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Episode 451 - Trump guarantees 4 more years of ... podcasting

In Episode 451 of the Iron Fist and the Velvet Glove podcast, hosts Trevor and Scott, along with Joe, dissect Donald Trump's second election victory, its implications, and the broader political landscape. They explore themes from the book 'Democracy for Realists,' discuss potential future impacts on the US justice system, and forecast Trump's policies, including his choices for the Supreme Court and his relationship with international allies. The episode also delves into local Australian politics, critiquing the proposed social media age limit law and analyzing Murdoch media's influence on government decisions. The conversation rounds off with commentary on global events like the Amsterdam Pogrom and the ongoing debate over North Korean soldiers in Ukraine.

00:00 Introduction and Episode Kickoff

01:03 Discussing Trump's Second Victory

03:33 Election Analysis and Voter Behavior

09:36 Media Critique and Political Commentary

15:16 Democracy for Realists: Book Insights

17:57 Tribalism in Politics

26:34 Economic Policies and Tariffs

32:47 Gaza Conflict and Media Coverage

37:33 Predictions and Speculations

39:41 Trump's Court Preferences

39:56 Project 2025 and Civil Service Overhaul

41:15 Trump's Trade Policies and Elon Musk

42:17 Trump's Family and Military Contracts

42:52 Trump's Foreign Policy: Israel and Ukraine

43:21 Trump and Military Contractors

54:24 Trump's Supreme Court Appointments

58:37 Social Media Age Limit Controversy

01:04:44 Albanese's Political Challenges

01:10:27 Biden and Kamala Harris Speculations

01:14:38 Final Thoughts and Predictions

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Transcript
Morgan:

We need to talk about ideas, good ones and bad ones.

Morgan:

We need to learn stuff about the world.

Morgan:

We need an honest, intelligent, thought provoking and entertaining

Morgan:

review of what the hell happened on this planet in the last seven days.

Morgan:

We need to sit back and listen to the Iron Fist and the Velvet Glove.

Trevor:

Yes, we're back dear listener.

Trevor:

Episode 451, Iron Fist and the Velvet Glove podcast.

Trevor:

I'm Trevor, with me as always, Scott the Velvet Glove.

Trevor:

How are you, Scott?

Scott:

I'm okay, thanks.

Scott:

Trevor, and yourself?

Scott:

Pretty good.

Trevor:

And Joe, how are you?

Joe:

I am surviving.

Trevor:

Yes, Joe's had a rough day of medical tests.

Trevor:

Right.

Joe:

Had some good drugs though, so.

Trevor:

There we go.

Trevor:

There's always a silver lining.

Joe:

Yes.

Trevor:

Ah, I love being knocked out.

Trevor:

Actually, yes, it's fantastic.

Trevor:

But anyway, um, well, dear listener, our first episode

Trevor:

post the second Trump victory.

Trevor:

So we're going to talk about that.

Trevor:

That's on the agenda.

Trevor:

Our thoughts on the Trump victory.

Trevor:

What happened?

Trevor:

What it means?

Trevor:

Thoughts that we'll have, um, I'm going to talk about a book I read years

Trevor:

ago called Democracy for Realists.

Trevor:

It helps to explain the Trump phenomenon.

Trevor:

We're going to look at Kevin Rudd as our American ambassador.

Trevor:

Maybe make some predictions about Trump over the next four years.

Trevor:

J.

Trevor:

D.

Trevor:

Vance, a little bit on him.

Trevor:

And then once we're done with Trump, a little bit on Australia, where we've

Trevor:

got that social media age limit rule that Albanese and the opposition want

Trevor:

to pass, which is just the craziest rule I think I've heard in a long time, um.

Trevor:

The Amsterdam Pogrom, uh, we'll touch base on whether there's any North Koreans

Trevor:

in the Ukraine and gosh, if we get through all that, we'll be doing well.

Trevor:

So, um, look, I'll just kick off in that last, um, last time we, we were

Trevor:

speaking, I mentioned I was confident that we would make episode 500,

Trevor:

but I wasn't sure I'd get to 501.

Trevor:

I was kind of thinking maybe we'll be done and and I've had enough.

Trevor:

But after the Trump victory, I just know there is going to be so

Trevor:

much shit over the next four years.

Trevor:

It would be impossible not to hop on a microphone and just whinge about

Trevor:

it, Scott, and get it off my chest.

Scott:

That's assuming he actually does last the full four years.

Scott:

You know, he could end up dropping dead, or he could actually, you know, get

Scott:

himself in the White House and get his J.

Scott:

D.

Scott:

Vance to take over, and then after that, Vance can make all

Scott:

his criminal issues disappear.

Scott:

Either way,

Joe:

it's still gonna be stuff to talk about.

Trevor:

Yes.

Scott:

Oh yeah, of course.

Trevor:

Crazy stuff.

Trevor:

Based on what we already know of past performance, it'll be quite extraordinary.

Trevor:

Yeah, so, um, in the chat room they're asking if a brain scan was

Trevor:

done, Joe, and possibly failed to find anything is the mean suggestion.

Joe:

Not on the ultrasound.

Joe:

The MRI was all the way in the tunnel, so who knows?

Trevor:

Yeah, so, yeah.

Trevor:

Right, um, so, I watched Planet America, that was pretty good.

Trevor:

Um, seemed to be that from exit polling and and sort of going through the

Trevor:

entrails of it, people decided on the economy and on immigration as the key

Trevor:

factors and probably not abortion.

Trevor:

So that was something to come out of, sort of, the polling after the election?

Joe:

Yeah, I mean a number of states had standalone abortion changes on their,

Joe:

um, polls and I wonder whether they felt if they codified state abortion law in

Joe:

their constitution, whether then they were safe to elect a Christian nationalist.

Trevor:

Exactly right.

Trevor:

Putting that on the ballot paper probably worked very much in Trump's

Trevor:

favour because the people who were, who were wanting to maintain the

Trevor:

right to abortion could, could vote on the state ballot question and have

Trevor:

that, that abortion right secured.

Trevor:

And then feel free to vote for double Donald Trump on other issues, um,

Trevor:

having secured it at the state level.

Trevor:

So, I think, uh,

Joe:

yeah, I think that would be Although interestingly enough, um, uh, Florida

Joe:

voted against, uh, legalising abortion and voted against legalising marijuana.

Trevor:

Well, all those boomers Yeah.

Trevor:

They're not going to fall pregnant and they drink alcohol rather than smoke dope.

Trevor:

Well, there is that.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

I think that would explain it.

Trevor:

Uh, the other interesting sort of one to come out of it was that, um, legal

Trevor:

Latinos, sort of documented Latinos, were quite willing to vote on immigration

Trevor:

lines and pull up the ladder and prevent fellow illegal Latinos from entering.

Trevor:

Seem to be a

Joe:

strong feature of this.

Joe:

And also now, um, one of Trump's supposed administration is saying We're document,

Joe:

we're turbocharging, what was it, un naturalizing, denaturalizing people.

Joe:

So anybody, anybody who's naturalized, so who's come over in the past and

Joe:

now is an American citizen, they want to get rid of their naturalization.

Trevor:

They're going to revoke their documents.

Trevor:

Right, right.

Trevor:

Is this the leopard, face eating leopard story again, Joe?

Trevor:

Yeah, yeah,

Joe:

yeah, absolutely.

Joe:

There's a Face eating leopards, Reddit is going wild with

Joe:

various, um, uh, lots of people.

Joe:

Which is essentially,

Trevor:

I voted for the face eating leopard party and I never thought

Trevor:

that the leopards would eat my face.

Trevor:

And there's going to be all these Latinos going, I voted for the Latino

Trevor:

haters, I never thought they'd hate

Joe:

Latinos.

Joe:

Well, exactly.

Joe:

And again, um, there was one Latino Trump voter who was complaining

Joe:

that the other Trump voters in his street wouldn't play with his kids.

Joe:

Barred their kids from playing with his kids.

Joe:

Uh, there was the black Trump voter, who was then getting hassled by the

Joe:

white Trump supporters, going, you'll never be one of us, you're a black.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

Uh, there was the trans, um, Caitlyn Jenner, isn't it?

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

Who, who congratulated Trump and then was piled on by the MAGAs

Joe:

as, you're not a real woman.

Joe:

Yeah, how dare you, you trans weirdo.

Trevor:

Right.

Trevor:

Right.

Trevor:

And you're not even a real trans if you're supporting Donald Trump there.

Trevor:

Well,

Joe:

yes, exactly.

Joe:

So this seems, but, um, there's also the whole, uh, what do you mean tariffs?

Trevor:

Yes.

Joe:

You mean tariffs are going to affect my low, low paid manufacturing job.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

Um, yeah, I think there's been a lot of people who just went in and voted and

Joe:

are now being told that possibly they might have voted for the wrong person.

Trevor:

Is this true though?

Trevor:

Are there really people like this who are now going, oh, what, are they

Trevor:

starting to pay attention to policy?

Scott:

I think there are some stupid people out there about tariffs.

Joe:

Um, again, the whole Brexit vote.

