WEBVTT - generated with AI 00:00:00.519 --> 00:00:03.299 Something is changing in our country, and most 00:00:03.299 --> 00:00:11.519 people feel it before they can explain it. Today's 00:00:11.519 --> 00:00:13.939 guest is David Korn. David is one of the country's 00:00:13.939 --> 00:00:16.379 best -known political journalists and a longtime 00:00:16.379 --> 00:00:18.920 Washington reporter who has covered presidents, 00:00:19.140 --> 00:00:21.739 scandals, national security, and the rise of 00:00:21.739 --> 00:00:24.239 the modern right for decades. He's now the Washington 00:00:24.239 --> 00:00:26.690 bureau chief for Mother Jones. And his reporting 00:00:26.690 --> 00:00:28.809 is consistently focused on power, corruption, 00:00:29.050 --> 00:00:31.809 disinformation, and the health of American democracy. 00:00:32.049 --> 00:00:34.609 So, David, welcome to the podcast. Good to be 00:00:34.609 --> 00:00:37.369 with you, John. Yeah, it's good to see you. God, 00:00:37.490 --> 00:00:39.170 it's a crazy time and there's almost too much 00:00:39.170 --> 00:00:42.609 to talk about. But let me start with some of 00:00:42.609 --> 00:00:44.270 the stuff you've written about lately. You've 00:00:44.270 --> 00:00:46.310 been writing about the schisms in Maga land for 00:00:46.310 --> 00:00:50.429 a while. And so what has been the impact of the 00:00:50.429 --> 00:00:54.880 Iran war on these various Maga? Because I see 00:00:54.880 --> 00:00:58.280 like various odd conspiracies being spread by 00:00:58.280 --> 00:01:00.420 folks like Nick Fuentes and Candace Owens and 00:01:00.420 --> 00:01:04.379 Tucker Carlson, Mark Levin, Laura Loomer, you 00:01:04.379 --> 00:01:06.379 know, Megyn Kelly, Joe Kent, all this kind of 00:01:06.379 --> 00:01:09.019 stuff. And a lot of them seem to have changed 00:01:09.019 --> 00:01:10.939 and are turning in different ways. What do you 00:01:10.939 --> 00:01:13.640 see happening based on what's happening in Iran? 00:01:13.700 --> 00:01:16.959 You do not have the time to get a full explanation 00:01:16.959 --> 00:01:20.680 of what's going on in Magalan on this. But there 00:01:20.680 --> 00:01:25.120 are cross, you know, I say that movements often 00:01:25.120 --> 00:01:28.140 end up with circular firing squads. We know that 00:01:28.140 --> 00:01:30.019 in the past, movements of the right, movements 00:01:30.019 --> 00:01:32.879 of the left. This has turned into a Mobius strip 00:01:32.879 --> 00:01:37.500 of firing squad with incoming and outgoing coming 00:01:37.500 --> 00:01:39.700 from all across different directions in Trump 00:01:39.700 --> 00:01:45.239 land. And you see people like Mark Levin, the 00:01:45.239 --> 00:01:50.069 Fox News host, who's very pro -Iranian war. and 00:01:50.069 --> 00:01:52.469 very pro -Israel and attacking Lebanon and all 00:01:52.469 --> 00:01:54.750 that, you know, getting into a fight with Megyn 00:01:54.750 --> 00:01:57.390 Kelly, who campaigned for Trump. I mean, she 00:01:57.390 --> 00:02:00.250 went to campaign rallies and spoke for Trump, 00:02:00.370 --> 00:02:05.150 who's now opposed to the war in Iran. And they've 00:02:05.150 --> 00:02:08.030 got to the point where she was making fun of 00:02:08.030 --> 00:02:11.229 the size of his penis, and he was literally calling 00:02:11.229 --> 00:02:16.930 her a slut. I mean, I'm not characterizing, I'm 00:02:16.930 --> 00:02:20.580 quoting. This is how vicious it's gotten. Tucker 00:02:20.580 --> 00:02:23.219 Carlson has kind of led the way. And we saw this 00:02:23.219 --> 00:02:26.280 before the Iran war broke out. You might remember 00:02:26.280 --> 00:02:31.020 last year, he got into a tiff with Ted Cruz, 00:02:31.139 --> 00:02:35.560 in which he had Nick Fuentes, who's a white nationalist, 00:02:35.699 --> 00:02:39.139 Hitler fanboy, far right figure, on his show 00:02:39.139 --> 00:02:42.819 and was talking to him respectfully. And Ted 00:02:42.819 --> 00:02:46.039 Cruz then... said you know that was wrong to 00:02:46.039 --> 00:02:49.919 do he was platforming an anti -semite and and 00:02:49.919 --> 00:02:52.439 um tucker you know attacked him for being a pro 00:02:52.439 --> 00:02:55.159 -israeli warmonger so you saw the split kind 00:02:55.159 --> 00:02:58.539 of beginning between american firsters who are 00:02:58.539 --> 00:03:02.139 anti -israel in terms of the current regime and 00:03:02.139 --> 00:03:05.080 what's happened in the last few years and pro 00:03:05.080 --> 00:03:09.219 -israel hawks who are you know maggot types and 00:03:09.219 --> 00:03:11.379 so this tension has been building and the iran 00:03:11.379 --> 00:03:15.539 war seems to have just burst it wide open, where 00:03:15.539 --> 00:03:18.300 you now have Tucker breaking with the president 00:03:18.300 --> 00:03:21.060 and saying, even accusing the president of maybe 00:03:21.060 --> 00:03:25.719 suggesting that he was literally the Antichrist, 00:03:25.819 --> 00:03:28.719 that he wouldn't put his hand on the Bible when 00:03:28.719 --> 00:03:32.919 he was inaugurated in 2025, a year ago, because 00:03:32.919 --> 00:03:36.740 he feared something about doing that, and that 00:03:36.740 --> 00:03:39.780 he's working with the neocons and Mark Levin 00:03:39.780 --> 00:03:44.020 to... basically set up a nuclear war against 00:03:44.020 --> 00:03:47.759 Iran. And he has a whole conspiracy theory about 00:03:47.759 --> 00:03:50.639 that, while at the same time making a moral argument 00:03:50.639 --> 00:03:53.340 that people on the left and middle and others 00:03:53.340 --> 00:03:55.960 who you agree with, that Trump's remarks about 00:03:55.960 --> 00:03:58.659 destroying civilization, particularly putting 00:03:58.659 --> 00:04:01.159 them out on Easter Sunday, the holiest day of 00:04:01.159 --> 00:04:04.780 Christianity, are profoundly anti -Christian, 00:04:04.979 --> 00:04:08.289 immoral, and anti -American. So, you know, with 00:04:08.289 --> 00:04:10.370 Tucker, you have him making an argument that 00:04:10.370 --> 00:04:13.229 will resonate with a lot of people of all political 00:04:13.229 --> 00:04:15.729 stripes and moral grounds, and at the same time 00:04:15.729 --> 00:04:19.589 promoting this very bizarre theological conspiracy 00:04:19.589 --> 00:04:23.310 theory, which he's suggesting Trump is the anti 00:04:23.310 --> 00:04:26.649 -Christ. And then you have people like Laura 00:04:26.649 --> 00:04:29.850 Loomer. who's now attacking Tucker Carlson for 00:04:29.850 --> 00:04:32.829 his attacks on Donald Trump. You have Roger Stone 00:04:32.829 --> 00:04:35.550 and Laura Loomer feuding with each other. You 00:04:35.550 --> 00:04:37.790 know, Bannon seems to be feuding with a bunch 00:04:37.790 --> 00:04:40.110 of different people as well. I mean, I wrote 00:04:40.110 --> 00:04:42.230 about this in my newsletter, Our Land, which 00:04:42.230 --> 00:04:45.550 people can subscribe to at davidcorn .com. But 00:04:45.550 --> 00:04:48.490 I only just did a small piece of it because it 00:04:48.490 --> 00:04:51.430 really would take thousands of words. I mean, 00:04:51.490 --> 00:04:55.269 this is a wire diagram that not even Carrie Matheson. 00:04:56.160 --> 00:04:59.339 The Homeland Show could figure out how to set 00:04:59.339 --> 00:05:02.120 up. But yes, it's happening. It's real. It's 00:05:02.120 --> 00:05:05.959 not going away. I think this is, you know, bad 00:05:05.959 --> 00:05:08.600 news for Trump and the Republicans. I'm not sure 00:05:08.600 --> 00:05:10.920 it's going to have a direct impact on the midterms, 00:05:10.920 --> 00:05:13.699 but it shows that this movement, and if you're 00:05:13.699 --> 00:05:16.939 thinking about 2028 or, you know, Trump's support. 00:05:17.399 --> 00:05:19.680 over the next few months as he tries to figure 00:05:19.680 --> 00:05:21.839 out what to do with this dumb war he started, 00:05:22.100 --> 00:05:26.279 it's going to impact that. There will be consequences. 