I know I'm going to die saying this, but Maduro is not our "sitting president" he's a twice (maybe thrice) illegitimate usurper. He's a narco dictator. Our actual president is Edmundo González Urrutia.
I mentioned this to some friends the other day. They called him the President and I was like "this guy basically did what everyone thought Trump would do in 2020." And they give me pushback on that. I'm like "he didn't win the election." I say this at my school as well and people give me side eyes, but it's the truth!
Some people just think that because someone is left-wing they're automatically good. Left wing people have committed as many if not more and worse atrocities throughout history than right wingers. People always think about Hitler but don't really think about Stalin.
Maduro created an entirely parallel Congress in 2017 to be able to perpetuate himself in power in the elections of 2018. This is what created the entire Juan Guaidó situation in 2019, because Maduro effectively called for elections out of time, elections our, majority opposition legitimate Congress (Asamblea National), ruled as unconstitutional. And then after that event you had the 2024 stolen elections.
We're not even sure he won the 2012 elections when Chavez died and those were called with him as the appointed successor of Chavez, there were a lot of irregularities and the win margin was extremely narrow. The opposition candidate at that time, Henrique Capriles, has basically dropped the mask and come out as a regime supporter, so we suspect the entire thing was even a ruse orchestrated by the regime.
I understand, but people really need to learn to define their worldview beyond what they're in opposition of. Sometimes even the worst person you know can do something right.
I have wondered about this - what else could be done here, but remove the guy by force? It would have been great if the Venezuelans had been able to wrest back their state, or a coalition of Latin American states had done it. I had questions about the legality of the operation, but removing Maduro (and reestablishing American deterrence in the region) was a net positive for the world. If the objections are lack of congressional approval or the end game/plan, that’s fair enough. But if Delcy Rodriguez fears a knock on her door at night if they start shooting people in the streets, I think that’s a net positive.
But something on the order of 9 million (out of 27 million) people left, creating a regional refugee crisis. Chavez funneled huge amounts of money to left and far left parties and groups thought the Spanish speaking world, destabilizing politics. Chavez also recruited useful idiots in the US. The Chavez regime destroyed the countries flawed but strong democratic tradition, destroyed its economy, used Cuban agents to keep Maduro ensconced in the Miraflores. The Cubans got a ton of free oil. Venezuela went from the wealthiest country in Latin America to one of the poorest. Its GDP contracted by 25%, which is unheard of outside of war time. The closest analogue is the collapse of the USSR. Maduro was providing safe haven to Iranian proxies. This was an intolerable situation, and it was only going to get worse.
There were a lot of things that could be done, but every US president failed to put sufficient pressure, and some even eased pressure, like Biden, on the regime, which allowed them to continue.
And its going to be hard for a coalition of LATAM countries to come to your aid when the regime propped up most of them, so rather than aiding the citizenry they run defense for the regime. Specially Lula Da Silva in Brazil and Lopez Obrador and Sheinbaum in Mexico, being the biggest LATAM economies.
Agreed! While I don’t like monocausal explanations, the sheer amount of money that Chavez funneled to leftwing to far-left parties in Latin America and the Iberian peninsula helped make the pink tide of the early aughts possible. The lifeline that they provided to Havana also probably helped extend the lifetime of that malign regime.
The cash caught at the airport for the Kirchner’s come to mind. I will give them credit for over-the-top, theatrical corruption that would make Trump blush, however.
Biden’s deal was particularly boneheaded. Sanctions relief for a promise of free and fair elections…which never happened, was never going you happen (because they’d lose power…). Once you’ve brazenly, shamelessly, stolen at least two, possible three, elections, why would you get the benefit of the doubt? Why would anyone think they would change?Authoritarians who give up power without an exile plan in place tend to have a bad time.
I also found the Biden administration’s attempt to portray Lula as someone deeply committed to democracy rather hard to stomach.
Our hosts didn’t mention it as they had plenty of other targets, but it is worth dwelling a bit on the idiocy of Piker in that clip claiming that Google removing gay dating apps on the orders of the Chinese government is entirely Google’s fault and not the Chinese government’s.
Yeah…that was a level of dumb that I didn’t know was possible. Not to mention, the state directing private enterprises is core the post-Deng era of the CCP.
Going after Piker for China's lack of gay rights is really a bit weak.
Basically all of Europe east and south of Poland doesn't recognize gay marriage. Places like Russia and Hungary are actively hostile to LGBT people and I (trans, bi) wouldn't want to even visit Slovakia or Romania.
But I felt no worries in visiting China (Nanjing) last October and experienced zero issues, aside from occasionally being gawped at for being white, while using public transportation exclusively and only dining in local, non-western restaurants. If you're fortunate enough to have a western phone and data plan then all of the apps work as China does not censor those connections. (This, in particular, probably explains some of Piker's comments.)
