E10: Twitter & Facebook botch censorship (again), the publisher vs. distributor debate & more

1. 0:00 – 1:29

   The besties catch up on the news

   1. JCJason Calacanis0:00

      Hey, everybody. Hey, everybody. Welcome. Besties are back. Besties are back. It's another All In Podcast dropping it to you, uh, unexpectedly-

   2. CPChamath Palihapitiya0:08

      (sighs)

   3. JCJason Calacanis0:08

      ... because there's just so much news. (laughs) There's too much news.

   4. CPChamath Palihapitiya0:12

      A surprise bestie pod.

   5. JCJason Calacanis0:14

      We're dropping a bestie. (laughs) It's not a Code 3- 13. We're not dropping any Snickers bars today.

   6. CPChamath Palihapitiya0:20

      (laughs)

   7. JCJason Calacanis0:20

      Just dropping a bestie.

   8. DSDavid Sacks0:21

      That's why I brought a megaphone.

   9. JCJason Calacanis0:22

      Oh, no. He's got a megaphone.

   10. CPChamath Palihapitiya0:24

       (laughs)

   11. JCJason Calacanis0:24

       Oh, nice. That's good. Megaphone. Oh.

   12. DSDavid Sacks0:24

       (sirens blaring)

   13. JCJason Calacanis0:27

       He's got two.

   14. CPChamath Palihapitiya0:29

       This is (laughs) .

   15. DSDavid Sacks0:32

       (sirens blaring)

   16. JCJason Calacanis0:32

       (laughs)

   17. CPChamath Palihapitiya0:33

       (laughs)

   18. JCJason Calacanis0:34

       Uh, my God.

   19. DSDavid Sacks0:35

       It's a special censorship edition. Warning. Warning.

   20. (sirens blaring)

   21. JCJason Calacanis0:39

       (laughs)

   22. CPChamath Palihapitiya0:40

       Censorship episode of All In. Oh, baby.

   23. DSDavid Sacks0:42

       (laughs)

   24. JCJason Calacanis0:43

       We hit a new low in terms of people needing to be heard.

   25. CPChamath Palihapitiya0:46

       Oh, my God.

   26. JCJason Calacanis0:47

       Trumon Sax's agent, um, and his chief of staff called me. He felt like he only got 62% of the minutes in the last two podcasts-

   27. CPChamath Palihapitiya0:56

       (laughs)

   28. JCJason Calacanis0:56

       ... versus the rest of us. And so I'm dealing with his agent a little bit. It's like the, uh, the debates where they count the number of minutes at interval.

   29. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:04

       Who, Daniel?

   30. DSDavid Sacks1:04

       Uh-
2. 1:29 – 7:27

   NY Post Hunter Biden story & censorship by Twitter/Facebook

   1. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:29

   2. JCJason Calacanis1:29

      So here we are, we're three weeks out from the election and somebody's emails have... A Democrat's emails have been leaked again, potentially. But last time, um, we had an investigation by the FBI and then that might have infected, uh, impacted the election. This time, we have a whole different brouhaha. Apparently Hunter Biden, who loves to smoke crack and has-

   3. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:58

      (laughs)

   4. JCJason Calacanis1:58

      ... a serious drug problem. This, this is... You know, he's a seriously, obviously troubled individual. Um, but he brought three laptops to get them fixed and never picked them up, according to this story in the New York Post. So the New York Post runs a story with an author who is kind of unknown. Um, and this, these laptops were... Somehow the hard drives ma-... He never picked them up. That's a little suspicious. The hard drives wind up with Rudee- Rudy Giuliani and the FBI. Uh, and anyway, what they say is that Hunter Biden, which we kind of know is a grifter who traded on his last name to get big consulting deals. I, I don't know what board anybody here has been on that pays 50,000 a month, uh, but it's obviously gnarly stuff. But the, the fallout from it was the big story. I went to tweet the story and it wouldn't let me tweet the story. Uh, so the literal New York Post was banned by Twitter at the same time Facebook put a warning on it. So let's just put it out there, um, you know, Sax, your guy is losing pretty badly in this election. And so we'll go to our token GOPer. What do you think?

   5. CPChamath Palihapitiya3:09

      (laughs)

   6. JCJason Calacanis3:09

      Is this... Let's, let's take this in two parts. One, what do you... Do you... What did they think the chances that this is fake news or real news or something in between? And then let's get into Twitter's insane decision to block the URL.