00:05:26.779 --> 00:05:30.240 And also, I didn't mention Candace Owens, who 00:05:30.240 --> 00:05:34.860 broke with the Daily Wire, Ben Shapiro, anti 00:05:34.860 --> 00:05:37.360 -war, but now she's feuding with Erica Kirk, 00:05:37.500 --> 00:05:41.319 Charlie Kirk's widow, believing... saying that 00:05:41.319 --> 00:05:43.899 there's a conspiracy to kill him that came from 00:05:43.899 --> 00:05:45.339 the U .S. government, the Israeli government, 00:05:45.560 --> 00:05:47.240 the Egyptian government, the French government. 00:05:47.480 --> 00:05:49.839 And then, by the way, Macron's wife is really 00:05:49.839 --> 00:05:54.060 a man. But she has 7 million viewers of her YouTube 00:05:54.060 --> 00:05:57.680 show. So a lot of this is, you know, these folks 00:05:57.680 --> 00:06:00.540 are all wrestling with each other to lead the 00:06:00.540 --> 00:06:02.680 conservative movement, but also to make money 00:06:02.680 --> 00:06:05.639 with expanding their audience. They're competing 00:06:05.639 --> 00:06:10.110 with each other for audience. And also, I think, 00:06:10.110 --> 00:06:11.509 for influence for what's going to happen down 00:06:11.509 --> 00:06:13.870 the road in the 2028 election. Is Trump weighing 00:06:13.870 --> 00:06:17.149 in on either side? What's he trying to do here? 00:06:17.269 --> 00:06:20.209 Is he sort of ignoring them now? I think he's 00:06:20.209 --> 00:06:23.769 a little busy at the moment. I mean, I'm sure 00:06:23.769 --> 00:06:27.269 he's paying somewhat attention, but he hasn't 00:06:27.269 --> 00:06:34.149 yet taken on Tucker, who I think is... His turn 00:06:34.149 --> 00:06:37.149 on Trump is the most significant. After him, 00:06:37.170 --> 00:06:40.930 Megyn Kelly. After her, then maybe Candace Owens. 00:06:41.389 --> 00:06:44.410 But he and Tucker are friends. They've talked 00:06:44.410 --> 00:06:47.430 a lot together. They used to play golf together. 00:06:48.110 --> 00:06:52.569 And Trump has not yet addressed Tucker turning 00:06:52.569 --> 00:06:54.250 on him, which happened just a couple days ago. 00:06:54.290 --> 00:06:58.529 He may get around to it. And certainly Laura 00:06:58.529 --> 00:07:02.360 Loomer is out there on his behalf. But he hasn't 00:07:02.360 --> 00:07:04.879 really weighed in on all this. He's too busy 00:07:04.879 --> 00:07:07.500 trying to figure out how to set up a toll booth 00:07:07.500 --> 00:07:12.300 in the Strait of Hormuz and share millions and 00:07:12.300 --> 00:07:14.639 billions of dollars with the Iranian regime that 00:07:14.639 --> 00:07:19.459 he wanted to destroy a few days ago. So he hasn't 00:07:19.459 --> 00:07:23.399 weighed in yet. But I think this stuff is not 00:07:23.399 --> 00:07:25.860 going to be patched up easily. It's going to 00:07:25.860 --> 00:07:30.139 get exacerbated. particularly as Trump goes down 00:07:30.139 --> 00:07:35.000 in the polls and Republicans keep losing elections. 00:07:36.220 --> 00:07:45.220 So it's a very real, confusing dynamic that may 00:07:45.220 --> 00:07:48.019 bounce in a couple of different and odd directions 00:07:48.019 --> 00:07:51.980 over the next couple of days, weeks, and months. 00:07:52.300 --> 00:07:55.410 That goes to a bigger question then. as we look 00:07:55.410 --> 00:07:58.449 towards 2028, is MAGA more than Donald Trump? 00:07:58.829 --> 00:08:01.509 It's not clear that MAGA is consistent ideology 00:08:01.509 --> 00:08:04.750 or a set of policies, aside from cruelty, perhaps. 00:08:05.189 --> 00:08:08.449 And RFK Jr., for example, anti -vax, that wasn't 00:08:08.449 --> 00:08:10.410 part of the core belief in Trump 1. Like, so 00:08:10.410 --> 00:08:13.529 yeah, what, is it more, what's MAGA? That's a 00:08:13.529 --> 00:08:15.230 really good question. And I think that's what 00:08:15.230 --> 00:08:18.250 part of this fight is about. What is MAGA? I 00:08:18.250 --> 00:08:21.189 mean, I think it tends to be a personality cult. 00:08:22.110 --> 00:08:25.029 It's a movement led by a demagogue. We've seen 00:08:25.029 --> 00:08:27.970 in the past, Farther Coughlin, Huey Long, others. 00:08:28.589 --> 00:08:30.870 And, you know, if you look at the polling, you 00:08:30.870 --> 00:08:33.389 know, one of the key principles of MAGA seemed 00:08:33.389 --> 00:08:38.370 to be America first and sort of isolationism 00:08:38.370 --> 00:08:41.129 and no forever wars. And, you know, all the talk 00:08:41.129 --> 00:08:43.110 that he's the president of peace. And if you 00:08:43.110 --> 00:08:45.490 vote for Kamala Harris, you will be in a war 00:08:45.490 --> 00:08:47.759 and your sons will be drafted. Well, the interesting 00:08:47.759 --> 00:08:50.720 thing is, and I just wrote about some of this, 00:08:50.799 --> 00:08:54.559 that the polls in the last couple of weeks show 00:08:54.559 --> 00:08:59.419 that MAGA Republicans, people who identify as 00:08:59.419 --> 00:09:02.360 being MAGA Republicans, are still highly supportive 00:09:02.360 --> 00:09:06.940 of the war, 70 to 80 percent. People who call 00:09:06.940 --> 00:09:10.679 themselves non -MAGA Republicans started at 70, 00:09:10.779 --> 00:09:14.070 but they're now closer to 50. supporting the 00:09:14.070 --> 00:09:16.850 war. So the traditional Republicans are peeling 00:09:16.850 --> 00:09:21.129 off faster than the so -called MAGA Republicans 00:09:21.129 --> 00:09:28.090 who before seemed to be supporters of an America 00:09:28.090 --> 00:09:31.850 First position. So you're seeing the split that 00:09:31.850 --> 00:09:34.289 we're talking about, this divide. There seems 00:09:34.289 --> 00:09:35.809 to be a little bit of divide between what you 00:09:35.809 --> 00:09:39.529 might call America Firsters, isolationists, and 00:09:39.529 --> 00:09:44.259 MAGA people who are basically You know, whatever 00:09:44.259 --> 00:09:47.940 he decides to do is fine. Now, these are vast 00:09:47.940 --> 00:09:51.940 generalizations, but we do see, you know, so 00:09:51.940 --> 00:09:55.840 I think in some ways, MAGA remains, was, remains 00:09:55.840 --> 00:09:58.659 a political cult and will do whatever, follow 00:09:58.659 --> 00:10:01.899 Trump in any which way. But as he veers to these 00:10:01.899 --> 00:10:05.399 extremes, he's going to lose people along the 00:10:05.399 --> 00:10:08.039 edges of that. And that's what's happening with, 00:10:08.100 --> 00:10:11.159 you know, think of an ice flow with a huge chunk. 00:10:11.909 --> 00:10:13.990 Breaking off. That's the kind of what just happened 00:10:13.990 --> 00:10:16.970 with Tucker Carlson. And we'll see to what degree 00:10:16.970 --> 00:10:19.289 this continues. It seems like it's going to make 00:10:19.289 --> 00:10:21.129 it hard for someone like J .D. Vance who wants 00:10:21.129 --> 00:10:24.950 to become the MAGA person going forward. It's 00:10:24.950 --> 00:10:28.490 not clear what MAGA is and what is the next person 00:10:28.490 --> 00:10:30.389 who wants to take up that mantle do. Because 00:10:30.389 --> 00:10:32.509 it's hard for me to imagine that people are going 00:10:32.509 --> 00:10:35.269 to, the real hardcore MAGA people are going to 00:10:35.269 --> 00:10:37.149 say, yeah, J .D. Vance is exactly what we want. 00:10:37.570 --> 00:10:39.970 I mean, that's exactly right. I mean, it's so 00:10:39.970 --> 00:10:44.139 keyed into Trump. The idea that J .D. Vance could 00:10:44.139 --> 00:10:48.840 just inherit this I think was always problematic. 00:10:49.639 --> 00:10:53.299 And now it's, I think, going to be more difficult 00:10:53.299 --> 00:10:56.259 because what there is to inherit is going to 00:10:56.259 --> 00:11:01.820 be divided and split up. And if you saw the story 00:11:01.820 --> 00:11:04.679 in the New York Times a couple of days ago about 00:11:04.679 --> 00:11:08.620 the inside run -up to the war, I mean, you know. 00:11:08.860 --> 00:11:11.120 It looked like it was planted by J .D. Vance. 