All-In with Chamath, Jason, Sacks & Friedberg - E16: Reflecting on the riots at the US Capitol, plus: Georgia runoff elections, vaccine distribution & more

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Besties are gone

That’s my dog taking a notice in your driveway

Oh man

My habitat will meet me at Winston

We should all just get a room and just have one big huge orgy because they’re all just useless

It’s like this sexual tension that they just need to release somehow

Wet your beak, wet your beak, wet your beak

We need to get merch

Besties are gone

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All right, and we’re back

And thank you to Young Spielberg

With the All In 1.5 Extended Edition Remix

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Thank you to the super fans

That was really incredible actually

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Yeah, shout out Young Spielberg

With us the dictator Chamath Palihapitiya

The rain man himself, David Sacks

Is definitely an excellent driver

And his dad lets him drive in the driveway

And the Queen of Kin Wa

Spectacular David Friedberg is with us

We did an emergency pod

We just had all agreed

We’re taking a nice break

Nothing’s going to happen over the new year

This is the down period

And 2021 is going to be delightful and simple

And then all hell breaks loose

We could start with the vaccine

We could start with the Capitol

We could start with Georgia

No, we have to start

We have to start

We have to start with the Capitol

Let’s just start with the Capitol

All right, so

Let me just run through the series of events

That occurred here

There was a certification process

Correct, Sacks?

That goes on

Where the Electoral College gets counted

And somewhere at 10 a.m.

Trump had a rally

Of thousands of supporters

You were not there, David, correct?

You weren’t at this rally

He was in quote-unquote Miami

Right

I think he’s in the Miami Hilton

On Pennsylvania Avenue right now

Had he put up that fake Miami background

But the truth is

Let’s be honest here

Trump came out at 10 a.m. and had a rally

Jason, can we just take a step back for a second?

Doesn’t David Sacks look like

Elliot Gould in Ocean’s Eleven right now?

He’s so Elliot Gould

He is a silver fox

And are you

I mean you were very public about being in Miami

Over the New Year

You took your talents to Miami

And we see this background

So we can assume the dictator’s in his

Pool house poker room

We know that Freeberg’s in a Ritz Carlton somewhere

Based on the furniture

He’s in his Ritz Carlton office

And Sacks

Based on your background

Are you in Miami right now?

Yeah

Are you still there?

I’m still here

Okay but David

Did you meet with the mayor or not?

I haven’t

I actually met him

I did meet him

I went to like a tech event

The other night

And he was there

Were you wearing masks at the tech event or not?

Were you wearing a mask?

Mask or no mask?

It was

There were like masks

I wanted to know

No no no I’ll tell you

There were masks indoors

And then there was like COVID testing inside

And then you could graduate to the

Outdoor patio part

Where people generally weren’t wearing masks

So were you in conversations with people

With no masks on?

Is that what you’re saying?

At this event?

Yeah but you know

Everyone’s been like COVID tested

Like a zillion times

And it was outdoors

And you know

I’m willing to meet with people outdoors

You know I generally don’t do it indoors

But I’m

I’ve said that’s my policy

Starting several months ago

Can we rewind to April

With that photo of Sacks

Do we have it?