   7. DSDavid Sacks3:23

      Yeah, I mean, so, so first... So I, I think this whole thing is a, is a tragedy of errors on the part of, um, sort of everyone involved. I think the New York Post story stinks. I don't think it, uh, it, it, it meets sort of standards of journalistic integrity. We can talk about that. Uh, but then I think, you know, Twitter and Facebook overreacted. And I think that the story was well in the process of being debunked by the internet. And it was like Twitter and Facebook didn't trust that process to happen. And so they intervened. And now I think there's going to be a third mistake, which is that conservatives are looking to repeal Section 230. We should talk about that. And so each one... There's been a cascade of, of disasters that have led to this, this dumpster fire. But starting with the story, it is, it, it is, um, very suspicious. First of all, these disclosures about Hunter Biden's personal life, they didn't have to go there. It was completely gratuitous to the article. It was sleazy. And then, of course, the story about how the hard drive ends up with the reporters makes no sense. Even today, uh, Giuliani was, was making up new explanations for how it got there. Um, it's now being widely speculated that this was the... that the content came from the result of a hack. Um, maybe involving foreign actors, that this whole idea that it came from this sort of hard drive that he left at a repair shop and forgot to pick up. Um, I mean, so that, that's now, you know... I think that would have been the story today if it weren't for, um, Facebook and Twitter making censorship of the story. And then the final thing is, you know, this story wasn't a smoking gun to begin with. I mean, the worst thing it showed was that there was a single email between a Burisma exec and, and Joe Biden. And, um, the, the Biden campaign has denied that Bi-... that Joe Biden never met with this guy. And so it wasn't ever this smoking gun. And, um, and, and that makes it all the more, um, apparent why Facebook and Twitter sort of overreacted. It was almost like they were trying to overprotect their candidate. Uh, but this was nev-

   8. JCJason Calacanis5:31

      That's the thing that obviously looks crazy. Like, they now have given the GOP, the right, the extreme right, the belief that the, the technology companies are now on the side of the left whereas last time, they were on the side of the right, I think, right? Facebook was supposed to be on the side of the right last time. So Chamath, you worked at Facebook famously for many years. What are your thoughts?

   9. CPChamath Palihapitiya5:55

      Well, Jack came out last night and basically said that the reason that they, that they shut down distribution was that it came from hacking and doxing or some... I think that was basically the excuse.

   10. JCJason Calacanis6:05

       A combination, yes.

   11. CPChamath Palihapitiya6:06

       A combination. Um, and then Facebook today came out and said, "You know, before we could take it down, it had been distributed or read 300,000 times." Um-I mean, look. If we just take a step back and think about what's happening here, there are more and more and more examples that are telling, I think all of us, what we kind of already knew, which is that this fig leaf that the online internet companies have used to shield themselves from any responsibility, those days are probably numbered. Because now, exactly as David said, (laughs) what you have is the left and the right (laughs) looking to repeal-

   12. DFDavid Friedberg6:45

       Yeah.

   13. CPChamath Palihapitiya6:45

       ... Section 230. And so... And by the way, two days ago, I think it was, Clarence Thomas basically put out the entire roadmap of how to repeal it. And if you assume that Amy Coney Barrett gets, you know, put into the High Court in a matter of days or whatever, um, it's only a matter of time until the right case is thoughtfully prepared along those guardrails that, that Clarence Thomas defined, and it'll get w- w- you know, fast-tracked through to the Supreme Court. But if I was a betting man, which I am, I think that Section 230 is... their days are numbered, and Facebook, Twitter, Google, all these companies are going to have to look more like newspapers and television stations

3. 7:27 – 13:23

   What is section 230 & how does it play into the publisher vs. distributor debate

   1. JCJason Calacanis7:27

      Okay. So before we go to you, Friedberg, I'm just gonna read what Section 230 is. Uh, this is part of, um, a law basically designed to protect common carriers, web hosters, uh, of legal claims that come from hosting third-party information. Uh, here's what it reads. "No provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider." Uh, so what this basically means is if you put a blog post up and people comment on it, you're not responsible for their comments. Or if you're Medium and you host the blog, you're not responsible for the comments of that person. It is that person's. It makes complete, logical sense. The entire internet was based off of this, that platforms are not responsible for what people contribute to those platforms. That's how publishing works.

   2. CPChamath Palihapitiya8:21

      Now-

   3. JCJason Calacanis8:21

      If you look at the internet as paper-

   4. CPChamath Palihapitiya8:22

      But, but, but again, let's build on this.

   5. JCJason Calacanis8:24

      (clears throat)

   6. CPChamath Palihapitiya8:24

      When that law was originally written, we had no conception of social distribution and algorithmic feeds that basically pumped content and, and increased the volume on those things. So, what you have now is really no different than if, you know, you created a show, um, on Netflix or HBO or CBS and put it out there. If that stuff contained, you know, something that was really offensive, those companies are on the hook. Did they make it?

   7. JCJason Calacanis8:50

      Yeah.

   8. CPChamath Palihapitiya8:50

      No. Did they distribute it? Yes. And it's the-

   9. JCJason Calacanis8:53

      But, but here-

   10. CPChamath Palihapitiya8:54

       And here-

   11. JCJason Calacanis8:54

       But here's the difference.

   12. CPChamath Palihapitiya8:54

       It's the active-

   13. JCJason Calacanis8:55

       You know, Netflix-

   14. CPChamath Palihapitiya8:56

       But it's the active act of distributing it. You cannot look at these companies and say, "They are basically holding their hands back." They have written, active code, and there is-

   15. JCJason Calacanis9:06

       Okay.

   16. CPChamath Palihapitiya9:06

       ... technical procedures that they are in control of that are both the amplifier and the kill switch.

