Radical, Fundamental Principles of Freedom, Rational Self-Interest, and Individual Rights. This is the Iran Brookshow. All right everybody, welcome to Iran Brookshow on this Monday, Monday, end of November. We're getting close to the end of the year. Thanks everybody, and thanks for being here. And I hope you had a fantastic Thanksgiving weekend, right? That you had a good time. Oh, video, yes, I need to turn on that button. All right, I was distracted. Let's see, we've got a bunch to talk about, and not much updates. I guess this week will be a pretty normal week tomorrow, and Thursday will be two shows. So this week will be a normal week as we go into December. I'm home all of December, at least that's the plan right now. So I expect that we will continue normal shows for basically the rest of the year with the exception of holidays and other stuff that might happen. All right, so that's a quick update on that. What else? Reminder that the Iran Institute is a sponsor of the show and the event. So there's an event tomorrow on the fountainhead. It's, you can all participate. It's by Zoom, so go to Iran.org slash start here. You can register, find out more about it. It's about the fountainhead. It's about all the Iran Institute efforts to get young people to read the fountainhead. It should be a lot of fun. It should be really interesting. I hope you join. If you do do it, do it through the Iran dot org slash start here link, you know, that that'll help the sponsorship of the show. Okay, I think that catches us up there. All right, let's jump into the news. As always, there's a lot going on. The ceasefire is continuing. It, it, this is the fourth day. It's supposed to be the last day, but there's now word that they, that Hamas and Israel have agreed to extend the ceasefire for another two days. We, everybody's assuming that that means that the Hamas will, will release another 20 hostages some tomorrow, some the day after. We're still waiting for the hostages today to be released. It's already what, 8pm in Israel. And I don't think they've been released yet, but the expectation is that they will be released later tonight. It seems like every day there's some glitch. There's something that Hamas says, oh, wait a minute. We don't do this. We don't want to do that. I guess they released a list and Israel objected to who was on the list and they had to renegotiate that and it went back, and it went back to, you know, Hamas has now agreed. John says he's got fuzzy, fuzzy video.  I don't know. I'm getting fuzzy video, but I can't tell. I can tell if that's just local or that some of you are saying no. Some of them say video is excellent. So I assume it's, video is good. All right. So ceasefire continues. Release of hostages continues. We'll see. I think more hostages released today. We'll see more tomorrow. We'll see more on Tuesday, on Wednesday. I suppose then the ceasefire ends. Other than the United States, Biden is continuing to press Israel and I guess to press Hamas into extending the ceasefire. It's unclear what the purpose is beyond a certain point. Hamas is not going to release everybody. It's only going to release some hostages. It doesn't want to lose whatever leverage it has by releasing all the hostages. But I think the strategy of the Americans is the strategy of mindless pragmatists, which is what the Biden administration is and what almost every American administration is. And that is delay, delay, delay.  To do what? We don't know. To develop a strategy maybe? No, God forbid. We don't want a strategy. We just want to buy time. And as long as there's no bombing in Gaza, that buys us time. So we don't want bombing in Gaza because that's not good for us. And the left wing of the Democratic Party doesn't like it. We're losing votes. So we just want the bombing to stop. And what's the solution then? We don't know. We have no answer. We have no strategy. We have no ideas. We have no clue. Put pressure on Netanyahu to eliminate Hamas in a more humane manner. I think that's the Biden administration's goal is the eradication of Hamas in a humane way. One of the things I think that as Israel is releasing its prisoners, notice Hamas is releasing hostages. Israel is releasing prisoners. These are all criminals. These are all people who have attempted murder and things of that nature. As Israel is releasing them, some people who are watching this and monitoring this are realizing every time one of these is released, and there's a big celebration on the West Bank. And in the celebration, they're calling for killing Israelis and celebrating Hamas's victory and celebrating October 7th. It's dawning on some people, not a lot, but some people, that the Palestinians generally like Hamas. And the Palestinians generally want Israel destroyed. And the Palestinians generally want to annihilate the state of Israel and they want to kill the Jews in Israel. And what are they supposed to do there? What are they supposed to do with that? That is the reality. People are finally discovering it. But you see it in their responses. They don't know what to do with it. They don't know what to make of it. So their response is, yeah, we need a diplomatic solution. We need a two-state solution. And it's like, wait a minute. How do we have a two-state solution with people who want to destroy Israel? How does Israel have a solution, a negotiated solution, with people committed to its destruction? And it's not, it turns out, surprise to many people, I guess, that it's not just a few members of the Hamas. It's the Palestinian people want Israel destroyed. At this point, the Palestinian people are committed to the destruction of the state of Israel. At this point, the Palestinian people do not want peace. They do not want a two-state solution. They want a one-state solution with the Jews in the ocean or under the ground. And only when you realize that do you realize kind of the absurdness of so much of the rhetoric out there. Oh, if only they could all live in peace. Oh, if only they could all go to the negotiating table and cut a deal. And the other myth that's out there that I think everybody, everybody's talking like this, that this is a war against Hamas.  But that's absurd. This is a war with the Palestinian people because the Palestinian people support Hamas. This is not just a war with Hamas. This is not just a war with a few people, with a particular organization.  This is a war between the Palestinian people and the Israeli people. And it is absurd. The Biden administration does this, the media does this, everybody on Twitter is doing this. You know, even the people who support Israel do this. Oh, no, no, we're not a war with the Palestinian people. I mean, Netanyahu and Israelis do this. Of course we are. Of course Israel is. It is a war with the Palestinian people. It's the Palestinian people who came in on October 7th. It wasn't just Hamas, it was people. It was the Palestinian people who celebrated when those monsters came back to Gaza. It's the Palestinian people who were spitting at the bodies. It's the Palestinian people who hate Israel and who want to destroy it. It's the Palestinian people that a war should, needs to convince to change their way. It's not just hopeless. But the only way you'll get peace in the Middle East, in this part of the Middle East, is by convincing the Palestinian people that they're cause is hopeless. And they better embrace a different one. There is no other way. But as long as you continue, as long as people continue to hold this absurd, this ridiculous notion of, no, no, the Palestinian people, they're peace-loving. It's only the leadership. It's only Hamas. Oh, the Palestinian Authority. They are huge fans of peace and a two-state solution. No, they're not. No, they're not. And their lovers of terrorism, their instigators of terrorism, their funders of terrorism. Sadly, the Palestinian people are going to have to suffer. And if you just make this a, I don't know, surgical operation that only goes after Hamas leadership, then you lose. And I think generally, if I had a, if I have to place bets right now, I'd say Israel's already lost or it's on the way to losing. There's no way Israel can win this because it won't let itself and because the world won't let them. The world has clearly decided Israel cannot win this, should not win this, will not win this. And it won't. It won't. It can't. And it won't dismantle Hamas. It can't because it won't do what's necessary. And it can't, and the world won't let it. And it can't and won't bring the Palestinian people, in a sense, their knees to the point of being willing to change their minds about the conflict. So anyway, so that's where we are. It's not a good place. There's nothing positive. This ceasefire was a disaster. Does anybody really believe that in two days Israel's just going to start bombing like crazy and going into Gaza with the force that they did? I mean, Israeli generals keep saying that's what they're going to do. But I'd be surprised if they actually do that. We will see. Maybe I'm wrong. Maybe I'm wrong. You know, one of the things just one more point, you know, people are using this, I don't know, 14,000 Palestinians have died or whatever. How do they know these things? How do they know these numbers? The Hamas Health Department is saying that 14,000, have they counted the bodies? Do you know how many 14,000 bodies? How many, you know, where are these bodies? Have they cleared the rubble and found these bodies? How did they know? And out of these 14,000, let's say that was true. How many of them are Hamas? How many of them are soldiers? And can we assume that all the young middle-aged men who were killed in these bombings are Hamas or at least a large percentage of them? But who has these estimates? Where are the mass graves? Where are the piles of bodies? I mean, it's taken Israel weeks to figure out how many people died on October 7th and to get a number and they still don't have an exact number. How do the Palestinians have an exact number? An exact number. They're so exact. They're so reliable. And then everybody trusts that everybody's citing it. How does anybody know what that number is? Nobody knows how many Palestinians have died. Nobody knows how many of those Palestinians have died are children. Nobody knows how many of them are civilians and how many of them are Hamas. Nobody has a clue. Hamas lies constantly and it lies for propaganda. We see this over and over and over again. They lie for propaganda and when they repeat the lies over and over and over again. And this is something that all liars have become very, very good at in the world of social media. If you repeat a lie over and over and over again on many different platforms by many different people, it just becomes truth. It just becomes something that everybody accepts. Nobody challenges it anymore. Nobody challenges the number of casualties that Hamas is putting out there. Nobody. And nobody challenges really anything Hamas says. It's amazing to me that when Israel puts something, it says, you know, the Israelis are claiming with this big caveat and skepticism induced language that X, Y, Z. And then when Hamas does it, Hamas says, as if, well, Hamas says