00:11:11.179 --> 00:11:13.899 Yeah, exactly. All the deliberations before the 00:11:13.899 --> 00:11:16.700 war. He's the one raising the skeptical questions 00:11:16.700 --> 00:11:19.159 and warning about what could go wrong. And it 00:11:19.159 --> 00:11:21.320 seemed to be that he was positioning himself 00:11:21.320 --> 00:11:24.480 to be able to say kind of like, well, I told 00:11:24.480 --> 00:11:28.470 you so. I was loyal to Trump. But I gave my expert 00:11:28.470 --> 00:11:30.370 opinion that this wasn't a good thing to do. 00:11:30.509 --> 00:11:32.610 That's very early to turn against Trump because 00:11:32.610 --> 00:11:36.210 he'll then try to destroy J .D. Vance. He's kind 00:11:36.210 --> 00:11:38.730 of laying down a marker so that he can point 00:11:38.730 --> 00:11:43.049 to this later when Marco Rubio presumably won't 00:11:43.049 --> 00:11:47.710 be able to. But you still have Vance, you know, 00:11:47.730 --> 00:11:52.110 officially in favor of the war, coming out and 00:11:52.110 --> 00:11:54.789 saying that publicly, not quitting over this. 00:11:55.450 --> 00:11:59.690 Joe Kent did. And Marco Rubio, obviously in favor 00:11:59.690 --> 00:12:02.409 of this. So there's no, you know, so the one 00:12:02.409 --> 00:12:04.429 question you might want to ask, I really don't 00:12:04.429 --> 00:12:07.610 like thinking about 2028 too soon here. There's 00:12:07.610 --> 00:12:09.730 a lot to happen and probably three more wars 00:12:09.730 --> 00:12:14.250 between now and then. That, you know, who's the 00:12:14.250 --> 00:12:21.149 anti -war candidate in, you know, going for the 00:12:21.149 --> 00:12:25.350 MAGA slash American first? constituency within 00:12:25.350 --> 00:12:29.809 the Republican Party. Some people think that 00:12:29.809 --> 00:12:31.549 actually Tucker Carlson wants to run for president. 00:12:31.629 --> 00:12:33.730 I don't think that's true. I do think he's a 00:12:33.730 --> 00:12:37.429 little too much of a weenie to be a good national 00:12:37.429 --> 00:12:44.409 candidate. But that lane seems open at the moment, 00:12:44.509 --> 00:12:46.850 and I don't think J .D. Vance can inherit it 00:12:46.850 --> 00:12:50.909 unless there's a true break, a very public break 00:12:50.909 --> 00:12:53.490 with Trump, which would be very dangerous for 00:12:53.490 --> 00:12:56.100 him. Yeah, yeah, for sure. So tell me a little 00:12:56.100 --> 00:12:58.799 bit, you've written a lot about Kash Patel. What 00:12:58.799 --> 00:13:01.200 should we know about his stewardship of the FBI 00:13:01.200 --> 00:13:03.799 and where the FBI stands and morale and the FBI 00:13:03.799 --> 00:13:06.220 and all those things? I mean, everything I've 00:13:06.220 --> 00:13:08.720 heard and what's been written about Julian Barnes 00:13:08.720 --> 00:13:10.299 and other people at the New York Times have done 00:13:10.299 --> 00:13:13.710 good stories about. Kash Patel, is that morale 00:13:13.710 --> 00:13:16.769 is just awful there. They've moved so many people 00:13:16.769 --> 00:13:19.669 from the work they do and what they're passionate 00:13:19.669 --> 00:13:23.149 about to immigration and street crime. So you 00:13:23.149 --> 00:13:26.830 have counterterrorism, counterintelligence, money 00:13:26.830 --> 00:13:29.950 laundering, crypto crimes, foreign influence, 00:13:30.269 --> 00:13:33.350 all these other things that the FBI does being 00:13:33.350 --> 00:13:36.720 tremendously short -shifted. In fact, There's 00:13:36.720 --> 00:13:38.639 a story that came out just the other day that 00:13:38.639 --> 00:13:41.779 there's a counterintelligence unit called CI 00:13:41.779 --> 00:13:47.120 -12, which has like 20, 30 people in it. And 00:13:47.120 --> 00:13:49.899 like half of them were just fired or cut or moved 00:13:49.899 --> 00:13:53.700 to something else. And they're in charge of counterterrorism 00:13:53.700 --> 00:13:58.460 operations involving Iran. So if we think Iran 00:13:58.460 --> 00:14:01.759 might want to hit back in asymmetrical ways, 00:14:02.059 --> 00:14:05.279 the FBI unit that's supposed to work on that 00:14:05.279 --> 00:14:13.220 has... just been decimated. And also, think about 00:14:13.220 --> 00:14:18.360 it this way, John. If you're an FBI agent, and 00:14:18.360 --> 00:14:20.879 I have a lot of respect for FBI agents, and I've 00:14:20.879 --> 00:14:22.600 been very critical of the national security state 00:14:22.600 --> 00:14:25.320 at times in my career, but I understand the important 00:14:25.320 --> 00:14:28.340 work that they do. But if you're an FBI agent 00:14:28.340 --> 00:14:31.799 and someone comes to you and they say, I got 00:14:31.799 --> 00:14:33.779 this great insider trading or cryptocurrency. 00:14:35.470 --> 00:14:38.129 of scam, you know, $20 million stolen, whatever. 00:14:38.629 --> 00:14:40.870 And here I have got all the memos. I got the 00:14:40.870 --> 00:14:43.889 emails. I even got some transcripts and they 00:14:43.889 --> 00:14:46.750 hand it to you. You go, okay, what's the first 00:14:46.750 --> 00:14:49.070 thing you're going to do? First thing you're 00:14:49.070 --> 00:14:50.549 going to do is going to Google the name of that 00:14:50.549 --> 00:14:54.129 person. And then you're going to see, oh, he 00:14:54.129 --> 00:14:57.769 attended an event at Mar -a -Lago. And you won't 00:14:57.769 --> 00:15:01.590 even tell your supervisor that you got this package. 00:15:02.440 --> 00:15:04.879 You would just, no, no, no, give me a drug lord 00:15:04.879 --> 00:15:08.019 to go after. And I understand it. You've been 00:15:08.019 --> 00:15:10.220 there 10, 15 years. You're looking at retirement. 00:15:10.360 --> 00:15:13.120 You have two kids going off to college. You know 00:15:13.120 --> 00:15:17.320 if you even raise the issue of this that you 00:15:17.320 --> 00:15:21.320 will likely be demoted, transferred, or fired. 00:15:22.100 --> 00:15:26.639 So I'm just thinking that there's all these guys, 00:15:26.799 --> 00:15:31.120 cronies, Republican donors, members of Trump's 00:15:31.120 --> 00:15:34.659 own family. that they all get out of jail free 00:15:34.659 --> 00:15:37.320 courts. They can do whatever they like, and not 00:15:37.320 --> 00:15:43.019 just the FBI, SEC, the FTC, Department of Justice, 00:15:43.320 --> 00:15:48.559 ATF, DEA, you know, Pentagon inspectors general. 00:15:48.779 --> 00:15:50.720 You know, they're all going to, no one's going 00:15:50.720 --> 00:15:54.899 to take on anything that crosses, you know, that 00:15:54.899 --> 00:15:58.000 has a connection to Trump or the Republican Party. 00:15:58.759 --> 00:16:03.179 So I think they all realize that. And the one 00:16:03.179 --> 00:16:05.159 thing, you know, one story that I wrote about 00:16:05.159 --> 00:16:10.379 Kash Patel that got some attention, but not when 00:16:10.379 --> 00:16:13.580 he came up for his nomination, that I'm very 00:16:13.580 --> 00:16:17.159 proud of, is that my colleague Dan Friedman, 00:16:17.179 --> 00:16:19.980 Mother Jones and myself, discovered that he had 00:16:19.980 --> 00:16:23.860 received a $25 ,000 payment for being part of 00:16:23.860 --> 00:16:27.879 this documentary series called... all the president's 00:16:27.879 --> 00:16:29.919 men. It was all about the deep state conspiracy 00:16:29.919 --> 00:16:33.360 against Donald Trump. And he was an executive 00:16:33.360 --> 00:16:35.460 producer. He was the feature of one of the six 00:16:35.460 --> 00:16:39.820 episodes. In it, he says, the FBI and CIA knew, 00:16:40.080 --> 00:16:43.759 says this, knew there was no Russian interference 00:16:43.759 --> 00:16:46.600 in the 2016 election. And they chinned this all 00:16:46.600 --> 00:16:49.320 up and they're all crooked and corrupt. He worked 00:16:49.320 --> 00:16:51.720 for Devin Nunes in the House Intelligence Committee. 00:16:51.879 --> 00:16:54.620 And even though they said that Putin wasn't trying 00:16:54.620 --> 00:16:57.730 to help Trump, They did say that Russia intervened. 