The radical, fundamental principles of freedom, rational self-interest, and individual rights. This is the Iran Brook Show. All right, everybody. Welcome to Iran Brook Show on this, what is it? It's Thursday, July 27th. We're here for another roundup, news roundup. So thanks for joining me. I am traveling, as you can probably see from the video. This is in my home view. This is me on the road. Oh, I should put on the video. Yeah, that way you can see. There you go. Now you can see me. Let me keep track. Okay, we've got the chat going on over there. That's good. As usual, we are raising $250 as part of funding these shows, part of making these shows possible. All right, I'm in Aspen, Colorado. I think I've got a little bit of this altitude sickness or whatever. I don't feel quite right. It's not anything specific, but it's just weird. Hopefully I'll get you stirred by tomorrow. I'll be fine, but I'll be here for a few days. It is high up here in Aspen. I have to tell you, Aspen is beautiful. If you've never been to Aspen, it's gorgeous. It's a little town tucked into this valley, mountains on the sides, green, pretty, filled with a lot of people here. A lot of people come here for the summers. Very, very wealthy place. There's a lot of wealth out in the streets here, but it's quite a beautiful place. So I encourage you to join us. All right, so we've got people from Italy. Thank you, Milko, for joining us. And Silvanos, thank you, has started us off with some super chat. That's great. Let's see. Is everything working here the way it's supposed to be working? Yeah, I think so. All right, let's jump in with some of our stories that we are following. I mean, the big story, of course, I didn't have our news roundup yesterday, so I apologize for that. I was traveling all day, but yesterday there was a hearing where Hunter Biden was supposed to plead guilty under a plea bargain agreement to two counts of, I guess, tax fraud where he didn't pay taxes on income of a million and a million and a half in two different years, and roped into that was a weapons possession charge. And he was supposed to plead guilty to that, and there was some pretty minor payment of the taxes, penalties, and then some, I think, pretty minor other penalties. So Hunter goes in there with his lawyers and judge Mary Ellen Nureka, who was appointed by Donald Trump in 2017, I think, and supported by Senate Democrats, so it was a hugely partisan appointment. Anyway, and by the way, the attorney, the prosecutor, whose prosecuting is also a Trump appointee, so you've got a lot of Trump appointees here, that's what happens when you have a presidency. Anyway, the judge starts questioning Hunter about the plea deal, and he expresses the willingness to plead guilty under the plea deal, and then she starts questioning the lawyers about the nature of the deal, and soon it becomes evident that there's some disagreement between the lawyers about what the deal actually includes, whereas the defense thinks that the deal covers everything, that is that the prosecution is committed to not prosecuting Hunter Biden on any other charges, the prosecution is going, oh no, no, no, we're still investigating certain aspects of Hunter Biden's activities in particular. We are investigating what's called illegal foreign lobbying on behalf of violation of the Foreign Agents Registration Act, and with the prosecuting that, and that's not off the table, that's not part of the plea deal. Anyway, they don't agree. So at that point, I think they all go out, and the lawyers all renegotiate, and they come back and say, okay, we agree that yes, the plea deal holds for these charges, but doesn't include the potential foreign lobbying charges. So then the judge continues the question, and she says, look, this drug deal, this gun deal, as part of this other, this tax issue, that doesn't seem completely right. It doesn't seem completely constitutional, and I'm not a lawyer, so I have no opinion about whether that's right or wrong. Anyway, she says, this is complicated, and you expect me to just sign off on this plea deal? No, I mean, I need to really think about this. I need to evaluate this. I need to really examine this. This is not straightforward or simple. And she says, I can't accept this plea deal today. I have to go and figure out what's going on. What actually happened is Biden pleaded not guilty for now, and the judge has asked both parties to file additional legal briefs defending the constitutionality of the plea deal, defending the different provisions, explaining how they understand the deal so that everybody is on the same page. They have 30 days to file these briefs. At that point, the judge is going to evaluate, think about it, and then I assume issue a written ruling about whether she accepts that the plea deal is legit or not. So all this is now completely thrown out into the land of confusion. Nobody knows exactly what's going on. Nobody knows what the outcome. I think the Bidens were hoping this would put this behind them. This has done the exact opposite. This has given Republicans more time to go dig more dirt on the Bidens, or at least if they can't dig the dirt, keep talking about it and keep talking about digging dirt and keep talking about their speculation about what's really going on. As you know, the Republicans are claiming that there were big payments made both by Ukrainian authorities and by Chinese authorities to both Hunter and Joe Biden. They have no proof of this. The recordings that supposedly proved this have disappeared. Nobody can find them. So it gives Republicans more time to keep on it, to keep Hunter Biden's name in the news. The Biden family cannot be happy with this at all. And it looks like Republicans will keep this. There are urgent things that this government needs to do. You know, entitlement reform, cut spending, maybe reform the way our defense budget is done, and make sure that the U.S. is ready for conflict with China if it comes. We're going to deregulate, get the government out of our lives, get us on a proper path for economic growth and prosperity in the future. But God forbid Republicans focus any time on any of those things. The agenda now is to go after the Bidens with hope of scoring political points. So be it. I mean, this is what's going to happen. You know, I've told you from the beginning, would I be shocked if the Bidens were getting massive payments? No. Would I be shocked if Hunter Biden got into business deals, boards of directors, other deals because he's the son of Joe Biden? Absolutely not. Hunter Biden strikes me as an incompetent moron who knows nothing, a drug addict, a womanizer, not exactly a person you want to put on your board of directors, unless you want access to the former vice president or the current vice president, a former vice president, a current president of the United States. But that's the way politics is done in the mixed economy. The only way to get rid of that, the only way to get rid of those kind of transactions is to get rid of the mixed economy, is to move us towards capitalism, get government out of the business of business. You know, we're not any way close to actually doing that. So this is where we are. Whether this goes political point or not, it doesn't matter. Republicans are going to push this. They don't actually want to deal with the actual problems that this country faces. They don't actually want to deal. And they certainly don't have solutions for the actual problems that this country faces, including the cronyism, including the corruption. They don't actually want to deal with the root cause of the corruption and the cronyism. So they will continue to do these kind of things and go after them. I wonder if they go after their own children who leverage their political parents, the connections of political parents. And should people suffer for this corruption? Absolutely, they should. But if you really took this seriously, if there's a real anti-corruption campaign in the United States, then it's likely that the Bidens and at least Jared Kushner and the former Treasury Secretary, I forget his name now, God, he used to be a Goldman Sachs guy. Anyway, the guy who was Treasury Secretary under Trump and the Pelosi's and pretty much everybody in our political class today, that was the same. Think about all the congressmen and senators who benefited from the fact over decades now that they are not prosecuted for insider trading and they can make money off of the laws that they pass and the impacts that they have on stocks. I mean, the amount of corruption is just unbelievable. And if you really were serious about it, then you'd be serious about it. This is not serious. This is just a political charade. It's a political charade to beat up on your political rivals. All right, fine. And again, if there was a real investigation, they'd be investigating a lot more than just Hunter Biden. They'd be investigating many, many more people, many, many more families who are in political positions in the United States. Well, Trump, surprisingly, had an interesting twist on what happened yesterday. So he wrote this on his truth network. I wonder why he's not using X, formerly known as Twitter. They've approved his account, but he still doesn't use it. Anyway, this is what he wrote. Weiss, who is the prosecutor of the Hunter Biden case, which Donald Trump appointed. Okay, this is Donald Trump.  A small version of Bill Barr. Bill Barr, Trump's secretary of the Justice Department, head of the Justice Department, and a Trump loyalist almost to the end, but cannot be forgiven for not playing along with Trump's fantasies about stolen elections.  A smaller version of Bill Barr, who never had the courage to do what everyone knows, everyone knows should have been done. He gave out a traffic ticket instead of a death sentence. This is Weiss. So Donald Trump is saying Hunter Biden should have got a death sentence. He gave out a traffic ticket instead of a death sentence because of the two Democratic senators in Delaware. They got to choose or approve him and or approve him. Trump actually nominated him. Maybe the judge presiding will have the courage and intellect to break up the cesspool of crime. The collusion and corruption is beyond description. Two tiers of justice. This is from a former president, the first in American history, who is an indictment now in two different courts, a state court in New York and a federal court for crimes that he likely committed, is facing a third indictment over his trying to overturn the election in 2020, in his actions around January 6th, and then is facing a fourth indictment from a county in the state of Georgia for trying to overturn the elections in Georgia, trying to manipulate people in Georgia to try to throw the election his way. This is a former president who actually currently has his lawyers meeting with the special counsel in the Justice Department to try to convince the special counsel that Trump should not be indicted for violating of pretty severe laws that bear pretty severe punishment if he is found guilty. So this is a president who has four indictments. Two federal, two state, all criminal. All could involve time in jail. He is talking about a cesspool of corruption. He is talking about two justice systems for everybody. I mean, he would like to get away from all of these. He would like them all eliminated because he is above the law. So yeah, this is a political class. Left and right, it doesn't matter. They think they can get away with everything. Alright, so he is not literally saying Hunter Biden should get a death sentence, but he is saying Hunter Biden should get a very, very, very, very severe penalty versus the very light penalty equivalent to a traffic ticket that he did get. So he is literally, yes, everybody gets that he is not literally saying they should shoot him. But still, that's the language he is using. Donald Trump chose to use. Nami, that's his words. And think about that severity. Imagine if that was the prosecutor's attitude towards Donald Trump in all these cases. He would be sitting in jail for longer than the next term of the president. He would be sitting in jail maybe for much of the rest of his life if they took that attitude.  And of course, people by answer, people are convinced that all of the prosecution of Donald Trump is one big conspiracy against him.  