that's a fact. They just have no clue. Yep. This is a war between Israel and Gaza, Israel and the Palestinians in Gaza. They haven't expanded it to the West Bank, but it should be a war with the Palestinians more broadly. I mean, Shay writes, I've been saying from day one that we should be calling this Israel-Gaza war, Israel-Palestine war, not Israel-Hamas. It's not the Likud-Hamas war. Yeah. I mean, I agree. But I'd say this, and I've been saying this for 20-something years. There's been, and there has been a war between Israel and the Palestinians for, you know, certainly since 1987 or maybe since sometimes in the 1990s. But there is an ongoing war between Israel and the Palestinians. This is round X. This is battle Y in a battle Gaza, if you will. Battle Hamas-Gaza, if you will. But the war is an ongoing war. The war didn't start on October 7th. And indeed, before October 7th, there was a ceasefire. And the war isn't going to end when this is finished. I don't think it was 67 because it's in 67 to 87. There was very little in terms of in Israel, very little hostility, very little hostile activity. The hostilities within Israel really picked up, really picked up by Palestinians in the territory of Israel, really picked up in 19, after the Oslo Accords in 1994. So they really picked up with Yasser Al-Fad returning to, returning, coming to the West Bank and installing himself the leader of the Palestinians in the West Bank or really recognized by Israel and the international community as the leader of the Palestinians. That was the end of it. That was really the beginning of an intense hot war between Israel and the Palestinians. I say 1994, the signing of the Oslo Agreement. I've told you this before, but that day when the news came, I called my parents up and I said, this is the most disastrous thing Israel has ever done. This is going to cause massive, massive casualties in Israel. You cannot sign peace deals with terrorists. You cannot cut deals with Yasser Al-Fad. Only bad things will happen from this. And my parents are like, yeah, right, this is great. This is peace. This is why you're being so cynical and negative. Well, we've seen since then the bloodshed, particularly in the Second Intifada. So certainly since 1984, I mean, terrorism's been against Israel. It's been going on since 1948. But I'd say this particular war with the Palestinians, defining it as Palestinians versus Israel, is since Yasser Al-Fad's return in 1984. All right. So yeah, this will keep you updated on the ceasefire. Elon Musk is in Israel. He is touring around, meeting, he met Netanyahu earlier today. He's meeting the president of Israel Herzog tomorrow. He got a tour of the area where some of the massacre happened. He's been near the border with the Gaza Strip. He is meeting with families of the hostages. He's doing a PR rehabilitation campaign in Israel. I mean, he took a real beating after positively commenting on a anti-Semitic tweet by an anti-Semite, which Elon Musk approvingly commented on, then explained the context that he only meant the ADL or whatever. But the reality is, and he took the PR blow for approvingly tweeting a tweet that was written by a known anti-Semite was the intention of being anti-Semitic. You know, Elon Musk might have criticism of particular Jewish groups that is not necessarily anti-Semitic, but why retweet or why comment positively on a tweet for whom five minutes of research were discovered that the guy's an anti-Semite, a known active anti-Semite. Anyway, he got clobbered. A lot of advertisers left acts. Elon Musk is in Israel to try to smooth everything over, to show he really loves Israel. He's friends with Israel. He's done an interview with Bibi Netanyahu that is available. I haven't listened to it yet. I did read a section of it when Netanyahu says, you know, we're going to have to, once we finish off Hamas, we're going to have to figure out how to rebuild, ultimately, how to rebuild Gaza. Israel's going to rebuild Gaza. And Elon Musk says, I want to help. I want to help Bibi Gaza. All right. So Musk is now committing billions to the rebuilding of Gaza. Again, good PR for him. And it'll be interesting how it plays out. It'll be interesting if there are any changes in terms of the attitude of some people on his platform towards Israel and towards Hamas. It'll be interesting to see what Musk writes about in the future. And, you know, he is, yeah, he is trying to improve his image. And I don't know if this will work. I hope so. But I don't know if it will work. You know, I still want Elon Musk to be successful.  I mean, including running Twitter, just be in the background and run Twitter. You don't have to retweet. You don't have to create all these problems for yourself. You don't have to globetrotter around the world becoming a pseudo-diplomat and pretending you care. You don't have to do all this stuff. Just run the frigging company properly. Just stay in the background and run it the way it's supposed to be run. Yeah, there's X space, I guess, between Netanyahu, Luca says, and Musk, he says, 20 minutes long and worth listening to.  I don't like Musk. I like Musk as a businessman. I wish he'd just stick to that.  I don't think he actually knows what he's talking about. He is too much of a flake when it comes to these things. All right. Lucinda says, thank you for doing such great work you're on. Thank you, Lucinda, really, really appreciate it. And thank you. Thank you for being a member of the show for six months.  Just click member down there. But if you're not a subscriber, first become a subscriber. Please subscribe to the show. Don't forget to like the show before you leave and so on. All right. The Houthis in Yemen who are a military organization of the Shiites in Yemen engaged in a civil war for the control of Yemen with a, with a, the Sunni government of Yemen, which is supported by Saudi Arabia. Basically, this has been a proxy war between Iran and Saudi Arabia in which tens of thousands of civilians have been killed and pretty much nobody in the world cares. Only when, when Israel is doing the killing, does anybody seem to care? What was it? Yeah. So the Houthis, as you probably know, been sending missiles to Israel direction. They can't reach the center of Israel, but they can reach the southern tip of Israel a lot, which is a resort town in the very southern tip of Israel on the Red Sea, beautiful location. And Israel has been shooting down those missiles and drones as they've made their way. I don't think any of them have actually hit anything of significance. But the same Houthis are also committed now to obstructing shipping in and out of Israel or really shipping of ships that are either owned by Israelis or flying in Israeli flag or have Israelis as crew members. They've already taken over one ship that is owned by an Israeli, an Israeli wealthy individual. And the ship was not carrying an Israeli flag. There were no crew member on the ship that was really, but the Houthis took it over. I'm not sure how that's going to be resolved in kind of, there's no, we're not getting a lot of news about that ship. But over the weekend, they try to take over another ship. This ship signal distress. This is near, not far from Somalia, close by to the ship. There was an American, I think it's a destroyer. The Americans sent over some troops. The troops prevented the ship from being taken over by the Houthis and indeed actually caught the perpetrators of the attempted hijacking. The assumption is the Houthis and who are being, and they're being held in custody on the American destroyer. And this is, this is in the best tradition of the American Navy keeping the sea lanes open in the best tradition of keeping trade flowing and stopping pirates on the high seas. It took them a long time to stop the piracy off the coast of Somalia if you remember 10 years ago, but they did ultimately. And now they're going to have to, I think that the Israeli Navy, the American Navy are going to have to patrol along the Red Sea and into the Indian Ocean. The Persian Gulf, those areas to prevent pirates, in this case the Houthis, from stopping or blocking the sea lanes and blocking trade. So that is happening as we speak. Hopefully that'll be the last ship that has to deal with this. This ship, by the way, was also Israeli owned, owned by an Israeli businessman. No flag, no Israeli flag, no Israeli crew, but it was owned. I guess they look at the ship name and you can find who owns it in the registry. And if it's Israeli owned, they go after it. If it's not, they don't. So thank you. I think it's a good use of American Navy to stop these things from happening. All right. A couple of kind of scary things happening on American campuses. The first late last week was at a high school, a Hillcrest High School in Jamaica, Queens. In this high school, there's a Jewish teacher who happens to be pro-Israel, who was identified on video, I guess, that she had been on Facebook, maybe, that she had been at a demonstration in support of Israel holding a plaque, I stand with Israel. The photos of this, of her being at the demonstration with the plaque, I stand with Israel, started circulating in the school that Facebook page was created, or at least, I guess, the photo was on the teacher's Facebook page, was on her profile, on her page. Right. Anyway, they took this, they started spreading it around. And at school, for about two hours last week, they basically rampaged through the halls, trying to do violence to this teacher. The teacher had to hide herself, had to lock herself and hide. As the kids, you can find video of this all over the web, as the kids just rampaged through the school, trying to figure out where she was, and trying to get her. You know, they ripped a water fountain from the wall. They shed a tiles on the floor of the boys' bathroom. They, you know, they were yelling Free Palestine, Allah Akbar, and F Israel. The teacher was in hiding. The New York City Police Department had sent 25 officers to the scene. It took them a while to get control over this.  Of course, this has been condemned by the school authorities. It's been condemned by the city, by the mayor. The mayor was pretty, pretty stringent about this. The Chancellor of New York Public Schools is, you know, is kind of condemned. They're not too much, right? He says, what's happening in Middle East has gotten a lot of emotions from a lot of people, right? Nobody wants to condemn it too much. They don't want to seem to be on the Israel side too much.  