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All-In PodcastAll-In Podcast

E12: Biden wins, Pfizer vaccine, markets rip, Trump's next act, COVID endgame scenarios & more

Follow the crew: https://twitter.com/chamath https://linktr.ee/calacanis https://twitter.com/DavidSacks https://twitter.com/friedberg Follow the pod: https://twitter.com/theallinpod https://linktr.ee/allinpodcast Show Notes: 0:00 Besties reflect on the election night special, comparing Trump's case to Al Gore's in 2000 4:44 Was this election devastating for extreme-ism in politics? 12:13 Pfizer vaccine, withholding the vaccine from the political news cycle 21:54 COVID endgame scenarios 28:45 Public markets ripping, gridlock great for the economy 34:43 Analyzing exit polls, death of identity politics 50:57 Biggest loser of the election: Journalism 57:43 When will Trump concede? What will his next move be? 1:07:37 San Francisco's collapse - will it eventually go bankrupt? #allin #tech #news

Jason CalacanishostChamath PalihapitiyahostDavid Friedberghost
Nov 11, 20201h 18mWatch on YouTube ↗

EVERY SPOKEN WORD

  1. 0:00 – 4:44

    Besties reflect on the election night special, comparing Trump's case to Al Gore's in 2000

    1. JC

      Hey, everybody. Welcome to another All In podcast. This is an all bestie, no guestie episode of All In. The last time you heard from the besties, it was election night and it was-

    2. CP

      A shitshow. (laughs)

    3. JC

      A fucking crazy shitshow, let's be honest. (sniffs) I mean, we, if we go back and look at that historical document, we had moments where we thought Trump was gonna absolutely crush, then we had moments of confusion, and now here we are. And I think we have to give a couple of, uh, bestie kudos to, uh, first off, Chamath, pointing out Pennsylvania was gonna be big. And then second, when we went through the possible scenarios of who, w- what, what could possibly happen, a big giant blue wave, uh, Trump winning it all, and then maybe something in the middle, option three came through and that was-

    4. CP

      Saxy Poo nailed it.

    5. JC

      I think that was your-

    6. DS

      The soft-

    7. JC

      ... your assumption, Sax. The soft landing.

    8. DS

      Well, the- the soft landing, yeah.

    9. JC

      W- what... So why don't we just, for the people who didn't tune in live-

    10. CP

      Sorry, Jason, can I ask a question? Saxy Poo, Saxy Poo, was that your r- um, like projection or was it from that, from that guy who lives in his dad's basement, his mom's basement-

    11. JC

      (laughs)

    12. CP

      ... that you brought in, you brought in on-

    13. JC

      (laughs)

    14. DS

      My, my researcher.

    15. CP

      (laughs)

    16. DS

      Well, Newman, Newman works for me, so we, uh...

    17. CP

      (laughs)

    18. JC

      Newman, Newman. (laughs)

    19. CP

      (laughs) Yeah.

    20. DS

      Newman, uh, N- Newman and I work, worked together on, on those takes. But yeah, the, the, the take that we thought was, was possible, but probably unlikely, but could represent a really good scenario was the, the soft landing, where you get a split decision. And I think that's what the American people voted for. Um, y- you know, you had the, the Democratic frame on the election was that we needed a return to normalcy and decency. The Republican frame was that the radical left could not be trusted with power. And voters basically said they were both right. They, sort of, surgically removed Donald Trump while thwarting the radical left's dream of total control in Washington. And th- what the electorate seems to be saying is they want the parties now to work together instead of voting for extreme ideology.

    21. DF

      But TBD, Sax. I mean, Georgia's still up for grabs. They're going to go after it hard, right? I mean, this could-

    22. CP

      They just... They filed in Pennsylvania.

    23. DS

      Yeah, so I think there's a series of, of court challenges we can talk about. I think that they're unlikely to prevail, very, very unlikely. I think Joe Biden will be the next president. Um, we can kind of compare this to, you know, uh, Bush v. Gore, uh, from 2000 and if you, you want to compare Trump's case to Gore's case, it's weaker in every respect. I mean, first of all, with Bush v. Gore, uh, Gore only had to overturn one state, which was Florida, whereas Trump has to now contest and overturn three or four states simultaneously. Second, you know, Gore was within a few hundred votes of Bush. It was extremely close. Trump is no closer than about 12,000 votes in, in Georgia. That's the closest one. Third, you know, um, Gore, uh, uh, uh, or, or, or Bush never trailed, uh, Gore in, in any, in any recount and, um, and, and, and Trump has that problem that he's never, um... And he, he, he's very far behind Gore as well. So you look at those three things and you'd say, you know, Gore couldn't overcome it and he had a closer situation than this. And of course, I'd say finally, you know, W had the Velvet Hammer, James Baker working for him, whereas Trump frankly has Rudy Giuliani who's throwing press conferences in the parking lot of-

    24. CP

      (laughs)

    25. DF

      (laughs)

    26. CP

      (laughs)

    27. DS

      Forces and Landscaping, uh, between a, a dildo shop and a crematorium.