And of course, one could argue, you know, that Republicans were likely to believe that Trump is a victim of the Justice Department and Hunter Biden is skating free because he is not being investigated. And it's probably that Hunter Biden is getting a much less penalty than a mortal human being, not part of the political class. But I also think that Trump expects the same behavior. And that Trump appears to be guilty on all counts, all of those counts. And he expects to just be get away with it and become president of the United States and pardon himself forever, I think. All right, anyway, so Trump's lawyers are meeting now. A third indictment of Donald Trump is expected any day now if the lawyers do not manage to convince the special counsel that he is innocent and does not deserve to be indicted. All right, fun stories, fun stories. Okay, here's one that is both inspiring and depressing. So two companies, two companies Waymo and Cruz, Waymo and Cruz have been testing out self-driving cars in San Francisco over the last, since really the end of 2021, when they got permission from the state of California to basically run tests with self-driving cars, basically no driver.   And these have been driving around San Francisco for a year and a half now. The results are pretty astounding. That is, the number of accidents as compared to what one would expect from a human driver, a fraction, they're down by, I have actually the stats here. Here's what it is. 53% fewer collisions, 92% fewer collisions in which the driver, in this case, the driverless vehicle was at fault, right? So you still had collisions because the other party was at fault, right? Somebody else drove into the car, but even there, you know, 92 less fewer collisions where the car involved, in this case, Cruz, was involved, was at fault. 73% fewer collisions with a meaningful risk of injury than the human performance benchmark, right? So these are astounding results. Basically, if we switch to driverless cars tomorrow, the number of fatalities, the number of injuries, the number of major accidents on the road would plummet. And of course, it wouldn't be perfect. There'd still be some accidents going on. The driverless cars would make, quote, mistakes, and there would be challenges, but we'd learn from those challenges and keep improving the cars. And in 10 years or now, we might have a car system where nobody drives, where the cars are all driving themselves, and where there are basically zero accidents on the road. That's what happened with flight. Originally, flight was quite dangerous. There were a lot of accidents. People died. And yet the last airplane to crash with fatalities in the United States, I mean, major airline, was 2001. 2001. That's over 20 years. We have not had a major fatality, a fatality causing crash in the United States in airlines. Now, how did they do that? They did it by learning, by taking risks by learning. And yes, they were accidents and they kept improving. They kept getting better and figured out what happened. There's accidents and today we have nothing. So you have a technology that is going to, the potential to dramatically reduce traffic jams because people drive more effectively. They dramatically reduce collisions because right now it only reduced collisions by 53% because all the other drivers on the street, on the road, are human. But it has the potential to reduce collisions by 90% tomorrow if all the cars are self-driving cars and 100% of collisions within a decade or two. Reduce, dramatically reduce collisions with any meaningful risk of injury. And at the same time, but at the same time, you know, because at the same time, there is massive opposition to these cars, primarily by people in San Francisco where these things were being run. You know, people are objecting because, you know, this rollout, which California is considering rolling these out, allowing driverless cars in California, which is stunning and amazing and wow, so exciting. And yet there's a number of reports saying that a Waymo vehicle killed a small dog. A week later, there was a Guardian report saying that one of Cruiser's vehicles obstructed emergency crew responding to a mass shooting. Last week, there was a Twitter posted a video of a near-death experience at the hand of a driverless car after Waymo ran a yellow-red light and nearly jackknifed another car.  And it turns out in every one of those cases, you know, people either lying or significantly misrepresenting the truth, with the little dog, the dog just ran out into the street with no leash. Behind a parked car, no human beings could have stopped at and he got run over.  Don't allow your dog to be unleashed in a next-door street. You know, what were the other cases? It turned out that the obstruction of an emergency crew just never happened. The Waymo car that had noticed that there was an emergency, there was a mass shooting in San Francisco gang-related, it turned out that the car noticed that the emergency vehicles were en route. It did a U-turn parked on the other side of the road to get out of the way of the emergency vehicles. Indeed, emergency crews were interviewed later and testified that that's exactly what the car did and it actually helped them. It's not clear, human beings would have been that fast and responded that well. And the jackknife thing was the car not running a yellow-red light, but there were cars in front of it that were backed up into the intersection. It had realized that it couldn't go through, so it stopped before the pedestrian things, letting pedestrians pass. And yes, as a consequence, it was sticking into traffic behind. But that's pretty good. Anyway, a lot of this is driven by just fear of technology. But a lot of this is driven by drivers, by taxi drivers, by Uber drivers, by people who are afraid of losing their jobs. There's panic and fear of a new technology, but the data is unambiguous that autonomous vehicles are safer than human drivers by several factors and significant life-saving savers. And yet, there is a big battle, big battle in all of California over this. You know, the good thing about California is that there are a lot of smart risk-taking people there, the industry is there, and the industry is pushing to have this approved. But there are also a lot of these anti-technology forces. It's going to be interesting to see who wins organized labor is in lockstep opposition to the autonomous vehicle rollout. This is going to hurt, again, different unions that relate to driving. The fire department is against it. You know, in the fire, the firefighters' union is against it, the taxi workers' alliance is against it, the teamsters are against it. And you can just imagine all these forces against progress, all these leadite forces against this massive innovation. And here is a positive use of AI. Let's see. The Wall Street Journal has an article that's about the economy. You know, for years now, certainly since COVID, but even before COVID, there were a lot of complaints about the fact that working age, prime working age young, particularly men, were not joining the workforce.  They were living off of welfare. They were using their checks that they got from COVID not to go to work. And labor force participation for the 25 to 54-year-olds, prime years, I consider prime years, was way below historical levels. That has rapidly changed over the last year. The share of people between 25 and 54 working or seeking jobs is at the highest level since 2002. So much higher than in 2019, before the pandemic, much higher than 2007, before the great financial crisis. This goes back to 2002, before you see so many people participating. This effect is an overall effect, but it's primarily shown among women. You know, rates of labor force participation among women in their prime peaked in the late 1990s and then declined into the mid-2000s and then increased to 2019 and then crashed again. And in 2019, we're again at kind of historical highs. Right now, female participation, women participating in the workforce between the ages 24 and 54 is at the highest level it's ever been. 77.8% of women in the prime years are participating. With men, men have been under decline since the 1970s. So 1970, 96% of all men in those ages were working. That has seen just a steady systematic decline throughout the years. It kind of stabilized during the mid to late 20s and then dropped dramatically during COVID. And it's now back to 2019 levels of about 89%. But just think about, we've gone from 96% to 89%. So there's 7% that have just gone. So what's interesting here is that primarily women are going into the workforce. They're going into the workforce at these ages. And it's pretty stunning though how low workforce participation of young people is in the United States among men. Among women, it's pretty high. But even there, the 78% is still lower than most Western countries, lower than even in Japan, UK, France, Canada, all have higher labor force participation among women in those age groups. But yes, people are going back to work, which is a good thing and a positive thing. We need to get more men. We need to get men back up to 90 plus percent. It's sad that they are 10% of the male population in those ages that's not working. It means they're living off somebody. Not sure whom. Maybe their wives. Maybe the women in their lives who've gone back to work. Finally, I told you that the Israeli parliament passed a law that restricts the power of the Supreme Court to overturn decisions made by the government and decisions made by parliament. Certain elements within Israeli society have sued and asked the Supreme Court to take a look at this law and rule this law as, you can't say unconstitutional, but can the Supreme Court overrule the law, restricts the ability of the Supreme Court to overrule laws? There's a constitutional conundrum for you. It's not clear, and since there is no constitution in Israel, it's not clear about what standard you even decide this. The Supreme Court will basically decide whether they want to have a big confrontation with the government by overturning what parliament has decided, or will the Supreme Court decide to give this one to the government in hope that they, I don't know, go after them less in the future. I don't know. This is unprecedented kind of situation in a free country to have this kind of situation where the Supreme Court has to rule about a law that defines what the Supreme Court cannot, cannot do. I don't know how this is going to end, but this is just exacerbating the phenomenon right now where the basic laws under which Israel has been governed for a very long time are now being questioned and there's real upheaval around them. What are the right laws and what are the wrong laws? This is very, very controversial within Israel, and whatever the Supreme Court rules, it's going to create upheaval within the state of Israel. It's real tragedy that this is what Israel is dealing with right now. At a time when the Israeli economy was humming along, quality of life, standard of living was improving, a new government could have actually focused on reducing the cost of living. Tel Aviv is the most expensive city in the world. They could have done a lot to reduce the cost of living by deregulating, by freeing up more land for building, by doing things like that to improve the quality and standard of living of Israelis. They could have deregulated those segment of the Israeli economy that are heavily regulated and thus created competition to reduce prices there as well. They could have focused on actually making Israel much, much richer than it is and maybe one day dealing with some of these contentious cultural issues where there's no solution because it's 50-50 in Israeli society. Actually, it appears that it's 70-30 against these changes, but since the 30% has political power, they're going to pass them anyway. So a real mess in Israel, we'll see how it all gets kind of cleared out and handled. Alright, let's see. Yeah, Cook says Israeli politicians should read up about the Federalist Papers and draft the Constitution. They can't. The Israeli politicians, the Israeli political system cannot overcome the issue of a separation of state from religion. This is why there wasn't a constitution when Israel was founded. It's why there's no constitution today. There's just not enough agreement among the people to establish a constitution that actually protects your rights. And at the end of the day, a constitution has to be based on, at least to some extent, the consent of the governed. And no constitution you could write today would achieve the consent of the governed among Israelis. Israel is truly split on all the major constitutional issues. But the fundamental split is religion versus state. There's all the religion in the state. Alright, let's take a look. Wes, thank you for $50. That's great. Antonio, thank you. Steven, thank you. Fred Harper, Catherine Silvanos, thank you to all of you for participating in the Super Chat. We're still like $170 short, and I've only got two very, very