Anyway, in these schools now, this is really scary. These kids are scary. And, you know, what kind of support are you going to get? And how is this going to change? What needs to happen to change these kids' minds? What needs to happen so that teachers can keep teaching without fear for their lives because of their particular positions? It is a truly bleak, horrible situation we're seeing for teachers who happen to be pro-Israel. Similar situation at the University of Southern California, USC. On a Thursday in early November at the USC campus, there was a large crowd and a large crowd of demonstrators, pro-Palestinian, shouting all kinds of slogans by some witnesses, including shouting destroy Israel. A university professor, a tenured university professor by the name of John Strauss, who's an economics professor, teaches developmental economics, was walking by, saw this, and got angry. He's Jewish. He's pro-Israel. And he heard destroy Israel. And he started telling them, I'm Jewish and I'm very pro-Israel. And he said, Israel forever, Hamas and murderers. Supposedly, as part of the yelling back and forth, there's video of him saying, Hamas and murderers, that's all they are. Everyone should be killed. And I hope they are killed. Anyway, the students videotaped us. They chopped it up in various ways as to make this particularly, whoever can put it up and tick-tock and put it up everywhere else on social media. And the result of that is that Professor Strauss, in spite of having tenure, has been suspended from the university. He's on a paid administrative leave. He's barred from campus and is not going to be able to teach his undergraduate course this semester. So the students are saying, he insulted us. He stepped on a paper with the names of dead Palestinians. He said horrible things.  They can call for murder, genocide, the destruction of Israel, all they want, no penalties, nothing. But you stand up for Israel. You stand up for Israel. And they tear you down. So anyway, they tear you down. They lose your job. You are basically turned into a campus pariah. You can't even teach your classes. The fact that you have tenure, the fact that being there forever doesn't make one difference. There's a long article in this on the LA Times, just an unbelievable injustice. And generally, what you're seeing around the country, around the United States today, is a complete and utter double standard. As long as you're calling for the genocide of Jews, that's fine. As long as you are calling for the destruction of Israel, that's fine. But if you say anything in support of Israel, or stand up against Hamas, or call for the destruction of Hamas completely, legitimately, you are shut down. You no longer have free speech. You no longer have any kind of sense of so-called academic freedom. All right. So yeah, I mean, this is horrific. And it's basically a form of anti-Semitism. It's basically a form of discriminating against those that are perceived to be successful, and therefore supposedly the oppressors. For the benefit of those who are oppressed, in the name of the oppressed, you can say anything you want. Never, never, ever defend the oppressors, or really, to put it another way. In the name of the poor, you can say anything you want. In the name of the successful, the rich, you can't defend them at all. All right.  And, oh, it's the end. A bunch of stories out of China. Let's start with the continued challenges of the Chinese economy. China is struggling economically, continues to struggle economically. We've seen a significant downgrading of its real estate sector. We've seen significant troubles of its real estate developers. It has not ended. It continues. They continue to struggle to pay their debts. They continue to struggle to raise money. Consumers or owners of condos continue to struggle to gain ownership over properties that they put money down on and are not being built. So that's an ongoing story of the kind of real estate problems. Now we're seeing massive losses in the financial sector in China. So a big kind of investor, you could call it, financial firm called Zongzi Enterprise Group, is facing criminal charges of fraud and all kinds of stuff. But it looks like their assets are going to have to be sold at 70% discount. We're talking about a company that has about $56 billion that it owes customers, it owns consumers, and it's going to have to take a massive right off on this. The problems with the Chinese economy just keep mounting. And again, the more we've talked about this before, the more authoritarian the Chinese government is, the more problems the Chinese economy is going to have. So it's not letting up. It's just getting worse and worse. Just a note on demography. We've talked about Chinese demography. We've talked about the collapse of the number of people in Japan in China at birth rates, very, very low, wobble low replacement. You know, Chinese are just not having kids and the Chinese society is getting older and older and it's going to get older at a very, very, it's getting older at a very, very fast pace. The Chinese don't have a safety net for old people. That means a lot of the money that young Chinese are going to making is going to have to go instead of to investment. It's going to have to go towards keeping their parents alive. These are parents that have not saved because they're too poor to have saved, right? So it's not that I'm arguing for safety net, but it is a massive challenge in China, given how poor the country still is on a GDP per capita basis. On a per capita basis, China is still a poor country. It might be the second largest economy in the world by some measures, even the largest economy in the world. But on a per capita basis, it's poor. Very poor. Anyway, it's poor with a demography collapsing does not bode well for future economic growth, future economic wealth, future economic success without pretty dramatic reforms. Well, there's one good news story, if you will, coming out on the demographic. It's kind of demographic side. And that is that while China has fewer and fewer young people, the young people that it does have are more and more educated. More and more of them are going to college. Many more of them today are going to college about 20 times. It was a 16 X the number that went to college at the turn of the century that is in 2000 are going to college today. So they're much more productive, earning a lot more. China's economy will slowly transition away from manual labor in factories towards more value added productivity enhancing type work. And it's not just that Chinese are going to college because hey, Americans are going to college too, but we don't consider that value enhancing necessarily. But the Chinese are going to college in large numbers towards STEM fields. And this is the this is the good news for China, if you will, 40% of China's college graduates are STEM majors, 40%. That is more than double in the US, which is only 18%. And I wonder how many of those are fallen born, 35% in Germany, 26% in the rest of the OECD. So the good news for China is that they are going to dominate engineering. They're going to dominate the production of scientists. The rise in productivity as a result of this is limited by the fact that it's authoritarian and these scientists and engineers cannot go out there and just make and do and produce what they want. They can't enhance productivity the way they could in a free market. But, you know, the reality is that then we produce 18% of our college graduates are engineers. I don't know how many we produce in some of the humanities where I think what they're taught in university actually decreases their productivity, probably wipes out the increased productivity we get from from from the engineers. You know, China has college graduates who are highly productive, which you cannot say probably for the United States. And then it's just a question of how much freedom will they have to do to enhance productivity to improve production in China. We will see, but that is the one piece of good news coming out of China. They've got a lot of STEM students. By the way, for years I've heard that the reason Silicon Valley companies go to China is not because of the lower cost of engineering, but the sheer number of engineers that they can get. They can hire thousands in a day, whereas you can't do that in the US. There's a shortage of engineers in the US. And instead of the US having immigration policies that take the 40% Chinese graduates and bring them to the US to work here, we encourage them if they did come to the US to study. We encourage them to go back to China and start their companies and go and help the Chinese economy be more productive rather than make the American economy more productive. You know, our hatred of immigrants far supersedes our love of increased production. And that, by the way, is primarily a Republican policy. That was for Scots. Let's see. Yeah. A setback from China is the fact that we've talked about the Taiwanese election. Taiwanese elections are coming up in January. The opposition tried to have one candidate. The opposition is a lot more friendly to China than opposition is much more friendly to China than the existing government is. So the opposition tried to rally around one candidate, probably to a large extent supported by the Chinese government. The Chinese government wants the opposition to win. That deal to rally around one candidate fell apart. There are going to be at least two opposition candidates running against the candidate of the governing party today. All likelihood that the current government will win, which is good news for those of you who value Taiwan as an independent country. China will not be happy. China is, you know, once the opposition to win, once pro-Chinese politicians in Taiwan to gain power, because ultimately China would like to take over Taiwan without having to go to war. They know today they cannot win a war, and they're not sure they could win such a war in the future. But the Taiwanese people either want the status quo, they want independence. So 32% of Chinese people want the status quo. 21% of the Chinese people want independence. Explicit, they already have independence, but make it explicit. Only 29%, oh, so 32% want status quo indefinitely, which means independence. 21% wants explicit independence. 29% want status quo, we'll decide later. So an opening for maybe combining with China. Only 6% of Taiwanese population want to move towards unification. So China has a lot of work before it, you know, to do what it did in Hong Kong. But that is ultimately its goal. Alright, let's see. Yeah, final story, you know, final story.  