Where he was in the ski mask

And the goggles

And the helmet

And like the biohazard suit

And like how things have changed

He’s like

I’ll go to Miami

And have a chat with someone

Yeah

Look you could

You could

You could definitely do

How it started

And how it’s going

Split photo for

But look

You’re like sharing a banana split with someone

Like you know

Well because

He’s literally on eBay and Alibaba

Buying ventilators

Right

For his home

Triage center

Well I mean

We had people from the WHO

Saying in March

That the

You know

That the case

The infection fatality rate

Was like 7%

You know

And the two big things

We learned after that

Were number one

That there was a huge distribution

By age

Right

And so somebody under 50

Without comorbidities

Had a much much much lower risk

And then also the thing we learned

Is that the

There’s maybe a 10x difference

Between the infection fatality rate

And the case fatality rate

I mean you guys know all this

Yeah

And so

So once we learned those things

I mean

You know

I think a rational person takes

Things like that into account

I changed my

Policy with respect to COVID

You know

And now especially that we have

You know

Easy access to tests

Which weren’t available

You can get tested before going into a

Event

I have a

I have a question to add on to that

Do you own

A fur Chewbacca outfit

And were

Were you in Washington D.C. yesterday

With war paint on

With war paint on your nipples

Do you have a podium

Do you have a neck to waist tattoo

Are you standing behind a podium

Let me hide the

The Viking horns that I’ve got

Stashed away here

Alright listen

There was a great

Can we title

Can we title yesterday’s event

National Lampoon Siege of the Capital

I mean

It was like Animal House

Like you know

Yeah there was a great

There was a great tweet

By somebody saying

This was

Like the storming of the Bastille

As perpetrated by the

Cast of Animal House

Right

And there was another

There was another great tweet

Saying

The Capital now appears to be

Under the control of a man

In a Viking mask

The best one

The best one was

I have lost all respect

For Nicolas Cage’s ability

To steal the U.S. Constitution

Yeah exactly

Apparently

Yeah

Whatever copies left

Let’s just go through

The chain of events here

And

It was

It was absolutely surreal

Because

Trump literally went out to

A mob of people

And said

I want you to march down

Pennsylvania Avenue

And show the GOP

What it takes to have courage etc

Mike Pence

Apparently told Trump

That he was not going to go to bat for him

In this ceremonial

Process of counting the votes

And

Lo and behold

You’re watching this

You know

The objections going on

To the electoral count

And

You see the Secret Service

Come rushing in

And it becomes a

You know

Very serious situation

And when you watch some of the videos

It is truly terrorizing that

Thousands of people

Overwhelmed the police

And

I guess I want to start with

People’s opinion on Trump’s

Culpability

Inciting

What was

Very dangerous behavior

Four people are dead

You know

While we’re joking about

The cosplay outfits

A woman who

Was an ardent Trump supporter

Who is a vet

Who did four tours

From what I’ve read

And I shared the video with you before

Literally

You know

As they broke into the building

Was trying to breach

Another area of the building

And she’s climbing through a window

And gets shot

Apparently by the Secret Service

Or the police

And dies

And so

It’s all fun and games

Until four people are dead

And now

Somebody’s lost their

Wife

Daughter

Sister

Jason

I mean

There could have been

400 dead

There could have been

4000 dead

Absolutely

Yeah I mean

This could have become

A shootout at the

OK Corral

I can’t understand

Why the police

Showed the restraint

They did

I mean

When you see them

Getting surrounded

I don’t know if you saw

The one

They didn’t

They didn’t show

But it has been there

For other situations

And then you compare it

To the amount of security

Knowing for a month

And a half

That this was coming

It’s

It just doesn’t

Make any sense to me

So I’m a little

I’m a little dumbfounded

That

You know

You couldn’t have seen

This Facebook group

Called

You know

Hashtag

Storm the Capital

Which had

Tens of thousands

Maybe hundreds of thousands

Of members in there

Plotting and scheming

Selling merchandise

Called

Storm the Capital

You know

They were wearing

Printed sweatshirts

That they had time to make

And nobody knew about it

And nobody thought

To reinforce

The security

And barricade it

And make sure

That you couldn’t go

From the protest site

To the

I mean

It just seems

Like there’s some level

Of complicity

That needs to get

Found out here

But there was

There was an interview

I saw with

An ex-DC police guy

Who said that

I think folks were told

To tamper down

The police forces

Were told to tamper down

Managing crowds

And protests

And riots

Following the controversy

Associated with BLM

A few months ago

And spraying folks

With pepper spray

And water

And all the

Physical techniques

That were used

Were so

Outraging

That

That there was just

More of a systemic

Concern

About being

Too aggressive

With protesters

And as a result

They went too far

The other way

It’s

It’s not

An unreasonable

It just happens

To be

That

When black people

Protested

And brown people

They got the tear gas

And beaten

With batons

And then when the

White people

Stormed

The

Capitol

In the same area

They got

Walked down

The steps

And escorted out

With a stern warning

To not do it again

I mean

This is hypocritical

And insane

I don’t know why