Queers do not yet have full equality in China but it's rather like being gay in the 80s and 90s in America, from what I can tell. Well, actually a bit better because sodomy isn't illegal in China as it was in the US until 2003. Don't think that we get to act morally superior to China when it was just as hard to be gay in the US as it is China when K&J (and I) were growing up.
A couple of anecdotes:
A lesbian friend from China left over a decade ago because she did not believe that she could live in China as a gay person. From talks she has with queer people back in China and from watching videos on Douyin (TikTok in China) from queer women she says that, while there's clear limits, gay people can live full and happy lives. It's difficult---too difficult---to have a family and kids but not impossible. We're now planning a visit to Chengdu, a city with enough of a gay-friendly reputation that it goes by Gaydu.
While applying for my Chinese visa the consular official made his distress and sympathy very clear about my own government not allowing me to update my passport---in fact that they had taken away a right trans people have had since 1992. The regret he showed over having to issue a visa with male indicated was plain and he asked his supervisor twice if he really had to do it. Somehow, allegedly, anti-gay Communists are able to see the cruelty and difficulty in this but not many Americans.
Surveillance in China is intense and the reliance on just two apps for nearly every financial transaction means that if you piss off the government you could be easily locked out of the economy. But the trains are frequent and reliable (every three minutes during rush hour), the streets are clean, you don't see homeless people, food is cheap and plentiful, and the cars are new.
China may not have homeless people (but for a population that's largely agrarian and lives below the poverty line they're certainly not thriving) but Hong Kong does - they just live in makeshift shanty towns and encampments in the mountains and have ferocious guard dogs (I stumbled upon a bunch of them when I lived there).
To add fun details: it comes from the practice of Popes appointing their nephews to benefices throughout the Church, though that was a euphemism covering up the fact that many of these "nephews" were illegitimate sons of the Pope himself.
As a general rule of thumb, never use Hasan account of events as factual. Hasan lies constantly and is a self defined propagandist. Hasan said he was question for hours of the US border but provided no evidence, other people did digging and found the timeline didn't add up.
Tough listen. Every time I hear Hasan speak, I involuntarily conjure Beavis & Butthead he-heheing and digging for gold on the sofa. I think Hasan might be genuinely subnormal.
When the whole abundance thing started, I remember thinking that I couldn't believe people were taking it seriously. I now realize that I had turned Ethan Klein and Ezra Klein into one nonexistent person who was prone to saying crazy things.
Fwiw, I'm Turkish and I hate Piker for a multitude of reasons that are nothing to do with our shared heritage. He's a narcissistic obnoxious moron whose cultural influence is genuinely malignant in so many ways
I listened to Andrew Sullivan interviewing Kevin D Williamson this morning, and they are discussing Trump's tariffs, and Williamson says it's a common superstition (great term) that rich people are economically smart. And then he adds that people also wrongly think that people who are tall and good looking are also smart, as if he knew I would be listening to a podcast about Hassan Piker.
Seriously, I’m not being glib when I say K&J should listen to the episode they did on Maduro a few weeks ago. It might make them start to see things a bit differently.
Piker does strike me as a truly odious individual….and a moron.
It also strikes me that a huge problem with world is that extremist idiots of all stripes, who pre internet would have ranted to a hall of six people, now have audiences of six figures & up.
Hasan outright says he's a campist against the US, and is surprised when they take away his expedited passport privileges? He's like someone who writes the Gulag Archipelago and The Revolution Betrayed in one book and thinks, what, Soviet leadership will exalt him as a model citizen and not think he's a massive pain in the ass who should be muzzled? I mean it's very ironic when he expects free speech but is totally cool with every regime that condemns the concept. What a clown
I know I'm going to die saying this, but Maduro is not our "sitting president" he's a twice (maybe thrice) illegitimate usurper. He's a narco dictator. Our actual president is Edmundo González Urrutia.
I mentioned this to some friends the other day. They called him the President and I was like "this guy basically did what everyone thought Trump would do in 2020." And they give me pushback on that. I'm like "he didn't win the election." I say this at my school as well and people give me side eyes, but it's the truth!
Some people just think that because someone is left-wing they're automatically good. Left wing people have committed as many if not more and worse atrocities throughout history than right wingers. People always think about Hitler but don't really think about Stalin.
Maduro created an entirely parallel Congress in 2017 to be able to perpetuate himself in power in the elections of 2018. This is what created the entire Juan Guaidó situation in 2019, because Maduro effectively called for elections out of time, elections our, majority opposition legitimate Congress (Asamblea National), ruled as unconstitutional. And then after that event you had the 2024 stolen elections.