Western China is dominated by Muslims. I don't know the exact number, it is a population, but these are millions and millions, tens of millions probably, of Muslims living in the western parts of China. A number of different, I mean, we hear about the Uighurs, but it's not just the Uighurs, it's a number of different peoples, a number of different groups out in western China in a number of different regions of China. You know, Muslims, China is engaged actively in undermining the religion. They're engaged in re-education. Some of that re-education is happening in camps. Some of that re-education is happening in schools. But part of that re-education campaign is the fact that China is basically disassembling mosques in these regions. They're basically taking them apart. The Human Rights Foundation has basically looked at satellite images of western China, looking at mosques that used to were there with the spires and the dome on the top. And many of these buildings, the domes have gone, the spires have gone, and the buildings are being used for other purposes. So China is dealing with the Islamic problem by basically forced assimilation, by basically actively destroying all remnants of the religion and forcing people to assimilate and become Chinese. China at least realizes that you better assimilate the Muslims. It's what Europe should do as well. Now by these tactics, Europe should do it within the context of freedom of religion. I think it would also be much more effective than these tactics. But China is going for the brute force tactics, and it's going to be interesting to see how they do. 10, 12 years ago there were regular terrorist attacks in China by Islamists. You don't hear of terrorist attacks anymore by Islamists in China. I don't know if that's because they don't happen or if that's because you just don't hear about them. It's just that the media in China just prevents them from coming out. But basically they're using force. The U.S. I think uses confidence in Western civilization and Europe is not doing anything. I mean the U.S. I'm being overly positive about the U.S. It's interesting to see in the future which model worked best. But clearly something has to be done about Islam. There's no question about that. All right, certainly about Islamists. All right, we will now go to questions. Not a lot of questions and not a lot of money raised towards our goal for the super chat for today. We're going to get back on track of reaching our goals. So please consider supporting the Iran Book Show. We're about $163 short. That's $820 questions. But we do have 148 people watching live right now. So what is it a dollar from each person? You can do a sticker. Gail just did a sticker for $5. A few people doing $5 sticker will get us there. WCZN, thank you. Ryan Ward, thank you. These are all people who did stickers. Luca, thank you. And Roosevelt, thank you. So yes, those stickers help. Most stickers like that could get us to our goal quite quickly. Also, don't forget to like the show before you leave. It doesn't cost you anything. It really helps with the algorithm. Thank you, John. John just did a $20 sticker. A few of those would get us quickly to the goal. And if you're not a subscriber, please consider subscribing to the show. All right. Rimo Rafael has a sticker. Thank you, Rafael. Appreciate it. Rimo says, what do you generally look for on a balance sheet of a company to determine whether to buy at stock? I mean, I don't. I don't buy individual company stocks other than in my hedge fund. In the hedge fund, you know, I look at certain things on a balance sheet, but I don't look at anything separate from a holistic view of the company. And I have very, very narrow view of what to look for for bank companies based on a model that's designed in terms of the probability that this bank will be taken over in the future and its governance and so on. But generally, if you're looking at something on the balance sheet, you don't have to make a decision about whether to buy a bank or not. Sorry, buy a stock or not. Just stop. Any analysis you do of a company's balance sheet, there are hundreds, if not thousands of people out there who are probably smarter than you, certainly more experienced than you, certainly more knowledgeable than you, doing the same thing, including a bunch of really smart algorithm written and probably constituting AI these days who know exactly how to take a balance sheet and completely analyze it to death. You have no advantage over that. There's nothing you will learn on a bank's balance sheet that is unique to you.  But never make an investment decision based on anything you find on a balance sheet. And generally, I do not encourage people to invest in specific stocks unless you're a professional investor because professional investors will eat you alive. I encourage people to diversify widely by mutual funds or ETFs and diversify. Don't day trade. Day trading is for losers. I know, I'll get a bunch of people now telling me how much money they've made recently in day trading. All right, talk to me in a year or two, but the statistics are clear. Day trading is a losing strategy for everybody except the real pros. So if you want to become a pro, then the things you can do to become a pro, you can go get a master's degree in finance, you can go work for a hedge fund, work in Wall Street or whatever. But yeah, so I look at a bunch of stuff on a balance sheet because it gives me some idea about the valuation and its relative stock price, but that in isolation is meaningless, is absolutely meaningless. So I don't want to say that I look at anything on a balance sheet because nothing on a balance sheet. I mean, again, yeah, I mean, if you're a professional investor, you look at balance sheets and you take off of all kinds of things, depending on the kind of company it is. A bank's balance sheet is very different than a tech company's balance sheet, but be very, very careful how you use that information in your investments, right? All right, Paul, thank you for the $50, really appreciate it. Paul says, Netanyahu has repeatedly said the war will resume after the ceasefire. Hamas now wants to keep extending the ceasefire with the release of more hostages. Do you think Netanyahu will resume the war and will Hamas be destroyed? First of all, I think they already announced that Netanyahu has agreed to extend the ceasefire for another two days. I don't know how long this will go on, but Netanyahu will extend the ceasefire as long as hostages are being released. I have no doubt about that. Will the war resume? Yes, it will resume. I don't know with how much vigor, I don't know how it will be resumed exactly. And I think at the first opportunity for another ceasefire, there will be another ceasefire. The war will not be prosecuted, and depending on how you view the destruction of Hamas, right? They are, according to estimates, 30,000 Hamas fighters that does not include all their Hamas civil administrators. Do I think 30,000 of them are going to die? No. Do I think every single one of the leadership in Hamas are going to be killed? No. Do I think the political leadership of Hamas in Qatar are going to be killed? No. Will Hamas actually be destroyed? I don't think so. I think Israel will claim victory. They'll declare it destroyed, and in a few years it'll be back. So I just don't see it. Well, Israel will go back to the war, yes. But I don't think with the same vigor as they did before. And they will focus primarily on the north, and in the south they will do more like, would be my expectations, fewer, less from the air, more on the ground, and on the ground much more cautiously thus sacrificing a lot more Israeli soldiers. I think what the ceasefire has really been a huge boon to Hamas, not only because it has increased, dramatically increased, the pressure Israel is under to extend the ceasefire indefinitely, but also because they are now much better prepared for the Israeli ground insertion, particularly in the south, into their various towns in the south of Gaza. So I just don't see how they're going to destroy Hamas completely. I don't see it happening. I know that Yinele keeps saying it, but Yinele said a lot of things in his history that he doesn't live up to, and I fear this is just one more of those. Thank you, Paul. Jason, our congressman, one of two GOP who voted to impeach and got re-elected, worries a lot about the CCP buying up U.S. farmlands. What to tell at the next town hall? I mean, really, of all the things to worry about in terms of the future of America, I think that is the least of them. I mean, let's say we go to war with China, then we just take away all the land that they own in the United States and say, whoops, sorry, we are nationalizing it and we're reselling it to Americans. Could happen like that. Of all the problems in the U.S., the CCP buying up U.S. farmlands, I mean, the reality is I'd like to see a GOP, anybody stand up against farm subsidies. That's a much bigger problem, much bigger problem than the fact that the CCP owns farmland. Indeed, a much bigger problem is the fact that the CCP owns our treasury bills, although I don't think that's a big problem either. Who cares if they own the farmland? A lot of farmers made a lot of money by selling them to the CCP. If that's even true, right? But I don't see what harm that does to the U.S. Whether they're going to stop producing food on that farmland, is that it? They're going to starve us by not producing food.  It doesn't make any difference. So it's a non-issue. Stop worrying about it. Focus on shrinking government spending. Focus on deregulating. Focus on reducing the tax burden on Americans. Focus on revitalizing the American economy. And revitalizing entrepreneurship of liberating the tax sector and the rest of the U.S. economy. Those are the things that should be focused on rather than obsessing about China, which sadly, Nikki Haley is also doing. I guess it's a way to get the... You have to have an other to rally people around. And so the other, the people are rallying around hating other Chinese, and that's what gets them going.  Absolutely. Do you think altruism functions as automatic in the sense that people are unaware of its impact on their thinking? Yeah, absolutely. I don't think people even think about it. I don't think people even challenge it.  It's basically, this is morality. They might think about how moral do I really want to be and do I want to be a pragmatist? But even then, altruism is shaping their decision. There is no conception of an alternative to altruism. I'll talk more about this when I do a review of the book Dominion, which I am almost done with, I think, four more hours of listening to and I'm done, which is fascinating, really, really interesting book.  But yes, I mean, Christianity is so thoroughly ingrained in all of us, including the most secular woke people that they cannot conceive of anything but altruism. Altruism is Christian altruism in particular, Christian altruism. The importance of the weak, the importance of the meek, the importance of the oppressed, the importance of the subjugated, which was everything about Christian morality from the beginning of Christianity, that attitude is everywhere and it's not challenged by anybody except I ran, and it dominates our secular thinking about the world, which is exactly what Tom Holland in Dominion argues. But he argues a lot more than that, which I'll get to. Ryan says, I recommend reading causality versus duty to better appreciate the current conflict. Do you think that this essay can be used to understand the barriers to peace? Does it all fall down to thinking versus unthinking? I mean, there's no question that at the end of the day, all issues, all challenges, all problems that exist out there boil down to thinking or not thinking. You know, the issue of altruism is boils down to not being willing, not willing to think about an alternative, not willing to do the work even when you're confronted with an alternative like rational egoism, not being willing to do the work. The whole issue of causality versus duty, causality requires thinking, requires work. People don't do the thinking, so much of our society as at the perceptual level. It's not at the conceptual level. So, you know, almost everything I agree with you about causality versus duty that is an excellent essay should be read once every couple of years. It is so much to say about so many things in our culture, not just, you know, and it's about, you know, the fundamental of dealing with the world through, you know, duty. This is what I have to do. This is what I must do. I cannot question. I cannot ask why. I cannot ask for a cause. I cannot think about what will happen when I do this. I just have to do it. That is what I'm supposed to do. That is my duty. Versus a conceptual mentality, which is a mentality that is constantly questioning. In Rand's theory, you don't have a duty to anything. You don't have duties, period. In Rand's, everything is about cause and effect. Everything is about thinking through. Everything is about achieving something, a goal, a purpose. And everything is about reasoning to achieve that goal, which means thinking. So it's the exact opposite, the exact opposite. But yeah, every conflict in the end of the day boils down to, I think, every challenge we have in the world, duty on duty.  