You have to go there

Particularly

It looked to me

Like what happened

Is that the

Capitol Hill police

Simply got

Completely overwhelmed

You look at these

You know

Giant

This is a

Rally on the mall

That turned into

A mob

Well first it’s kind of

Turned into a tailgater

Then it turned into a mob

And then it turned into

An insurrection

It kind of stumbled

Forward into

Progressive

Phases

Stupidity

Of stupidity

And disaster

But

It’s

It looked to me

Like the Capitol Hill police

Simply got overwhelmed

They were unprepared

They were surprised

I think by this

And I saw video

Of tons of tear gas

Being used

I saw people

Getting tear gassed

Like crazy

And I think there was

Reports

This morning

On Twitter

That the whole area

In front of the Capitol there

Was covered in that

Light film

That remains after

Tear gassing

So I don’t think

They were really

Pulling punches too much

And I also think

That

There will be

Prosecutions

I think that

These people

Are being

Captured on video

There’s a lot of talk

On Twitter

And everybody

Is in favor of

Finding out who they are

Applying facial recognition

And

Bringing charges

So I think there will be

A lot of charges

Unlike

Let’s say

The BLM protests

This summer

I don’t remember anybody

Getting charged

Based on video

Of people rioting

Or looting

And then I think

You know

The final difference

Actually with the BLM protests

Is that

If you’ve

Watched Fox News at all

In the last 24 hours

You’ve probably seen

The most recent

Reaction

Of the storming

Of the Capitol

Of what happened

Has been

Across the board

Both right and left

Everybody across

The political spectrum

Has condemned it

Nobody is

Apologizing for it

Nobody on the right

Is looking for

Root causes

To explain

The reasons why

It happened

Everybody is just

Condemning it

And saying that

It should never have happened

And

The people who did it

Should be prosecuted

And

So I don’t see

You know

Either physically

Or rhetorically

I’ll tell you where I see

The kick off sacks

Is when you see

Officers being chased

Up the steps

And

Or taking selfies

You know

Which is one instance

I don’t want to just say

That’s the only indicative thing

But when people are

Breaking through windows

And just kind of

Being let go

I mean

They were obviously

Overwhelmed

But I’m surprised

More people didn’t get

Shot

Chamath

David

Let’s just tackle this

Head on in terms of

The race issue

David

Do you think that

If this were

Black and brown people

Storming the capital

Would there have been

More or less than

Four deaths?

Honestly I think

It would have been the same

I just

Disagree

I disagree

I really disagree

And I’ll tell you why

I think you have

The best of intentions

Wanting to think that way

But here’s the way I see it

I see a president

That basically

Instigated

A group of people

Who are fundamentally

Disenfranchised

Let’s face it

There are a lot of

Very very reasonable

Republicans

And a lot of very reasonable

Democrats

The fringes of both parties

Are functionally

Mentally retarded

We know this

Okay

And so

What you see are

Extreme

On both sides

Who are just

Completely

Lost

And looking for

Any excuse

And so

You have a president

In the tail end

Of his presidency

An anonymous presidency

Basically call them out

Nobody who actually

Had a job or anything to do

Could show up

Right

So you had all these people show up

It’s a Wednesday

During the day

I mean

And what do you think happens

They’re there

They’re all frothed up

You know

Eric Trump frothing them up

Donald Trump Jr. frothing them up

Trump frothing them up

Giuliani frothing them up

And all of a sudden

As you said

Stumbling into degrees of

Craziness and stupidity

To storm the capitol

And I just think to myself

How could a president

Instigate this kind of action

Number one

The second thing I think about is

When black

Athletes

Peacefully protested

Something that they had

The fundamental constitutional

Right to protest

In the president’s eyes

They were sons of bitches

White people

That stormed the fucking capitol

The people’s house

Were called patriots

By the president’s daughter

And then were told

That they were loved

By the president himself

To me it’s just an enormously

Stark contrast of a double standard

I think that beyond

The persecutions of the people

I actually feel very bad

For the people that stormed the capitol

I feel like these are folks

That are on the fringes

Who just need a vessel

And Trump is a vessel

And then he instigates them

And runs away

You know what I mean?

He’s a coward

He’s lost

These are lost people

Then these guys commit the crime

And now they’re going to go to jail

I feel like the culpability

Has to go all the way back

To Trump

To Hawley

To Cruz

These guys are

Those are the real scumbags

In all of this

Freeberg, what are your thoughts on this?

And then I’ll go back to Sax

And let him respond

I don’t think it’s unreasonable

To assume that

If this was a Black Lives Matter

And it was black people

Involved

Or brown people involved

In the same sorts of activities

You saw yesterday

That you would not see

More shootings

I don’t think that’s an unreasonable

Position to take

Obviously

I think there’s this other circumstance

Which is that event

Preceding this one

As I mentioned

I saw an interview

With a D.C. police

Former police director

Of the police

I forgot what his title was

Where he highlighted

That folks were

Kind of instructed

To stand down

Following the BLM controversies

And so I think that’s also

Kind of a reasonable point of view

What about the president’s culpability?