    28. CP

      (laughs)

    29. DF

      (laughs)

    30. DS

      And, uh, I mean, you can't make this stuff up.

  2. 4:44 – 12:13

    Was this election devastating for extreme-ism in politics?

    1. JC

      to what could ha- ... So many things went right for the Democrats, but there was also something very clear here that happened, which is the, what I call the, uh, HSP, the Hysterical Socialist Party of America, I think was dealt a, a death blow. If you look, this was very close. And so, you know, e- e- even if we want to t- look, talk about the Electoral College, et cetera, the- these are still very low numbers. I believe if the Pfizer news comes out last week, Trump wins, or if any combination of AOC, Bid- uh, AOC, Bernie, or Warren were in any way involved in this election process and weren't pushed to the side. The squad was squashed because we knew that if they got any kind of play, Trump sails into victory. So when we look at what happens going forward, and I'll, I'll, I'll let any one of the three of you take this, what does this say about the Hysterical Socialist Party, the HSP, the Squad, the Bernie Bros, what does this say about them?

    2. CP

      Well, you have a, you have a- look, you have a, you have a loud group of people on both sides. And the reality is that both extremes of both parties actually, after this election, have very little to stand on that's unique. Because if you think about what, um, the plurality of Americans want is actually just a common, decent, centrist, do-no-harm alternative. And they're going to pick that more times than they're not going to pick it. It's only when things get extreme, like in 2016, in order to send a message, will they do it, um, and until it's resolved, they tried to do it again now, so we should actually talk about that. Th- I don't think that this was, you know, a runaway. It was way too close on too many dimensions that actually matter for the future prosperity of America. But that being said, what does it mean for the future? I think the future is like a Pete Buttigieg must be high-fiving, you know, the people in his camp right now because a common, decent, thoughtful, centrist, uh, platform will win. For example, like let's just say you believe in gay rights. Guess what? You don't need to be at the fringes to believe in that. That's mainstream. You believe in, like, a reasonable form of healthcare. That's mainstream. If you believe in climate change, it's mainstream. You start to go and tick off the things that the extremes would want to believe, there's very little room for them to stand on, so one party is going to be basically about, like, a federalized nanny state, and the other party will be a bunch of conspiracy theorist crazies, and I think it's gonna force more and more people to the middle. I think that's the future. To me, that's, that's a much safer place to be than I think where we could have been if, you know, Trump had won or if the extreme left had basically been, um, been validated with a candidate that won.

    3. DS

      Right. And I would, I would add to that that the, the, the proof of that, the proof of the electorate's desire to tack towards the center is you look at the down-ballot, uh, elections. So, you know, in the Senate, the Republicans are still holding onto majority pending the Florida, um, uh, runoff. But the, the Democrats failed to take out Susan Collins, Thom Tillis, Steve Daines. These were, uh, three incumbent Republicans who were way behind in the polls heading into election day. Uh, they didn't come close to taking out Lindsey Graham or Mitch McConnell despite spending over $2 million.

    4. JC

      (laughs) How did Lady G get out of this one alive? Explain that to me.

    5. DS

      Susan Collins?

    6. JC

      No, Lady G. Lindsey Graham.

    7. DS

      Oh, Lin- oh, I see. L- you know, uh, Lindsey Graham, they said that it was neck and neck, and he actually ended up winning that state by, like, 14 points. It wasn't close. Uh, the polls were wildly off and, um, and you saw that across, across the board. In the House, too, uh, Democrats expected a gain of 10 to 15 seats. Instead, they've lost about 10 seats. They failed to defeat a s- a single GOP incumbent. The GOP House members ran about two or three points ahead of President Trump. Um, and the D- a- and then the Democrats were completely shut out in Texas, which was supposed to be going purple. There were eight open GOP seats. Democrats won none of them. So this, you know, so s- anyway, I'm providing s- some support to the idea that this was a split decision election. The voters voted to remove both of the, or t- voted against the extremes of both parties.

    8. JC

      So Friedberg, when you look at this, you see, I think, an absolute, um ... just people don't want to deal with Trump anymore. And how much of this do you think is Trump derangement system, s- uh, syndrome and what got Trump into office, eventually taking him out, which is the guy just takes up too much oxygen in the room, and that's coming from me, (laughs) and the guy is just incredibly annoying to have to deal with day-to-day?

    9. CP

      That's also coming from you.

    10. JC

      And that's also coming from me.

    11. DF

      (laughing)

    12. JC

      Friedberg, what do you think?