quick questions. So this show is going to be over in four minutes unless we get more questions. And it would be great if those questions were $20 questions. And of course, we don't have to do questions in order to get our target. We've got 80 people watching right now. So, you know, two, three bucks from each person as a sticker would get us our target as well. Cook, thank you. So please consider supporting the show value for value you're listening. You must get something from it. Know the value you get by doing a sticker. Just that Super Chat button, that little button at the bottom that has dollars on it. You can do it on your phone. You can do it on the computer. And make a small or large contribution to sustaining the Iran Book Show, in particular with regard to these news roundups. Okay, again, two very, very short questions. Michael, what holes in the enlightenment did Ayn Rand plug? I mean, she plugs many holes in the enlightenment. She basically frees all of the enlightenment thinking completely from religion. I mean, they try to do it kind of natural rights, but it all kind of dependent on an intrinsicist, God-given kind of reality world. And so she basically plugs that big, massive hole, if you will, by grounding all the principles of the enlightenment, reason, pursuit of happiness, individual rights, political freedom, in a foundation that was secular, in a foundation that did not acquire a God. So that's one big one. She also then actually has a theory regarding the efficaciousness of reason that they didn't have in the enlightenment. They got it at a sense that freedom was, the reason was efficacious. And they try to come up with explanations, but explanations were filled with holes. And part of that is because they viewed, they were intrinsicists and rationalists, and they didn't have the conception concept, a proper concept of objectivity, of the role of human consciousness, in identifying truth. Truth just implanted itself on you, that's kind of intrinsicism. And so she brings objectivity to an understanding of reason, but she also brings the whole theory of concept formation, which is at the heart of how reason actually functions, how do we form abstractions, how do we then deal with abstractions, and what is the legitimate way in which we prove abstract knowledge, through reduction to reality. So all of that in epistemology, she makes these massive breakthroughs that ground this idea of the efficacy of reason, and reason as man's basic means of survival in science, in real philosophical knowledge. Then of course in ethics, she bridges the art gap, she solves the art problem, that there is an art, that you can't have moral principles derived from reality, from the nature of man and the nature of the world. I mean that's huge, now you can have a whole moral code built on the idea of the pursuit of happiness, built on the idea of independence, and built on the idea of human rationality. And an egoistic morality that is built on the nature, on the factual reality. And then finally, so that's of course in morality, and she has a whole moral code, which they don't. The enlightenment still relies much on altruism. And then ultimately, in politics she grounds individual rights in a morality of egoism, in a morality of self-interest, and in the need of human beings, all human beings, to use their reason in order to survive and to thrive, and therefore individual rights are the mechanism, the moral-political mechanism by which we secure the freedom of people to think and act based on their own thoughts. But you can only understand that fully by understanding the world of reason, and the fact that reason cannot function under force. And that's all I ran, that's all I ran's contribution. There's elements of that in the enlightenment, but the integration, the massive integration from epistemology to ethics to individual rights, that's I ran. And then of course, when it comes to capitalism, she is much more, to political freedom, she's much more consistent than the founding fathers, so she rejects the idea that governments should be involved in education or in any, she understands, because of the importance of individual rights, she understands that a free society is a society in which government only protects individual rights. That's its function. It doesn't have any other functions. To the extent that it does these other things, they are illegitimate functions of government, and therefore they should be scrapped, and she has a complete separation of state from economics, from state from education state, from science by implication and so on, which I don't think the founders had completely. So all of those are ways in which she plugs the holes, and much, much more. Because each one of those requires a whole philosophical argument. All right, we're still about $145 short. Thank you, Shelly, really appreciate it. Thank you, Steven. Thank you, Jennifer. We need like three people. Whoops, I guess my camera just disappeared on me. Why is that? Why is it not charging? Once again, I'll be right back. Let me just figure out, this has happened before, right? It didn't charge properly. All right. We'll see if that works. We're close to the end anyway. Last question by Justin is, Peacuff liked Ann Coulter, but you hate her. Why? Well, again, I'm not going to comment on Peacuff, on Leonard Peacuff's views and why we disagree. It's not fair for me to comment on it when Peacuff can't respond and he can't comment from his perspective. It just doesn't make any sense for you to be asking these questions when he can't respond. I mean, I'm not going to be... I don't want to put myself in a position of explaining why Leonard Peacuff holds view XYZ, you know, where we disagree. So I don't think these questions are fair to him or to me. And I really ask that you stop asking them. It's as if people are trying to get me to say something because I know this will happen. I'll say something Leonard Peacuff thinks XYZ. And then you guys will, some of you will immediately send Leonard Peacuff an email and I've seen this happen. You're on book said that you hold this and this and this and this and this. And you might report it accurately. You might report it inaccurately. But it'll just piss him off and then I'll have to go and explain to him what I actually said in the context for it. And this happens constantly. So why should I put myself in that position? Why should I put Leonard in that position? It's not fair to either one of us. And I don't understand why you're asking these questions. I mean, ask me what my opinion about Ann Coulter is. And unfortunately you're not in a position and probably never will be to ask Leonard those questions. That's just the reality. But to have me interpret is bizarre. You figure it out. Think about it. I mean, we disagree about immigration. And I have found Ann Coulter's work on immigration in particular to be filled with misrepresentations, holes, and distortions and evasions. Leonard obviously disagrees. So you guys will have to deal with that. Leonard deals with it. I deal with it.  But stop asking me questions about why does Leonard pick up think X? Why does Leonard pick up vote this way? Why does Leonard pick up do it? He does what he thinks is right. And to the extent that he's in a position to answer your questions, he will. And to the extent that he won't, it'll stay a mystery for you forever. And I'll do what I do and I'll explain what I do because that I can explain. And I don't know how much Peacock likes Ann Coulter. You're saying that. I don't even know if that's true. I don't know how much he likes it. I don't know when he said that. So, all right. Cool. If anybody wants to contribute something, Mark, thank you. If anybody wants to contribute something, you get as close to the goal before we wrap up, which is basically now. That would be terrific. Let's see what else do I want to do here? We're good there. We thought about 80 people listening. So it wouldn't take much to get us to where we need to be. Yeah. Ken even says, maybe like is a bit of a strong term for Peacock's view of Ann Coulter. But I don't know. I don't know what the context is. And again, drop this. This objective has said that. What do you think? Ask them. Ask them what they said. I'll comment on my views. All right. Thanks, everybody. Thanks to all the superchatters. Really appreciate it. I'm not sure when I'll be back. I'll try to do another show tomorrow. Well, I'll try to do some longer shows over the weekend. We will see. We do have to pick it up in terms of the superchat in order to make our July goals. But we've still got a few days in order to achieve that over the next, well, we've got four days. Okay. We've got one quick question from Frederick. Guys don't bother the Canadian American hero with this stuff. He shows always Iran. Canadian American hero. Don't bother. Oh, in terms of Leonard. Yes, don't bother Leonard with this stuff. He's 89. He's going to be 90 very soon. Let him focus on enjoying life rather than on Iran said X. Shouldn't you come out and condemn Iran? Which is what many of you want him to do. I know. You're motivated to do that. But it's just not helpful. Not for anything. Not for anything. Thank you, Frederick. I appreciate the support both in the comment and in the dollar sign. Basically, we're halfway.  Thank you guys. I will see you all probably tomorrow. If not, then certainly on Saturday. Bye, everybody.


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The presidential committee on fiscal policy and tax reforms has been tried to transform the tax system to support sustainable development and achieve a minimum of 18% tax to GDP ratio within the next three years. President Thinubu said the committee has as its objective the advancement of viable and cost-effective solutions to issues such as multiplicity of tax collection agencies, the high cost of revenue administration and the lack of effective coordination between fiscal and other economic policies across all levels of government. As president, I am determined to end this cycle. On the day of my inauguration, I promise that my administration will address all the issues impeding investment and economic growth in Nigeria. This promise is why I saw an end to the first subsidy. It is the reason the central bank has called an end to its multiple exchange rate system. It won't happen under my watch. For this same reason, we gather here today to inaugurate the presidential committee on fiscal policy and tax reform. The chairman of the committee, Taiwu, already said if the country is to achieve the needed growth, aside from other necessities, there is the need to create a conducive environment to attract private and foreign investment through a comprehensive approach and coordinated strategy. If other hinted, the committee will evolve ways of mobilizing more tax revenue without necessarily increasing tax burdens. Our approach will be comprehensive and long-term focused, addressing fiscal concerns related to sustainable development goals as well as multi-dimensional poverty, ensuring responsible energy transition and a coordinated strategy to elevate revenue reporting and quality of spending. The empirical data affirms that Nigerians are willing to fulfill their tax obligations when they see meaningful returns on their tax contributions. We must therefore be intentional in renewing the social contract and, more importantly, act in the best interest of our nation. Nigeria has eight potential for a new position that should be something to cater for our people, without resorting to excessive poverty, which overgrants the private sector and gives them the ability to finance sustainable development and jobs and prosperity for Nigeria. Speaking after the inauguration, the representative of the World Bank said the agenda of the committee is keen to helping Nigeria achieve inclusive growth with more economic opportunities and better services for Nigerians. I think this is why the agenda for this committee is so important to what we at the World Bank are here to help Nigeria do. I am very honoured that I was invited to be part of this. Most of the financing that we provide is directly for services like primary healthcare, electricity access, rural roads. Those are things that we look forward to a day where Nigeria is fully financing those from its own government resources. I would love to see a day where the work of this committee lays the foundation for making our financing redundant. Members of the committee drawn from the private and public sectors and ministries, departments and relevant agencies have further charged to cooperate fully with the committee towards achieving their mandates. I am notified about fresh news updates.