00:16:57.809 --> 00:17:00.070 They did put out a report saying there was a 00:17:00.070 --> 00:17:02.250 Russian attack in the 2016 election. And here 00:17:02.250 --> 00:17:05.089 you're saying, no, they all made that up. And 00:17:05.089 --> 00:17:09.730 so he was paid $25 ,000 to be in this series 00:17:09.730 --> 00:17:12.369 and be executive producer. Who, you might ask, 00:17:12.450 --> 00:17:16.349 made this series? A Russian -Ukrainian -American 00:17:16.349 --> 00:17:20.809 filmmaker named Igor Lopatonic. He lives in a 00:17:20.809 --> 00:17:23.150 very nice house in Beverly Hills. I knocked on 00:17:23.150 --> 00:17:27.420 the door once. and um he produces films that 00:17:27.420 --> 00:17:30.720 are russian talking points uh anti -ukrainian 00:17:30.720 --> 00:17:34.220 films poor kazakhstan dictators uh he's been 00:17:34.220 --> 00:17:35.920 doing this for a bunch of years sometimes he 00:17:35.920 --> 00:17:37.880 works with oliver stone the famous film director 00:17:37.880 --> 00:17:43.059 who's a putin fan um and he's also a kremlin 00:17:43.059 --> 00:17:46.900 connected propagandist a few years ago after 00:17:46.900 --> 00:17:51.519 the war in ukraine started um they created this 00:17:51.519 --> 00:17:55.460 program in russia called to Russia with love. 00:17:55.619 --> 00:17:59.099 It was trying to encourage people in the West 00:17:59.099 --> 00:18:04.779 to move to Russia. They had a contest with bloggers 00:18:04.779 --> 00:18:08.960 and video content creators to produce the best 00:18:08.960 --> 00:18:12.019 content that would make people want to leave 00:18:12.019 --> 00:18:15.680 the West and move to Russia. This was funded 00:18:15.680 --> 00:18:21.680 in part by Vladimir Putin's office. Igor Lopatonic. 00:18:22.480 --> 00:18:26.500 who gave Kash Patel $25 ,000. This is all on 00:18:26.500 --> 00:18:30.460 Kash Patel's financial disclosure form. He was 00:18:30.460 --> 00:18:34.279 the honorary chairman of the judging board for 00:18:34.279 --> 00:18:38.519 that project. So he worked for a Kremlin -supported 00:18:38.519 --> 00:18:43.400 propaganda outfit, and he's giving the head of 00:18:43.400 --> 00:18:48.500 the FBI $25 ,000. I asked him where he got the 00:18:48.500 --> 00:18:51.200 funding for his project. For that money, he also 00:18:51.200 --> 00:18:54.079 gave $100 ,000 to Rudy Giuliani and maybe to 00:18:54.079 --> 00:18:57.059 others who were involved. And he refused to tell 00:18:57.059 --> 00:19:00.039 me. He chased me off away from his front step. 00:19:00.980 --> 00:19:04.420 So, I mean, to me, this is kind of mind -bending, 00:19:04.440 --> 00:19:07.859 should -be -front -page news that a Kremlin -connected 00:19:07.859 --> 00:19:10.599 propagandist gave the FBI director $25 ,000. 00:19:11.299 --> 00:19:15.480 And yet, I'm sure this is the first time you 00:19:15.480 --> 00:19:17.960 and a lot of the listeners are even hearing about 00:19:17.960 --> 00:19:20.890 this. Well, and the FBI should be investigating 00:19:20.890 --> 00:19:22.809 people like that. You know, they're not doing 00:19:22.809 --> 00:19:25.430 it. And your point's a good one about how the 00:19:25.430 --> 00:19:27.990 FBI, DOJ and these places aren't looking into 00:19:27.990 --> 00:19:29.130 things because they know they're going to get 00:19:29.130 --> 00:19:32.250 attacked. That's what Trump learned. If you reach 00:19:32.250 --> 00:19:34.210 down in the bureaucracy and you attack individuals, 00:19:34.589 --> 00:19:37.109 you attack these organizations, they're going 00:19:37.109 --> 00:19:39.930 to back off. And, you know, it's unfortunate. 00:19:40.109 --> 00:19:43.930 And, you know, some people have the strength 00:19:43.930 --> 00:19:49.200 to fight back, but then they get... cut off and 00:19:49.200 --> 00:19:51.940 so let me tell you about because i'm running 00:19:51.940 --> 00:19:53.839 into this all the time because i'm working on 00:19:53.839 --> 00:19:57.119 a a book just finishing it up it's called how 00:19:57.119 --> 00:20:01.740 russia won and it's about how um you know the 00:20:01.740 --> 00:20:04.059 fight over what happened in 2016 and afterwards 00:20:04.059 --> 00:20:06.200 you know how trump kind of won that messaging 00:20:06.200 --> 00:20:08.339 fight about russia russia russia it's a hoax 00:20:08.339 --> 00:20:11.119 it's a witch hunt you know and the democrats 00:20:11.119 --> 00:20:13.890 and the media kind of dropped the issue And the 00:20:13.890 --> 00:20:16.829 book also covers how after 2016 and every election 00:20:16.829 --> 00:20:19.269 since then, Russia has intervened once again 00:20:19.269 --> 00:20:24.029 to help Republicans or to help Trump. And that 00:20:24.029 --> 00:20:26.470 also is unknown. But so in the course of doing 00:20:26.470 --> 00:20:29.869 this book, I've been reaching out to people who 00:20:29.869 --> 00:20:38.019 recently left the IA, the FBI, INR, state. to 00:20:38.019 --> 00:20:40.660 talk to me about what they've seen and what's 00:20:40.660 --> 00:20:42.599 happened to them, their jobs and their agencies. 00:20:43.259 --> 00:20:47.460 And it's always hard to talk to people in the 00:20:47.460 --> 00:20:49.700 national security world. I'm a journalist. I've 00:20:49.700 --> 00:20:51.119 written a bunch of books on national security. 00:20:51.440 --> 00:20:54.000 And it's always hard to find people inside or 00:20:54.000 --> 00:20:56.980 who weren't inside even to talk. It got easier 00:20:56.980 --> 00:21:01.880 after, you know, in the last 20 years. But in 00:21:01.880 --> 00:21:05.039 this project, it got much harder once again. 00:21:06.779 --> 00:21:09.160 I would go to people's homes. I'd get people 00:21:09.160 --> 00:21:12.799 to, you know, phone numbers. They have people, 00:21:12.940 --> 00:21:15.380 mutual acquaintances and friends and contacts 00:21:15.380 --> 00:21:19.000 to reach out for people, people for me. And people 00:21:19.000 --> 00:21:21.940 are scared to talk because they see that Trump, 00:21:21.980 --> 00:21:24.720 you're right. He goes low into the low levels 00:21:24.720 --> 00:21:27.759 or mid levels and he names people, calls out 00:21:27.759 --> 00:21:30.079 people by name. If they're working for a company, 00:21:30.220 --> 00:21:33.259 he calls out the company and he says, that person 00:21:33.259 --> 00:21:35.339 shouldn't be working for you. If you have a government 00:21:35.339 --> 00:21:39.170 contract, you have to. worry about that i i i 00:21:39.170 --> 00:21:43.009 understand that i had one uh former colleague 00:21:43.009 --> 00:21:46.089 of yours probably at the cia was there for a 00:21:46.089 --> 00:21:50.089 long time this person left you know a couple 00:21:50.089 --> 00:21:53.230 years ago not too long ago has a lot of contacts 00:21:53.230 --> 00:21:56.450 there and i've asked them to you know introduce 00:21:56.450 --> 00:21:58.390 me and put me to people including people who've 00:21:58.390 --> 00:22:02.549 left and so far they've struck out they just 00:22:02.549 --> 00:22:04.390 they keep going to be they go you know people 00:22:04.390 --> 00:22:07.789 who still you know, want a career, want to find 00:22:07.789 --> 00:22:09.950 a job in the private sector or who might want 00:22:09.950 --> 00:22:11.990 to do contract work, which as you know, is a 00:22:11.990 --> 00:22:14.349 big deal. Once you leave an agency, a lot of 00:22:14.349 --> 00:22:16.069 people go back and they work on contract basis 00:22:16.069 --> 00:22:18.309 and they don't want their, you know, they don't, 00:22:18.309 --> 00:22:20.630 you know, I'm not going to, I won't name people 00:22:20.630 --> 00:22:23.650 in my book unless they want to, but they don't 00:22:23.650 --> 00:22:27.089 want to even take the risk of talking to a journalist, 00:22:27.109 --> 00:22:29.109 reporter, a book author. Now, if anyone listening 00:22:29.109 --> 00:22:33.950 does want to reach out to me. I'm at Signal at 00:22:33.950 --> 00:22:37.690 David Korn, with a C, David Korn 99. You can 00:22:37.690 --> 00:22:39.369 find me there. Let me ask a quick question on 00:22:39.369 --> 00:22:44.470 this issue. Since Trump, I would think that more 00:22:44.470 --> 00:22:48.130 people are willing to leak information. But you're 00:22:48.130 --> 00:22:50.529 talking about going to people, and it's going 00:22:50.529 --> 00:22:52.910 to be harder because they're worried about more 00:22:52.910 --> 00:22:56.589 people stepping out? I don't think there's—no, 00:22:56.710 --> 00:22:58.809 I've talked to other national security reporters 00:22:58.809 --> 00:23:01.759 at some of the major news organizations. And 