Well, it depends what you mean. The Christians who live in Israel have not been a threat to Israel. They are citizens of the state of Israel. They're treated for the most part as equal citizens. A large part of their population in the city I grew up in Haifa were Christians, Christian Arabs. They do very well in Israel. Again, they are doctors. They're engineers. They're in every profession out there, and they've done very well, and they're not a threat at all. The Christians in the West Bank have a hard time, because on the one hand, I think they would like to join the Christian who live in Israel, the Christian Arabs who live in Israel. They would like to be part of Israel, because they would like the rights that they would get if they were part of Israel. On the other hand, they have to be very, very careful, because if they express those views, they will be killed by the Muslim neighbors. So they are often anti-Israel, at least because that is what's required from them in order to be able to live with the neighbors who are Muslim. They're not that many Palestinian Christians in the West Bank and Gaza. They are a tiny minority, and they do what they're told, basically, because their lives depend on doing that. They do what they're told in terms of what the Muslims tell them to do. Luca says, what can be done with URWA schools, with kids learning to hate the Jews from a UN-sanctioned school? That's even a huge issue that needs fixing in my humble opinion. I mean, yeah, I don't think it needs fixing. I think it needs demolishing. I've talked about this for years now. The UN needs to be demolished. You could imagine an international organization of free countries. Free European countries, if there are any countries in Africa, you would deem free South American countries, free Asian countries. A global organization of free countries that serve some of the things that the United Nations serves. But you cannot have a union of Putin and America, of Saudi Arabia and Iran and America and Holland and Sweden and the UK. There's no unity there. There's no thing there. The UN needs to be dismantled completely. It needs to be eliminated. What do you do with the schools? Well, the UN should be banned from these territories. Israel should ban them from them. Israel should dominate, occupy the West Bank and Gaza and dictate, dictate what is taught at the schools. Is the UN evil? Absolutely the UN is evil. It is absolutely an evil organization. It is an evil organization. The service of evil. There's nothing good about the UN. And it should be done away with completely. Jennifer, when is the next members only show God? I've neglected those, right? I'll try to figure it out. Probably either this coming Sunday or the Sunday after that. But very soon on a Sunday. Buzz, why cool to see figures like Musk talk spotlight? I don't find it cool. I mean, you might want to find it cool. I don't find it cool to see figures like him. I mean, he's good at business that doesn't make him good at anything else necessarily. And his political views are not particularly educated. They're not particularly interesting. They're a hodgepodge. I would prefer that he leave politics out of it, run his business as well. And I don't think what is he spotlighting? He's spotlighting Elon Musk.  So sadly, I wish it wasn't. I wish businessmen were all serious and had real serious intellectual views and could fight for good cause. But Musk is not an example of that. The causes he wants to fight for are not necessarily good causes. Entertainment says, why is a rainwater collection banned in the West Bank? I don't know. I mean, the West Bank has a, like the rest of Israel, it's not only banned in the West Bank. I think it's banned all over Israel. Israel has created a unified water distribution system. It guarantees the quality of the water. It guarantees that everybody has water wherever you happen to live. Rainwater collecting is not banned just in the West Bank. It's banned everywhere. Because the government in its infinite wisdom cannot certify the quality of that water. So Israel has a network of water distribution, one of the most advanced in the world, including massive quantities of water from desalination plants that is distributed all over Israel, including the West Bank. Should it exclusively ban rainwater collecting? No, from no way, including the West Bank. But it's just one more status policy that Israel's engaged in. But it's not engaged in just against the West Bank again. It's engaged in all over Israel. It's just another example of statism versus an example of, I don't know, discrimination against Arabs in West Bank. I don't think that's it at all. Rafael says, I've been to Stockholm recently and the way they approach life is named Lagom. Not too much, not too little, just the right amount. Do you agree with this? No, no. The whole Scandinavian model is a model of no ambition, no real striving, no pushing to the limits, no great achievement, but no great losses. It's kind of this risk-averse mediocrity. And I think that humanity does not advance much if that is the attitude. We're kind of stagnant and stuck.  So it's a culture that's anti-individual ambition, which is not a good culture at all. Phil says, in all seriousness, at what age does a U.S. university expel students who bring in, distribute, or does that not apply anymore? I don't really understand the question. But I don't think a U.S. university will expel students for violence. They'll expel students for explicitly racist comments. They won't expel them for anti-Semitic comments. They won't expel them for supporting Hamas. They won't expel them for supporting violence against Jews. But they will expel them for being a member of the KKK or expressing anti-Black or anti-Spanic sentiments. It is interesting how they do this. And right now, American universities, at least some of them are suffering because some of the alma mater, some of the donors are stopping to send checks. Now we'll see if that's sustainable. We'll see if they'll continue to do it. We'll see how widespread it is over time. Yeah, Jennifer says, even if she says something anti-gay, they'll probably expel you. Not if you say something anti-Israeli or anti-Jewish. Garbled says, hi, Iran. What do you say to the argument that more civilian casualty leads to more future extremists? Does the data bear this out? No, quite the contrary. The data does not bear this out. I mean, the best data points of this are from World War II, where a lot of civilians died. And that is that there's no hatred of American Germany. There was no hatred of American Japan, even though both the United States and the UK killed hundreds of thousands, if not millions of civilians in Japan and the UK. So the data doesn't bear this out. I don't think it's true. I think it is true that if you do a half job at killing civilians but not winning the war and not doing it in such a way and with such confidence that that nation that you're attacking is convinced that they have lost, that they cause is hopeless, then the killing a civilian will breed more hatred. And that's why you have to go wholeheartedly. You have to do it in a non-half-assed way like we did in Japan and Germany. And in Israel, Israel does it half-assed. And yes, it breeds more hatred, but what's the option? The hatred's already there. One way or another, Israeli weakness, more hatred. Israeli civilians, more hatred, no matter what it does more hatred, except if Israel actually thoroughly, unapologetically, systematically defeats the Palestinian people. Now come us, the Palestinians. And until it does that, it cannot win. Well, it says Bitcoin is freedom, a pseudo-freedom, delusional freedom, but I guess some of you will take that over nothing.  Well, he didn't shift. There's nothing new here. Netanyahu has always been like this. I've been telling you exactly who Netanyahu is for 25 years.  I've told you all this literally for over 20 years. So, and Israel kept electing him even then. I think this time maybe it's too much, not because of the altruism. I think maybe this time too much is because he failed so badly to prevent the original attack. But come on people, you know, go back and watch my talks from 2000. And one, in 1999 I think I gave my first talk on Israel. I've always been anti-Netanyahu. Always said the same thing, gives great speeches, doesn't act it out. So, nothing new. Alright, Happy Avocado says, what do you think about the book? How to win friends and influence people? I mean like a lot of books like that, it's got some good ideas. It's got the particular principles that are good. It's got other things that are completely sick and handed and bad. So, it's a mixed bag like a lot of self-help books. You know, it's not, you know, you have to come with to it with a critical rational mind focused on your interest, focused on being rational and with a virtue of integrity and justice in mind and figure out what makes sense and what doesn't. I read it a long, long time ago and with that in mind. Mark Thomas says, maybe student writers can be sued. Objectivism, I'm not sure what the objective is.  I don't know under what other basis you'd be able to be sued. The only basis of suing is actual damages. You have to show damages. So, suddenly if they destroy property they should all be sued. They should be put in jail. They should be criminally prosecuted and sued. Thank you guys, really appreciate the support. If you want to support the show on a monthly basis, please consider doing so on Patreon or on Subscribestar. You can look at your own book show on there. If you'd like to subscribe, please do so. Subscribe to the show. That'd be great. And share. And of course, oh, like the show with 96 likes. We had 173 people watching live. We should have a lot more likes. So please, if you like the show, if you get value from the show, please like it.  And it does help the algorithms. It doesn't. Nobody knows you liked it. It, you know, you don't get a negative social score by liking it. It just helps the algorithm. It helps promote the show. It helps the show get out there. And, and yeah, I'll be back tomorrow with another one of these shows probably at 12 o'clock East Coast time. See you all then. Bye everybody. Have a great Monday.