Hi again everybody. Welcome to this next handbook's podcast. I'm Paul Ken Gore, Steve Cunningham is the producer, and we have Julia Maloney with us this week, and she's done a fantastic book on the St. Gal and Mafia, titled The St. Gal and Mafia. And this is a subject that a lot of Catholics have been very intrigued by, have wanted to know about, wanted to understand better. I have two, and I'll say right off that for a book to be done on this in a way that I think is so readable, so lively, and so fair, so levelheaded, and not a book that goes out to take shots at Pope Francis, but just really written very well. This is it. So I think this is the book on the subject, the book that needed to be written. But before going through all of that, let me welcome here Julia Maloney. How are you? I'm doing great, Paul. Thank you so much for having me. Sure thing. So tell us a little bit first about yourself before you go into this, before we talk about the book. And so I've read you at Crisis Magazine for, I guess a few years now. I don't know how long you've been writing for Crisis. It seems like a while, a little while. And so tell us a little bit about your background, where you're from. Yeah. So I am a cradle Catholic, originally from Colorado, and I just grew up in a really great Catholic family and went off to Yale and Harvard to study English literature. I focused on the Middle Ages. So I was actually like my senior essay at Yale was on St. Catherine of Siena. So I tried to kind of, I was, you know, in kind of a hostile cultural Marxist center, but I tried to kind of hide out and do medieval studies. So what time was that? When were you there at Yale? I was there in the early 2000s. And then, and then I took a couple of years off to teach high school literature. And then I went to grad school to Harvard to get my master's degree in English literature as well. Did you, did you by chance know Michael Knowles at Yale? I don't know if you, if you were in the same years or not. No, I did not know him at Yale, unfortunately, because he was, he was in a similar area, I think, and even did, I think Italian literature, I believe. And and but this is one of the questions I was going to ask you, you must read or speak Italian. Yes, no, I, I have a reading knowledge of several languages. I can, I can have a dictionary and translate it. But I don't really speak any other. I'm very bad at speaking the languages. Okay, yeah, I mean, it's one thing. So I'm like this with Italian, I can read it and speak it a little bit if I practice it. But but it's hard right off the cuff to just sort of break break into a language. But but but did did you did you read some of these books in the original Italian? It looks like maybe you did some of the books on Francis. Yes, so there are a lot of books, especially the ones on Martini that you can't get them in translation. So and there were a number of French books too. There was a really good French book by Nicholas Diat that was kind of it was a major source for a lot of these revelations. So so yes, I would I would just read them in the original and and and for most of them, I just did like a paraphrase of like in the in the actual writing of the book. The footnotes, as you know, are so dense. There's like six, six or seven footnotes a page. And so I would just kind of summarize for the reader what was going on in there. And they and they are indeed footnotes rather than end notes. In fact, a lot of a lot of people in books, they use end notes. And I think footnotes are better. They're more transparent, right? People can look right at the very bottom and check your source right away. A lot of people won't flip to the back with with end notes. But but some people also feel that that that footnotes are more distracting, right? But I prefer them. And especially it really it really shows, I think that it gives you an immediate feel for how much you've read, how well read you are on this, the scholarly feel to it. And the and you and you refer a number of times to Vaticanistas, people like Sandro Magister, who I go, I visit his website. And a lot of them you can you can translate right away when you go to the website. But but but some of them are not not translated. And you really kind of need to read them in the original language to get a sense of exactly what they're saying. Yes. Yes, exactly. This was the sort of book. I think that some of these linguistic issues are some of the reason why we, you know, several years ago, when I thought about this project, I I wondered why no one had taken this project yet. Because to me, you know, the way I framed it to my family when I thought about this was, if I could write a book, I would write it about the St. Gallin mafia. That's that was the one thing that I wanted to write about. And I thought it was just the most fascinating subject in the entire world. And I think that you know, there are some sources, if I could say, you know, one gap in the book is definitely that I don't have any reading knowledge of German. And so there are key German members, of course, but Dr. Micahickson at LifeSite News and a lot of other people have, you know, read a lot of these texts and summarize them for us. So I had to kind of rely on other people for that. But it's definitely a project that, you know, you know, as much as I've tried to kind of collect things in this book, I feel like this is a starting point, hopefully for, you know, maybe someone else will get interested in this and do it their own deep dive into some of these sources or asking similar questions as well. Yeah. And so I'm sort of jumping ahead. But and I've wondered why no one else tackled this, why no one else jumped into this. And obviously you were wondering the same thing, right? Why hasn't anybody written about this, including I could think of a lot of really anti-Francis writers on the on the Catholic side and some of which are good friends of mine that I don't I don't know why they didn't take this on. Do you have any any idea any theories as to why why why you were first why someone else didn't beat you to it? I think that the the dictator Pope when it came out, the first chapter, of course, was called the St. Galen Mafia. And he did he did such a good job with that, that in a sense it probably made people feel satisfied that most of the story had been told. That's one theory that I have about it, because I was after that book came out, I wrote my first article on the St. Galen Mafia. It was on Martini. It was called The Man Who Was Antipope, and it was in Crisis Magazine. And that article that that was the beginning of this for me, because I started I wrote like six or seven different St. Galen Mafia articles before I even wrote this book. Yeah, I read those. I read those. And the yeah, the the dictator Pope that was by Mark Antonio Colana, right? Who's really I think Sire Henry Sire, I believe, is the member of the Knights of Malta. And and who it by the way Mark Antonio Colana was a major figure in the Battle of Lepanto and in 1571. So it's very interesting that that he that he that he picked that pen name. But yeah, other than that, I can't really think of anything else that anybody really did, right, that stands out other than some articles, perhaps. Exactly. I mean, I know that definitely on the other side, Austin Ivory wrote about the St. Galen Mafia for his book, The Great Reformer. And he of course, for anyone who doesn't know, he's the former spokesman for Connor, sorry, Cardinal Cormac Murphy O'Connor, who was part of the St. Galen Mafia. So he had an insider's look, and he kind of got himself into trouble saying some things in there that he retracted later on. But aside aside from those those two texts and articles, we that there was a big gap in this area, definitely. So let me back up a little bit more. So you're at Yale, and I could show you on my wall right here. I don't know if I should try there. There's St. Catherine of Siena. So yeah, she she is she's one of my favorite saints. So you did your you did your thesis, your senior thesis on Catherine of Siena? Yes, I did. Yeah. Go ahead. Oh, I was just going to say there was so she had her her dialogue. And it was translated into Middle English. For some nuns in the late 15th century or so. And it was called it was called the Orchard of Zion. And so basically, it was about St. Catherine and her book, but also about its reception in England by medieval nuns and and how it had been rearranged by a by the Middle English translator. So that was kind of the angle that I was that I was taking on that book. Okay.  Yeah. And then and so. So what what followed what followed after that? You started writing, I guess, mainly for publications. I think I think this is your first book, correct? This is my first book. Yeah. Yeah. So essentially, I I after I went to Harvard, I got married, had a family. I was just honestly, I was just living my life. And I wasn't writing. I wasn't doing anything outside at all. And then the pontificate of Pope Francis happened. And for the first several years of this pontificate, I was kind of a low information Catholic, even though I love Catholicism. And I find it, I find all of this very stimulating and everything. I just, I was so swept away with, I don't know, the I was so swept away with the feeling of newness when he came in that I just wanted to hear good news about him, basically for several years. So I, I didn't read a lot except for, you know, very kind of fluff pieces about the pontificate. And then for me, the real turning point was when a more Slatica came out. And I started reading the main website I started reading was Crisis Magazine, which would have, it felt like it would have, you know, articles about it almost every day, you know, constantly about it. And I just started catching up on the fact that, you know, there's, there is real controversy going on here. There's confusion. And ever since then, I have just been just kind of riveted to the story of what's going on in this pontificate. And trying to figure him out, right? I mean, that's, that's where I've been. And I defended him publicly for a long time. I did, and I still do, but I wrote a really long piece for Crisis. It was like 5,600 words. And it was something like the politically incorrect Francis 12 shocking statements. And I sent it to John Vella, the editor, right? And Eric Sammons is the editor now. And Michael Warren Davis was between the two. And I sent it to John. And I said, look, you're going to be shocked. And I said, this is 5,600 words in length. But, but, you know, look at it, you might, you might want to see this. And he looked at it, he thought about it. And he said, all right, we're going to run the full thing. And so that was a long defense of Francis going through some of his statements that should horrify liberals and should thrill conservatives. And, and yet ever since, I think that was probably the last piece that I wrote defending him. Because now I'm just like so many other people just completely confused by the guy. And, and I mean, he, he does make really strong statements in defense of, for example, unborn life, right? It's really good and abortion makes really good statements on things like condemning gender ideology and gender theory and, and still condemns even things like same sex marriage. But on the other hand, he does these things privately and the appointments that he makes and the people that he surrounds himself with. And, and I'll tell you, Julia, I just can't figure the guy out. I don't know. And so this goes right into your book. I can't figure out sometimes when the guy is leading, when he's being led. If he's, excuse me for saying this deceiving or being deceived, the guy is really kind of maddening to figure out. And it's, you know, to borrow from a Francis phrase is kind of made a mess of things. And I think for people