Joe:

Very much, there were people after the fact going, I did it as a protest,

Joe:

I didn't really think we'd get 50%.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Joe:

It wouldn't surprise me.

Joe:

I don't think

Trevor:

people, I don't think, I don't think people voted for Trump

Trevor:

as a protest, and thinking that he wasn't going to win though, that was

Joe:

No, no, I think, I think they just, um, from what I'm hearing, a lot

Joe:

of people bought into the rhetoric.

Trevor:

Mm.

Joe:

Uh, that Trump was going to give them money, you know, Trump was going to

Joe:

stop tax on tips and stop tax on overtime.

Trevor:

And

Joe:

of course he's going to stop tax on overtime because

Joe:

he's going to ban overtime.

Trevor:

Yeah, yes, yeah.

Trevor:

Look, I've got an all encompassing solution to all this coming up.

Trevor:

But before we get there, let's just do it the standard way

Trevor:

that everyone else is doing it.

Trevor:

Um, uh, Harris didn't have any policies, except that she's not Donald

Trevor:

Trump and, uh, she was selling joy.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Joe:

But she did have policies.

Trevor:

She

Joe:

articulated her policies.

Trevor:

What were they?

Joe:

They were out there.

Joe:

People could look at them.

Trevor:

Yeah, well she didn't sell them very well.

Trevor:

Whatever they might have been.

Trevor:

It was pretty much more of the same.

Trevor:

And, I'll protect abortion.

Trevor:

And, and I'm selling jewelry.

Trevor:

You'll have the wonder of having a black, a coloured female president.

Trevor:

Won't that be joyful?

Joe:

Well, I think it was more workers protection.

Trevor:

Mmm.

Joe:

Um, yeah.

Joe:

I didn't pay attention to the politics because I wasn't voting, so I didn't care.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

Um, what else have we got here?

Trevor:

Um, um, ah, the ABC locally here.

Trevor:

Reporting was horrendous whenever I switched over to the ABC.

Trevor:

You know, they get these commentators saying that, um, the USA has

Trevor:

the best economy in the world.

Trevor:

And it's like, okay, in the last 12 months it's economy might have been

Trevor:

performing better than most of the Western countries, but there's a shitload of

Trevor:

other countries whose growth and other measures are way better than the USA.

Trevor:

It's just this Western centric commentary, um, an ABC reporter claiming that Biden

Trevor:

had been conciliatory towards China,

Trevor:

um, and then Well, well, but he hasn't been conciliatory towards China.

Trevor:

Um, he's, you know, levied Special Chips Act and whatnot against them.

Trevor:

Um, what else did he do?

Trevor:

Oh, and we had a reporter in a bar in Taiwan.

Trevor:

Musing over the local reaction in Taiwan to the US election.

Trevor:

It's like, for God's sake, ABC, you've got to do better than that.

Trevor:

And then they had a

Joe:

interview I think they should have had a reporter in Gaza.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

Musing over the reaction.

Trevor:

That would have been better.

Trevor:

And then they had interviewed an employee of Joe Hockey's lobbying firm.

Trevor:

Um, who of course turned out to be quite pro Trump.

Trevor:

in their positive outlook.

Trevor:

So, um, Shocked.

Trevor:

That just annoyed the heck of me.

Trevor:

Um, I'm up for a new law, I think, when it comes to interviews and opinion pieces.

Trevor:

That they've got to start with a disclosure of any conflicts of interest.

Trevor:

Otherwise, both the publisher and the interviewee are liable

Trevor:

for some penalty or something.

Trevor:

Like, I am just sick of, of these think tank operatives being invited

Trevor:

onto the ABC and other places.

Trevor:

Mouthing off with their opinions, and nobody at any point says, Well

Trevor:

of course it's in your financial interest what you're saying.

Trevor:

And of course you would say that, because you work for a company that sells weapons.

Trevor:

So, you would accentuate that there's going to be a war with China and

Trevor:

therefore weapons need to be built up.

Trevor:

Like,

Trevor:

I think I've reached the point where I'd like to see that

Trevor:

in an Iron Fist dictatorship.

Trevor:

Thank you.

Trevor:

Not everyone would agree with me, I know, but I'm so shitty with it, so.

Trevor:

Chip in, Scott, if you want to say anything as I, as I meander

Trevor:

my way through these things.

Scott:

No, it's fine.

Trevor:

Bernie Sanders said it should come as no great surprise that a

Trevor:

Democratic Party which has abandoned working class people would find that

Trevor:

the working class has abandoned them.

Trevor:

So.

Joe:

I have to say they could have avoided all this back in 2016.

Joe:

The Democrats, Having had Bernie as the person chosen in the

Joe:

primaries, then pulling him out and sticking Clinton in instead, I

Joe:

think was a large cause of Trump.

Joe:

I think a lot of disaffected voters would happily have voted for Bernie.

Joe:

And I think a lot of this wouldn't have gone the way.

Joe:

But they were worried, the bankers were worried, weren't they?

Joe:

The bankers were worried that Bernie was going to be slightly

Joe:

more left than they wanted.

Trevor:

Oh yeah, so the powerful groups in the Democratic Party didn't

Trevor:

want Bernie and, um, he was quickly shuffled off in favour of Bernie.

Trevor:

What

Scott:

did Bernie actually do?

Scott:

All he wanted was a healthcare system like we've got here in Australia.

Scott:

That's all.

Scott:

He also wanted to improve the rights of workers and that type of thing.

Scott:

Probably bring them up to Australian standards more so than their standards.

Scott:

I don't think Australia is a socialist country.

Scott:

And Bernie Sanders was pilloried because he referred to himself

Scott:

as a democratic socialist.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

He was trying to bring the U.

Joe:

S.

Joe:

into line with the rest of the Western world.

Joe:

Yeah.

Joe:

In terms of worker protection and poor people protection.

Scott:

Exactly.

Scott:

I didn't think there was anything offensive about what Bernie

Scott:

Sanders was actually trying to do.

Joe:

It meant that rich companies would be paying more tax, and

Joe:

that's what was offensive.

Trevor:

And they make up, the rich donors make up a huge proportion of the Not

Trevor:

only the donors, but just the power and influence in these political parties.

Trevor:

So

Joe:

I just re watched, um, Inequality for All, the Robert Reich documentary.

Joe:

Yep.

Joe:

Talking about, um, what was the Citizens United Act, or Citizens United ruling?

Joe:

And, um, just basically how lobbying and money have just

Joe:

infected, um, politics in the US.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Joe:

And, and how basically because of that, the, the rules, he, he's saying

Joe:

there is no such thing as a free market.

Joe:

The free market is always constrained by laws.

Joe:

The question is, who are those laws working in favor of?

Joe:

Are they working in favor of business, big business, or are they

Joe:

working in favor of the common man?

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

I mean, we see it in our own defence policies here.

Trevor:

Labor, opposition, totally infested with right wing, pro war, weapons

Trevor:

manufacturing, lobbying types.

Trevor:

Um, that's why we're in the position we're in.

Trevor:

So, um, I've got a bit of an explanation here.

Trevor:

Years ago, on this very podcast, I would have mentioned a book

Trevor:

called Democracy for Realists.

Trevor:

Why elections do not produce responsible government.

Trevor:

And I'm just going to run through a few of the main ideas from this book

Trevor:

as a sort of an explanation of of what went on, not only in this election, but

Trevor:

all elections, is what they're saying.

Trevor:

And they come to these conclusions based on a lot of studies of people,

Trevor:

a lot of in depth, um, studies.

Trevor:

So, well, in my own words, we can dissect demographics in these elections, like

Trevor:

age, race, education, income, religion, ethnicity, gender, et cetera, which of

Trevor:

these demographics voted for who and Um, at election time, according to the, this

Trevor:

book, voters choose a party validating their social and political identity,

Trevor:

then rationalise their decisions with appropriate party supplied reasons.

Trevor:

It's very tribal.

Trevor:

Political campaigns consist in a large part of reminding voters

Trevor:

of their partisan identities.

Trevor:

They say evidence demonstrates that the great majority of citizens

Trevor:

pay little attention to politics.

Trevor:

It's very tribal.

Trevor:

At election time, they are swayed by how they feel about the nature of the

Trevor:

times, especially the current state of the economy, and by political loyalties

Trevor:

typically acquired in childhood.

Trevor:

Those loyalties, not the facts of political life and government

Trevor:

policy, are the primary drivers of political behaviour.

Trevor:

Even the most informed voters typically make choices not on the basis of policy

Trevor:

preferences or ideology, but on the basis of who they are, their social identities.

Trevor:

The political belief systems of ordinary citizens are generally thin,

Trevor:

disorganised and ideologically incoherent.

Trevor:

And why does this happen?

Trevor:

Well, people are naturally group oriented.

Trevor:

Human thought is deeply conditioned by culture, including group subcultures.

Trevor:

And people take their views from the groups to which they belong.

Trevor:

Often because the people around them make it difficult not to do so.

Trevor:

So the power of groups to shape thinking, um, have been reinforced

Trevor:

by the results of multiple studies.