00:23:01.759 --> 00:23:05.200 they are finding it harder to get sources from 00:23:05.200 --> 00:23:07.880 people, people who are in or people who were 00:23:07.880 --> 00:23:10.880 recently in. You know, a lot of national security 00:23:10.880 --> 00:23:13.420 reporting is based on people who were recently 00:23:13.420 --> 00:23:17.960 there inside. Not all of it, but a lot. And they 00:23:17.960 --> 00:23:20.440 just, you know, people are just wigged out. I 00:23:20.440 --> 00:23:22.700 mean, people are being subpoenaed. People are 00:23:22.700 --> 00:23:26.460 being subpoenaed for what they did with the intelligence 00:23:26.460 --> 00:23:29.660 community assessment about Trump and Russia from 00:23:29.660 --> 00:23:35.599 2016. It's now a decade later, and there's a 00:23:35.599 --> 00:23:40.200 grand jury in Florida subpoenaing Brennan, Clapper, 00:23:40.380 --> 00:23:46.859 and other people who worked on this thing. And 00:23:46.859 --> 00:23:50.539 that CIA person I just mentioned a moment ago, 00:23:50.660 --> 00:23:54.640 they told me when subpoenas are flying, people 00:23:54.640 --> 00:23:59.589 duck. They keep their heads down. And, you know, 00:23:59.589 --> 00:24:01.589 and Trump is just so vindictive. I mean, it used 00:24:01.589 --> 00:24:03.470 to be, I think, when you're out, you're out, 00:24:03.529 --> 00:24:06.950 you take chances. You're working for a consulting 00:24:06.950 --> 00:24:09.910 firm, a beltway bandit. No one knows what you're 00:24:09.910 --> 00:24:12.690 doing. It's fine. But now they're so vindictive. 00:24:12.690 --> 00:24:14.670 They come after you. They subpoena you. They 00:24:14.670 --> 00:24:17.670 do whatever. Then your boss calls you in or the 00:24:17.670 --> 00:24:19.849 person you're negotiating a contract with and 00:24:19.849 --> 00:24:22.150 says, what's up, John? You're in the news. We 00:24:22.150 --> 00:24:27.869 don't want people in the news. Let me ask about 00:24:27.869 --> 00:24:30.369 another person who's in sort of MAGA land who 00:24:30.369 --> 00:24:32.309 seems to be different. And you've written about 00:24:32.309 --> 00:24:35.170 him quite a bit. He's RFK Jr. He spreads conspiracy 00:24:35.170 --> 00:24:37.970 theories, obviously, about vaccines. And a lot 00:24:37.970 --> 00:24:40.250 of his lies have led to a lot of really bad public 00:24:40.250 --> 00:24:43.950 health consequences. So what's your take on him? 00:24:44.049 --> 00:24:46.150 I mean, in his confirmation hearings, he seemed 00:24:46.150 --> 00:24:48.990 to have made some specific promises to senators 00:24:48.990 --> 00:24:51.430 to get the job. And it seems like he's gone back 00:24:51.430 --> 00:24:54.130 on a number of those. Oh, yeah. I mean, he... 00:24:54.890 --> 00:24:58.950 You know, I knew Bobby back in the day. We weren't 00:24:58.950 --> 00:25:02.529 close friends. We had friends in common. And 00:25:02.529 --> 00:25:07.890 I saw him occasionally in New York in the 80s, 00:25:07.890 --> 00:25:15.069 I guess early 90s. And the guy, it sounds, you 00:25:15.069 --> 00:25:16.990 know, I don't want to sound partisan or mean, 00:25:17.049 --> 00:25:21.119 but he's a liar. He's a pathological liar. He 00:25:21.119 --> 00:25:23.440 says things, you know, it's like Trump in that 00:25:23.440 --> 00:25:26.799 way. What he says is very transactional. And 00:25:26.799 --> 00:25:28.980 when he was testifying before Congress, he lied 00:25:28.980 --> 00:25:31.720 again and again and again about his positions, 00:25:32.119 --> 00:25:34.319 what he believed, and also what he would do. 00:25:34.400 --> 00:25:40.299 He made all these assurances to the senators 00:25:40.299 --> 00:25:45.960 about what positions he would take and how he 00:25:45.960 --> 00:25:49.930 would handle his vaccine. He's not a vaccine 00:25:49.930 --> 00:25:53.069 skeptic. He's a vaccine opponent. And he's broken 00:25:53.069 --> 00:25:57.769 all those promises. And like he's cut back, you 00:25:57.769 --> 00:26:00.589 know, half a billion dollars in funding and MRNA 00:26:00.589 --> 00:26:03.829 research, which could lead to not just vaccines, 00:26:03.970 --> 00:26:06.769 but to treatments for cancer and other things. 00:26:06.930 --> 00:26:10.210 You know, he's just, you know, he's presided 00:26:10.210 --> 00:26:13.210 over the devastation of the NIH and the CDC. 00:26:14.170 --> 00:26:17.769 It's awful. And he is, I mean. You do a whole 00:26:17.769 --> 00:26:21.690 podcast on conspiracy theories. He is an out 00:26:21.690 --> 00:26:25.569 -of -touch conspiracy theorist, not just on vaccines, 00:26:25.809 --> 00:26:31.009 on so many other things, whether it's COVID or 00:26:31.009 --> 00:26:34.410 5G networks. I mean, again and again and again. 00:26:34.849 --> 00:26:39.250 He said the CIA killed his uncle. The CIA killed 00:26:39.250 --> 00:26:42.569 John Kennedy. And he's the only one in the family 00:26:42.569 --> 00:26:45.400 who believes that there was conspiracy. Behind 00:26:45.400 --> 00:26:47.819 the death of the assassination of his own father. 00:26:49.680 --> 00:26:53.619 So, you know, before, before, you know, the election, 00:26:53.779 --> 00:26:56.660 you know, I did a story about you don't know 00:26:56.660 --> 00:26:59.259 how crazy he is. And I took one of his conspiracy 00:26:59.259 --> 00:27:04.500 theories, which was that the CIA and others used 00:27:04.500 --> 00:27:08.789 COVID to. unleash an anti -democratic regime, 00:27:08.970 --> 00:27:11.589 and they had been planning to do this. They were 00:27:11.589 --> 00:27:14.589 waiting for a pandemic to happen. And his key 00:27:14.589 --> 00:27:19.769 thing was a war game that had been held in October 00:27:19.769 --> 00:27:23.650 2019, I believe, with a bunch of corporate executives, 00:27:23.970 --> 00:27:26.569 crisis management people, one or two government 00:27:26.569 --> 00:27:33.430 officials, and Avril Haines, who had been DNI. 00:27:34.960 --> 00:27:39.640 before this. And he was on this show, this podcast, 00:27:39.920 --> 00:27:43.180 Theo Vaughn, who's kind of a mini Joe Rogan. 00:27:43.339 --> 00:27:45.980 And he said, you don't have to listen to me. 00:27:46.279 --> 00:27:50.079 You can go, this thing is online. This is online. 00:27:50.460 --> 00:27:52.700 You can go and you can see how they have all 00:27:52.700 --> 00:27:57.460 these plans to exploit a pandemic to basically 00:27:57.460 --> 00:28:01.200 install an authoritarian one world government. 00:28:01.859 --> 00:28:05.460 And so I did what he asked. I went online and 00:28:05.460 --> 00:28:08.740 watched the damn thing. And nothing he said about 00:28:08.740 --> 00:28:12.220 it was true. I mean, you watch him on these podcasts 00:28:12.220 --> 00:28:16.660 and he'll cite reports, you know, YouTube videos 00:28:16.660 --> 00:28:19.099 and this event happened and that event happened. 00:28:19.200 --> 00:28:23.799 And like they all nod, Joe Rogan, oh, wow, you 00:28:23.799 --> 00:28:26.500 did your own research. If you go and look at 00:28:26.500 --> 00:28:31.720 any of those things, they never say what he says 00:28:31.720 --> 00:28:37.960 they say. I mean, not even close. So he's just 00:28:37.960 --> 00:28:42.079 making shit up. And, you know, of course, that 00:28:42.079 --> 00:28:44.339 doesn't bother Donald Trump because he does the 00:28:44.339 --> 00:28:47.599 same thing. And, you know, so we've had this, 00:28:47.700 --> 00:28:52.299 you know, the Lancet, you know, the medical journal 00:28:52.299 --> 00:28:56.119 came out with a story in an editorial actually 00:28:56.119 --> 00:28:59.960 in January saying that what, you know, Robert 00:28:59.960 --> 00:29:03.920 Kennedy has done in one year has been. such a 00:29:03.920 --> 00:29:08.960 threat, such injury to our public health system 00:29:08.960 --> 00:29:12.299 that millions of people will suffer the consequences 00:29:12.299 --> 00:29:17.700 in the years ahead. Oh, great. But this is happening 00:29:17.700 --> 00:29:21.900 on economy, national security, you know, the 00:29:21.900 --> 00:29:24.400 devastation is really something. But you're an 00:29:24.400 --> 00:29:25.980 expert and you've been doing this forever with 00:29:25.980 --> 00:29:29.859 the media. What's your take on, has the media 00:29:29.859 --> 00:29:32.700 and reporters done a good job on? reporting on 00:29:32.700 --> 00:29:34.480 Trump? And then even the bigger question is, 00:29:34.519 --> 00:29:37.359 what's the state of the media now that Paramount 00:29:37.359 --> 00:29:40.579 and CBS and more people moving to Substack and 00:29:40.579 --> 00:29:42.980 stuff, what's happening and what's the impact 00:29:42.980 --> 00:29:46.099 of it? You know, there's a New Yorker cartoon. 