   17. JCJason Calacanis9:11

       But isn't this a bad analogy, Netflix? Shouldn't the analogy be the person who makes film stock or the person who makes the camera, or the person who develops the film, not the person who distributes it? There are-

   18. CPChamath Palihapitiya9:22

       No, because that... No, that law is now-

   19. JCJason Calacanis9:23

       ... a limited amount of shows on Netflix. You can police all of them. You can't-

   20. DFDavid Friedberg9:26

       Net- Netflix-

   21. JCJason Calacanis9:27

       ... police everything written.

   22. DFDavid Friedberg9:29

       ... Net- Netflix is making editorial decisions about which shows to publish, just like, you know, a magazine makes editorial decisions about which articles to publish. They are clearly publishers. Um, but the, the Communications Decency Act Section 230, the original distinction... I mean, if you wanna think about it, like, in offline terms for a second, you've got, y- you've got th- this idea of publishers and distributors, right? That's a fundamental dichotomy. A magazine would be a publisher. The newsstand on which it appears is a distributor. It shouldn't be liable. If there's, if there's a, a, a, a, a libelous article contained in that magazine, you shouldn't be able to sue every single newsstand in the country that made that magazine available for sale. That was th- that was the original offline law that was then kind of ported over into Section 230. It made a lot of sense. Without this... I mean, I think it was a really visionary provision. It was passed in 1996. Without that, every time that somebody sends an email, uh, that, you know, potentially created a legal issue, uh, you know, Gmail could have been liable.

   23. JCJason Calacanis10:35

       Friedberg-

   24. DFDavid Friedberg10:36

       Um-

   25. JCJason Calacanis10:36

       ... is it... What's the right analogy? When people post to the internet, is that the... is the analogy-

   26. DFDavid Friedberg10:41

       No, but-

   27. JCJason Calacanis10:41

       ... paper or film stock? Is it the newsstand? Or is it the publisher?

   28. DFDavid Friedberg10:45

       So remember, like, what Sacks is pointing out is this was passed in 1996. So think back to 1996, when you would, um, create some content, right? And the term around that time was user-generated content, right? You guys remember this, like the early days.

   29. JCJason Calacanis11:00

       Yeah.

   30. DFDavid Friedberg11:00

       It was like the big sweeping trend.
4. 13:23 – 28:30

   Distinguishing between publishers & distributors

   1. CPChamath Palihapitiya13:23

      takedown notices.

   2. JCJason Calacanis13:24

      So, Jim Ma-

   3. CPChamath Palihapitiya13:24

      I think the problem, the problem-

   4. JCJason Calacanis13:25

      Yeah.

   5. CPChamath Palihapitiya13:25

      ... comes back to the code. If you explicitly write code that fundamentally makes it murky whether you are the publisher or the distributor, I think that you have to basically take the approach that you are both. And then, you should be subject to the laws of both. If, for example, Twitter did not have any algorithmic redistribution amplification, there, where the only way you could get content was in a real-time feed that was everything that your friends posted and they stayed silent, you could make a very credible claim that they are a publisher and not a distributor.

   6. JCJason Calacanis14:03

      Mm-hmm. Which, by the way, is the way it originally worked, and it was why they were falling behind Facebook, as you well know, because you worked on the algorithm at Facebook.

   7. CPChamath Palihapitiya14:11

      You cannot, you cannot claim-

   8. DSDavid Sacks14:12

      Right. But-

   9. CPChamath Palihapitiya14:13

      ... you're, you're not a distributor when you literally have a bunch of people that sit beside you writing code that decides what is important and what is not. You can debate-

   10. DSDavid Sacks14:22

       Well, but-

   11. CPChamath Palihapitiya14:22

       You can debate which signals they decide to use, but it is their choice.

   12. DSDavid Sacks14:26

       Well, but, but, but if the signals are, are the user's own clicks, then I would argue that's still just user-generated content.

   13. CPChamath Palihapitiya14:34

       No, no, no. It is a-

   14. DSDavid Sacks14:35

       Um, but-

   15. CPChamath Palihapitiya14:35

       It is a signal, David, but that's not the only signal. For example-

   16. DSDavid Sacks14:37

       Well, I mean-

   17. CPChamath Palihapitiya14:38

       ... I can tell you very clearly that we would choose a priori stuff that we knew you would click on. It wasn't necessarily the most heavily clicked. We could make things that were lightly clicked more clicked. We could make things that were more clicked less clicked. But my point is-

   18. DSDavid Sacks14:51

       Right.

   19. CPChamath Palihapitiya14:51

       ... there are people inside the bowels of these companies that are deciding what you and your children see. And to the extent-

   20. DSDavid Sacks14:58

       Right. Well-

   21. CPChamath Palihapitiya14:58

       ... that that's okay, that's okay.

   22. JCJason Calacanis15:00

       So wait, wait, wait. Maybe we've actually solved this problem, Sacks, in that-

   23. DSDavid Sacks15:04

       Mm-hmm.

   24. JCJason Calacanis15:04

       ... if we said, "If you deploy an algorithm that is not disclosing how this is going, then you are, ergo, a publisher. And if you-"

   25. DSDavid Sacks15:14

       Right.