Trevor:

So, so, people identify with a tribe and then, What does my tribe believe

Trevor:

in, or do, and just accept that holus bolus and, and just justify

Trevor:

everything with the thought bubbles that the tribe provides for you?

Joe:

There was an interesting You Are Not So Smart episode talking about masking.

Joe:

Right.

Joe:

And how masking was nothing to do with the evidence, nothing to do with the science.

Joe:

It has everything to do with what my tribe believes or what the other tribe believes.

Joe:

And, um, the same guy has done a book called How Minds Change.

Joe:

And it's very much the cost, the social cost, of going against

Joe:

what your tribe believes.

Joe:

And in historical times, to be excluded from the tribe was death.

Joe:

And so we actually would prefer to die than to exclude ourselves from the tribe.

Trevor:

Yes.

Trevor:

Yep, we're highly conditioned to, to massage our thoughts to be in line

Trevor:

with the prevailing group think.

Trevor:

And um, well, one of the studies that was in this book, researchers asked

Trevor:

a group of previously unacquainted male undergraduates to judge which

Trevor:

of three line segments was closest in length to a fourth reference line.

Trevor:

Left to themselves, more than 99 percent of students gave the correct answer.

Trevor:

But in groups, the outcome was quite different.

Trevor:

Unbeknownst to the experimental subjects, um, the other group members

Trevor:

were confederates of the experimenter.

Trevor:

The confederates were seated in such a way that they spoke first, leaving the

Trevor:

remaining student, the innocent, unknowing one, to either give the correct answer, in

Trevor:

defiance of everyone else, or to go along.

Trevor:

A large majority of the experimental subjects conformed on what they said.

Trevor:

At least some of the trials, some conformed all of the time.

Trevor:

In debriefing afterwards, the conformists ranged from those who knew that their

Trevor:

answers were wrong but thought they should go along with what everyone

Trevor:

else was saying, or those who thought that their eyes must be deceiving them,

Trevor:

and so adopted the group's perception.

Trevor:

So, uh, Um, all sorts of experiments done along those lines, where

Trevor:

people comply with groupthink.

Trevor:

And I just think that, um, the sort of, um,

Trevor:

um, I can hear you tapping away, Scott.

Trevor:

The, um, this all reminds me of Howard's Battlers.

Trevor:

I just think Trump has captured what was Howard's Battlers in Australia.

Trevor:

And you've just got these people who consider themselves as,

Trevor:

um, well, what have I got here?

Trevor:

Somewhere, um, sort of, um,

Trevor:

government hating, freedom loving, hard working, aspirational,

Trevor:

aggressively pro American.

Trevor:

Um, very, very similar to the ideal of the Howard Battlers.

Trevor:

And He was basically able to say to that group of people, Do you

Trevor:

identify as an American battler?

Trevor:

Well, I'm the man for you.

Trevor:

If you're a battler, this is your party.

Trevor:

And don't worry so much about the fine detail of the policies.

Trevor:

Don't you worry about that.

Trevor:

You're a battler and I'm for you.

Joe:

It's interesting.

Joe:

They, um, asked a bunch of Trump voters.

Joe:

Uh, about, uh, democratic policies, without saying who they were.

Joe:

They were saying, you know, do you believe that, uh, I don't know, corporations

Joe:

should pay more tax, or should pay a larger, more tax income, or the same

Joe:

amount of tax as you pay in your tax bill.

Joe:

Oh, absolutely.

Joe:

And asked them a whole series of questions without saying whose they were.

Joe:

And at the end of their said, you do realize that those are all.

Joe:

Democratic policies.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

Oh, oh no.

Joe:

And, and it was very much, I don't know if you've also seen the, um, the

Joe:

Obamacare versus the Affordable Care Act?

Trevor:

No.

Joe:

Okay, so the Affordable Care Act, which did a basic, horrible,

Joe:

uh, it was a Republican idea, and it was all that Obama could get past.

Joe:

Which basically said that all insurance companies had to provide a

Joe:

minimum level of insurance, even for people with pre existing conditions.

Joe:

And everyone would be covered by it.

Joe:

And, um, the Republicans, because even though it was a Republican idea

Joe:

originally, couldn't possibly let it lie.

Joe:

They called it Obamacare.

Joe:

And there are a number of Americans who are using this Affordable Care

Joe:

Act to get health insurance they wouldn't otherwise be able to get.

Trevor:

Who

Joe:

wants to repeal Obamacare but they're very fond of ACA.

Joe:

So they don't know that it's the same thing and that it's what they're

Joe:

relying on for their health insurance.

Joe:

One has the word Obama in it and therefore it's bad.

Trevor:

Yep, because that's what their tribe has said, and

Trevor:

that's the sort of argument that they are given, and, yeah, so.

Scott:

That reminds me of, there was a talk about that ages ago, you

Scott:

were talking about that, Trevor, there was a protester who was out

Scott:

there protesting against Obamacare.

Scott:

And it was pointed out to her that, uh, this is exactly what you're on.

Scott:

She said, no, I'm on the Affordable Care Act.

Trevor:

Right.

Scott:

Yeah.

Scott:

You know.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

So, I, I think that tribalism and the failure to then really address the actual

Trevor:

policies because who's got time and, um, and, and then innately, we just, if you

Trevor:

lived in small town America, if you'd have grown up in small town America,

Trevor:

you've got a business, you've the local car workshop, or a farm, or something,

Trevor:

you're embedded in that community.

Trevor:

If you don't conform to that community, you're making life hell for you.

Trevor:

As a human being, you are going to be wanting to, um, fall in line

Trevor:

with the culture that surrounds you.

Joe:

Yeah.

Joe:

Maybe instead of a vote for a politician, we should have, like, the vote compass.

Joe:

Where you go, how do you feel on this?

Joe:

You know, do you support more this policy, that policy?

Joe:

Make it a selection of 20 policies and at the end of that, it

Joe:

automatically selects the candidate who is most close to those beliefs.

Trevor:

It would just get contaminated with the tribes telling their tribe

Trevor:

members what their answers should be.

Joe:

Possibly.

Trevor:

The tribe would say, here's our tribal response to these.

Trevor:

And that's what you should do.

Trevor:

Because people would go, I can't be bothered reading that, I don't

Trevor:

understand it, what's my tribe say?

Trevor:

That's what we do with referendums, isn't it?

Trevor:

So, it's a sort of a policy question, but invariably it becomes tribal, doesn't it?

Trevor:

Yeah, so, yeah.

Trevor:

Ah, there we go.

Trevor:

Um, you know, you do hear.

Trevor:

from different people, I think Jonathan Pye sort of said this and others say it,

Trevor:

that, that, um, voters are struggling financially and vote for Trump as a

Trevor:

protest vote for their dire circumstances.

Trevor:

Um, I don't think so.

Trevor:

I, these people believe Trump will fix things.

Trevor:

I've never seen anyone in these street interviews say, Look, I

Trevor:

know he's a liar and a conman and won't do what he says, but I'm

Trevor:

voting for him anyway as a protest.

Trevor:

These people are the most credulous people on earth.

Trevor:

They actually think that he's going to do something about these things.

Joe:

But there's also, um,

Joe:

he's going to hurt people.

Joe:

And I don't care if it hurts me slightly, as long as it

Joe:

hurts the people I hate more.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

So, in that way, it's not a protest vote per se, but it's, I don't like

Joe:

these immigrants, so he's going to, he's going to hurt these immigrants,

Joe:

and if I have to pay a bit of tax for that to happen, well, I'm all for that.

Joe:

Mmm.

Scott:

Yeah, but you know, it's just, everything I've read When they've

Scott:

actually started to put everything that he's actually proposing under a

Scott:

microscope, they're going to have to round up between 11 and 15 million

Scott:

undocumented aliens in the United States.

Scott:

Now, their entire prison population is only 1.

Scott:

5 million people.

Joe:

Have you seen how much the private prison stock index has gone up?

Scott:

Yeah, it doesn't surprise me.

Scott:

It has gone through the roof because they're going to have to build new

Scott:

prisons, and because he wants it done quickly, they're going to have to put up

Scott:

barbed wire and everything, they're going to have to put up razor wire around tents,

Scott:

and they're going to have to lock people in there for a very quick turnaround.

Scott:

Now, what's that going to do?

Scott:

What's that going to do is it's going to drive the price of wages up so that the

Scott:

Average American will get off his ass and go and do these jobs, which is going to

Scott:

drive up the price of food, it's going to make food more expensive, it's going

Scott:

to make um, clothing more expensive, it's going to make um, anything to do

Scott:

with hospitality more expensive, because these are the, those are the industries.

Scott:

That most of the undocumented aliens work in.

Joe:

But they're willing to pay it because it's going to

Joe:

hurt the brown skinned people.

Trevor:

Well,

Trevor:

yeah, what was I going to say about tariffs?

Trevor:

You know, the other thing, like, tariffs can be a good thing.

Trevor:

If you were then going to have a, um, a policy of reinvigorating

Trevor:

your local production industry.

Trevor:

So if you're using the tariffs to protect local industry while it got up and

Trevor:

running, Then, you know, tariffs can be a good idea, but there's no talk of using

Trevor:

the breathing space offered by tariffs to reinvigorate American manufacturing.