We're not even sure he won the 2012 elections when Chavez died and those were called with him as the appointed successor of Chavez, there were a lot of irregularities and the win margin was extremely narrow. The opposition candidate at that time, Henrique Capriles, has basically dropped the mask and come out as a regime supporter, so we suspect the entire thing was even a ruse orchestrated by the regime.
To be fair these friends just really hate Trump. Appreciate added context.
I understand, but people really need to learn to define their worldview beyond what they're in opposition of. Sometimes even the worst person you know can do something right.
most definitely agree
100%
I have wondered about this - what else could be done here, but remove the guy by force? It would have been great if the Venezuelans had been able to wrest back their state, or a coalition of Latin American states had done it. I had questions about the legality of the operation, but removing Maduro (and reestablishing American deterrence in the region) was a net positive for the world. If the objections are lack of congressional approval or the end game/plan, that’s fair enough. But if Delcy Rodriguez fears a knock on her door at night if they start shooting people in the streets, I think that’s a net positive.
But something on the order of 9 million (out of 27 million) people left, creating a regional refugee crisis. Chavez funneled huge amounts of money to left and far left parties and groups thought the Spanish speaking world, destabilizing politics. Chavez also recruited useful idiots in the US. The Chavez regime destroyed the countries flawed but strong democratic tradition, destroyed its economy, used Cuban agents to keep Maduro ensconced in the Miraflores. The Cubans got a ton of free oil. Venezuela went from the wealthiest country in Latin America to one of the poorest. Its GDP contracted by 25%, which is unheard of outside of war time. The closest analogue is the collapse of the USSR. Maduro was providing safe haven to Iranian proxies. This was an intolerable situation, and it was only going to get worse.
There were a lot of things that could be done, but every US president failed to put sufficient pressure, and some even eased pressure, like Biden, on the regime, which allowed them to continue.
And its going to be hard for a coalition of LATAM countries to come to your aid when the regime propped up most of them, so rather than aiding the citizenry they run defense for the regime. Specially Lula Da Silva in Brazil and Lopez Obrador and Sheinbaum in Mexico, being the biggest LATAM economies.
Agreed! While I don’t like monocausal explanations, the sheer amount of money that Chavez funneled to leftwing to far-left parties in Latin America and the Iberian peninsula helped make the pink tide of the early aughts possible. The lifeline that they provided to Havana also probably helped extend the lifetime of that malign regime.
The cash caught at the airport for the Kirchner’s come to mind. I will give them credit for over-the-top, theatrical corruption that would make Trump blush, however.
Biden’s deal was particularly boneheaded. Sanctions relief for a promise of free and fair elections…which never happened, was never going you happen (because they’d lose power…). Once you’ve brazenly, shamelessly, stolen at least two, possible three, elections, why would you get the benefit of the doubt? Why would anyone think they would change?Authoritarians who give up power without an exile plan in place tend to have a bad time.
I also found the Biden administration’s attempt to portray Lula as someone deeply committed to democracy rather hard to stomach.
Our hosts didn’t mention it as they had plenty of other targets, but it is worth dwelling a bit on the idiocy of Piker in that clip claiming that Google removing gay dating apps on the orders of the Chinese government is entirely Google’s fault and not the Chinese government’s.
Worth nothing I think it was Apple not Google?
Yeah…that was a level of dumb that I didn’t know was possible. Not to mention, the state directing private enterprises is core the post-Deng era of the CCP.
Going after Piker for China's lack of gay rights is really a bit weak.
Basically all of Europe east and south of Poland doesn't recognize gay marriage. Places like Russia and Hungary are actively hostile to LGBT people and I (trans, bi) wouldn't want to even visit Slovakia or Romania.
But I felt no worries in visiting China (Nanjing) last October and experienced zero issues, aside from occasionally being gawped at for being white, while using public transportation exclusively and only dining in local, non-western restaurants. If you're fortunate enough to have a western phone and data plan then all of the apps work as China does not censor those connections. (This, in particular, probably explains some of Piker's comments.)
Queers do not yet have full equality in China but it's rather like being gay in the 80s and 90s in America, from what I can tell. Well, actually a bit better because sodomy isn't illegal in China as it was in the US until 2003. Don't think that we get to act morally superior to China when it was just as hard to be gay in the US as it is China when K&J (and I) were growing up.
A couple of anecdotes:
A lesbian friend from China left over a decade ago because she did not believe that she could live in China as a gay person. From talks she has with queer people back in China and from watching videos on Douyin (TikTok in China) from queer women she says that, while there's clear limits, gay people can live full and happy lives. It's difficult---too difficult---to have a family and kids but not impossible. We're now planning a visit to Chengdu, a city with enough of a gay-friendly reputation that it goes by Gaydu.
While applying for my Chinese visa the consular official made his distress and sympathy very clear about my own government not allowing me to update my passport---in fact that they had taken away a right trans people have had since 1992. The regret he showed over having to issue a visa with male indicated was plain and he asked his supervisor twice if he really had to do it. Somehow, allegedly, anti-gay Communists are able to see the cruelty and difficulty in this but not many Americans.