   26. JCJason Calacanis15:14

       ... "uh, are just showing it reverse chronological, or chron as we used to call it back in the day, with the newest thing up top," that would be-

   27. DSDavid Sacks15:22

       Right.

   28. JCJason Calacanis15:22

       ... uh, just a... And so maybe we should be not getting rid of 230. We should be talking to these politicians about algorithms equal publisher. So the publisher at the New York Post-

   29. DSDavid Sacks15:32

       Right, right.

   30. JCJason Calacanis15:32

       ... is the same as the algorithm. I like this as a-
5. 28:30 – 37:21

   Why Twitter & Facebook's actions with the NY Post were a huge blunder & crossed a line, should the laws be rewritten?

   1. CPChamath Palihapitiya28:30

      wrong with that.

   2. DFDavid Friedberg28:31

      May- may- may- maybe the only, like, disagreement here is that I- I think that, uh, code can be written and algorithms can be written t- in a speech-neutral way, so that the distributors don't cross over the line to becoming publishers. I fully agree with you that these sites should not be publishers. The reason why the New York Post story has really taken off-

   3. JCJason Calacanis28:47

      They should be platforms.

   4. DFDavid Friedberg28:49

      They should be platforms, and they cross the line. I would say that this, this New York Post story is... The- the reason why people are up in arms about it is because what Twitter and Facebook have done is basically said they're going to sit in judgment of the media industry. And if a publisher like the- the- the New York Post puts out a story that doesn't meet the standards of Twitter and Facebook, they're going to censor them. That is a sweeping assertion of power. They're picking and choosing who they don't want to give distribution to.

   5. JCJason Calacanis29:18

      Yeah. We all, we all agree on that piece. They should not be the arbitrator of what-

   6. DFDavid Friedberg29:22

      That is what is triggering, but that is what is triggering the conservatives in particular, but everybody, but especially conservatives, to say they want to repeal Section 230.

   7. CPChamath Palihapitiya29:31

      Nobody is safe.

   8. DFDavid Friedberg29:32

      My point is-

   9. CPChamath Palihapitiya29:33

      Nobody is safe.

   10. DFDavid Friedberg29:34

       And t- and it's less about, um... I- I actually think that there's a- a- a nuance point to this which is it's less about what they think is legit or not as much as what they think is important or not. They chose to make this an important article. They chose to kind of intervene in this particular case, when every day, there are going to be hundreds of other articles that are going to be actively shared on these platforms that are, by those same standards, false with, you know, some degree of equivalency, false

   11. JCJason Calacanis30:00

       Of course.

   12. DFDavid Friedberg30:00

       ... and shouldn't be on the- the platform.

   13. CPChamath Palihapitiya30:01

       Absolutely.

   14. DFDavid Friedberg30:02

       And it is the simple choice that they chose an article to exclude, um, regardless of the reason and the background, because there are many articles like it that aren't being excluded.

   15. CPChamath Palihapitiya30:11

       Yeah.

   16. DFDavid Friedberg30:11

       Um, and that alone speaks to the hole in the system, as- as kind of Sax is pointing out.

   17. CPChamath Palihapitiya30:14

       Mm-hmm.

   18. JCJason Calacanis30:15

       Well, it's because, it's because they, they have too much power and they're unaware of their own biases. They can't see this action for what it so clearly was. It was a knee-jerk reaction on the part of employees at Twitter and Facebook to- to protect the Biden campaign from a story that they didn't like. I mean, because if they were to apply the- the- these standards evenly, they would have blocked the Trump tax returns for the exact same reason.

   19. CPChamath Palihapitiya30:38

       By the way, just so you know-

   20. DFDavid Friedberg30:39

       J- J Cal's about to block you so he can keep the Biden campaign strong and not have your

   21. JCJason Calacanis30:43

       (laughs)

   22. CPChamath Palihapitiya30:43

       Well, I- I- I would say, I would say-

   23. JCJason Calacanis30:45

       I've been red-pilled actually. The last 24 hours have been red-pilling for me (laughs) .

   24. CPChamath Palihapitiya30:49

       I- I- I got to say, David, I agree with you because, like, I thought, I thought that both things were, uh, crossing the line. Like, meaning either you publish them both-

   25. ... or you censor them both. And there are very legitimate reasons where you can be on either side. But to choose one and not do the other, it just, again, it creates for me uncertainty, and I don't like uncertainty, and I really don't like the idea that some nameless, faceless person in one of these organizations is all of a sudden going to decide for me, knowledge-

   26. Yeah.

   27. ... and information.

   28. Yeah. Yeah.

   29. That, to me, is just unacceptable.

   30. A- the journalistic standard becomes a slippery slope to nowhere, right? Like, at that point-
6. 37:21 – 46:14

   Trump beats COVID, what that means for better treatment options, dueling town halls

   1. JCJason Calacanis37:21

      All right, let's, let's give Sax his victory lap. He predicted last time that, uh, there was a possibility that Trump would come out of this like Superman and would do a huge victory lap. And sure enough, he considered putting a Superman outfit on under his suit. (laughs) Uh, and he did a victory lap literally around the hospital, uh, putting the Secret Service at risk, I guess. Um, and then did a, uh, Mussolini-like, uh-

   2. DSDavid Sacks37:48

      (laughs)

   3. JCJason Calacanis37:49

      ... salute from everybody (laughs) from the top-

   4. DSDavid Sacks37:50

      Yeah.