Trevor:

It's just not going to happen.

Trevor:

No.

Trevor:

So

Joe:

Yeah, I mean, all this talk of on shoring jobs, on shoring jobs is never

Joe:

going to, certainly the manufacturing jobs that were there in the 50s and 60s

Joe:

have moved offshore because it's cheaper.

Joe:

Yeah.

Joe:

And they never come back.

Trevor:

The skill base has been lost.

Trevor:

It's like Australia saying, let's start a car manufacturing industry again.

Trevor:

Like, so much has been lost, it would be, it could be done, but

Trevor:

the commitment required to But

Joe:

it's also the same with digging up coal, you know, we need to move away from

Joe:

coal, we need to retrain these people, we need to find viable industries in the

Joe:

regions that is going to replace coal.

Joe:

And just saying we need to ban coal isn't going to work, because otherwise you're

Joe:

just going to have a huge disaffected workforce who are voting against you.

Trevor:

Yep, the Howard Battlers,

Joe:

yep, yeah,

Trevor:

yeah, um, look Do you remember when Donald Trump once

Trevor:

said he could shoot someone on Fifth Avenue and still get elected?

Trevor:

Hmm.

Trevor:

Turns out that was a modest claim.

Trevor:

Yes.

Trevor:

Because presidential candidates can promise to continue a

Trevor:

genocide and still get elected.

Trevor:

That's what's happened in this election.

Trevor:

Both sides are essentially saying we're going to support Israel, we're going to

Trevor:

keep selling the weapons, They're just as responsible as the Israelis, cause

Trevor:

they're providing the bulk of the weapons.

Trevor:

They could stop it tomorrow.

Joe:

The Arab Americans really showed it to Kamala for supporting the genocide.

Joe:

Because obviously, um, Gaza is going to do so much better under a Trump

Joe:

government than they will under Kamala.

Trevor:

Yeah,

Joe:

that's

Trevor:

right.

Trevor:

There was no choice.

Trevor:

Both, both parties.

Trevor:

Except for the Greens.

Trevor:

The Greens actually did quite well in a Muslim district.

Trevor:

Yes,

Joe:

um, so, so the Greens who were sponsored by Putin, uh, What

Joe:

do you mean they were sponsored?

Joe:

The Greens were sponsored by Putin, what's that story?

Joe:

Jill Stein basically was at a Russia Today dinner celebrating 10 years of RT.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Joe:

And, um, She basically turns up every four years.

Joe:

In the meantime she does nothing, she doesn't support any of the

Joe:

local Greens groups, none of the local, all she does is put her name

Joe:

on the ballot every four years.

Joe:

The only reason can be seen is to take votes away from one of the candidates.

Joe:

There's a lot of criticism.

Joe:

It could be

Trevor:

that she's lazy in between elections.

Trevor:

But she's not offering an alternative.

Trevor:

No, she's not offering

Joe:

an alternative.

Trevor:

Well, she did it on Gaza.

Trevor:

Well, yeah.

Trevor:

And I'm pretty sure, I thought they were offering a few different, a

Trevor:

bunch of different policies that sounded reasonable to me at the time.

Trevor:

Typical sort of green stuff in terms of tax and wealth taxes and stuff like that.

Joe:

Yeah, I, there is certainly a lot of feeling that.

Joe:

She's just there as a spoiler vote and is doing quite nicely out of it.

Joe:

She, she's making in money for each, uh, presidential election and then sits back

Joe:

and coasts on the money in the meantime.

Trevor:

Ah, there you go.

Trevor:

Is the

Joe:

allegation.

Trevor:

From bitter Democrats who don't want her spoiling the two party system?

Joe:

Probably, but even from Greens people who say, we don't see her, we

Joe:

don't see any form of cross routes.

Joe:

Right.

Joe:

In the meantime, she just turns up for a presidential election

Joe:

and then pisses off again.

Trevor:

But wouldn't that be up to the Greens then to bring

Trevor:

about some other candidate?

Trevor:

I'd

Joe:

hope so.

Joe:

I don't know how it works.

Trevor:

Yeah, except that Russia's sponsoring her.

Trevor:

You know that much.

Joe:

Uh, yeah.

Joe:

I mean, she seems to be very ply with RT and Right.

Joe:

I was on rt.

Joe:

I'm not sponsored by the Russians.

Joe:

Uh, I'm asking questions.

Joe:

The commentators mother

Scott:

surprised me.

Scott:

The

Trevor:

commentators thought I was Jewish because of my nose.

Trevor:

Right.

Trevor:

They were like, look at him.

Trevor:

He must be Jewish.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

That was all to do with that, uh, tempo Satan stuff.

Trevor:

Yes.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

Okay, well that's um, you know, I think I would have been tempted

Trevor:

to vote for the Greens if I was in America, this last vote.

Trevor:

I just, the genocide in Gaza, I just, every day am watching poor,

Trevor:

poor parents crying over the bodies of their deceased children.

Trevor:

And children crying over their siblings and their parents and lost kids wandering

Trevor:

the streets and it just breaks my heart.

Trevor:

I can't, I can believe it.

Trevor:

It's the crime of this propaganda that these images are not plastered on

Trevor:

mainstream media every day where people could just for a moment empathise and

Trevor:

put themselves in the place of the.

Trevor:

Palestinians and think just how horrible it would be.

Trevor:

So, um,

Joe:

Yes, but people get tired.

Trevor:

Yeah, I know, but they wouldn't if the media actually

Joe:

did its job.

Trevor:

What's that?

Joe:

They'd just stop watching.

Trevor:

They wouldn't.

Trevor:

They would be outraged and continue to watch.

Trevor:

They would not look at these images and go, Oh, not another crying, crying kid.

Trevor:

Properly shown, people would just get more and more outraged and, and want

Trevor:

to see more and more of it, I think.

Trevor:

Even as hard as it is.

Trevor:

It's

Scott:

just,

Trevor:

um

Scott:

I think you're looking at the world through rose

Scott:

coloured glasses there, Trevor.

Scott:

I think that people would actually be turned off and they wouldn't

Scott:

bother watching it any longer.

Joe:

I, I would say the, the groundswell of opinion, uh, supports Ukraine.

Joe:

And I think the, the media is not covering Ukraine these days.

Joe:

Because people are bored.

Joe:

People are tired.

Trevor:

But, you know, there's a limited amount you can actually show of Ukraine.

Joe:

Yeah.

Trevor:

But, but in terms of footage in Gaza, there's just

Trevor:

hours and hours of it that people could see and be just outraged by.

Trevor:

And I just, uh, if it was presented as it should be, I

Trevor:

don't think people would go, Oh.

Trevor:

Another atrocity.

Scott:

Come on,

Trevor:

move on.

Trevor:

I'm waiting for the footy result.

Scott:

I think you, I think that's probably what a lot

Scott:

of people would be saying.

Scott:

They'd be outraged for a couple of weeks, but then after that they'd get bored.

Trevor:

Well, I wish somebody would test it.

Joe:

Human nature, I'm afraid.

Trevor:

Well.

Trevor:

Particularly

Joe:

as it's so far away and, uh Those

Trevor:

brown people whose lives don't matter.

Joe:

Exactly.

Trevor:

Meanwhile, what about those poor Israeli football supporters who've

Trevor:

been beaten up by some Dutch football supporters, and isn't it terrible that

Trevor:

there's a pogrom in Amsterdam, and let's spend, you know, heaps of time showing

Trevor:

that, rather than some other things.

Joe:

Right, but I think that that's a five minute, that's an interesting,

Joe:

this is an outlier, this is normal, it'll get attention for five

Joe:

minutes and then it'll go away.

Joe:

If it was happening on an ongoing basis, I'm sure people would

Joe:

go, oh not more of this shit.

Trevor:

Lord Don, essential Lord Don in the chat says, there's a thing

Trevor:

called grief and disaster fatigue.

Trevor:

People get to the point where they can't feel any worse.

Trevor:

Well, when there's a flood or a hurricane, we get wall to wall

Trevor:

coverage for a few weeks at least.

Joe:

Yeah.

Trevor:

And you know, the hurricane's gone and the cleanup starts.

Trevor:

It's just a continual hurricane.

Trevor:

Look, I think there's more to it than just fear of boredom of people

Trevor:

not watching the shows anymore.

Trevor:

It's, it's, they don't want to show it.

Joe:

I'm sure there's political, yes.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

Um, Kevin Rudd, the American ambassador, had to delete one of his, well, the

Trevor:

Australia's ambassador to the US.

Trevor:

Yes.

Trevor:

Had to delete one of his old, um, tweets, which was this, um, by Kevin

Trevor:

Rudd, with a picture of Donald Trump.

Trevor:

The most destructive president in history.

Trevor:

He drags America and democracy through the mud.

Trevor:

He thrives on fermenting, not healing, division.

Trevor:

He abuses Christianity, church and Bible to justify violence.

Trevor:

All aided and abetted by Murdoch's Fox News network in America, which feeds this.

Trevor:

And, uh, apparently on election night he quickly deleted it.

