film ever is The Sixth Sense.

And

calls on all these emotions, being raised by a single mother.

I just think the thing is genius.

And it was supposed to, it's supposedly crowned the new Steven Spielberg, a guy named M.

Night Shimalian.

I see dead people.

And he went on to make a series of really mediocre films.

Signs was a good film, but he made a film called The Village.

And The Village is a story of these group of people who decide they want to sequester from society and live a more traditional family values life, and they swear off all medicine and modern technology.

And the way they keep anyone from wanting to leave, especially the young people, this little village or this area, is they create these monsters and they have, essentially they find out that the monsters are just, you know, villagers dressed up to scare the shit out of everyone and keep them in line.

And I feel like Antifa is the monsters in the village, and that is it's a total fake, illusory thing propped up.

I think the administration is literally hoping that Antifa shows up somewhere and does something mean or

non-patriotic or violent because they need something to scare people to keep them, to keep them thinking backward and to keep them in sort of a primitive society.

Or to say, you need me.

That's what they're hoping.

Like what happened with DC, frankly.

That's again.

Yeah.

Socialism is this notion of equality, liberalism, this notion that everyone should have the right to pursue liberty.

And the juice of fascism is trying to convince people that the enemy is within, that, oh, it's your neighbor who's a secret member of Antifa and likes Senator Warren, you know, that that's the threat.

Which is what he told the generals, right?

Get ready.

You've got to help us out with the enemy within.

There you go, which makes.

I texted you the picture of Hillary Clinton and Sidney Sweeney.

Can you look at it?

Oh, really?

Yeah, I just.

I'm going to have a lot of mixed emotions here.

I'm going to have a lot.

I'm pulling it up.

I don't know.

I don't want to make you uncomfortable and you are still on camera, but

I see it.

Yeah, look, look.

Secretary Clinton looks great.

Beautiful.

Yeah, she does.

She's beautiful.

All right.

I'm not sure how to respond to this.

We got to go anyway.

There you go.

All right.

That's all for this episode.

Thank you for listening to Raging Moderates.

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Jess, have a great rest of the week.

You too.

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