   5. JCJason Calacanis37:50

      ... of the White House. I mean, you nailed it, Sax.

   6. DSDavid Sacks37:53

      Il Duce, yeah.

   7. JCJason Calacanis37:53

      He came out-

   8. DSDavid Sacks37:55

      It was very Il Duce. I have to admit that.

   9. JCJason Calacanis37:57

      Il Duce. He did Il Duce.

   10. DSDavid Sacks37:57

       Uh, it was very Il Duce.

   11. JCJason Calacanis37:59

       Il Duce. (laughs)

   12. DSDavid Sacks37:59

       Um, no, it was, it was, it was, it was very predictable. It was, you, the media was making it sound like Trump was on his death bed, you know, because the presumption is always that the administration's hiding something, he must be much sicker than he's letting on. If he says he's not that sick, it must be really bad. Um, and so for days and days, they were talking about how Trump was, you know, potentially had this fatal condition, and by the way, he deserved it. You know, it was a moral failing, he was negligent. And so, he had t- a- and it's not unlike really what the right was doing, constantly accusing Biden of senility, you know, and then Biden went into that debate and then blew away expectations. Um, and so the same thing here, you know, the, the media set up Trump to kind of exceed expectations. But I, but, but I do think, you know, it is, um, noteworthy that Trump was cured so quickly with the use of these, you know, uh, clonal antibodies that we talked about last time, and we talked about it on the show two weeks ago. And it was a combination, I guess, of Regeneron and Remdesivir, and the guy was out of there in, like, a couple of days. So, um, you know, it, it's, it's like the, the media doesn't want to admit anything that is potentially helpful to Trump. But you have to say that at this point, we have very effective treatments for COVID. They may not be completely distributed, uh, yet. Uh, Trump obviously had access to them that the rest of us don't have. But it feels to me like we are really winding down on the whole, the whole COVID thing.

   13. CPChamath Palihapitiya39:27

       Can I ask a question? Is it, has, have they published the blow-by-blow tick-tock of exactly what he got when, um... No, they haven't, right?

   14. JCJason Calacanis39:37

       Well, no.

   15. CPChamath Palihapitiya39:37

       I would love, I would love to have that because I think all Americans deserve to have that.

   16. They did roughly, yeah. They know, they know what his dosage was and they, they said what day he got it on the Remdesivir. He got several doses. It said what days he got the antibody treatment.

   17. Uh, I ju- I just want to print that out and keep it as a folded in my pocket, just in case. (laughs)

   18. DSDavid Sacks39:55

       Oh, we know what to take now. We know what to take if we get sick, right? I mean-

   19. CPChamath Palihapitiya39:58

       Yeah. Well, the question is can we get it? Can we get it?

   20. But even independent of that, right, like, um, I think people love s- um, anecdote. It's very hard for people to find emotion and find belief in statistics. And, you know, if you look at the statistics on COVID, you know, you're going to the hospital, 80% chance you're coming out. And, you know, the average stay for someone that, that goes in, a lot of people are going to the ER and they're getting pushed back out because they're not severe enough. And I, I think the anecdote is everyone that gets COVID dies. The statistics show that that's not true. And, you know, whether or not Trump got exceptional treatment, he certainly did. Um, it's very hard, to Sax's point, for the storytelling that has kind of been used to keep people at home and, and manage kind of, and create this, this expectation of severity of this crisis, et cetera. Um, it's very hard for people to kind of then say, "Hey, like, you know, he's got a 97% chance of making it through this and he'll be, 90, 90% chance he'll be out of the hospital in three days." When it happened, it was a shocking moment, um, and it really hit that narrative upside down, right? Like, it was just like...

   21. DSDavid Sacks41:04

       Well, can we, can we show that there's a tweet recently providing the statistics on what the real infection fatality rate was for COVID? Um-

   22. CPChamath Palihapitiya41:12

       Yeah, I saw it. It was like-

   23. DSDavid Sacks41:13

       I think, you know, Bill-

   24. CPChamath Palihapitiya41:13

       It's, it's about half a percent, .4, and that's across, you know, the whole spectrum. But, like, in, in anyone under 75 years old, uh, you've got the numbers, right, Sax?

   25. DSDavid Sacks41:23

       Right. But it's, here, let me pull it up so on, uh, we, we tweet, I think Bill Gurley first tweeted it and then I retweeted it.

   26. CPChamath Palihapitiya41:28

       Yeah, I thought, I thought the IFR was, like, .1 if you're young, and it goes all the way up to, like, .4 if you are above 75.