Trevor:

Uh, yeah.

Trevor:

Anyway.

Trevor:

Predictions.

Trevor:

Gentlemen, I've got a few.

Trevor:

Number one.

Trevor:

Trump really hated being in court so often.

Joe:

Yep.

Trevor:

Lookout justice system.

Joe:

There is an argument.

Joe:

So, New York put off sentencing until after the election.

Joe:

Hmm.

Joe:

There is a possibility that New York will jail Trump for his 34

Joe:

crimes that he's been convicted of.

Trevor:

Hmm.

Joe:

He could be the first US president to serve his presidency whilst in jail.

Trevor:

That will not happen.

Trevor:

He will refuse to submit to any authority that attempts to

Trevor:

handcuff him and drag him off.

Trevor:

And he will surround himself with secret service agents

Scott:

who will

Trevor:

fight off anyone who tries.

Scott:

This is a state government that would actually be imposing a

Scott:

state government sentence on him.

Scott:

The End.

Scott:

He's not got the breadth of, uh, Secret Service agents around him just right now.

Scott:

So, yeah.

Scott:

Oh, I

Trevor:

see.

Trevor:

This will be before his, um.

Trevor:

Before he's inaugurated.

Trevor:

Ah, okay.

Trevor:

But,

Trevor:

yeah.

Scott:

See, it's like the It's still not gonna happen.

Scott:

It's like the Georgia thing, because that's a state, that's also a

Scott:

state government prosecution too, that he can't do anything about.

Joe:

And he, he can't even, um, give himself clemency.

Trevor:

He will lock himself in Mar a Lago and tell his supporters to gather

Trevor:

round and create a human cordon, um, shielding him from anybody coming in.

Trevor:

There's just no way he is going to submit to that.

Trevor:

Yeah,

Scott:

but then he won't be able to get inaugurated, which will be over.

Trevor:

He'll hold out until his inauguration and then the Secret

Trevor:

Service arrives and he flies out in a helicopter straight to the White House.

Trevor:

There's just no way he is going to submit himself.

Trevor:

He hates being in court.

Trevor:

He's, look, whatever happens There's going to be massive

Trevor:

abuses of the justice system.

Trevor:

He

Joe:

loves being in court when he's suing somebody.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

He hates being a defendant in court.

Trevor:

Yes, correct.

Trevor:

In particularly a criminal court.

Trevor:

Yes.

Trevor:

More the case.

Trevor:

Yeah, true.

Trevor:

So Project 2025 means tens of thousands of public servants will

Trevor:

be replaced with political So

Joe:

Project 2025, we don't know if it'll happen.

Joe:

Schedule F happened last time, he will be re implementing it.

Joe:

And that is the sacking of civil servants.

Trevor:

And just putting in place his own appointees.

Trevor:

So, who will do all sorts of administrative

Trevor:

shenanigans to favour Trump.

Trevor:

Now,

Joe:

the question is how effective they will be at general

Joe:

day to day running of things.

Joe:

Because if you stick in a bunch of people who have no idea how government works

Joe:

into a government, it could well be that all sorts of things fall apart because

Joe:

of that, but you can guarantee that his, uh, his ideas will get priority.

Trevor:

That will just prove to everybody that, um, governments are a waste of

Trevor:

money and should be done away with.

Joe:

Probably.

Trevor:

That's all part of the, the tribal.

Trevor:

Um, identity that voted him in, anti government, big business, or pro business,

Trevor:

anti government, anti regulation.

Joe:

Yes.

Trevor:

These people can't run these regulations, let's just

Trevor:

get rid of the regulations.

Trevor:

So, look out for that, um, he hates China, he really hates China, so tariffs

Trevor:

are coming in one way or another.

Trevor:

How long they survive, or?

Trevor:

Well,

Joe:

Elmo has said, please don't implement them.

Joe:

Straight away, build them up slowly so that he can build up

Joe:

his stock and get ready for it.

Joe:

Who, who said that?

Joe:

Elmo.

Trevor:

Elmo?

Joe:

Yes.

Trevor:

Who's Elmo?

Joe:

Elon.

Trevor:

Oh, Elon.

Joe:

Yes.

Trevor:

Okay.

Trevor:

Don't do it straight away until he's got his ducks in a row.

Joe:

Basically until he's built up his stock and he's, he's got everything

Joe:

ready for all these increased tariffs because obviously he imports parts.

Joe:

Right.

Joe:

So he wants to make sure that he's ready for the increased price of the parts that

Joe:

he wants to build his EVs in America.

Joe:

Yeah.

Joe:

Except he doesn't build them in America, does he?

Scott:

He builds them in China, doesn't he?

Scott:

Most of it

Trevor:

in China.

Trevor:

There's various places.

Trevor:

A little bit in America.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

Obviously Trump loves money for himself.

Trevor:

There is going to be more graft and lucrative contracts

Trevor:

for himself and his family.

Trevor:

I say, expect his family to cash in on consulting to military contractors.

Trevor:

So,

Joe:

in the past I expect to be courted for his name to be on

Joe:

various schemes around the world.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

And, and for, um, visiting important members of foreign governments to stay

Joe:

at his, uh, his hotels in Washington.

Trevor:

But, you know, something, you know, the word seems to be, of

Trevor:

course, he'll be very pro Israel and give them whatever weapons they want.

Trevor:

And he will be happy to build up weapons against China.

Trevor:

Seems to be less inclined to spend money on Ukraine because Oh,

Scott:

no, no.

Trevor:

He

Joe:

will force Ukraine to settle.

Joe:

He will pull all the weapons out of Ukraine and give those weapons to Israel.

Trevor:

Yes.

Trevor:

And, um, or, you see, if I was a military contractor supplying the government with

Trevor:

stuff that's currently going to Ukraine, And I'm wanting that to continue and

Trevor:

I want Donald Trump not to cancel it.

Trevor:

What I would be doing is offering Donald's trusts, family trusts, obscure Cayman

Trevor:

Island companies, a consultancy fee.

Trevor:

And, uh, and that would of course encourage Donald Trump to

Trevor:

continue with The, um, supplies spending from the government.

Trevor:

I'm sure that would be going through the minds of lots of people.

Trevor:

Scott?

Trevor:

Yeah, it would be.

Trevor:

Yes.

Trevor:

And we know it's not beyond him.

Trevor:

Like, that's, if you're a military contractor, worried

Trevor:

about losing, you would just say, well, how can we pay him off?

Trevor:

If, if he, if we pay him off, he'll keep it going.

Trevor:

It's obvious.

Joe:

A a lot of the arms to Ukraine Don't forget.

Joe:

Yeah.

Joe:

Don't however much money was actually to replenish us stock of

Joe:

arms that were going out of date.

Trevor:

Right?

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

So, so realistically it's a, it's a done deal.

Joe:

Mm-Hmm.

Joe:

They, those weapons need replacing anyway.

Trevor:

Mm-Hmm.

Trevor:

. Joe: But the question is where they're gonna get sent to and Israel needs

Trevor:

some bombs to, and, and some shells.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

So, it's just going to be really easy for, um, for these guys to shuffle consultancy

Trevor:

fees to Trump family interests, I reckon.

Trevor:

Look out for that.

Trevor:

You heard it here first.

Trevor:

Um, um, obviously he likes Israel and he will let them finish the job.

Trevor:

So, look out, poor Palestinians.

Trevor:

There's no easing off in that corner of the world.

Trevor:

They're just going to.

Trevor:

Wipe them out and Israel wants the land, it wants the oil that is offshore of Gaza,

Trevor:

it wants a whole kit and caboodle, it's taking it over and Donald Trump will,

Trevor:

will um, let them finish the job and

Joe:

then get his beachfront hotel.

Trevor:

Indeed.

Trevor:

Because the

Joe:

Gaza is a lovely bit of the Mediterranean.

Trevor:

And his evangelical supporters will be very happy,

Trevor:

um, because he's so pro Israel.

Trevor:

It all leads to the,

Joe:

you know,

Trevor:

what's it called?

Trevor:

The final

Joe:

Armageddon.

Trevor:

The rapture.

Trevor:

Yeah, the rapture.

Trevor:

So, puts all in one place.

Trevor:

So, yep, that's the prediction there.

Trevor:

He doesn't care much for allies.

Trevor:

He sees America as spending all the money And these allies

Trevor:

are just sponging off America.

Trevor:

So, look out NATO, um, and Ukraine.

Trevor:

Unless, of course, he can personally cash in.

Trevor:

Um, so, you know, just when it comes to allies actually,

Trevor:

uh, his Vice President, J.

Trevor:

D.

Trevor:

Vance, had some stuff to say about this.

Trevor:

I'll just play a little clip from, uh, Vice President J.

Trevor:

D.

Trevor:

Vance.

Trevor:

He could well be president at some point.

Trevor:

The

JD Vance:

leader, I forget exactly which official it was within the European

JD Vance:

Union, but sent Elon this threatening letter that basically said, we're going

JD Vance:

to arrest you if you platform Donald Trump, who by the way, is the likely

JD Vance:

next president of the United States.