I mean I think that’s

One issue that’s gonna have

To be addressed post

And I think we have to figure out

What life post-Trump

Is gonna be like

Because this is a level of chaos

That nobody

To Sax’s point

All people condemned

There’s a theory

Which actually

Takes its origin

From Hitler

Where Hitler

Used this term

The big lie

And you know

The theory is that

You can create

Political propaganda

By saying something

That’s so outrageous

It is so improbable

That people say

There’s no way this thing

Keeps getting said over and over

Unless it’s actually real

And this is sort of like

The QAnon pedophile ring

In the pizzeria

Or the fact that

The election was stolen from you

It is such an outrageous statement

That it seems to people

That it only has to be true

Because it is

Such an insane thing

And if it is

It’s so insane

And I am so

Incited by this thing

So this is kind of

You know

Acknowledged as being

You know

A political propaganda technique

That goes back

A long time

By the way

Hitler used it as a way

To use it

As almost like a double bluff

To blame the Jews

In Germany

Which was

You know

An unfortunate kind of origin

Of the term

But

But the term is used a lot now

In saying like

These sorts of events are ridiculous

Now

What’s going to happen going forward

I don’t think

Big lies go away

You can try and mute them

On Twitter

And mute them on Facebook

Or mute them on Reddit

But whether it’s QAnon

Or whatever is next

This is becoming

Kind of a standard form now

Because of the way

Media is distributed

Anyone can say a big lie

And it gets a lot of listeners

And Trump is totally culpable for that

He made some shit up

He made a bunch of claims

I mean

If you guys haven’t seen

Lindsey Graham’s speech yesterday

It is absolutely worth watching

That he gave late last night

I saw it

And he’s like

I asked for the

Show me the 10

Give me 10 people

That claimed that

They voted and they were under 18

He’s like

They gave you 1

Give me anyone

That was in prison

Or died

And they gave me 0

And he goes on and on

For a couple minutes

About how none of what was said

About what happened in the election

Was true

And it was all false

And he’s like

This is all just not true

And so I think

Trump is culpable

For creating a falsehood

And

You know

Having a megaphone

And you know

What about the inciting

Of violence

That is I think

Where the rubber’s

Gonna meet the road

Trump’s gonna be out of office

In two weeks or less

One way or the other

Do you

And let me just

Take it to Saks

Saks

I want to give you

The time to respond

To the

The issue of

The double standard

In terms of race

And BLM

And then also

Do you

Saks

If you’re

On Biden’s team

Coming in

Do you advise

That you prosecute

Trump

Or investigate Trump

For

This insurrection

Yes or no

Okay so

Just to tie off

On the

The BLM issue

I just

You know

I just fundamentally

Don’t think that race

Is the issue here

Chamath

Look I

I don’t know

At the end of the day

What the fatalities

Of the people

Who are involved

I’m talking about

The people who stormed

The Capitol

Then we saw

From all the

The BLM protests

Over the summer

I mean I don’t

Remember any

Prosecutions coming

Out of videotape

Of people being

Caught recorded

Looting and

Riding

And I predict

You will see

More here

And again

I think another

Difference

Again

To the extent

There’s a double

Standard

I don’t

Know

There’s a

Double standard

You know

I remember

A lot of

Left wing

News networks

Calling the

Riding and

Looting in the

Summer

Peaceful

Protests

Which they

Clearly were

Not

You even

Had a book

Called

In Defense

Of Looting

And I don’t

Hear anybody

Defending the

Storming of the

Capitol

Nobody

On the

Defense

Was

The

Arbiter

The

Mass

I mean

Clearly

100%

Yes because

He is the

One who

Who

Who put

Forth this

Theory that

The election

Was stolen

And was

Constantly

Repeating

It for

The last

2 months

Ago

And

All

These

Concerns

Are

Saying

Who

Are

They

Afraid

And

The

Theory

Was

Deplorables

Don’t

Riot

And

The

Riot

Was

Proud

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Months

Ago

And

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Are

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And so I started doing a little bit of research and then we had

this horrible New Year’s Eve killing of this, you know,

wonderful young woman, Hannah

Abe, who came to America from Japan for college and

stayed here for work. She was just 27 years old.

She gets killed by a

criminal, someone who was released, who was paroled

by Chase Abudin back in

April. He had been in jail for armed robbery.

Chase released him as part of a plea

bargain. And then he was arrested five more times

for stealing cars and other crimes, most

recently two weeks ago. And the

DA refused to press charges. And that’s the reason he was

out on New Year’s Eve. He stole a car and

then there was this hit and run where he killed Hannah and another

woman. And so, you know, I had already been

noticing this issue. And so I started doing some

research. And I have a research assistant helping me

with this. It’s the only way I could put something like this together.

And we went pretty deep and we realized that the

death of Hannah wasn’t just an

accident or an act of negligence by this DA.