   27. It's way, way less than .1 if you're not.

   28. Way, yeah. It's, it's, it's, it was, um, I thought the IFR was a lot less severe then.

   29. And by the way, that, that, that IFR is also distorted. You, you know, based on the seroprevalence study that was just published, you can take that number that's published and divide it by about three, uh, three to five-

   30. Why?
7. 46:14 – 54:34

   Sacks explains his stance on Prop 13 & Zuckerberg's pro-Prop 15 lobbying

   1. JCJason Calacanis46:14

   2. CPChamath Palihapitiya46:14

      I would like to ask David to explain his, um, tweet related to Prop 13. Um...

   3. DSDavid Sacks46:22

      Or 15, yeah, yeah.

   4. CPChamath Palihapitiya46:23

      Prop 15.

   5. DSDavid Sacks46:24

      Yeah. So, um, so I saw that that Mark Zuckerberg had contributed $11 million to try and convince the people of California to vote for this Prop 15, which is the largest property tax increase in California history. What it does is it chips away at Prop 13 by moving, um, commercial property out of, of, of Prop 13. And it would then, uh, tax it on what's called fair market value as opposed to the, the cost basis of the property. It would have a lot of unfair consequences for property owners who, who've owned their, their, uh, commercial property for a long time. You know, if you're a, a small business and you've owned your, your store or whatever for 20, 30 years, all of a sudden you're gonna get, your taxes are gonna get reassessed at the new fair market value. Um, but, you know, I just think there's, it- it- the, the, the larger prize though is that the, the u- the California unions, uh, the- the government workers unions wanna chip away at Prop 13. This is the first salvo. First they're going to strip out commercial property, eventually they wanna, they wanna basically repeal all of Prop 13. And I just think it's like so misguided for billionaires to be using their wealth in this way, um, because Prop 13 is really the shield of the middle class in California. And it's kinda no wonder that, frankly, like tech bel- wealth is so dis- increasingly despised in this country, um, because tech billionaires are funding such stupid causes.

   6. JCJason Calacanis47:55

      To explain this to people who don't know, in California, if you bought your house in 1970 for $50,000, the 1% tax you pay on it is $500. That house might be worth $5 million today if it was in Atherton. And so, you're still paying what would have been a $50,000 tax bill is a $500 tax bill. So they're starting with commercial spaces and you're right-

   7. CPChamath Palihapitiya48:15

      And Jason, sorry, nerds.

   8. JCJason Calacanis48:16

      It will go backwards.

   9. CPChamath Palihapitiya48:17

      And you can pass it off to your kids.

   10. JCJason Calacanis48:20

       At that cost basis.

   11. CPChamath Palihapitiya48:21

       Yeah.

   12. JCJason Calacanis48:21

       So this is why you have two old people living in a five bedroom.

   13. DSDavid Sacks48:25

       Right.

   14. CPChamath Palihapitiya48:26

       It caps the rate increase of the, the tax increase every year.

   15. DSDavid Sacks48:30

       There, there, there's, there- if you didn't have-

   16. CPChamath Palihapitiya48:32

       I guess, Sax, Sax. ???

   17. DSDavid Sacks48:32

       If you didn't have Prop 13... No, hold on. It will... If you didn't have Prop... Let me just explain this to people. If you didn't have Prop 13, anybody who owned, who's owned their house for say 20 years would have a massive tax bill all of a sudden, and probably would have to sell their house. Just about anybody who's middle class who's been in California for, for more than a decade or two probably could no longer afford to live in their house.

   18. CPChamath Palihapitiya48:55

       But the reality is people are mortgaging that asset, Sax, to access capital that they're using in investing in different things, whether it's, you know, that's fueling the economy, right? So, I mean, the libertarian point of view might be less taxes is good because in this particular case, that building can still be used by that resident-... uh, to buy stuff. Uh, they can take a mortgage out-

   19. DSDavid Sacks49:16

       Right.

   20. CPChamath Palihapitiya49:16

       ... and they can go spend that money, versus having that money eaten up by property taxes, which just goes to the government.

   21. DSDavid Sacks49:21

       Yeah. Well, yeah, so, so, so I, I, I understand that if you were to design the, like, perfect tax policy, it wouldn't look like Prop 13 or, you know, or, you know... And, and maybe Prop 15 in a vacuum, if you're just, like, a policy wonk trying to design the ideal tax policy, it might look more like that. But the real problem in California, we're not an under-taxed state. It's a massively taxed state. And, and there's never enough. You know, the beast always wants more. And so what I would say is, look, if you want to reform Prop 13, do it as part of a grand bargain that creates real structural reform in the state of California. Um, what I mean by structural reform, well, you got to look at, well, who controls the system? And it's really the government employee unions who block all structural reform and who keep eating up a bigger and bigger portion of the state budget. Um, so we've talked about this on previous pods, that the police unions block any kind of police reform. Um, you know, the, the prison unions block prison reform. You've got the teachers' unions blocking education reform and school choice. If you want to talk about systemic problems in California, look at who runs the system. It's these, these gigantic unions. And a bigger and bigger portion of the budget keeps going to them every year. They're breaking the bank. Um, and by the way, it doesn't get us more cops on the beat. It doesn't get us more teachers in the classroom. What it's buying is lots and lots more of administration, along with a bunch of pension fraud. And so what I would do is I would say, look, we need some structural reforms here. We need some caps on the rate of growth in spending. We need some pension reforms. In exchange for that, as part of a grand bargain, you might get some reforms to Prop 13. But just to give away one of the only cards we have in negotiating with these powerful special interests for no reason, I just think it's dumb, you know?