JD Vance:

So what America should be saying is, oh, if NATO wants us to

JD Vance:

continue supporting them, And NATO wants us to continue to be a good

JD Vance:

participant in this military alliance.

JD Vance:

Why don't you respect American values and respect free speech?

JD Vance:

Excuse me.

JD Vance:

It's insane that we would support a military alliance if

JD Vance:

that military alliance isn't going to be pro free speech.

JD Vance:

I think we can do both, but we've got to say American power comes

JD Vance:

with certain strings attached.

JD Vance:

One of those is respect free speech, especially in our European allies.

JD Vance:

Like, look, I'm not going to go to some backwoods country and tell them

JD Vance:

how to live their lives, but European countries should theoretically share

JD Vance:

American values, especially about some

Trevor:

There you go, um, American, um, military alliances

Trevor:

come with strings attached.

Trevor:

Who would have thought?

Joe:

Elon should respect free speech and not ban people from

Joe:

Twitter who he doesn't like.

Joe:

Is that what I'm hearing?

Trevor:

Now you're, now you're picking up hypocrisies.

Trevor:

So, so, you know, the two things to come out of that are, one,

Trevor:

um, military allies have to toe the line in, um, in, in values.

Trevor:

Thanks.

Trevor:

With America if they want America to continue to be an ally and then

Trevor:

just the rewarding of Elon Musk in whatever he does Because Musk has

Trevor:

Continuing value for Donald Trump.

Trevor:

What continuing value does he have?

Trevor:

Twitter.

Joe:

He may be an illegal immigrant.

Trevor:

Yeah He may be but he's continuing value for Um for, for

Trevor:

Trump is, is via Twitter, like, that is a cesspool of bro Yeah, it's a

Scott:

cesspool of garbage now.

Trevor:

Of bro, pro Trumpish stuff.

Trevor:

Yeah, for sure.

Trevor:

Is, is highlighted and emphasised on that place now.

Joe:

Trump doesn't like Elon because Elon's actually a billionaire.

Trevor:

I don't think that's a problem.

Trevor:

Yeah,

Scott:

but the other thing is that Elon also makes a hell of money selling Teslas.

Scott:

Which Donald Trump doesn't like.

Trevor:

He doesn't like Teslas?

Trevor:

No.

Joe:

He doesn't

Trevor:

like renewables.

Trevor:

Right.

Trevor:

Well, he gets stuff from Elon Musk in terms of Twitter.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Joe:

And plus 150 million towards his election campaign.

Trevor:

Yeah, yes.

Trevor:

So, and they'll get, you know, Trump will ditch people when

Trevor:

they're no longer of value.

Trevor:

But I see, I see Elon Musk having continuing value for Trump.

Trevor:

So, um, yeah.

Trevor:

Um, that, that, you know, Twitter is definitely becoming

Trevor:

a cesspool for that sort of

Scott:

Elon

Trevor:

Musk.

Trevor:

Yeah, so if you're on Twitter, dear listener, just use lists, you go on

Trevor:

there and you can just put, create your own custom list of people you

Trevor:

follow and you just look at that and you can avoid the cesspool stuff.

Trevor:

Don't

Joe:

give Elon your money and just give up on Twitter.

Trevor:

Yes, although there's still things that you get there

Trevor:

that you don't get anywhere else.

Trevor:

So, um, stuff with.

Trevor:

I think, say, the Amsterdam Pogrom, with some of the revealing footage

Trevor:

of what actually had happened there.

Trevor:

Um, speaking of which, do you guys have any thoughts on

Trevor:

that, what happened over there?

Scott:

I only heard that, um, there was Yeah, forgive me if I'm wrong, but there

Scott:

was some story about a Israeli soccer team or something like that in Amsterdam

Scott:

and there were a few Israeli supporters that were beaten up by Dutch people?

Trevor:

Yep.

Scott:

Now, I don't know whether or not they were Dutch Muslims or

Scott:

whatever they were, they were Dutch and they beat the shit out of them.

Scott:

And they are referring to it as a pogrom and they were making all sorts of

Scott:

inflammatory comments saying that it's the worst, worst bit of anti Semitic

Scott:

violence since the Second World War.

Scott:

So where

Trevor:

did you hear all that?

Scott:

I heard that on the ABC.

Scott:

So have I got everything right or not?

Scott:

Have they

Joe:

forgotten about the Arabs who were shooting Israelis

Joe:

in France five years ago?

Joe:

I couldn't tell you,

Trevor:

yeah.

Trevor:

Well the bit that they left out then, Scott, was that prior to any skirmishes,

Trevor:

the Maccabee football supporters were marching on the streets of Amsterdam,

Trevor:

pulling down Palestinian flags that were just on people's homes, and

Trevor:

chanting all sorts of anti Arab chants.

Trevor:

One of which was, there are no schools in Gaza, there are no children left there.

Trevor:

Fuck the Arabs.

Scott:

Jesus Christ.

Trevor:

That, you know, they're in the railway stations and the airports, in the

Trevor:

streets, saying, there are no schools in Gaza, there are no children left there.

Trevor:

Ha ha ha.

Trevor:

Fuck the Arabs.

Trevor:

For fuck's sake.

Trevor:

What did, like, there's the context that you didn't get.

Trevor:

But, you know, that at least is all over Twitter and the video footage of it.

Trevor:

I mean, so, what would you do if you were

Trevor:

in Amsterdam with that sort of There is such a thing in criminal

Trevor:

law, the defence of provocation.

Trevor:

That's the context that was left out.

Trevor:

Is it

Joe:

a defence or is it a Uh, a qualifier.

Trevor:

Is it a mitigating, uh,

Joe:

um Mitigating circumstance, yes.

Trevor:

Good question, Joe, but, um,

Joe:

uh Surely you're still culpable of assault.

Joe:

It's just the assault was

Trevor:

Do you know, I think it might have been one of the defences, though.

Trevor:

Not so easy to prove, but, um Right.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

Um But, I mean,

Joe:

that just ignores the, um God, was it Charlie Hebdo?

Joe:

It was anyway, there was an Arab guy who went around and shut up

Joe:

a Jewish supermarket in Paris.

Joe:

And this is, you know, five, 10 years ago.

Joe:

Surely that was the worst anti Semitic pogrom since the Second World War.

Scott:

Yeah, I would have thought so.

Scott:

Anyway, it's just, it's just that Netanyahu is just

Scott:

making a big deal out of it.

Trevor:

Sky News did a piece originally, which gave the full context, and then they

Trevor:

pulled it and gave The story without the full context that I've just explained.

Trevor:

So, someone got on to them and said, Hey, hang on a minute.

Trevor:

It's got a bit of anti Israeli content in there by providing that content,

Trevor:

that context, um, but change that.

Trevor:

So I actually got rid of that context.

Trevor:

That's where we're at.

Trevor:

So, um, just back to Trump predictions before I go anywhere else.

Trevor:

More Supreme Court appointments of course.

Trevor:

That is the

Joe:

scariest bit.

Joe:

Because, um, you know, you've got three Supreme Court Justices who are

Joe:

getting close to their last legs.

Joe:

And if he does the same as he did with his previous appointments and sticks a 40

Joe:

year old in there, Yeah, that's, that's 30 years of right wing Supreme Court.

Joe:

Mm-Hmm.

Joe:

So may, maybe the balance won't change at all if it's the old right wingers that

Joe:

are going, uh, but by replacing 'em with young right wingers, you've guaranteed

Joe:

a right wing court for 30 years.

Scott:

Yeah.

Scott:

I've actually heard that, um, the Democrats were suggesting

Scott:

that, uh, you are, quote, going to get Republican fetuses.

Scott:

On the, on the bench.

Scott:

Yes.

Trevor:

I don't understand that.

Trevor:

What's young people?

Trevor:

No, they were, they were gonna get young people.

Trevor:

Oh, right.

Trevor:

So they're saying Republican and we say young.

Trevor:

Right?

Trevor:

Okay.

Trevor:

Yes.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

Um, to ensure longevity of their decision making.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

Mm-Hmm.

Trevor:

. Um, and the other one, of course, it seems like JFK Jr.

Joe:

RF Power of K JR.

Joe:

FK

Trevor:

Jr.

Trevor:

Is gonna be given, um, yes.

Trevor:

Some, some power in relation to health, mate.

Scott:

He's got a real problem with fluoridation, fluoridation of water.

Scott:

Yeah, and vaccines.

Scott:

And vaccines.

Scott:

He's an idiot, basically, but, um, one of the things that I said today

Scott:

was that fluoridation of water started in Nazi Germany, and they said, well,

Scott:

that's, you know, the conspiracy theory is that was a way of getting docile

Scott:

people so you can control their minds.

Scott:

And I said, no, Nazi Germany wasn't a bad place to live, provided

Scott:

you weren't Jewish or communist.

Trevor:

You

Scott:

know, if you're prepared to, if you're prepared to look the

Scott:

other way and that sort of stuff, it wasn't a bad place to live.

Scott:

And fluoridation of water has led to a hell of a lot less cavities

Scott:

and everything else in your teeth.