00:29:46.259 --> 00:29:49.160 It's one of my favorite cartoons from many, many 00:29:49.160 --> 00:29:53.420 years ago. And it shows Charles Dickens, you 00:29:53.420 --> 00:29:56.319 know, in a desk and he's sitting at the desk 00:29:56.319 --> 00:29:58.940 of his editor. He's like, editor. And he's like, 00:29:59.000 --> 00:30:00.500 he's handing in, you know, there's a manuscript 00:30:00.500 --> 00:30:04.619 sitting on the desk. And it actually says copy 00:30:04.619 --> 00:30:07.460 editor. And the copy editor says, now, surely, 00:30:07.599 --> 00:30:11.099 Mr. Dickens, it could not have been both the 00:30:11.099 --> 00:30:17.079 best of times. I feel like there's been a lot 00:30:17.079 --> 00:30:19.539 of really good journalism in the last year covering 00:30:19.539 --> 00:30:23.019 Trump. And a lot of things have not gone well 00:30:23.019 --> 00:30:28.309 in journalism. most fundamental level, there 00:30:28.309 --> 00:30:31.210 are literally not enough journalists to cover 00:30:31.210 --> 00:30:34.650 everything that's happening. I mean, all, you 00:30:34.650 --> 00:30:36.849 know, the assault on, you know, every federal 00:30:36.849 --> 00:30:40.349 agency, whether it's UID, the Consumer Protection 00:30:40.349 --> 00:30:43.430 Financial, Consumer Finance Protection Board, 00:30:43.690 --> 00:30:48.789 USDA, FHA. I mean, today I saw, you know, I haven't 00:30:48.789 --> 00:30:50.509 checked. I don't know if it's true that Trump 00:30:50.509 --> 00:30:53.869 is. going to eliminate the U .S. Forest Service. 00:30:54.150 --> 00:30:55.789 I mean, there literally are all the, you know, 00:30:55.789 --> 00:30:58.569 what's happened at EPA. All these are gigantic 00:30:58.569 --> 00:31:01.809 stories that could take a team of reporters. 00:31:02.230 --> 00:31:05.730 But as we know, most news organizations, and 00:31:05.730 --> 00:31:07.930 you look most recently what happened to Washington 00:31:07.930 --> 00:31:10.789 Post, have fewer reporters these days than they 00:31:10.789 --> 00:31:13.710 had five years ago, if not longer. And so there 00:31:13.710 --> 00:31:17.970 just literally are not enough bodies to cover. 00:31:18.599 --> 00:31:22.539 all the stories happening. And then, you know, 00:31:22.539 --> 00:31:25.720 and putting that aside, then there's this fire 00:31:25.720 --> 00:31:29.059 hose of outrage and scandal and controversy and 00:31:29.059 --> 00:31:31.920 extreme action that's happening. And it's very 00:31:31.920 --> 00:31:35.339 hard to put those things in perspective. You 00:31:35.339 --> 00:31:37.740 cover something one day, but there are 20 other 00:31:37.740 --> 00:31:40.920 outrages and it doesn't necessarily get the attention 00:31:40.920 --> 00:31:43.880 it deserves because it's competing with 19 other 00:31:43.880 --> 00:31:47.519 things that also deserve, you know, front and 00:31:47.519 --> 00:31:53.789 center. And I think there's less of this than 00:31:53.789 --> 00:31:56.569 there was a year ago, that when we talk about, 00:31:56.730 --> 00:31:58.890 and I don't use this as a pejorative term, but 00:31:58.890 --> 00:32:00.490 the mainstream media, the conventional media, 00:32:00.609 --> 00:32:03.450 the legacy media, there's a gravitational pull 00:32:03.450 --> 00:32:06.569 in places like the LA, excuse me, the New York 00:32:06.569 --> 00:32:09.230 Times, and I'd say the LA Times, Washington Post, 00:32:09.609 --> 00:32:12.230 Wall Street Journal. There's a gravitational 00:32:12.230 --> 00:32:18.259 pull to conventional and neutral language. They 00:32:18.259 --> 00:32:20.700 like to think of themselves as being unbiased, 00:32:20.759 --> 00:32:25.220 not skewed. And so if someone tells an obvious 00:32:25.220 --> 00:32:28.160 lie, they don't like using the word lie or saying 00:32:28.160 --> 00:32:30.740 that person is a liar. It seems like you're taking 00:32:30.740 --> 00:32:33.460 a stand then, even if it's demonstrably true. 00:32:33.680 --> 00:32:37.319 So they come up with a statement that was contradicted 00:32:37.319 --> 00:32:42.779 by other evidence. Or they feel like with Trump. 00:32:43.390 --> 00:32:46.369 You know, the first reports of him saying that 00:32:46.369 --> 00:32:48.309 he was going to wipe out a whole civilization 00:32:48.309 --> 00:32:51.769 and open the fucking street, whatever, you know, 00:32:51.769 --> 00:32:55.210 it was like, you know, the initial social media 00:32:55.210 --> 00:32:58.809 posts from all these places was Trump makes dire 00:32:58.809 --> 00:33:02.470 threat against Iran. I mean, earlier in the administration, 00:33:02.690 --> 00:33:04.289 they were talking about, you know, I remember 00:33:04.289 --> 00:33:07.269 there was a piece in the New York Times saying, 00:33:07.309 --> 00:33:09.809 you know, Trump has a muscular approach to the 00:33:09.809 --> 00:33:13.630 presidency. Well, muscular sounds positive. We 00:33:13.630 --> 00:33:16.670 all want to be muscular as opposed to Trump trying 00:33:16.670 --> 00:33:19.849 to impose authoritarian measures, right? Or Trump 00:33:19.849 --> 00:33:22.990 overstepping lines. I mean, they really want 00:33:22.990 --> 00:33:26.569 to sort of tamp down, you know, they have a hard 00:33:26.569 --> 00:33:29.150 time covering extremism because they're not trained 00:33:29.150 --> 00:33:31.269 to do that. They have a hard time covering someone 00:33:31.269 --> 00:33:33.930 who's lying all the time. And so I think, you 00:33:33.930 --> 00:33:36.130 know, there have been times when that's worse, 00:33:36.410 --> 00:33:40.910 times when they've overcome those inclinations. 00:33:41.740 --> 00:33:45.259 But I think it's generally been difficult for 00:33:45.259 --> 00:33:49.539 them to deal with someone who is attacking the 00:33:49.539 --> 00:33:52.720 press itself, the notion of freedom of the press, 00:33:52.839 --> 00:33:56.700 and also undermining democracy. They still want 00:33:56.700 --> 00:33:59.259 to say, here are the Democrats, here are the 00:33:59.259 --> 00:34:01.460 Republicans, they're fighting, da -da -da -da 00:34:01.460 --> 00:34:04.519 -da -da, and we cover both sides of the story. 00:34:05.119 --> 00:34:12.079 And why do people lie? You know, as an intelligence 00:34:12.079 --> 00:34:15.659 officer, people lie to gain an advantage. That's 00:34:15.659 --> 00:34:19.079 why people lie in life and almost in any situation. 00:34:19.699 --> 00:34:24.119 And if you treat the lies too even -handedly, 00:34:24.260 --> 00:34:27.980 you are therefore giving them the advantage they 00:34:27.980 --> 00:34:31.679 seek. If someone is trying to use the freedom 00:34:31.679 --> 00:34:36.340 of the press and your neutrality to undermine 00:34:36.340 --> 00:34:42.449 democracy and maybe suppress... the press, you 00:34:42.449 --> 00:34:45.690 are basically enabling them. So it's a very, 00:34:45.829 --> 00:34:48.210 I mean, I'm not saying there are easy answers 00:34:48.210 --> 00:34:51.610 to all of this, but I think that a lot of the 00:34:51.610 --> 00:34:56.769 media did not fully, you know, confront the question 00:34:56.769 --> 00:35:01.010 that Trump poses in terms of how he should be 00:35:01.010 --> 00:35:04.309 covered and how his excesses, extremism, his 00:35:04.309 --> 00:35:10.250 racism, his misogyny, his lies. should be contextualized. 