Welcome to the metal voice and today first time on the show Sharon Denadal all the way in Holland I'm assuming. Yes exactly. I already have one like a half day ahead of you guys. It's two o'clock here where it's eight o'clock at you guys where you live it's thank you for being here so early in the morning. Yes Bleed Out is the eighth studio album by of course Within Temptation and it was released on October the 20th 2023. We've heard it Stefan's heard it so let's get going there Stefan. I took a lot of pleasure listening to it because your album came out one drop at a time over the past three years one single two singles three singles I'm very curious why did you try to choose to sort of slowly release it sometimes bands like to hide everything and then okay let's launch this whole new 12 track record to the world you did this very very differently can you explain the other part? Yeah well we were well we are for the first time independent and of course with everything happening like the whole COVID period which we didn't know was going to last that long we wrote some new stuff before we were on a co-headline tour here in Europe with Evanescence and then you know the tour was postponed three or four times and we felt I think everyone everywhere felt a bit helpless like oh my god when I'm gonna kill the time and to do that to keep everybody busy we just released songs and kept on writing and nothing is about COVID or the pandemic but it's more about social topics in the beginning and later on about the war in Ukraine of course and and some other very important topics to my opinion but yeah we kept on releasing because after the pandemic we've also felt like okay everybody starts releasing stuff again and we still want to keep people engaged where you know normally when you release an album you have a time span of two weeks and then you release everything at once and there's one big bang which is nice but then you know after those two weeks nobody talks about you anymore and I was like yeah we had those two weeks and now continue writing and continue touring and for us it was like a time span of three years which was a bit long I do agree and too many singles but it was for a good reason and yeah next time a little bit less I guess less singles but still more than the average with a record album you know I'm really loving this album and I'm happy that you're released it piece by piece because you could digest it piece by piece and I also found it fascinating how we go to war which I'm assuming that was about the Ukraine situation here we are with another war and it's sort of pertinent to this topic is pertinent to what's happening today I mean care to comment on that yeah it's very sad that of course in the Middle East there's another you know of course it has been going on for many years and with an extreme point now again of course but that there's so many things happening in the world yeah it's terrible of course and it does well the song is actually about the Ukraine and especially before because war is forced upon you you have to defend yourself and that's what what we mean by we go to war not because we want to but it's forced upon us and um but this in the Middle East I find it also very difficult to um well it's there's two things I think I think this has been going on before I was born so it's a very difficult situation for an outsider to really understand to grasp music is of course something extremely uniting within temptation has an audience all around the world you've managed to work on every market do you feel that heavy metal is the kind of music that translates extremely well into unifying people everywhere in the world I mean it's not a genre like country music where there's a certain demographic that comes with it within temptation has been able to unite fans all around the world looking back you say oh my god never thought that people of different nation different language uh could unite around that single theme of the type of music you do well I think of course that um I think I do agree that people that the music unites but I think you can also see that in in different in different genres also but I do think what we have in common in the metal scene is maybe being a bit of an outsider we're not mainstream we are already chose not to be mainstream in a way so we are well we choose to not to be also because our heart lies in a different kind of music of course and to take that step already is already from a big group of people I guess so and I guess so in a small way I think we do know what it is to be an outsider and a bit different and maybe that unites I think it's also the fact that you like this specific kind of thing that a lot of people don't like also anyway so I think that unifies uh and therefore also is also yeah I love that also about this scene that's like we stand as one and we're united it's just the scene itself is beautiful can I open the door to one single question Jimmy yeah the song ritual has this yeah drop dropping video I gather made with the latest technology were you involved all in the process of getting that video together it's just I find it jaw dropping and the video the song and the video yeah okay well the this song is actually a more of a fun track and of course we went over top with it it's a little bit if in a situation that if you would give the same strength to women as men physically have what would they do in a certain situation when they're well you know harassed or and it was just it's just a fun again a fun track a video because we love Halloween here we don't have as much as you guys over in America we love that so we've always wanted to do a Halloween video and for us this is more like a Halloween slash slayer horror kind of thing and I think if anyone can understand that probably America does and Canada does because the tradition is there a bit bigger than we we've adopted it actually from you guys and we have now one sitting in the Netherlands I really love to do that it's called Sutomir and the whole town is whole Halloween now so it's uh and it's quite a big town as well a city the city it is and anyway um yeah um we also with like I said with the video we go over the top we take some certain things of course there's a message in there but still we had a lot of fun writing the lyrics and doing the video so over the top and it just makes people's eyebrows go up on this topic I mean I remember back in 2007 you know how has a women's role in metal evolved because there was the in 2007 it was the hottest chicks in metal tour right yeah right I mean how do you feel about that today well I was already surprised at the time that I was in the airplane when I heard the title you know that the how they announced the tour and I was like what hottest chicks in metal and I was really like I just surprised me so much because you don't have the hottest men in metal you don't have the handsome most handsome men of metal no we're the toughest but when it comes to women the sexier so of course the one who thought of that um yeah how to announce his tour um was thinking how can I say sell this tour the best well sex sells apparently and to announce it like that of course was a bit yeah I think people would think twice nowadays to give it that kind of title to a tour and um it's a compliment in a way right I mean yeah it is a compliment but it does put you in a certain corner you're not that taking that seriously maybe that's the reason why we didn't like it that much is because of course I totally agree it is to a certain degree a compliment but you want to also be taken seriously of course literally I was like and the coolest is always taken me take a seriously you don't you don't take that not seriously but they couldn't get away with a title like that today they couldn't know that's what I say yeah yeah so and things have changed and you know I do agree with all this the whole situation I love the fact that we are starting to realize how should we go about certain things better although we shouldn't know but also take it easy because sometimes things are also in this topic taken too extreme against like okay hopefully we get into the middle of the whole situation again and becomes a little bit lighter and yeah relaxed around this topic yeah I would like to be the hottest podcaster you know yeah but but that's because that's because I'm starting from down here you know and if I can get up there I'm good but I do recall in the 1980s I do recall in the 1980s uh because I'm a child of the 80s where metal well there you go metal bands in the 80s female metal bands I remember very well a girl school who were very tough looking and and certainly did not play in that image their record company tried anyway bands like vixen whose image was built around that uh and even later forward to a degree people these are artists who always resented being marketed for their feminine side as opposed to their musical style am I correct to say that the symphonic metal genre in the 1990s when it started out sort of created a radical cut from that marketing from the 80s well I don't agree because you know because most of because a different uh synonym for uh symphonic metal band is almost female fronted because especially the bands coming from the Netherlands where a lot of them were symphonic had a symphonic sound and they always most of them had a female singer and but they were very different from each other the way uh they you know implemented metal or rock was quite different with every band and so you know which like for Nightwish for instance it was a little bit more folk-based and you have Epica which is really a little bit more metal metal and then but all with females and and us you know going everywhere in the meantime going you know every album was a bit different it is strange to keep you know and also other bands like like Evanescence to put everyone on a pile like that's female fronted is is is like not going really to see what what how different they actually are of course it also helped us to be honest because because we were called female fronted it also uh well to a certain degree it also helps you of course to to be a certain category but I don't think we were a certain genre by itself because we were so different the only thing that we really had together is it's a female fronting it and you know but but's but's the fan I just want to say something to your point here it's strange because Lita Ford and all those bands that the Vixens they were all male followers but this is where the cutoff that you're talking about where you're kind of now the females have entered into the metal world and that way fans that's what I think he's trying to say oh yeah that's that is true that is true sorry I misinterpreted your question it's okay I'm here for clarifications it's it's it's it's coffee mornings well I still need to get my second one which I really need by the way so my apologies you kept referring to of course symphonic metal and other stuff but we've seen the growth of of your career you know very early on it was extremely gothic with symphony then you went more and I don't like to use the word industrial but it evolved with the harder edge sound in in the 2000s you always kept the symphonic side the back the upper like voice but ultimately you never seemed to have much of a problem to move and evolve into a much more modern sound much more identifiable to to the last decade did is it because there's been a change in the songwriting process uh no I think we've always tried to um get well we always look for new things to inspire us