Trevor:

Oh, if you're half inclined to become a dentist in America, keep going.

Trevor:

Yeah, you're going to have more work than you can poke a stick at.

Joe:

I mean, Nazi scientists were some of the best in the world.

Joe:

Yeah, they were.

Joe:

So to just dismiss everything because it was dreamt up by

Joe:

the Nazis, it would be stupid.

Scott:

Exactly,

Trevor:

it was stupid,

Joe:

you know.

Trevor:

Hey, Joe, we have to look at something with the chat room, like

Trevor:

it's sort of doubling up, isn't it?

Trevor:

The restream bot is doing something.

Trevor:

Yeah,

Joe:

the bot is doing some weird thing and I don't know

Trevor:

why.

Trevor:

Don't know why either.

Trevor:

So anyway, um, That's the sort of main, um, predictions I had in terms of Trump.

Trevor:

Um, what else have we got here?

Trevor:

Uh, So yeah, unless you guys have got anything else you want to say

Trevor:

about Trump, we might just move on to some other issues, just quickly.

Trevor:

Well,

Joe:

I thought it was quite interesting looking at the demographics,

Joe:

the total number of votes.

Joe:

Now, admittedly, we haven't got the full numbers.

Joe:

Yeah.

Joe:

But, uh, Trump was polling slightly less than he did in 2020.

Joe:

Yep.

Joe:

But there was at least 10 million people missing.

Joe:

Who had voted for Biden, who just didn't vote for Kamala.

Trevor:

So, I saw your graph and yeah.

Trevor:

I poked around and I think there's been increases to that number,

Trevor:

which is not as bad as it looked.

Trevor:

Um, so we still need more time to see how many votes still come in on that one.

Trevor:

It does look like Yeah, I mean

Joe:

the popular vote, because I didn't think that people had flipped.

Joe:

I think people just hadn't turned up was the point.

Joe:

Yes.

Trevor:

Yeah, it's also showing that the turnout was low,

Trevor:

particularly for Democrats.

Trevor:

But, um Still voting.

Trevor:

Still, somehow, numbers being added to that, even now.

Trevor:

So Well, yeah,

Joe:

I mean, they still haven't finished the primary votes.

Joe:

They've gone far enough to go, Oh, he's definitely won

Joe:

this, she can't come back, but

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

Yeah.

Trevor:

So, um, Scott, have you heard about this social media age limit?

Trevor:

Yeah, it's a

Scott:

ridiculous bloody thing that Albanese has dreamed up.

Trevor:

And the opposition are bipartisan on this.

Scott:

They're both bloody idiots on the whole thing.

Scott:

It's one of those things that has to come back.

Scott:

You know, Joe was right when he was talking about it

Scott:

and all that sort of stuff.

Scott:

He says what you've got to do is you've got to do the hard yards with

Scott:

education because you can't actually, you know, what are they going to do?

Scott:

Are they going to hold a gun to people's head and say you've got to tell the truth?

Trevor:

Somehow, they're going to force the social media companies

Trevor:

to check on people's identities to ensure that they are over 16.

Joe:

So you're either going to have to set up a government system where

Joe:

you've identified yourself to the government and then they validate

Joe:

you to social media companies, in which case the government knows who

Joe:

everybody is on every social media site.

Trevor:

Yep, or you're divulging the information to

Trevor:

the social media company, yeah,

Joe:

and you hope that they keep all your identifiable information secure.

Joe:

So you want to send this passport or your credit card or something

Joe:

and give it to each of those sites.

Scott:

I'll just give up on social media, I think.

Scott:

It's insane.

Scott:

It's not

Trevor:

just kids who have to jump through hoops to get on social media.

Trevor:

It's everybody is going to have to prove their

Joe:

age.

Joe:

But hang on, once this infrastructure is in place, then they can

Joe:

push it out to the porn sites.

Joe:

Yes.

Joe:

So this is, this is the porn site validation through a backdoor.

Joe:

Now,

Trevor:

who Who wants this law?

Trevor:

Does, you know, if you, if you checked with the majority of

Trevor:

Australians and explained that.

Joe:

I, I would suggest that the government want this law because it allows

Joe:

them to track people on the internet.

Trevor:

Uh, no.

Trevor:

I'll tell you why they want it.

Trevor:

They've been bullied into it by the Murdoch press.

Joe:

Right.

Trevor:

So, um, dear listener, for my sins, I read the

Trevor:

fucking Courier Mail every day.

Trevor:

And I can tell you that there has been a campaign in that paper, and presumably

Trevor:

run through all the Murdoch papers, basically about how tough it is for kids

Trevor:

on social media, um, finding examples where kids have committed suicide or had

Trevor:

other issues, demanding the government do something to bring in age restrictions.

Trevor:

And And why have the Murdoch press run this campaign?

Trevor:

Is it because they're genuinely interested in the welfare of

Trevor:

young teenage Australians?

Trevor:

No.

Trevor:

No.

Trevor:

The reason is, Meta announced it wasn't going to renew the news deals.

Trevor:

Remember how Meta was forced, if you're going to be reproducing links

Trevor:

to websites, you had to pay money.

Trevor:

Well, in February, 29th of February, Meta announced, they're just not going to do

Trevor:

it, they're going to withdraw from that.

Trevor:

And within few days, News Corp just exploded in anger, the mastheads

Trevor:

immediately blew up, and literally 19 days later, uh, actually no, that was February

Trevor:

29th, it was May 19th, News Corp launched.

Trevor:

Let them be kids campaign.

Trevor:

Calling on the federal government to raise the age limit, to access

Trevor:

social media to 16, to stop the scourge of social media and give our

Trevor:

kids back three years of childhood.

Trevor:

And they're the ones who have been calling for it, not because of, um,

Trevor:

uh, a love of children or because of any You know, detailed examination of

Trevor:

the best way to deal with this problem.

Trevor:

It's purely because they're pissed with Meta.

Trevor:

And they started a campaign and fucking Albanese is so gutless

Trevor:

that he's fallen into line.

Trevor:

Because he's so scared of the Murdoch papers.

Trevor:

And the opposition are falling into line because They need the

Trevor:

support of the Murdoch Papers.

Trevor:

So here we've got a policy that's being introduced into the Parliament

Trevor:

in a flash, within months, without really the community having any

Trevor:

groundswell of support for it.

Trevor:

And if you just talk to people, they'll all recognise it as a shitty

Trevor:

idea, but driven by fucking News Corp.

Trevor:

That's, you could, you've got other policies where not, you

Trevor:

know, 80, 70, 80 percent of people want done and it never happens.

Trevor:

And just cause News Corp pressures Albanesey, it's happening.

Trevor:

It disgusts me that they are so pathetic, this Labor government.

Trevor:

And the only ones opposing it, the Greens.

Trevor:

Three cheers for the Greens, hip hip hooray.

Trevor:

I say, oh, that's the story.

Trevor:

If you want to know what's behind this social media thing, now I could

Trevor:

have told you all of that, but there's a lovely article from Crikey that

Trevor:

explains it in detail by Danielle Saeed, that I've been saying in my head

Trevor:

for days or weeks, this is a bloody Murdoch campaign that I've been reading

Trevor:

in the Courier Mail all this time.

Trevor:

So, um, I reckon, Scott, next election, Albanese will be associated with The

Trevor:

Voice, which failed, this stupid social media ban, his big new house on the beach,

Trevor:

the Qantas Chairman's Lounge, and when it comes to cancelling debt for uni students,

Trevor:

they're gonna drag up examples of, of, Privileged uni kids getting 170, 000,

Trevor:

you know, huge amounts of money, um, for, it'll be painted by the Murdoch press as

Trevor:

privileged uni students getting money, but your average battler not getting money.

Trevor:

And I reckon he's gonna lose.

Trevor:

I reckon he'll be blamed for the cost of living.

Trevor:

I reckon Dutton could pull this off based on what he's

Joe:

too young to have had the free uni, wasn't he?

Trevor:

I don't, uh, I don't know.

Trevor:

But it doesn't matter what he's It's about, again, that appeal to the battlers.

Joe:

And there's all of

Trevor:

those things, all those issues are going to run against Albanese.

Joe:

Well, I think if Albanese had any sense, he'd be

Joe:

straight in going to Dutton.

Joe:

How much do you pay for uni?

Trevor:

And nobody will care.

Trevor:

Nobody will care.

Trevor:

Because they'll only read in the Murdoch press the examples of people,

Trevor:

you know, they're not going to read about Dutton's contracts for Paladin

Trevor:

and all that shit that happened when he was Home Affairs Minister.

Trevor:

They're not going to read that, they're not going to know anything about it.

Scott:

I don't think Dutton's actually got a hope in Helen winning because he

Scott:

hasn't concentrated, he hasn't got those inner city seats that were Liberal seats.

Trevor:

He's leading 51 to 49.

Scott:

Yeah, I know, but

Joe:

he's not going to win those seats back.

Joe:

I've told you, haven't I, there's a strong Facebook advertising campaign

Joe:

about basically a Teal in my electorate.

Trevor:

Hmm.

Joe:

Uh, there's a lot of money being pumped in by, uh,

Joe:

God, what was his name now?