on both sides ought to feel that way because both sides, whether they, whether a liberal Catholic, conservative Catholic, you have a hard time just knowing what, what the guy really believes. I don't know. Your thoughts on that? I, I think that was extremely well put. I mean, it is a very frustrating task. And I think that kind of early on in the book. So, so for anyone who doesn't, who hasn't read it yet, the book starts with the conclave of 2005 and Bergoglio is the character because he, the mafia is interested in, in getting him elected. And when I was writing that, that, that section, and I had to do kind of like a quick backstory of who is Bergoglio. I put in there, you know, he was an enigma to people because he had had ultra conservative days where he was doing years before he was doing, you know, the kind of conservative things that you were just mentioning, Paul. He was acting, acting like an ultra conservative around novices and in teaching and in piety and doing things that were just kind of a throwback to the pre-conciliar era. And then you, you fast forward and then you get to the time when he's the Archbishop of Buenos Aires and you have one of his friends, the Vatican specialist, Elizabeth Pique saying that people were on his case all the time because he wasn't conservative enough and he was too easy. They thought he was too easy on sexual issues. For me, the defining issue that kind of tells me something I can hold on to about Pope Francis is the fact that according to Sandro Magister and others, he allowed everyone who wanted communion in his area when he was in Argentina to come up and he didn't refuse communion to anyone. And to me, that's kind of the bridge. Magister makes it clear that the St. Galen mafia, according to him, they were watching that and they knew that about him. And that's something that became huge with the Casper proposal in the family sentence. But to me, I just, I don't think that's the mafia necessarily. I don't know. I just think that's where we see Pope Francis being Pope Francis before he is Pope Francis, so to speak. To me, that gets to the heart of who he might be and what his philosophy on things really is. Yeah. In fact, when I did a review of your book for the tan blog, tan direction, that's exactly what I focused on because we had just been through the two visits in November or was it October by same month by Nancy Pelosi to the Vatican and then Joe Biden to the Vatican. And we were wondering what would Pope Francis say to them about communion. And frankly, it's not clear what he said to them. Again, this maddening uncertainty, right? But the one thing that you pointed out in your book, he really sees the Eucharist as sort of medicine for the soul, right? For the sick, for the ailing. So it's not something that he doctrinally holds out as, okay, if you're not worthy to present yourself for communion, if you're in a state of mortal sin and you haven't confessed, you should be denied this. You should be denying yourself he seems to have been doing just the opposite, right? No, you need this then you need this Eucharist more than ever. Of course, the teaching of the church is, but you need to repent, you need to realize that you're sitting, right? You know, you give the medicine to somebody who says, no, father, help me, I am sick, right? And then he says, okay, go and sin no more. And now you can have the Eucharist, but but he doesn't seem to go there. His view is just give it, right? Give it, give it to the Eucharist, give it to them. And that was, that was really eyeopening to me reading, reading that part of your book, precisely at the time that Pelosi and Biden were there at the Vatican. So I could see taking from your book that what did Francis really say to Joe Biden? Well, we don't really know. But I could see him saying what Biden claimed that he said, right? Which it seems like maybe Biden said this sort of tell from the different news reports, but that that you should keep receiving communion as Biden. I could see that as being consistent with where he was in Argentina. Yeah. Yeah, I totally agree. And I think that was, and I remember reading that article that you did for tan direction and thinking that you, you know, you handled it very deftly, weaving in the nuances of it, but also the big picture of, you know, who he was in Argentina, and where he is, where he is now, I think that was, I think it was very illuminating. So, so going back then to him in Argentina, and maybe we should, maybe we should pick up with Benedict, right? And in 2013, that was all really illuminating as well in your book. I did, only after reading your book did you piece it all together. Did I, I see now that I shouldn't have been surprised really that he stepped down, right? This was not a lightning bolt out of the blue, right? And pun intended. The lightning hit the Vatican twice, right? On that day, twice, twice of all things. But, but he had been in many ways, this was kind of anticipated, right? Maybe we shouldn't have been surprised in retrospect or at least knowing what we know now and what you lay out in your book. Yeah. Yeah. I think, I think that that, that word surprise is, is so interesting because the first chapter ends on Martini. It's, you know, at the end of Benedict has just been elected Pope. And then Martini is talking about the new Pope. And he says, expect beautiful surprises. And I literally have, like sheets of different mafia members giving their little interviews, using the same word surprises, he's going to be a man of surprises. And, and talking about, literally, I think one of them was also talking about the God of surprises as well. So something surprising is going to happen. And then the surprising thing happens that everyone kind of knew was going to be the surprise. It's very, it happens at the very end. It's very interesting. Yeah. Yes. Yeah. It's very, very interesting. But a lot of this, when you're in the moment, I remember, I remember when I found out that Benedict was abdicating. And I remember where I was when I found out he was elected Pope. I was, I was still at Yale when he was elected Pope. And I just remember, you know, tears in my eyes just feeling so relieved. And just like he was going to take care of the church and, you know, and be there forever. And then when he abdicated, I just remember that, you know, that being punched in the gut kind of feeling like you're everything has changed. So, so for the average person on the street, you know, it was, it was absolutely shocking. And we're still, we're still trying, you know, there's this part of me that understands part of where it came from this other part of me that still like feels punched in the gut again every time I think about it. So, so I was at, I was at morning mass when I learned about him abdicating. And the priest came in and told us and I was shocked. And I remember when he was chosen in 2005, I had just come into the church, my wife and I, and I remember watching it on TV and same reaction and getting tears in my eyes. And I had been through this with Catholic friends for a decade before I kept saying to them, well, what happens if I convert and you guys end up with a bad pope, right? Or a pope who, who disagrees with all they kept saying, you're not going to get that. That can't happen. The pope like that can't be possible. And so then, so then Ratzinger was chosen and it was complete reassurance. And of course, and the issues that I was concerned about in 2005, I think the church is still good on them today. But still you have this confusion. Who, who is the, the anti Pope? And this is really, this is an anti AN of ANTI, right? But ANTE, right? What's, what's the difference between, I guess it'll be Ante, right? Ante and Ante, but we say anti either way. What's the difference? Explain that. Yeah. So he would be the antecedent, the precursor or preparer for another pope. And that was the leader of the St. Galen mafia, Colonel Carlo Maria Martini. Martini is, Martini is, has always been the real protect. I don't know the heart of this book for me, because he's the one that when I was reading the dictator pope and that first chapter on the St. Galen mafia, he has different portraits of the characters in the mafia. And I got to Martini and read it. And just from his eight paragraphs or so about Martini, I was absolutely fixated on, on wanting to know more about this character and stopped reading and downloaded Martini's book and, and stayed up late at night reading it. So for me, Martini is the heart of, of the story, because this is his dream, the church that we're living in right now, the, the church of Pope Francis. I completely believe it's, it's the dream church of Martini. And it really is, right? I mean, every Catholic ought to know who, who Carlo Maria Martini is. I mean, this is, this is really a stunning story. And, and not only his influence on, on Francis, but I guess going back to, to Benedict the 16th and, and his pontificate, his resignation, seeing all of this, all of this that happened, I think is maybe the most fascinating part of the book. So tell, tell us a little bit more about him. We see from Northern Italy, I think, Milan, I believe. Yeah, he became Archbishop of, of Milan, yes. And he, he was born, I think the same year as Rathsinger. So they were, they were parallel in many ways. Martini, so he grew up in the, the Pre-Consilier Church, of course, and he talks a lot about his memories of things like his, his mom would wake him up early on first Fridays. So he could receive Holy Communion, and then they would celebrate with chocolates later on.  But then with, with the Second Vatican Council, for him, it represented a new era and a new prerogative. And he in 1980 becomes the Archbishop of Milan and right around this time, he's beca, he's beginning to make friends with men who are going to be the, the future Mafia members. So he's making friends with De Niels, Cardinal Godfrey De Niels. He's making friends with Cardinal Basil Hume. They are doing meetings in a group called the CCEE. The Council of European Bishops, and- Sounds like some Soviet acronym, by the way. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. And he's just kind of growing in, in, in power. And in the early 90s, they start to describe him as this next pope. There was, there was a big article that described him in the London Sunday Times and that kind of language. And basically a couple of things happened to him. The first thing is he was, he became the new president of the CCEE, and John Paul II effectively ousted him from that position. That was in the early 90s. And then he founds in the mid 90s, he founds the St. Gallin Mafia. And our understanding is they wanted Martini to be elected as pope. So it was his vehicle for ascending all the way, all the way to the papacy, really. And then he gets Parkinson's disease. And it becomes more and more, you know, he, he reveals it in, I believe, 2002. And then by 2005, he's taking a cane to the conclave. There's no hope that he's going to be pope, but he's like the pope maker or the anti-pope already. So that kind of brings us right up to the, yeah, right up to the conclave. And that's right when John Paul II is dying of Parkinson's too. Yes. In 2005. So, so you, okay, so you right here on page 178, Martini said to Benedict, this was in June 2012, the Curia is not going to change. You have no choice but to leave. You imagine this? And looking the pope in the eye, according to Martini's confessor, father Savano Fausti, Fausti, if all things right, you know, Fausti in the bargain, right? The time for resignation, Martini told Benedict, is now. Nothing can be done here anymore. I mean, it's just amazing. Tomorrow, except the papacy with my, with my votes, Martini has said to have told rats and you're in 2005. You accept, since you have been in the Curia for years, you're intelligent and honest, try and reform the Curia. And if not, you leave, you leave. And so apparently by June 2012, he was basically telling him, you should leave, right? And, and, and this is quite interesting too. So you go through this on page 179, Pope Benedict actually expected that the conclave would pick not Bergoglio, but Scola, right? Who was, who I believe, and you go through the votes here, or at least what some have reported the votes to be from the conclave. And I think Scola, was it Angelo, was that his first name? He was, he was in the lead. He probably should have, he probably should have been the next pope, the Italian. And, but they, but the, the St. Gallen mafia crew, that group, got Bergoglio, right? Just enough votes to kind of get notice. And then in the second round, maybe he doubled the total, right? And the third round, maybe tripled the total. You take us through that a little bit. Yeah. I think that the book talks a little bit about how Scola had, he had some weaknesses. So that was part of the story of, of what happened. But really the, the, I think the St. Gallen mafia alumni, they had learned their lesson from the last conclave. And this is what Austin Ivory, again, pretty much comes out and says they knew that they needed to get Bergoglio in the first conclave according to reports in 2005. He only got maybe 10 votes. And then I think in this, in this second conclave in 2013, he got 26 votes on the first try. So he went from getting 10 on the first try to 26 on the first try. So they, they really, and they had a meeting that, that the, you know, the book talks about where they tallied how many people were planning to vote Bergoglio. And they counted 25. So they, they were so well organized that they knew within one vote, how many people were going to vote for him. And then it just, and a lot of it, you know, I wrote down, I'm just kind of collecting what we know from what other people have said. But how much of this is, you know, like the iceberg theory where it's like, you can only see part of it. And then the rest of it is just submerged. There's so much of this story of this book. This is just what is available in the public documents that I can cite in a, in a professional scholarly way. There's so much hidden or that's implied or that you can kind of deduce, but not fully know for certain that that's just lying there in a subterranean way. Essentially. Well, and you write on page 101. This is an interview that Pope Benedict later did with Peter Seawald who does, did so many interviews with him. And he said of the, of the choice of Bergoglio as Pope Seawald asked Benedict, were you expecting someone else? Benedict said, certainly yes. Not anyone in particular, but another yes. And then Seawald said, Berglio is not among them. However, and Benedict, no, I did not think he was among the more likely candidates. Although they say he was one of the favorites at the last conclave next to you. That is true, said Benedict. But I thought that has passed. That has passed. One person not surprised as you write right before this on the same page was a carnal McCarrick who boasted to CNN. Many of us had thought of it beforehand, the election of Bergoglio, that this might happen. So I was not totally surprised. I was delighted. I was delighted. Yes. Yeah. Amazing. Amazing. So the, all right. So the actual Saint Gal and Mafia, and I can't believe we're already almost 40 minutes into this, this discussion. So here they are, right? It's Cardinals, Carlo Maria Martini, Godfrey De Niels, Walter Casper. You mentioned before Cormac, Murphy O'Connor, and Achille Silvestrini, who was a kind of very, I hate doing, I hate politicizing this stuff and putting people in Canada, camps of left and right, but he was very, very left of center. In fact, one friend of mine, I won't say what he said about him, but I'll probably get quoted and cause trouble. I don't need to, but he was very much on the left. So that is, he got Martini, De Niels, Casper, Murphy O'Connor, Silvestrini. So that's five right there. Are those five kind of the core then of what we consider the Saint Gal and Mafia? Am I missing somebody? No, I don't think so. I kind of, those are the names that keep popping up as kind of the core groups. So I, and they all had enough material for me to be able to devote different chapters to them as well. So for our purposes, we kind of pick them as the core, but there were definitely rotating members. You know, people, there were people who weren't cardinals yet. They were just bishops and maybe they would come for a couple of years and then rotate out and everything. So it's very, a lot of that part is still, still shadowy and nebulous. So you clearly think that the Martini is the most significant, which he clearly is. Silvestrini joined the mafia in 2003, meaning he plotted with them for approximately two and a half years. From January 2003, the time of the group's annual meeting to April 2005, the time of the conclave. So he stands out, Martini stands out. The, and also then Martini is, is the anti-pope as well, right? No, ANTE. Also standing out here, Casper. Wow. And I mean, Casper probably more than any of these other figures really emerged with Amoris Letizia, right? And, and the proposals at the Synod that took place. And I guess, what was it now? Maybe 2014, 2015, where we're still trying to figure out what was Francis doing there, right? Was, what was he forwarding? What did he believe? Was he, was he representing himself? And, and, and Denil's too. Denil's is really striking. What can you say about, about, about any, any of those figures? Maybe Denil's, maybe Casper. Denil's kind of shows us the, the really dark side of, of the mafia, because he, for anyone who doesn't know, he, he's a Belgian and I think around 2010 or so, he was recorded on tape trying to silence a sexual abuse victim and the victim had been abused by his own uncle from the age of five to 18, I believe. And really disturbing. Really disturbing. It's, yes, it's incredibly disturbing. And this uncle was, became a bishop and became a protégé of Denil's. And Denil's, when you actually read, and I tried to put in some of the transcripts in the actual book for people to read, but you, you hear, you know, the man talking about like, he's saying to Denil's like, why are you always defending my abuser? I, I thought I was coming here to get support and help. And you always take his side, things like that. And so it, it should have left him in disgrace. It was so horrible. And yet Denil's, there's this sermon that he has in his biography. And I alluded to it in the book, where he, he literally, he compares his trials.  And Easter came, he said, because Pope Francis came. And so he, he literally is, is speaking in multiple ways of a resurrection that he had at Pope Francis' hands. And we all, most of the people watching this will have already known about, you know, the pictures of Denil's out the night that Pope Francis is elected Pope. And he's standing there and he's kind of folding his hands in satisfaction. He's got this little sliver of a smile on his face and everything. And it's just, it just speaks of how this group, they, they were in the shadows. And he just, he was there out in the open, right, right there. And shortly after Pope Francis was elected, he started making more and more statements openly in favor of gay marriage. He had secretly written a letter to a Belgian politician years before congratulating him on a piece of legislation that, that was, that was a pro-gay legislation. And now he's out in the open just being quoted in the papers about it. So that to me, it just, when you really think about it and the figure of Denil's, you know, it's just enough to kind of give you goosebumps a little bit. And it seems that so many of them want that. They, they want this kind of secularity. You quote Casper saying, just as it is forbidden to clone others, it is not possible to clone Pope John Paul II. Let's not search for someone who is too scared of doubt and secularity in the modern world, right? Actually, I want a pope who's scared of secularity in the modern world, right? That's exactly, exactly what I want. Martini, same kind of thing. This is on page 58. He said, the life did not begin immediately with fertilization, but rather sometime later. He said, quote, I maintain that respect must be granted to every person who, perhaps after much reflection and suffering, follows her own conscience, even if she decides to do something that I do not feel that I can approve of, meaning abortion. And so later he reiterated the church's task was not to dispense prohibitions, but to form consciences and teach discernment. And yeah, so they're, they're all kind of like this. And you've said a number of times. In fact, this goes into my next question. This is a conversation. This is Theodore McCarrick and Murphy O'Connor. A day after that dinner on March 2nd, the Italian papers quoted an anonymous Cardinal is saying, quote, four years of Bergoglio will be enough to change things. Four years. Murphy O'Connor would later repeat that exact slogan adding, but pray to God, we have them for much longer than that. Well, you have, right? 2013 to 2017 would have been four years. You've got at least another four beyond that. McCarrick said he could do it, you know. No, this is what the Italian said. And then McCarrick asked, what could he do? He Bergoglio could reform the church. If we give him five years, he could put us back on target. But so that gets to my question, Julia. What, what is the goal? What do they want to reform? What, you know, we heard all about this phrase, right? Reform the curia. We must reform the curia. Like it's like, it was looking back at this now is like, who cares about the curia? I mean, if all of this happened because of that, whatever that might be, was it worth it? You know, I'd rather have, you know, more clear understanding of doctrine and church teaching. But what, you know, what, what are the goals of, of the Saint Galen mafia, of this, of this core, of this handful of individuals? What do they want to do? What did they want to do? What they want to do? There are a couple of places where we have a pretty clear understanding, you know, straight from, from their own mouths of what they want to do. There was this famous speech that Martini gave in 1999 that delineated some of these goals, but he gave a, he was still kind of speaking in code. You can, you can decode what he's saying. But it's really later on, he spoke to of all people, Eugenio Scalfari, who speaks frequently to Pope Francis and there it has these controversial. And we never know what's really said in those conversations either, right? They're complete history every time. Yeah. Exactly. So, so Martini gave an interview to Scalfari and I want to say maybe it's, maybe it's around 2008 or so. But he basically, Scalfari asked him, okay, what are the most important issues in order? And then Martini says, the divorce is number one. Number two is, I want to say it's the selection of bishops. Number three is priestly celibacy. Number four is the role of the laity.  