It was part of an overall philosophy of

decarceration that he has.

His background is very interesting. He was

a child of parents who were in the weather underground

who, when he was just a baby, committed armed robbery

and were part of the murder.

David, say the words. They were domestic terrorists.

That’s right. They were domestic terrorists. They participated

in an armed robbery against a Brinks truck.

And these were domestic terrorists that were competent when compared to what we saw

yesterday in the Capitol. These are highly

capable domestic terrorists, to be clear.

I don’t know how capable they were. Their

robbery resulted in the death of two police officers and a Brinks

guard. And they were put in prison. His mother spent 20 years

in prison. She’s now released. His father is still in prison

for almost 40 years.

And he’s described in interviews how

his earliest memories are visiting his parents in prison and how this

shaped his entire political outlook. And he

became a public defender, which I think was a pretty good place

for him. I think if I were an indigent

criminal defendant, I would want someone like Chase Aboody on my side.

But the problem is he ran for district attorney

and he simply doesn’t believe in prosecuting

huge numbers of crimes,

certainly property crimes, burglary, shoplifting,

vandalism. And those crimes

have absolutely spiked in the city.

A 45 percent increase in

burglaries in one year, a 35 percent increase

in stolen cars, 30 percent increase in homicides.

Crimes are through the roof because he simply doesn’t believe

in putting people in jail.

Well, you know, I just say this. Sorry, let me just

point out there’s a little bit of a history to

to this notion that DA’s should

change the criminal justice system. There’s a TED talk

by a guy named Adam Foss. I don’t know if you’ve seen it or if any of you guys

have watched it. I was at the TED conference the year that he

spoke. But this guy basically thought

he made the case that it is the role and the opportunity

for the district attorney, for the prosecutor, to change the criminal justice

system from the prosecutorial side. That you can

kind of demotivate jail and

other kind of mechanisms

of punishment and push for

a rehabilitation program as an alternative

and that the district attorneys can take this role on of changing

the criminal justice system. And it created a little bit of a mini movement

and there was a lot of attention and follow up after he gave his TED talk.

And I think San Francisco, in large part, picked

up on the momentum coming out of this and other

similar sort of stories about the DA can really change the criminal

justice system. And Chesa Boudin really kind of capitalized on it.

In principle, a lot of people are motivated from a good

place when they elected him, which is it is unfortunate

a lot of people get trapped in a life of crime. And the fact that they’re

in and out of prison is a result of the fact that they’re put into

the criminal justice system in the first place. And parole is really

harsh on people and all these other reasons why people’s

lives are ruined for simple mistakes. And if they get an opportunity

in life, they can fix themselves and they can come out

in a better place. So there is a bit of an origin story.

It’s not just like San Francisco said, let’s get an anarchist to be our DA

and destroy the world and kill us all.

I think it came from a good and true place where this all

kind of originated. But obviously, the experiment has gone severely awry in San

Francisco and his particular methods

and his particular actions have certainly caused far more harm

than anyone has seen any good, as we pointed out.

They’ve started a recall effort for him, too.

I think the danger is not that you have

an enlightened political philosophy. I think

that’s actually quite great and that we can experiment.

I think the danger is both on the left and on the right

where people cathartically deal with childhood trauma through their job.

I don’t know what

Chesa Boudin has gone through and I feel very bad that he had an incredibly

hard life or complicated

or maybe not. I don’t even know.

But I wouldn’t want to know that he’s

trying to deal with his own experiences

through his job because that’s not his job.

Meaning, you don’t want an activist DA.

I think you want a DA that’s enforcing the laws.

What you do want is you want to elect politicians who change the laws to reflect

our values.

That would be a better through line, I think.

If you look at what’s happening in San Francisco,

I think we’ve conflated

income inequality, which people in San Francisco are very

tuned into, with essentially

junkies, people who are addicted to incredibly

powerful drugs that are very hard to

get off of. We’ve had more deaths from

overdoses of fentanyl than we’ve had from

COVID by a magnitude of four or five.

It is bedlam on the streets of San Francisco.

If you don’t enforce

a basic rule of law, what happens is the price

of drugs gets cheaper, more available, more people

try them, more people get addicted, and then more people come from other places

because they know you have the lowest price on drugs

and the price of drugs is inversely correlated with

prosecution of drug crimes.

This is why San Francisco is spiraling.

Most drugs are purchased from criminal funds, so

criminal activity goes up to fund the drug purchasing.

That’s the vicious cycle that’s driving San Francisco.

There’s a recall going on, and then in