00:35:10.409 --> 00:35:14.929 I think it hasn't really been figured out yet, 00:35:15.010 --> 00:35:17.989 and we're still stuck with what we used to call, 00:35:18.190 --> 00:35:23.010 when we refer to Russia, propaganda, a firehose 00:35:23.010 --> 00:35:26.329 of lies. You just keep blasting people all the 00:35:26.329 --> 00:35:29.469 time, and it's very discombobulating, and it's 00:35:29.469 --> 00:35:32.289 discombobulating for the media. You become numb. 00:35:32.429 --> 00:35:35.230 And it's true. There's not two sides to a lie, 00:35:35.369 --> 00:35:40.809 right? Right. Let me go back to think from my 00:35:40.809 --> 00:35:42.710 old world. One more person I'd like to be interested 00:35:42.710 --> 00:35:45.130 to get your thoughts on is Tulsi Gabbard. I knew 00:35:45.130 --> 00:35:46.809 you were going to get there. She's got to be 00:35:46.809 --> 00:35:49.510 in a weird spot, right? Because she's always 00:35:49.510 --> 00:35:52.949 been anti -war and anti -war against Iran. And 00:35:52.949 --> 00:35:55.550 she's got all these conspiratorial and strange 00:35:55.550 --> 00:35:58.449 things. I wrote some stories about her last year. 00:35:58.710 --> 00:36:03.130 I found some tapes from like 2019, 2020, in which 00:36:03.130 --> 00:36:06.829 when she ran for president in 2019 in the 2020 00:36:06.829 --> 00:36:09.710 campaign. He literally put out an ad saying, 00:36:09.809 --> 00:36:13.449 we have to stop Trump from launching a war on 00:36:13.449 --> 00:36:17.349 Iran. He's a warmonger. And I got tapes of her 00:36:17.349 --> 00:36:19.929 saying that he wants to wage war in the Middle 00:36:19.929 --> 00:36:23.010 East to make money for his friends. I mean, she 00:36:23.010 --> 00:36:26.469 was as, you know, anti -war as one could be. 00:36:26.610 --> 00:36:31.889 And she was also, you know, she went to see al 00:36:31.889 --> 00:36:38.989 -Assad in Syria. And when no one else would see 00:36:38.989 --> 00:36:40.510 him and she raised questions about whether he 00:36:40.510 --> 00:36:43.070 was really using chemical weapons or that was 00:36:43.070 --> 00:36:46.989 like a Western, you know, probably Israeli conspiracy 00:36:46.989 --> 00:36:51.650 theory against him. And at the beginning of the 00:36:51.650 --> 00:36:55.289 Ukrainian war, she was on with Tucker talking 00:36:55.289 --> 00:36:59.150 about these false or this phony bioweapons labs 00:36:59.150 --> 00:37:03.130 in Ukraine, which was a big Russian talking point 00:37:03.130 --> 00:37:06.409 or COVID action to a degree to spread that false 00:37:06.409 --> 00:37:10.570 story. So, you know, she's been anti -Trump. 00:37:10.750 --> 00:37:14.650 She's been pro -Putin, pro, you know, quasi -pro 00:37:14.650 --> 00:37:17.869 -Assad. And, you know, here she is in charge. 00:37:18.230 --> 00:37:22.750 But the thing is, her powers of evaluation, of 00:37:22.750 --> 00:37:26.670 judgment, her reading comprehension, all these 00:37:26.670 --> 00:37:30.449 things that you'd want. to be strong in a DNI, 00:37:30.469 --> 00:37:32.989 Director of National Intelligence. I mean, she 00:37:32.989 --> 00:37:34.869 doesn't have any of that. She had no experience 00:37:34.869 --> 00:37:37.309 throwing the intelligence field, let alone running 00:37:37.309 --> 00:37:40.250 or overseeing something like 17 different intelligence 00:37:40.250 --> 00:37:44.130 agencies. So just a terrible pick for the job. 00:37:44.510 --> 00:37:47.429 And, you know, she comes from the same politics 00:37:47.429 --> 00:37:52.610 that Joe Kent comes from. Yet we saw Joe Kent, 00:37:52.789 --> 00:37:55.670 who himself is a conspiracy theorist, who's involved 00:37:55.670 --> 00:37:58.510 in all the MAGA. that we talked about earlier 00:37:58.510 --> 00:38:02.909 on the podcast, you know, she, you know, is not 00:38:02.909 --> 00:38:06.309 resigning in principle the way he did because 00:38:06.309 --> 00:38:10.190 she's outraged at this. You know, she is also 00:38:10.190 --> 00:38:15.210 transactional, a careerist, you know, and we 00:38:15.210 --> 00:38:17.909 have, and, you know, this is something that I'm 00:38:17.909 --> 00:38:21.210 writing about for my book. Last summer, we see 00:38:21.210 --> 00:38:26.159 her putting out all these memos and... declassifying 00:38:26.159 --> 00:38:29.780 intelligence documents to make it seem like the 00:38:29.780 --> 00:38:34.619 whole Russia story was a hoax and concocted by 00:38:34.619 --> 00:38:37.639 Obama, Biden, and Clinton. And she even accused 00:38:37.639 --> 00:38:41.139 Obama of committing treason, a crime still punishable 00:38:41.139 --> 00:38:45.559 by death. And so if you actually looked at what 00:38:45.559 --> 00:38:51.019 she put out, it was just so transparently... 00:38:52.029 --> 00:38:54.409 I don't know what else to call it. I mean, she 00:38:54.409 --> 00:38:58.710 was purposely confusing some of those basic elements 00:38:58.710 --> 00:39:02.670 of intelligence to say that these documents showed 00:39:02.670 --> 00:39:05.590 that there was this conspiracy. I won't get into 00:39:05.590 --> 00:39:07.690 all the details. You can read my book when it 00:39:07.690 --> 00:39:12.610 comes out. But it was one of the, I think, you 00:39:12.610 --> 00:39:15.469 know, I've written histories of the CIA, but 00:39:15.469 --> 00:39:18.829 I think one of the biggest acts of intelligence 00:39:18.829 --> 00:39:24.369 gaslighting. and politicalization of intelligence 00:39:24.369 --> 00:39:26.989 that we've seen in the history of the U .S. national 00:39:26.989 --> 00:39:28.989 security community. I mean, it's just complete. 00:39:29.130 --> 00:39:32.449 And John Ratcliffe also was part of this as well, 00:39:32.510 --> 00:39:35.949 I have to say. It wasn't just her, the CIA chief. 00:39:36.510 --> 00:39:41.550 But just atrocious and just showing that all 00:39:41.550 --> 00:39:45.710 they care about is protecting Trump, not serving 00:39:45.710 --> 00:39:49.829 the national interest, not protecting national 00:39:49.829 --> 00:39:52.230 security. Just a little bit of inside baseball. 00:39:52.329 --> 00:39:55.550 I saw that, yeah, they cherry pick and declassify 00:39:55.550 --> 00:39:58.050 things that they hope fit their narrative. And 00:39:58.050 --> 00:40:00.289 of course, as you know, in the CIA, there's millions 00:40:00.289 --> 00:40:03.070 and millions of pages of stuff that comes out. 00:40:03.090 --> 00:40:05.030 You can always find something. And I've saw that 00:40:05.030 --> 00:40:07.449 they put out several what look like intelligence 00:40:07.449 --> 00:40:10.170 reports to try to fit some narrative that they're 00:40:10.170 --> 00:40:13.690 creating. And they're putting out, this is an 00:40:13.690 --> 00:40:15.690 inside term, non -disseminated information. So 00:40:15.690 --> 00:40:17.750 if I'm overseas and I have a source and he tells 00:40:17.750 --> 00:40:20.690 me something and I send that in. It could be 00:40:20.690 --> 00:40:22.250 an intelligence report, which would then go out 00:40:22.250 --> 00:40:25.610 to the community of analysts. Headquarters looks 00:40:25.610 --> 00:40:28.269 at it and says, no, this doesn't make sense and 00:40:28.269 --> 00:40:32.269 doesn't stand up. And the other 50 analysis is 00:40:32.269 --> 00:40:34.769 not disseminated. In other words, if I send 10 00:40:34.769 --> 00:40:36.909 things in, like two of them might, they won't 00:40:36.909 --> 00:40:39.989 even send them out. He's then taking non -disseminated 00:40:39.989 --> 00:40:41.829 stuff and putting it out to the public, pretending 00:40:41.829 --> 00:40:44.380 like that's... suggesting the story she wants 00:40:44.380 --> 00:40:46.619 to direct, when in fact, years ago, we already 00:40:46.619 --> 00:40:49.400 said this is so beyond the pale that we won't 00:40:49.400 --> 00:40:51.940 even send it to our analysts. I mean, this is... 00:40:51.940 --> 00:40:55.019 She put out stuff like that, and she did this 00:40:55.019 --> 00:40:58.760 very sort of like a stupid trick. You know, the 00:40:58.760 --> 00:41:03.079 ICA, the Intelligence Community Assessment that 00:41:03.079 --> 00:41:06.699 came out in early 2017, in the last days of the 00:41:06.699 --> 00:41:09.599 Obama administration, said that Russia attacked 00:41:09.599 --> 00:41:14.349 the 2016 election. They wanted to impede Hillary 00:41:14.349 --> 00:41:17.329 Clinton. They wanted to cause chaos. And they 00:41:17.329 --> 00:41:21.349 also wanted to help Trump. Those are the conclusions. 