So divorced, the, the, the Casper proposal for communion for those, for the civilly divorced and remarried. We've, we've got that in this pontificate. We had the Amazon Synod where we were talking about the ordination of married men that covers number three, priestly celibacy. And then the relationship between church and, and politics is kind of omnipresent here. We were just talking about, you know, Joe Biden and Pelosi and communion and things like that. That's definitely present here. But I think if I had to add to the list, I think what happened with Tradicionis Custodis, the just clamping down on the traditional Latin mass, that's something I don't really cover in the book. Just because it, Tradicionis Custodis ended up coming out after my book was, was done editing and everything. But I, I've written pieces before where I've said, okay, we can look back and trace what the mafia was doing. And that's, that was also presaged by the mafia as well. Yeah. In fact, could you say maybe a retrospect that a kind of binding sort of glue that holds all these guys together sort of anti-tradition? Right? Yes. You know, the, the understanding, you know, we need to jump into modernity. We, you know, we need to become more secular. And, and I think you say a number of times too, the whole synodality idea, right, of, of giving local bishops more control, which is exactly what somebody like Denil's would have wanted. The current group of Germans, you know, the bad Germans currently, what they, what they've wanted to do. And I think you've probably written about this in crisis the last couple of years, I have others have, even Francis seems a little bit shocked by some of what the Germans want to do, right? They seem to be getting so out of control and unhinged and maybe going in directions that he didn't expect. But, but this is one of my beefs with Francis. He appoints these people and embraces them.  He's, that seems to be the people he's comfortable being around, even if he doesn't seem to always agree with them. And yet, when he appoints them and they do the things that they do, then maybe he seems surprised by it. And, and, and so that's what this is leading to. And I, and I think this is probably, it's probably what the St. Galen Mafia Corps wanted. I almost called him cabal. But, you know, I think that that's probably, it's probably where they wanted to go. Yeah. Yeah, I definitely agree. And I think the issue with Pope Francis and the Germans is interesting because I remember a couple years ago, the Vatican expert, Edward Penton, who does phenomenal work, he, he did a report where he said, you know, basically just came right, came right out and said like that there were different Germans who were pushing him to pushing Pope Francis to go faster than he was going on certain things. And I think that issue of pacing is so important. My, my, as you know, I, I, I called the second half of my book time. And I have a chapter that is also called time. And then I have a chapter that is called patience. Because I think the issue of, of time is, you know, Pope Francis says time is greater than space. The idea is, and as opaque as that sounds, and just kind of out there, time is greater than space is basically saying, it's, it's, it's another way of saying that give something time, give it some patience, go incrementally, and you don't have to dominate spaces in the beginning. You don't have to have everything done in the beginning. You have to have faith in time. And so to me, I am just perpetually fascinated by what the pacing issue that they have here, because we were talking about five years and Austin Ivory was saying that he said at one point that Pope Francis had a five-year plan that he thought would take seven years. So a five-year plan that takes seven years brings you up to 2020. And, and we don't know yet if that five-year plan that would, that needed seven years, if it needed a couple more years, so maybe it's a nine-year plan now, or what exactly, we don't know quite what it is. But they are literally like, they're thinking in these types of terms of years and how much, how much time do we need. So I definitely see that as kind of an obsession with them. Yeah. And the fact that we don't know what the plan really is has a very kind of deceptive quality to it. And I think that's what really troubles me that, you know, the church shouldn't be like that. Everybody should know what the church believes, what the Pope believes, what the Pope wants to do. The idea, and we saw it at that first synod on the family where he seems to be telling some of his guys, no, that's too, that's too much.  You shouldn't do that. That has a kind of deceiving nature to it. You know, just go fight for what you believe and put it out there, unless you're afraid to put out what you really believe, which I guess they are. So a lot of times these goals and what reform even means is just so unclear. And in the process, it's just, again, to borrow from Pope Francis, it's made a mess of things. Yeah. So you close this with the section on Indeed Time, and you quote the Italian historian Roberto De Mattei, who just did a great book on Pope Pius V through Sophia Institute Press. And he says here, we are living, and you quote a Latin phrase, motus infine velochior, I don't know if I said that right, motion accelerates toward the end. Time passes more swiftly at a period's close. And here you quote Roberto de Mattei, we are living through an historical hour, which is not necessarily the end of times, but certainly the end of a civilization and the termination of an epoch and epic in the life of the church. I mean, that's pretty, what does that all mean? And you conclude, for a clock wound up with its inexorable ticking and the revel, for a clock wound up with its inexorable ticking, and the revolutionaries had to hurry. And really, that's what they are, right, they really are revolutionaries. For some dreams like martinis are finally as fleeting as lightning, destined to FNS while somewhere in the Sistine Chapel, the Christ of the last judgment gazes on. So that's pretty strong ending. Tell us what you mean by that, unpack that for us. When I thought about kind of like dominant images, so again, I'm an English major, I'm a literature person, like symbols, themes, I've written short stories before. So I've, these kinds of things are really important to me. And I tried to write this in a way where it's, it's like, like a term paper and it's got footnotes, but it's also kind of like reading a novel, you know, and it's got characters, symbolism, that sort of thing. So I thought about it and we keep hearing about the Christ in the Sistine Chapel, the Christ of the last judgment fresco. And he's kind of, you keep hearing about him, but you kind of don't know what he's doing, or it doesn't really become clear. And then I think at the end, the dominant image that I wanted to leave people with was this idea that, okay, so we're obsessed with time, the revolutionaries are obsessed with time, but they only have an hour or they have this limited period that they can work with. I don't know what it corresponds to in earthly terms. I don't know, I just know that it's limited and they know that it's limited. That's why they're constantly anxious. They can't go too fast. They know that they can't be like the Germans and they can't catapult everything into schism or chaos or anything like that. But they also know that they can't go too slow. So they have to find the right amount of time and they have to find the right opportunities. And at the end of the day, though, like at the last judgment, at the real last judgment, we will look back on this and we will think about how this was a finite period of chaos in the church and the Christ of the last judgment was in control all along. And I don't know quite how he's going, we don't know the details about how he's going to get us out of this, but we are going to get out of it at some point. So I wanted to just kind of evoke some of those larger feelings and a larger context for what's going on. That's very good. So it's a very optimistic, actually, right? Conclusion. So you don't go into this, but who will succeed Francis? I mean, you don't go through the number of people, the cardinals that he's appointed that can vote in the next conclave, the ones that have passed that were under Benedict and John Paul II. By the way, wouldn't it be shocking if Francis dies before Benedict XVI does? I mean, with the way that all of this is going and he's gotten eight years, he's going on nine, they thought they only needed five, maybe six or seven at the most. So, you know, they've gotten more time than they thought. And even then for whatever reform or goals that it was that they can't tell us about, I don't know if they've really gotten them. I think they've just gotten is, again, a mess of things that's left a lot of people on all sides confused and frustrated. But who's the next pope? What do you think? Where does this go next? I really don't know. I know that there was recently an article in the National Catholic Register that was talking about Colonel Zuppi as basically he would be someone who is absolutely committed to finishing what Pope Francis started. So, he would be in his image. If he can get the votes. Yeah, what they were talking about in a kind of coded way was they were talking about different groups that were backing him and already making themselves known. And you always wonder with that, well, if everyone already knows about this, is he going to be successful or is he just the one that everyone thinks is going to win? And there's going to be a dark horse elsewhere. So, I don't quite know. I go back and forth on how much hope we have for the pendulum swinging the other way. But I think we probably most likely we're going to get someone, whether we know his name now or he's more unknown. I think we're probably going to get someone in the image of Francis and someone probably who has some kind of group, even if it's not the mafia, some kind of group were working for him in some sense, trying to build up hype and get the votes and do that sort of thing. Which is not how it's supposed to go. It's not how it's supposed to operate. John Paul II even explicitly forbade that. All right. Well, this has been great. So, tell us, do you have, are you going to do another book? Do you have plans for another book? Maybe on Catherine or Sienna? I would love to do another book at some point. I'm just like, I feel like my brain is so pride from kind of all the different, all the work that I've done that I can't even, I don't even know what I would do. You need the right topic, right? Something like this that really inspires you. And you wonder, why hasn't anyone written a book on this, right? And at that point, as an author, I've been through this. Sometimes you think, well, I guess maybe I'm supposed to do it, right? Yeah, exactly. So, I don't know if it's, if it's going to be something like, some people have kind of thrown the idea like maybe if I wrote kind of like a part two of the St. Gallin Mafia or like something that's a companion or something. It's always the possibility or I could do something totally different, you know, a different historical figure or Fatima or something, something just, you know, a different time period as well. So, I'm not sure. Wait till the, wait till lightning strikes the Vatican twice again. Yes. That'll do it. So, do you have a website? Yeah. It's just Julia Maloney.com. Okay. All right. So, people can follow you there and also your writings for crisis. And you write for Lifesite News too, I believe, right? Sometimes. Yes. Sometimes I write for them as well. And I also write for One Peter Five. Yes. Yes. I'm pretty, and I'm pretty active on Twitter as well. I'm Julia Maloney one on Twitter. Okay. All right. And Steve Cunningham will put that up on the screen as well as, you know, your book, the St. Gallin Mafia. So, this has been great. Thanks so much for doing this. Really appreciate it. And God bless your work. Keep it up. Thank you so much. I appreciate it so much. And thanks everybody for joining us. We'll do another one of these podcasts again in a few weeks. We do, we do want about once every month on average. So, we will talk to you again soon. Go to the Tan Books website, especially now at Christmas time and load up. Give away some of these books for Christmas. These are, I can't think of better Christmas presents than some of the books in the Tan Books catalog. So, everybody take care. God bless and we'll see you again next time.