and there's always new bands coming around and everybody brings something new to the table and there's of course new sounds that sounds in themselves already you know evolve as well and we're always looking for a new refreshing sound that makes us sound like a band that had it's just begun you know releasing their first album more or less and of course we have our DNA with us and we try to implement all those new influences in in our own already existing DNA so yeah it's always looking for new things new bands so we keep on trying renewing ourselves if there's a new sound that we really love we try to take in a certain way that into our music but not doing that exactly but more and like combining it with what we already have and what people know us from because in the basis we just love heavy music and we love melodies because we come from the 80s right there's 80s kids so I love emotion and I love melodies that's why we're not the heaviest band around of course but I also think it's also nice that I don't have to be the heaviest and also because I'm a woman I like to also embrace my femininity and without trying to be like any guy who is in the metal scene and so it's it's a combination of a lot of things that we are who we are every time and how we evolve let me ask you this you toured with Aryan Maiden you know what was that's where we saw you actually last oh really cool you opened up for Aryan Maiden in Ottawa Canada the day before you were at Metropolis a solo show which was packed completely packed my pregnant daughter can I get a stool what did you learn like touring with Aryan Maiden what did you take away from that experience well you know they've been around has been since we were kids of course inspired by by by Aryan Maiden but also bands like them because Merilion was also a band that we love to listen to and so many you know it was the biggest compliment to being asked to go on tour with them in America because we do well in America and in in in Canada but you know they do quite a different venue than we do normally of course in yeah well so it's in Europe of course not but here it is so it was for us a compliment to be with them and to go on tour with them but what I learned mostly is their love for music and I think I think I hope to be like Steve Harris when I am his age or older still like loving music so much he breathes it he eats it he speaks it is you know he's constantly busy with music and every show that we played on stage during that tour for three weeks he was every time behind our gear looking at our show and he apparently does it with with all the support acts because I think he picks them and so he really likes a band and then he asked them on tour and he loves to see I think also the interaction of you know being a little bit thrown through to the wolves you know or the lions whatever you want to say it is like okay you have to convince an audience that is only there for Aryan Maiden to convince them that you are worthy to be in their support you know act and so it's it's and it is a nice chance I love that on the dark position myself as well because well you have to reinvent yourself just feeling the atmosphere of the venue like okay what's what's the mood what's happened just recently here and just being prepared before you go on stage okay I'm in this city and this happened just now what am I going to say to people how am I going to get them on our side as well how am I going to win their hearts you know it's like and that's the struggle which is always very cool to have as your opener up like in such a yeah iconic band as Aryan Maiden of course and I think he loves us to see that yeah favorite Aryan Maiden album and song oh my god I'm really bad come on let's go one two three one two three run to the hills is my favorite okay you've you've come I've seen you in Montreal a couple of times mostly on your own without another major act on the bill does it sort of look sensitive question but you've been on the road for almost 30 years now the concept of opening for another band when you're so established with your own following both kind of bother you like why am I still an opening act in my 50s when this is something most bands do when they start out well no I think it keeps you grounded in a way also it's a it's a very good to go back to where you once were and to understand how that's you know that like I said it's nice to fight a little bit for your own music and to be that on the dark position which we had a long time also in Europe because radio didn't want to play us and it was a little bit of you know we were a bit of a strange band because we were very melodic but too heavy for radio and you know we also had to fight if we were in a metal festival people said well they're very melodic and on the you know mainstream festival my god they're heavy you know it was always always you were always a bit how we say in Dutch it's in Dutch saying it's like the strange duck and that's how we felt always and it's nice to be remembered where we came from and we you know it's like to be in an underdog position again although I must say that most of the times the Iron Maiden fans are pretty cool to play for we had we did play also open up for other bands where it was way more difficult than Iron Maiden fans I think because they also love Melody and they love storytelling and you know Melody and Melody because when I saw you in Ottawa with Jimmy I thought you brought the whole house down that's what I remember Jimmy remember that too yes yeah yeah you did very well yes the band did very well and it was very accepted by the fans too you know and I think yeah yeah and I think there's also this political social topics that you inject into your music that people say you know what these people are a thinking band versus you know rock and roll party all night long right and I think that matters too with the Iron Maiden crowd yeah I think so too I think there's there's an overlap in that perspective yes I noticed that sorry the new album you went without a record company most people would say well what's a record company these days anyway I mean there's no record stores but that obviously took an awful lot of courage self-promoting when you're no longer with a record label becomes very difficult tell us about this was this a personal choice or you felt that the state of the music business allows you to simply be unattached to a label well we've been around of course for 27 years already and we've worked with different record companies and we couldn't you know we watched over their shoulders always like what are they doing and how are they doing it so we learned in the meantime and felt confident enough to make this choice also because they didn't want to you know times are changing I think I see a lot of music genres where they release in a different way than the traditional rock and metal music is being released where you have like one or two singles or three maybe and then you have the whole album being released and when we talked to our record company at the time it's like okay we want to do it differently we want to maybe do some little bit more singles in the moment that we feel that it a certain you know something is happening in the world and we want to write about it and we want to release them immediately because if it ends up on an album three years later it won't matter anymore and for us it's very important to be talking about the subjects which are important for us in the moment so I think we had the best time ever when this pandemic happened that we were able to do so to be more flexible because they would not have really let us release more than three singles otherwise and we went we well we went our different ways in a very friendly way they had one more option to bring out an album and we didn't want it anymore because they said we can't do it and yeah I think they had well they you know we always had a good relation with them so we felt I think they well we just decided to go both different ways and they knew it wasn't possible yeah it's also sorry to cut you off it's marketing artistic vision and publishing I would say those are the three main things that the record company just can't provide artists anymore or at least not as much it is the publishing a big thing now you're independent you own your own publishing I'm assuming you're right all of it's yours yeah all of it's ours and that's also very nice to be honest that with the ghost and it goes a big chunk of course to a record company and you don't of course you get in advance and those kind of things but you don't now it takes time to well to get your your publishing back at a certain time and but everything almost everything we have already back now which is also nice that we are able to do and release whatever we want from the past without asking permission every time because your videos people don't understand this you get millions of hits yeah we do your spotifies in the millions as well and all this is money now being filtered to your band versus to you know a third party or a record label whatever the case may be yeah and but now we can spend it on the promotion and everything that we think we need or an extra video or and everything costs of course a lot of money and time to organize because we have now we hired everybody ourselves now it's like you know all the promotion people everything we've done but we do work with a distribution who does get a part of what we're earning of course with this album which is very because you can't do everything so the distribution is of course needed distributions the deal and I do not recommend this to every band especially when you're starting this is not something you want to do you need to build up something you need to learn how to well learn from the record companies that you have been with and don't sign more than two albums if you're able to because then you can go away and do it on your own later on which is a good thing I think I'm curious also uh you will I gather go back on the road promoting this new album same set list with a few new songs from the new album looking at doing something different this time well you know not every song has been played live that we have on the album I think there's like five five songs we didn't play live yet and maybe we'll release also some new things along the way before the tour starts I'm not sure we're looking forward to start writing again there's enough to write about again so it's it's it's always inspiring to look at the world and and see what's happening so maybe we'll release something before the time I'm not sure it depends with how well we succeed in that as well but we mostly gonna focus on making a new stage for the new new tour because the tour doesn't really start until next year around this time and we need time to well because we do that ourselves as well it's like four months at least thinking about what you want to have on stage what kind of lightning what are the cost the specs you know every venue is different so there's a lot of work and this is mostly done by Robert and he has his own artist team that actually works with him and things along what we are able to do to fix to make because the head that we had on the stage in Europe that was made by artists that made every piece by hand metal and it was yeah it was really done in a very spectacular way I yeah why are you waiting a year to go back on the road usually a new album you want to promote it heavily and and and hit the road as quickly as possible yeah another way of going against the grain well we have been you know