   22. CPChamath Palihapitiya51:07

       Do you think that Zuck was tricked or what do you think?

   23. DSDavid Sacks51:11

       I think he's probably got... Uh, look, I don't really know, but I don't have anything against Zuck, and I've defended him on this podcast a lot, basically, on, on the speech issue. But I think what it is, he's got some foundation and he's got some pointy-headed policy wonks sitting there trying to analyze what the perfect tax policy is, and it probably looks more like fair market value than, like, cost basis. And they're not thinking about the larger political, um, sort of ramifications, which is we... the private sector is being squeezed more and more by these public employee unions, and we do need structural reform. And we can't just give up one of the only cards we have, which would be, you know, trading reform on Prop 13.

   24. CPChamath Palihapitiya51:53

       And Zuck doesn't own any commercial real estate?

   25. Yeah. (laughs)

   26. DSDavid Sacks51:56

       Well, even if... So I, I, I own commercial real estate, but-

   27. CPChamath Palihapitiya51:58

       I, I, I would, I would venture to guess that maybe Sacks does. I, I don't know. I mean-

   28. DSDavid Sacks52:01

       No, no, no, no, no. Hold on. Let me... Look, I, I, I do, but let me explain that. This doesn't affect me because my cost basis is fresh. Yeah, all the, all the commercial real estate that I've bought in California has been in the last few years. It's probably underwater. I mean, it's certainly not above my cost basis. Um, so I... It doesn't affect me. It affects the little guy. It affects the small business who's owned their property for 10 or 20 years. And again, I'm not arguing that we couldn't come up with a better tax system. But what I'm saying is the bigger, more pressing need is structural reform. We have-

   29. CPChamath Palihapitiya52:31

       Totally. No, I mean, look, I, I totally agree. The bloated monster of socialism is coming for us, and it starts with the unions and it evolves and it's just taxing-

   30. Average salary, I don't know if you saw this go viral in the last couple of weeks on Twitter, but-
8. 54:34 – 1:04:11

   Thoughts on Amy Coney Barrett & Biden's large lead in the polls

   1. CPChamath Palihapitiya54:34

      Uh, I have one other thing I want to ask you guys about, which is the Amy Coney Barrett confirmation hearings, whether you guys have watched them and what you guys think. Um, and I don't know whether these are just, um, cherry-picked clips or whether she's playing dumb or... I, I really don't want to judge because I want to know more, but I just want to know what you guys think of... uh, going into this. Um, you know, the-

   2. Well, I'll say something about climate change because... Look, I'm... I, I, I spend a lot of time looking at data and research on climate change and certainly feel strongly that there's a, a human-caused function of, of global warming that, that, that we're actively kind of experiencing.... but I think everyone kind of assumes you have to take that as truth. I think one of the, the key points of science is you have to recognize your ignorance, and you have to recognize that science is, um, you know, kind of an evolving process of discovery and understanding. I, I don't... And she's getting a lot of heat for what she said about, "I'm not a scientist. I don't know how to opine on climate change." And I heard that and it actually gave me a, a bit of pause that like, this, this is e- exactly, you know, what I would expect someone who's thoughtful to say, not someone that's trying to act ignorant and play to the right. Um, and she didn't say, "I don't think climate change is being caused by humans." And I think like everyone kind of wants to jump at her and every... It's like become religion. I just want to point out that climate change has become as politicized and as dogmatic as all these other topics we talk about. And we all kind of assume that if you do or don't believe in climate change, you're left or right, you're evil, you're good. Um, and I, I think like it's very easy to kind of just go into hear- those hearings and assume that. But I wouldn't say that her answer necessarily made me think that she is ignoring facts and ignoring the truth. I think, you know, she's kind of pointing out that this is a process of science and there's a lot of discovery underway. So I, I don't know. I mean, that was one point that, controversial point, that I thought I should make, um, 'cause I am a believer. I, I do think that climate change is real. I do think the data and science supports it. But I do appreciate that someone recognizes that they may not (laughs) have the skills ...

   3. Yeah. The few, the few clips ...

   4. ... rather than just assume what the, what the media tells them to, uh, to believe, you know?

   5. Yeah. The few, the few clips that I saw of the confirmation hearing, my takeaway was basically, you know, any candidate on the left or the right comes in extremely well-coached, and they're taught basically how to evade, meaning there's a go-to answer. Amy Coney Barrett's go-to answer was, um, "Listen, as a judge, I'd have to s- you know, hear that case on the record. I can't opine on something hypothetically." You know, she had this very well-rehearsed answer, and a lot of the answers to the questions from the left were that. Um, and, uh, you know, the questions on the right were, um, more softball-ish. Um, so I couldn't really get a sense of it. Now, the, the thing that I take kind of a, a, a lot of comfort in is that, you know, when we saw John Roberts get confirmed to the court, um, it was supposed to be five-four conservative with John Roberts. And basically what we learned was now John Roberts in, you know, some critical decisions, he is willing to basically, you know, uh, make sure that things don't change that much.