I'm Tess Harwood. I started the New Colombo Plan in 2014 in its first year. I went to Jakarta and Jogjakarta in Indonesia. The New Colombo Plan gave me the diversity of opportunities. I got to go to Jogjakarta where I studied international relations as well as advanced Japanese. And then when I went to Jakarta, I worked at the Australian Trade Commission where I worked on Australian and Indonesian two-way trade, especially with marine trade and then also looked at education and food imports and exports. Having the experience in the Asia-Pacific region really helped me to get a job in the Coral Bell School of Asia-Pacific Affairs. So having the knowledge of the region as well as the experiences that I got while I was at the Embassy working in social media and soft diplomacy helped me to find a job in communications at the Coral Bell School. The New Colombo Plan gave me credibility. It helped me to get my current scholarship that I'm on a full tuition scholarship at the Coral Bell School of Public Policy. The New Colombo Plan bringing me to Asia has just shown me what a connected region it is and how important this region is.


Israel should use Jericho missiles to level Gaza without mercy after the weekend's attacks by Hamas, lawmaker Revital Gottlieb has said. Gottlieb is a member of the Knesset from the ranks of Likud, the party of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Jericho missile, Jericho missile, strategic alert, before considering the introduction of forces, Doomsday weapon. This is my opinion. May God preserve all our strength. Gottlieb posted on X.Jericho is the name of an Israeli intercontinental ballistic missile whose most recent iteration is capable of striking almost anywhere in the world. Israel is widely understood to have anywhere from 100 to 200 nuclear warheads, which the government has neither confirmed nor denied Gottlieb followed up her post about nuclear missiles with another, calling fork crushing and flattening Gaza, only an explosion that shakes the Middle East will restore this country's dignity, strength and security. It's time to kiss Doomsday, shooting powerful missiles without limit, not flattening a neighborhood, she posted. Otherwise we did nothing, with slogans, with penetrating bombs. Without mercy, Gottlieb added.X tagged her post as potentially being in violation of rules against violent speech, but did not delete it as it was deemed to be in the public interest.In multiple other posts, Gottlieb urged the Israeli government to shell Gaza mercilessly and urged it to order the crushing of Gaza. She also praised US President Joe Biden for a flame-froing speech that showed Hamas that we are not alone in our intent to wipe it off the face of the earth.


People say you wanted to be black, but people try to hear it all the time. Yeah, I'm about to figure that. All the time. And you know, I wanted to do something to differentiate myself from the last white rapper. And at that time, it was Vanilla Ice. To the extreme, I walk a mic like a vandal. Light up a stage and watch the chump like I can't do a dance. I grew up just thinking that boom. It was. Who left a lot of bad taste in people's mouths. And you know, Eminem hadn't come out yet. Yeah, we on boss talk one on one. One on one. Yeah, we gon' talk.  Um, how many white boys you saw listening to this music and we to follow it the way how you were. So what was really unique about my situation is, uh, we lived in a nice looking house, right? Uh, the factor of that is my dad was unemployed. He got laid off from Coca Cola when he was 55 years old. Nobody's hiring a 55 year old maintenance again.  She, her job was taking care of the kids. And when I grew up, I knew what food stamps were. I knew what government cheese was. You know, we might look like we had a nice house, but we heated our house with our oven. I didn't understand that that was a poor quality until I went to school and somebody was capping on somebody about you.  I was like, wait a minute, what are you talking about? You know, but at the time I went to a predominantly black high school, you know, West Bay. We tease and we call it the future prison for, you know, inmate, right? But it was just a predominantly black school and a lot of the friends that I had were, were black, you know? And so for me to be in that situation, it was just what my surroundings were, it wasn't, I was trying to be black or want to be. I just enjoyed rap music.  That was all down his pipe, you know, when it came to my turn, I was, you know, listening to DJ Screw and Street Military and UGK. And that was my music. Three, two, that was my music, you know? So did people say you wanted to be black? Yeah, that's what I was. All the time. Yeah, I'm about to figure that. All the time. And you know, I wanted to do something to differentiate myself from the last white rapper. And at that time it was Vanilla Ice. To the extreme, I walk a mic like a vandal, light up a stage and watch the chump like a candle dance. Because I was just speaking that boom. It was. Who left a lot of bad taste in people's mouths. And you know, Eminem hadn't come out yet. Dear Slim, I wrote you, but you still ain't calling. I left myself, my pager, and my home phone at the box.  Go on tour with all that and do all the support and everything else like that. Unfortunately, he passed away and we weren't able to, you know, fulfill that dream. But when you grew up in that area, you didn't think twice about our skin color. We were just boys, we were, you know, homies or whatever.  Now it's a different story.  And so, you know, you get a lot of reverse racism, reverse racism sometimes, not all the time, but we'd go to the National Black Programmers Convention, you know, we were the only white people there, you know. All the time, people always either thought we were the cops or like what those white guys doing over here, you know. But I had a question, but with you doing that and seeing so many things, do you agree with that term that because you are white, it gets you into certain doors when a black person might not be able to? Oh, totally, totally. And listen, when it came down to the Fed case, I asked where my white privilege was at. I was like, wait a minute. You did not. Yeah, I was serious because I'm told all the time, oh, you're good, don't worry about no long sentence.  I ain't got to worry about no time. Listen, sentencing came, I got four points for being a leader organizer. Wait, we're gonna go there, but I wanna, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna, I wanna, I did not exist. I did not exist, it separated the poor and the rich and I was in it, I didn't have enough money. Let me ask you this. Okay, got it. When it came to your music, evading the n-word, well, I've seen it, as other guys that have come up on the scene that used the n-word and some, some of them regret doing it and it was white guys, right? How do you open it? I don't know. Just pull it down. Just put it down. Okay, there it is. So, what were your thoughts?  So, it could be an all white crowd that did it. So, even though I actually hold a card, right, in the hood, I got my hood passed, I don't use that word, right? That word evokes a lot of hatred, right? If I use that word, it's really bad, right? If we're in a surrounding and we're friends and you're using it towards me or whatever, I understand, but I will never ever say that. That word won't come out of my mouth in music or around friends. I don't own that word. I don't believe in that word. It's not something I grew up on. A lot of my friends were black growing up and so that just wasn't even a thought. How hard is it though? Because when you're listening to rap music, you hear that word thrown around a lot. If that's the only word you can rhyme, you need to go get a rhyming dictionary and you need to go get you a vocabulary and come and see me. If that's the only two syllable word you can think of, then you're in a bad situation, you need to get your game up. Yeah, like I said, it was other people that were doing it that were white and it caused a big friction and the thing is, it's like, I get it, but I'm so old school, I could never, you know, I could never get on with that. You know what I mean? But at the end of the day, I heard people saying, oh, he was around this or they've been around these types of people and you just said to the fact, no, that still doesn't give you the right to do that. Not at all.  But at the end of the day, I feel some type of way, you know, when somebody that's not of color or even Hispanic, you know what I mean? Like I've been around, I've been like, man, should I stop using that word? Because if I don't wanna hear it, I shouldn't maybe even be saying it. You know what I mean? That's a good attitude to have, but the truth of the fact, it's part of the culture, right? It's how friends greet each other, right? Is it wrong? Probably, but what you interpretate a word and what you think the meaning is, it's how you receive it, right? Exactly. How much power do you put into those words, right?  But growing up, those were just words we just used. There was no real meaning behind it, but nowadays, you'll get canceled for it. You know, you said the n-word and it's a whole big, blown-out-of-proportion deal. Listen, it's part of the rap culture. I don't use it. I don't prefer anybody, you know. Listen, if you use it in conversation, I'm not gonna hold your feet to your fire, say, listen, I appreciate our friendship, but would you please stop using the n-word around me, it offends me.  But it's part of the culture, and that's what it is. Yeah, I know, I wanted Willie D to come on the show, and I heard him say, don't use that word. He was telling somebody he was interviewing, I said, maybe that's the reason I ain't got Willie D yet, cause I said a lot, that he would be on the show. Funny thing, I hate, I don't like to listen. But I like, because being from somewhere else where people don't want me to say that word a lot, and then to come here and hear, even when I came here and I heard people saying that black person or that white person, I'd be like, shh, don't say that. But it's become a thing where people don't understand what you're saying unless you say that. You know what I mean? So it's like, not to say you adopt to it, but you know when and where to use it, so to say. Well, back in the days when George Jubs and them, they would use all counter words, him and Archie Barker. I'm not getting excited, I am getting mad. Listen to me, that's what happens when you mix black and white, 10 more seconds he's gonna call a nigga. And that's right, and you could even get those played today. 10 more seconds he's gonna call a nigga. Listen to that, I ain't used that word in three years. Yeah, you couldn't hear those today. No. They'd cancel you instantly. Like, for real, for real, for real. Archie Barker, yeah, he would get no play. Sorry, he gets no play, yeah.  Yeah, we on boss talk one on one, one on one. Yeah, we gonna talk.