because of the covid situation we had to catch up a lot of shows and also we had to had a lot of a lot of festivals so since last year summer last year like started in june and until December halfway December we were finished with all the touring so it was a long long run and in a bit in between we were recording writing and so I came home this this winter last last winter after christmas and my my husband said well actually Daniel that's our producer it's going to be on the doorstep tomorrow I said what yeah yeah we're going to start recording the next two weeks we don't finish lyrics yet what are you doing so yeah well where's my laptop I said it's like I'm going to go which one is the third is which one won't take that much that's which one will buy me time you know and since that moment from january till I think well up to now I've been promoting recording and finishing songs and it was such a intense long time so we felt like we need a break from everything also most bands actually do announce their tour always a year ahead also because a ticket price that went up people having time to buy a ticket if they really want to and instead of pushing them within two months to buy something all right so on that note yes bleed out is the eight studio album that was just released pick it up next year you're on tour I'm assuming in 2025 a new album correct uh yeah maybe I'm gonna aim for that's gonna try that let's aim for that okay on that note thank you very much within temptation Sharon Den Adele thank you so much for your time thanks for being on the show and we look forward to seeing you on tour thank you very much for having me thank you Sharon uh if you give me a second my daughter just texted me something here she says the iron is I'm translating from French iron is the song that you put on when you prepare an epic fight in your head I'll take her word for it comment on that um well it is yeah yeah I can relate to that yes it's it's um and also the video was a little bit but has some references to that so um it's fighting to stay on the right path a bit yeah all right there you go keep it in your set list okay I will I'll tell the boys to prepare themselves your daughter's got the last word there's the fact thank you so much you're welcome


And we're away first time of asking, and it's a good start from Lindgren, game number two. Look at Pavlitsky! Well, he may not have been happy with his bike. He changed in, then went back, and he's got the lead, and that was a wonderful move. And now Mickey Pedersen's going into the dirt on that bottom turn. Battle with Hancock, Hancock gets third. Lindgren now trying everything, he's all over the back wheel. And Shemeck Pavlitsky, he's got wide, that allows Hancock the opportunity, perhaps. But they're settling down now with Pavlitsky having the lead. Lindgren is second, third is Hancock, and Mickey Pedersen, covered in dirt, he's at the back and watch out for Lindgren. He really is piling on the pressure on Pavlitsky. Indeed he is. Pavlitsky must have heard us. He made a jet propelled start there.  Lindgren nearly ran in the back of Pavlitsky, and then Hancock had to put all the brakes on as well. Tight coming out of turn two, halfway through the right. It's into the last lap. Pavlitsky working his socks off out in front. A little bit greasy there, but he's made it work. He got to the front at the right time. Oh, who saw this result coming? Not many. Szemek Pavlitsky takes the checkered flag, and a Polish contingent in this crowd, and there's plenty of them. Delighted with that. Terrific ride. Szemek Pavlitsky gets his first points on the board tonight. Huge confidence boost for him there, but he had Lindgren and Hancock absolutely all over him. Really did have to keep them at bay. And one of two scary moments along the way as well. Indeed, there was. And Nicky Patterson got pushed out in that first corner and quite clean. He didn't enjoy conditions covered in dirt as a result of the watering, but it is a tough call for the track curator tonight. Pavlitsky out in front. That was some way to bounce back. Yep. Szemek Pavlitsky, the winner. Freddie Lindgren was second. Greg Hancock was third. Nicky Patterson at the back did complete the race, and Lindgren now on four points, and very much like previous Grand Prix, a couple of second places, very, very consistent four points from two rides so far. Absolutely right. And what you have to take into account as well that Lindgren had a lot of speed, and if the track had just given him a little bit more, but just couldn't find a way around, had to just be patient on the inside. Great move. That's what won the race for Pavlitsky there, that move from Gate 3. We saw Yonovsky winning style there, his compatriot. And again, Gate 3 proving to be quite a winner in the opening heats here this evening. Pavlitsky out in front. Not always the fastest rider in this heat, but he's in the right place at the right time. Freddie Lindgren, the question was the faster of the two riders out in front, but could not find a way through. He was also mindful of the fact that he had Greg Hancock pegging away. There we saw very nearly, Greg Hancock does very well to stay upright there.


This is a story of sacrifice and not just any sacrifice. Great sacrifices have been mentioned all throughout history. Ancient or modern civilizations, some are myths, some are tales, some are stories. Others are real-life events told a million times over. The famous Prophet Jesus, for example, told his day, we find a fig tree implanted on the chest of a passerby in every corner of the world. But what makes a sacrifice great is the result that follows. And for many, this is a tale that resonates like an annual tide, with tears and emotions surfacing at the shore. A yearly guest that when the days come, he knocks on the door. And we welcome him in. But who is this visitor? And what kind of sacrifice did he make that the earth and all his stays cannot forget him?  He traveled the distance with a handful of friends and a handful of family, brothers, sisters, sons and mothers, and even newborn additions.  He stood and stood and they took and took until he had nothing more to give in life than life itself. Yet life demanded more until he had more fingers to count the loved ones, not spared like Abraham from the fires with the hail storm of arrows, not spared like the throat of Ishmael, no sheep to replace this young one. There was no river to float a baby across like baby Moses in the Nile. No, this time the river was the villain of the story, not spared like the people of Israel. When the sea was split open and the people fled to safety, no, this time an army of thousands swallowed them. And those who remained were paraded to the point that 40 years in the wilderness would have been sweeter. And neither was there an ark to save them like the ark of Noah, two by two. No, this man was left alone drowning in his sacrifice. There was no hero to save this story, no David against Goliath, no King Arthur, no Hercules, no miracle to become or to be, so no healing words could save nor love between teardrop slaves, the value of his sacrifice. How much his sacrifice was worth? How much was his sacrifice worth? Cannot be quantified, but he gave it all not for a throne or wealth or gold or power or anything that could be sold. He gave it all for something that most men would not comprehend where philosophers would fail to follow the trail of thought to its end. And equations cannot simplify nor solved by algorithms. He gave it all for something that most men would not comprehend and that cannot be measured in this earth, nor beyond the layered sky. He gave it all for the pleasure of the most high. And in return, he's become immortalized. And that, my friends, is the story of Hussain, but there's a whole different story when he looked into the details. So then now that you know the story of Hussain, let me tell you the story of the hands of Hussain. Let me tell you the story of the hands of Hussain. Let's go back to the battlefield. Hussain was thinking. It was as if it was yesterday when his hands were tightly held by his grandfather. They were tiny, soft, and knew nothing of pain. While his grandfathers were big, bold, and as comforting as rain, but the times have changed and these hands felt no comfort, just blood between the crevices. Lost were the ones that once held them and he wondered how many more pulses he would feel stopped beating. Or how many eyes he'd forced to close because they reminded him of the miracles that were once breathing. How many more young heads he would comfort because he was all they had left. He would look at his hands. How much more could they take? His hands were worn and his mind was torn. He could not choose which body was more painful to touch, nor which soul ached more to lose. Whether the embraces of the living band more or the coldness of the body has gone so soon. But all he knew for sure was that his back was still heaving. From that recent meeting where he had to lift two hands kneeling near a man he left by the river like a lunar silhouette. Where he had to lift two hands kneeling near a man he left by the river like a shivering lunar silhouette. His palms were still warm and his fingers were still wet. He dropped to his knees and held his brother like the day they first met a moon enshrined in a cloak. His tiny eyes as a baby too shy to meet his own. Too shy to meet his eye was it? An arrow had always been the reason why. Little did he know that he would eventually match his shrine but that mattered little right now. He'd say I need you to hold me up brother. I need you to be my spy. Was that his most painful? Was that his most painful? Or was it peeling the one who most resembled his grandfather from a spear like an angel? An angel who had fallen on splinted wings holding each piece of what used to be a man raised forever settle his heartbeat. Now wrapped in cloth and sheet when not longer go he held him young. A father's lap designed to be his son's seat. And now the same lap soaks his blood deep and the same knees that once rocked him now take him to sleep. Don't close your eyes son.  You're the final fragment of my grandfather.  Was that his most painful? Or was it the baby's sacrifice like a feathered dove caught between his two nervous hands? If hearts were made of strings that three-pronged arrow no doubt offered that final sting slicing through that last remaining string that held his beautiful heart together. And now his heart was nothing more than an organ bleeding crushed by the memories like a woman he once knew was crushed behind the door. To hold or how he needed her right now to hold him like he was holding his martyred son. Mohsen bled in the womb and here is Hussain holding another. But he still stood tall despite being broken into uncountable fragments. He still stood tall because Zaynab needed one last look at her mountain. He held her tightly and from afar it looked like a dark cloud hugging a mountain eroding. He held her tightly as if he could give her all the strength he had left for the remainder of the journey and he looked on in anguish for what he saw and what he could foresee. His hands still bleeding from the shards left by 72 broken ornaments blown away by death like autumn leaves in the breeze remembering and hoping that at that very moment his grandfather would once again hold his hand because it was if it was yesterday when his hands were tightly held by his grandfather they were tiny soft and knew nothing of pain while his grandfathers were big bolders and as comforting as rain.