Joe:

Acourt, wasn't it?

Scott:

Holmes Acourt.

Scott:

Yeah.

Joe:

Um, Simon Holmes Acourt.

Joe:

Yeah, into the Dixon electorate, looking for a Teal to stand against him.

Trevor:

Oh, well,

Scott:

it would

Joe:

be quite funny if he lost his seat.

Joe:

It

Scott:

would be absolutely hilarious if he lost his seat.

Scott:

I just don't think that he has done enough to actually convince those liberal

Scott:

voters that did actually vote TL last time, to actually convince them that

Scott:

he's not enough or anything like that.

Scott:

And he's not going to, say again?

Joe:

I said I haven't seen a green energy plan

Scott:

from

Joe:

the LNP.

Joe:

No, they don't have one.

Joe:

Well, exactly.

Joe:

So why would the Teals vote for him?

Scott:

No, I'm just saying they're not going to.

Joe:

Yeah.

Scott:

You know, and I just think to myself that that is a hell of a

Scott:

lot of seats that he's turned his back on and he's not really saying

Scott:

the right things that he could actually win the Outer Suburbs.

Scott:

He might win a few seats, but he's not going to win enough to make up for all

Scott:

those seats that he's already lost.

Scott:

in the inner cities.

Scott:

And I just think to myself that, yeah, I understand what you're saying,

Scott:

but I just don't agree with you.

Scott:

I think that, um, the most likely scenario is that Albanese is going to

Scott:

be plunged into minority government.

Scott:

And he will be propped up by either the Teals or the Greens.

Trevor:

If he, if this social media thing is passed, even though the opposition

Trevor:

will support it, it will be, it will be, it'll be the end of Albanese.

Trevor:

If people are going to go, what?

Trevor:

I've got to disclose my details to log into a Facebook, an

Trevor:

Instagram, a Twitch account,

Joe:

they're going to be so pissed.

Joe:

And then after the first breach.

Joe:

Yep.

Trevor:

They're just going to be so pissed.

Trevor:

Add to that the other issues.

Trevor:

It's, it's going to be really easy for Dutton to, to paint a picture

Trevor:

of an out of touch, woke, um,

Scott:

Labour Party.

Scott:

Dutton's actually in favour of it.

Trevor:

I know, but, but he'll, he'll have the support of the, of the propaganda that

Trevor:

will paint it all as Albanese is doing.

Trevor:

That's what will happen.

Trevor:

Because it'll,

Scott:

it'll be his.

Scott:

He'll,

Trevor:

he'll make sure it's his.

Scott:

Yeah, I know, he's going to have to wear it and that sort of thing.

Scott:

I just don't think that, um

Trevor:

That's where we're heading.

Scott:

Well, we'll have to wait and see.

Scott:

Yeah.

Scott:

But it really wouldn't surprise me that, uh, it really wouldn't surprise me that

Scott:

someone might actually move against Albanese before the next election.

Trevor:

Now,

Scott:

the rules of the Labor Party means that you can't actually do that

Scott:

because he's only in the first term.

Scott:

That's the Rudd, um, Rudd rule and that sort of stuff that says you can't move

Scott:

against the first term Prime Minister.

Scott:

Which means that No, you can't.

Scott:

Well, but I really wouldn't be surprised if someone actually taps

Scott:

his on the shoulder and say, mate, you're fucking this up badly.

Scott:

They won't.

Trevor:

There's nobody there for that.

Trevor:

So, yeah.

Trevor:

Anyway, I think that's a good point to end up with, unless you had something

Trevor:

pressing you wanted to add at this point?

Scott:

No, I just don't think that Albanese is done for, but it really

Scott:

wouldn't surprise me if after the next election he's replaced.

Joe:

Going back to the US, there has been a suggestion that Biden should step down

Joe:

and make Kamala president for the last, whatever, hundred days that are left.

Joe:

Oh yeah?

Joe:

And that way at least America has had its first, um, black and female president.

Joe:

Which kind of breaks the mould, sets the precedent, so no longer

Joe:

is any election about this is going to be our first whatever president,

Joe:

because there's already been one.

Trevor:

Wow.

Trevor:

Who's come up with that?

Trevor:

Who's saying that?

Joe:

A number of people in the states are going, yeah, he's got nothing left

Joe:

to lose, why shouldn't he step down now and just give it to her, give her

Joe:

the easy win at least for, you That

Trevor:

sounds like the most stupid idea, and if she was to accept

Trevor:

that, even stupider decision.

Trevor:

Just to, to sort of belittle the role of the President, so that

Trevor:

you just slip into it for a few months to say that you were there.

Joe:

He was only ever supposed to be a caretaker President anyway.

Trevor:

Yeah, for four years, well, for three years, yeah.

Trevor:

That's a crazy idea.

Scott:

How do you have actually done what he said he was going to do?

Scott:

He would go down in history as probably one of the greater presidents.

Scott:

Now he's going to go down in history as the one that

Scott:

spoiled Kamala Harris chances.

Joe:

Yeah.

Trevor:

Well, uh, in the chat room, uh, John says, I don't think

Trevor:

Albo will make the next election.

Trevor:

There you go.

Trevor:

Um, uh, also, Bye.

Trevor:

John says most of California is not in yet, so there'll be a lot of

Trevor:

votes there to add up to the total.

Trevor:

Um, Essential Lord Don Oh, that's who the House of Representatives is, is it?

Trevor:

Yeah, um, must be, um, in Congress.

Trevor:

Um, Essential Lord Don says Trump gave him the mission to go wild on health.

Joe:

This is RFK.

Joe:

Yeah.

Trevor:

Yes, Junior.

Trevor:

Um, John has bailed on Twitter.

Trevor:

Um, what else we got?

Joe:

By the way, there's an interesting Behind the Bastards series on RFK Junior.

Joe:

Yeah, it's a podcast.

Trevor:

Yep.

Joe:

Uh, not a huge fan of the way they present the content,

Joe:

but the content is interesting.

Trevor:

Okay.

Trevor:

Um, what else we got here?

Trevor:

John still, he may not get, be able to get out of Ukraine.

Trevor:

There are a lot of Republican politicians with arms manufacturers in their states.

Trevor:

So, um, Talking about Trump pulling out of Ukraine.

Trevor:

Um, incidentally, John, still haven't seen a picture of 10, 000 North

Trevor:

Korean soldiers in the Ukraine.

Trevor:

No, but

Joe:

these imaginary soldiers apparently are now for the first

Joe:

time in their lives looking at porn.

Joe:

Yes, exactly.

Scott:

According to who?

Scott:

No, I saw that too, and I just didn't bother finding out whether

Scott:

or not it was true, it's just

Joe:

According to who?

Joe:

It's like, for an invisible army, there's a lot of stuff being made up about them.

Trevor:

Yeah, it's just amazing that they're there, they're doing exercises.

Trevor:

They're looking at porn, and yet nobody can take a picture of them.

Trevor:

It's not as if there are, sort of, phones that people have that might

Trevor:

be able to video or record this.

Trevor:

Yeah, but the

Scott:

North Koreans don't have those sorts of phones.

Scott:

No, but the, you know,

Trevor:

but there's been plenty of, um, Russian dissidents around

Trevor:

who would like to prove it.

Joe:

You don't trust them, do you?

Trevor:

Who?

Joe:

The dissidents.

Joe:

The dissidents.

Trevor:

I don't trust them, but you'd expect them to put forward

Trevor:

some evidence if they could.

Trevor:

It hasn't even, you know, there's nothing yet.

Joe:

Apparently there are radio intercepts of Russian troops

Joe:

going, these fucking Koreans, why are they posting them with us?

Joe:

And who said that?

Joe:

Ah, the Ukrainians.

Joe:

Yeah.

Joe:

But again, surely they're as believable as a Russian dissident.

Trevor:

Yeah, yeah.

Trevor:

What?

Trevor:

Where is it?

Trevor:

You don't see, where's the audio?

Trevor:

Where's the video?

Trevor:

Like it just, I'm, I'm looking, I'm looking, John I'd like to, you

Trevor:

know, I'm happy to buy your video, I'm just waiting for the evidence.

Trevor:

So, um, what else is in the chatroom?

Trevor:

Um, John again, the biggest problem with Trump will be the people

Trevor:

around him running the show.

Trevor:

Was anyone else in the chat, in the chat besides John?

Trevor:

Um, uh,

Joe:

John and Don basically.

Joe:

Yeah,

Trevor:

okay.

Trevor:

Um, Trevor for First World President.

Trevor:

Thanks, Don.

Trevor:

Right, well, we'll finish up on that note.

Trevor:

Um, we'll be back next week for another episode.

Trevor:

I mean, we've got at least four years and a bit to go.

Trevor:

Might as well get started on it.

Joe:

Under his eye.

Trevor:

Yes.

Trevor:

Right, we'll be back.

Trevor:

Talk to you then.

Trevor:

Bye for now.

Trevor:

And it's a good night from me.

Joe:

And it's a good night from him.

Trevor:

Good night.

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The Iron Fist and the Velvet Glove
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