Surveillance in China is intense and the reliance on just two apps for nearly every financial transaction means that if you piss off the government you could be easily locked out of the economy. But the trains are frequent and reliable (every three minutes during rush hour), the streets are clean, you don't see homeless people, food is cheap and plentiful, and the cars are new.
China may not have homeless people (but for a population that's largely agrarian and lives below the poverty line they're certainly not thriving) but Hong Kong does - they just live in makeshift shanty towns and encampments in the mountains and have ferocious guard dogs (I stumbled upon a bunch of them when I lived there).
Lol at “nepo nephew” - the word “nepotism” COMES from the word NEPHEW.
It's a nepologism.
To add fun details: it comes from the practice of Popes appointing their nephews to benefices throughout the Church, though that was a euphemism covering up the fact that many of these "nephews" were illegitimate sons of the Pope himself.
Thank you, the pedant in me couldn't let that one go.
While we're on the subject of etymology, “hench” is a back formation from “henchman” used commonly in the Yookay.
I already emailed them this correction. Embarrassing smh
As a general rule of thumb, never use Hasan account of events as factual. Hasan lies constantly and is a self defined propagandist. Hasan said he was question for hours of the US border but provided no evidence, other people did digging and found the timeline didn't add up.
Tough listen. Every time I hear Hasan speak, I involuntarily conjure Beavis & Butthead he-heheing and digging for gold on the sofa. I think Hasan might be genuinely subnormal.
“I think he needs some fiber. Or maybe a vegetable.” I agree with Katie a fair bit, but never so much as with this particular sentiment.
He's unbelievably stupid.
B&B was commentary on stupid youth culture. Now imagine if people, Stewart aside, were actually watching them for hours-on-end.
They are back on Paramount+. I think they were surprised to see that not as many people as they expected watched.
But, as far as Hassan and EK go, it might be a case of the shallowness peaking through.
But there’s also the reinforcement that every group opposed to the totalitarian west must be okay because there can only be two sides to any issue.
STFW for “Distortions At Fourth Hand.” And understand that it took an invasion by the Stalinists to stop that very real horror.
Listening to the extremely public drama between people like these makes me so thankful for just having a normal job.
When the whole abundance thing started, I remember thinking that I couldn't believe people were taking it seriously. I now realize that I had turned Ethan Klein and Ezra Klein into one nonexistent person who was prone to saying crazy things.
Haha - had the absolutely same experience!
Fwiw, I'm Turkish and I hate Piker for a multitude of reasons that are nothing to do with our shared heritage. He's a narcissistic obnoxious moron whose cultural influence is genuinely malignant in so many ways
I really hope they don’t try to equate Klein’s fair use cases as a defendant and as a plaintiff
Also Piker’s parents are extremely wealthy. There is plenty of evidence to support the likelihood that they are worth 9-10 figures
Yeah when Katie referred to them as just “academics” I was like hold up..
I listened to Andrew Sullivan interviewing Kevin D Williamson this morning, and they are discussing Trump's tariffs, and Williamson says it's a common superstition (great term) that rich people are economically smart. And then he adds that people also wrongly think that people who are tall and good looking are also smart, as if he knew I would be listening to a podcast about Hassan Piker.
I admit, I spent about the first 15 minutes of this episode mistaking Ethan for Ezra Klein, and thinking, "WTF? YouTube reaction videos? Tourette's?"
I was mistaking him for Ethan Ralph, which was also hilarious.
Same!
So is Katie driving 3,000 miles across country in an ice storm?
Her lifestyle is completely baffling to me.
I suspect her lifestyle is completely baffling to her too.
Sensible Katie!
I hope the van can handle 2000 miles of below 0 temperatures.
how have you not listened to a full triggerpod ep? Francis talks plenty and has his own podcast too. Hasan glazing the CCP was such a joke.
Seriously, I’m not being glib when I say K&J should listen to the episode they did on Maduro a few weeks ago. It might make them start to see things a bit differently.
Piker does strike me as a truly odious individual….and a moron.
It also strikes me that a huge problem with world is that extremist idiots of all stripes, who pre internet would have ranted to a hall of six people, now have audiences of six figures & up.
If Katie had ever heard Konstantin’s podcasting partner speak, she might have had a better take on Venezuela
*badum tss*
Hasan outright says he's a campist against the US, and is surprised when they take away his expedited passport privileges? He's like someone who writes the Gulag Archipelago and The Revolution Betrayed in one book and thinks, what, Soviet leadership will exalt him as a model citizen and not think he's a massive pain in the ass who should be muzzled? I mean it's very ironic when he expects free speech but is totally cool with every regime that condemns the concept. What a clown