   6. DSDavid Sacks57:42

      Right.

   7. CPChamath Palihapitiya57:42

      Um, including Obamacare.

   8. DSDavid Sacks57:44

      Yeah, exactly. You, you, you don't... You don't know exactly how they're going to vote on these issues. You really don't. Roberts was the deciding vote in upholding Obamacare. Gorsuch, uh, extended, uh, gay rights well beyond anything Anthony Kennedy ever did. That was a big surprise. And so, we don't really know exactly how she's going to vote. The reason why Amy Coney Barrett rocketed to the top of Trump's list, quite frankly, is because of how Dianne Feinstein treated her three years ago in the last confirmation hearings where she is, she... Where Feinstein attacked her Catholicism. It was, and it was so ham-handed, it was so poorly done that it made Barrett a hero instantly on the right, and it rocketed her to the top of this list. But, but we don't know how she's gonna vote based on her Catholicism, you know? People-

   9. JCJason Calacanis58:29

      Which is a feature, isn't it, David? Because e- the lifetime appointment means they, like tenure, they can go with what they think is right. So that, that is kind of a good feature of the Supreme Court, or do you think there should be like a, a term?

   10. DSDavid Sacks58:43

       Well, I, I think it's a little crazy that decisions as important as, you know, the, the, the, the right to, to choice or something like that, um, hangs on whether an 89-year-old, uh, cancer victim can hold on for three more months. You know, it seems very arbitrary to me. And therefore, these Su- Supreme Court battles become very, um, heated and, and, um, and, and, and toxic. And there's been a, a recent proposal by Democrats that I, that I would support, which basically says, listen, we should have an 18-year term for Supreme Court justice. That's long enough. And each president should get two nominees, like one in the first year, and then one in the third year. And so you basically have one justice rolling off every two years, and one coming on. And so you have nine justices, and so every two years adds up to 18 years. That proposal makes a ton of sense to me. And, um, and so, you know, you know that when you vote for a president, they're going to get two Supreme Court picks. Um...

   11. JCJason Calacanis59:40

       Um, that feels less chaotic than this.

   12. DSDavid Sacks59:42

       That would be, that'd be a much better system, much better system.

   13. JCJason Calacanis59:45

       That's a, that's a great idea. That's a great idea.

   14. CPChamath Palihapitiya59:46

       Yeah.

   15. JCJason Calacanis59:46

       That's a great idea.

   16. DSDavid Sacks59:46

       I think it's a f- I think it's a fabulous idea. Yeah.

   17. JCJason Calacanis59:48

       I, I took solace in the fact that when they asked her the, uh, fr- what's protected in the First Amendment, she couldn't name all five things that I could. (laughs) And I was like, "What about protests? Did you miss that one?" And I thought that was like a... I mean, it's a gotcha moment, obviously. Uh, and it's not easy to be under that kind of scrutiny. And obviously she-

   18. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:00:05

       Justice Jaykal.

   19. JCJason Calacanis1:00:07

       Wow, I just thought that was like...

   20. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:00:08

       (laughs)

   21. (laughs)

   22. JCJason Calacanis1:00:08

       It's also like pretty interesting ...

   23. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:00:11

       Could you imagine? Oh, yeah.

   24. DSDavid Sacks1:00:12

       I think they, I think they, I think they, I think they invented the word unconfirmable.

   25. JCJason Calacanis1:00:16

       Oh, Rod DeAngelfele. I think they invented the word unconfirmable for Jaykal.

   26. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:00:20

       You got a right to have your own pistola, but you shouldn't have a shotgun.

   27. JCJason Calacanis1:00:25

       (laughs)

   28. CPChamath Palihapitiya1:00:25

       Boys, Friedberg- Friedberger's has a hard stop at 3:00.

   29. Yeah, I gotta run.

   30. JCJason Calacanis1:00:28

       Uh, uh, uh, the, the, uh, the fact that she left out protesters is interesting. I do think... Let's, let's just end on the election, uh, and our little handicapping of what's gonna happen and, uh, getting out of this mess. I do think one of the stories coming out of this is gonna be, uh, female voters. I have the sense, and I know it's anecdotal, that Trump has just alienated and pissed off so many women, and that the threat of the Supreme Court thing, and with, uh, RGB dying, uh, this has made women feel so underappreciated and attacked, especially with Trump, um, uh, you know, in terms of how he treats women and things he says about women. And then you had......the constant interruption by, uh, Pence, of the moderator, and Kamala. Like, I think all of this is gonna add up when we do the post-mortem on this. Losing all these women as voters is gonna be... And, and as well as, uh, the Black vote and people of color. This is gonna be, uh, a big part of it. So, I think that Trump's gonna lose and it's gonna be a landslide.

Episode duration: 1:04:11