00:41:21.750 --> 00:41:23.590 And they've been reaffirmed again and again and 00:41:23.590 --> 00:41:25.969 again since. But they're going back to that report. 00:41:26.230 --> 00:41:29.110 They want to try to wipe out the fact that this 00:41:29.110 --> 00:41:31.449 was done to help Trump. They've given up on the 00:41:31.449 --> 00:41:35.670 other conclusions. And so she put out – she found 00:41:35.670 --> 00:41:39.570 these intelligence reports from 2016 that said 00:41:39.570 --> 00:41:45.579 – Russia is not affecting the election by getting 00:41:45.579 --> 00:41:48.420 into election systems and changing the vote. 00:41:49.199 --> 00:41:51.199 And they had a couple because they were worried 00:41:51.199 --> 00:41:52.900 about that because they had gone into election 00:41:52.900 --> 00:41:55.639 systems, Russian hackers. And so what they were 00:41:55.639 --> 00:41:57.280 looking at this, they said, well, we don't see 00:41:57.280 --> 00:41:59.619 any evidence of doing anything inside the system. 00:41:59.780 --> 00:42:01.920 So there were several reports saying Russia was 00:42:01.920 --> 00:42:05.739 not doing that. And she said, look, these reports 00:42:05.739 --> 00:42:09.400 tell us that Russia was not. working to help 00:42:09.400 --> 00:42:13.300 Trump. Therefore, that ICA conclusion was completely 00:42:13.300 --> 00:42:17.039 concocted to subvert Trump, and it was phonied 00:42:17.039 --> 00:42:20.960 up, and that's an act of treason. Well, this 00:42:20.960 --> 00:42:25.139 is apples and orangutans, because it's true. 00:42:25.219 --> 00:42:27.079 There was no evidence they got into these systems 00:42:27.079 --> 00:42:29.519 and changed votes or fucked with the systems. 00:42:29.739 --> 00:42:34.019 But what the ICA was looking at was the hacking. 00:42:34.829 --> 00:42:39.070 and leaking of information and the social media 00:42:39.070 --> 00:42:42.570 campaign that they ran. And it was not to change 00:42:42.570 --> 00:42:46.469 votes in voting machines. It was what's known 00:42:46.469 --> 00:42:50.650 as an influence operation to cause chaos and 00:42:50.650 --> 00:42:54.670 to sway the media and voters. And it did cause 00:42:54.670 --> 00:42:56.630 problems for Hillary Clinton because for the 00:42:56.630 --> 00:42:59.190 last month of her campaign, all these leaks came 00:42:59.190 --> 00:43:01.500 out. through WikiLeaks that were stolen from 00:43:01.500 --> 00:43:04.539 John Podesta by Russians. And it caused her campaign 00:43:04.539 --> 00:43:07.900 a lot of, created a lot of headwinds and caused 00:43:07.900 --> 00:43:10.320 a lot of problems and had an impact on the election. 00:43:10.679 --> 00:43:14.760 So they're really, if you look at this stuff, 00:43:14.940 --> 00:43:18.630 you know, it takes about 10 seconds. to say this 00:43:18.630 --> 00:43:21.170 doesn't make sense. But yet they come out there, 00:43:21.289 --> 00:43:23.889 they hold press conferences, John Ratcliffe is 00:43:23.889 --> 00:43:25.969 part of this, Tulsi Gabbard, Caroline Levin, 00:43:26.030 --> 00:43:29.949 and all of Fox, and all of One American Network, 00:43:30.070 --> 00:43:34.429 and all of Newsmax, and Trump himself, of course. 00:43:34.510 --> 00:43:36.989 And they go, see, here is evidence that this 00:43:36.989 --> 00:43:42.630 was a conspiracy against me. It is, you know, 00:43:42.630 --> 00:43:46.650 in some ways it's dispiriting that they can do 00:43:46.650 --> 00:43:51.039 such or work, get away with it. I mean, it's 00:43:51.039 --> 00:43:52.840 not even a good, you know, you know about conspiracy. 00:43:52.900 --> 00:43:55.019 The public doesn't know all these details. It's 00:43:55.019 --> 00:43:57.340 easy to fool people because it's complicated 00:43:57.340 --> 00:43:59.960 and complex if you're not paying attention. But 00:43:59.960 --> 00:44:01.860 yeah, they're just essentially creating false 00:44:01.860 --> 00:44:04.380 narratives and spreading them. Yeah, and I think 00:44:04.380 --> 00:44:09.639 in the years before Fox News, cable, and social 00:44:09.639 --> 00:44:13.039 media, if someone had tried something like this, 00:44:13.219 --> 00:44:15.920 the major news organizations would have looked 00:44:15.920 --> 00:44:20.230 at it and said, Yeah. Not even reported or say 00:44:20.230 --> 00:44:22.789 that these are phony documents and it would die 00:44:22.789 --> 00:44:26.090 on the vine. But now, because the social media 00:44:26.090 --> 00:44:29.530 amplification, right wing MAGA media amplification, 00:44:29.730 --> 00:44:32.869 they can just put the stuff and have a veneer 00:44:32.869 --> 00:44:38.090 of evidence and of officialdom and get coverage 00:44:38.090 --> 00:44:41.590 for it. And that's what I mean when I say it's 00:44:41.590 --> 00:44:43.530 dispiriting. I mean, I understand why it happens, 00:44:43.650 --> 00:44:46.269 but it's just that, you know. they can get away 00:44:46.269 --> 00:44:51.590 with what is really a pretty lousy con job. I 00:44:51.590 --> 00:44:53.769 mean, John Le Carre would look at this and go, 00:44:53.849 --> 00:44:57.150 come on, can't you guys do better? I don't think 00:44:57.150 --> 00:44:59.610 they can. But listen, Dave, you've been gracious 00:44:59.610 --> 00:45:02.250 with your time. Before we go, though, can you 00:45:02.250 --> 00:45:04.949 tell us what you're working on now, a little 00:45:04.949 --> 00:45:06.889 bit about your book and how people can find you? 00:45:07.570 --> 00:45:10.869 Sure. Well, people can find me, Blue Sky, David 00:45:10.869 --> 00:45:14.039 Korn. Also, if you bother with Twitter, it's 00:45:14.039 --> 00:45:20.000 DavidCornDC or X, DavidCornDC on X. I have a 00:45:20.000 --> 00:45:22.820 newsletter that you can get a free trial subscription 00:45:22.820 --> 00:45:27.320 to and just go to DavidCorn .com, that's corn 00:45:27.320 --> 00:45:31.400 with a C, to sign up for that. And you can find 00:45:31.400 --> 00:45:34.820 my work at MotherJones .com. We have great stuff 00:45:34.820 --> 00:45:38.780 up every day, as well as a magazine you can subscribe 00:45:38.780 --> 00:45:44.400 to if you like. Right now, I'm still pursuing 00:45:44.400 --> 00:45:46.559 some of the MAGA crack -up stuff, which I've 00:45:46.559 --> 00:45:49.860 written about last week or so, and really trying 00:45:49.860 --> 00:45:52.380 to put on some of the finishing touches to this 00:45:52.380 --> 00:45:54.980 book. So if anyone out there is listening, I 00:45:54.980 --> 00:46:00.000 have tips, advice, good leads for my book or 00:46:00.000 --> 00:46:05.460 anything else. Again, davidcorn .99. I think 00:46:05.460 --> 00:46:09.800 it's .99 or it's davidcorn99 at Signal. And you 00:46:09.800 --> 00:46:12.840 can find me that way. And I appreciate any information. 00:46:13.440 --> 00:46:16.460 Always can be anonymous and confidential. Beautiful. 00:46:16.860 --> 00:46:18.539 No, you've been doing this for a long time and 00:46:18.539 --> 00:46:19.980 you're a great reporter. I would encourage people 00:46:19.980 --> 00:46:22.900 to follow your stuff. And I look forward to reading 00:46:22.900 --> 00:46:25.920 the book. So for the audience, and if you like 00:46:25.920 --> 00:46:27.360 what you're hearing, please subscribe to The 00:46:27.360 --> 00:46:29.679 Sentinel and follow Steady State content and 00:46:29.679 --> 00:46:31.840 give us a... Five -star review on Google, if 00:46:31.840 --> 00:46:33.880 you would. It helps spread the content to the 00:46:33.880 --> 00:46:36.800 widest audience possible. So stay informed, stay 00:46:36.800 --> 00:46:39.099 engaged, and join us next week for the next episode 00:46:39.099 --> 00:46:44.900 of the Steady State Sentinel. Thank you for listening 00:46:44.900 --> 00:46:48.599 to the Steady State Sentinel podcast. Don't miss 00:46:48.599 --> 00:46:51.679 out on more insights and exposes from America's 00:46:51.679 --> 00:46:55.219 premier global security experts. 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