    13. DF

      I, I think we've, I think we've been at a rave for four years and everyone's, like, coming down from the molly and you're not going to go to a Marilyn Manson concert, like, right after being at a rave? Like-

    14. JC

      (laughs)

    15. DF

      ... you want to go sit in the parking lot?

    16. DS

      (laughs)

    17. DF

      Hey, hey, you just want to chill out a little bit and we all just want to, like, have a beer and relax, you know? Like, I mean, I think that's the-

    18. JC

      You need some 5-HTP (laughs) and a banana?

    19. DF

      Yeah. You just, yeah, you, you-

    20. JC

      (laughs)

    21. DF

      ... you, you want to go sit in the 7-Eleven parking lot at 4:00 in the morning and you want to, like, go get a fucking sweet cappuccino and smoke a cigarette and relax. Like-

    22. JC

      (laughs)

    23. DF

      ... it's been, it's been too much. And I think it's like everyone's just kind of ready to chill out a bit, and so this whole fucking swinging back to the, you know, to the concert across the road sounds just as bad as what we've just been through. So let's just, you know, let's just live our lives a little bit. And, you know, we'll come back in four years and figure out how to fuck things up again. I, I think that's kind of the psyche.

    24. DS

      Right. That's right. I think the, I think voters want a presidency they can forget about, you know? I think Trump's, um, sort of Achilles heel is he demanded too much of the voters' constant time and attention. There was, like, this psychic cost to it. It obviously antagonized the other side and drove turnout for the Democrats. But, um, but, uh, it's, it, it seems like voters are saying, "Look, just leave us alone. We want to just forget about what's happening in Washington for four years." And now they can because, you know, pending the Georgia runoff, it looks like, you know, Mitch McConnell and Joe Biden will have to be in a power-sharing arrangement. And nothing gets done unless the two of them agree.

    25. CP

      And by the way, just on that, there was a great, uh, tweet by Paul Graham. He said, the day after the election, something to the effect of, "It feels like some background process in my computer had, was just killed that was consuming 5% of my CPU." And it's-

    26. DF

      (laughs)

    27. DS

      (laughs)

    28. CP

      ... and it's so, it's so true.

    29. JC

      Like that wi- it's like that Mac operating system-

    30. CP

      But-

  3. 12:13 – 21:54

    Pfizer vaccine, withholding the vaccine from the political news cycle

    1. JC

      is if you look, the proof is in the pudding. Trump, we, we find out on Saturday morning that Trump is, uh, you know, has lost and Biden has won. And 48 hours later, we find out Pfizer has 90% e- efficacy (laughs) on their vaccine. Obviously, these two things are highly correlated. Biden has already delivered the vaccine in just 48 hours, and then today, we got the rapid testing has been approved by the FDA. I mean, look at this. Bi- if at, at this rate, Biden's gonna cure global warming by the end of the year. (laughs)

    2. DF

      (laughs) Look, um, first off, I, I think it's a little, um-

    3. JC

      It, it is pretty paradoxical that-

    4. DF

      Yeah.

    5. JC

      ... (laughs) the vaccine news came 48 hours- Yeah, and, and, and th-

    6. DS

      I don't think it's paradoxical. I mean, that was crazy. I mean, you know, there's supposed to be an October surprise, not a November surprise. I think if Trump has any legitimate argument about being done dirty in this election, it is over this vaccine news because, you know, the, the Chinese announced it three hours after Biden's declared president. Pfizer announces it a day after, uh, Biden's declared president. I mean, you know, when Trump went around this, the, um, you know, w- was campaigning, saying a vaccine was mere weeks away, everyone thought that was bullshit. But as it turns out, he was telling the truth, and if those guys had announced it, Jason, like you were saying, two weeks before the election, it might have changed this thing.

    7. JC

      But you guys-

    8. DS

      No, that-

    9. DF

      Yeah.

    10. JC

      Might have 100%-

    11. DS

      100%, 100%. And, and this is not-

    12. DF

      But-

    13. DS

      ... something he can go to the courts. It's not like he can go to the courts and get the election recounted or overturned because of this, so it's not something that's legally actionable. But I do think that on this news alone, Trump, in four years, will be able to claim on some level that this was a stolen election.

    14. DF

      But couldn't the same be said about Hillary's, uh, email server, right? So like-

    15. JC

      Yes.

    16. DF

      That, that-

    17. JC

      100%.

    18. DF

      ... news came out, like-

    19. JC

      100%.

    20. DF

      Oh, and it was, like, timed around the election, and I do think that there was a concerted effort to not let, um, you know, the progress with COVID get in the way of the election in any way, you know, biased it either way. And I think it, it's, like, pretty reasonable and fair to say, like, "Let's just not make this part of the news cycle leading into the election." And this was expected, like if you guys go back a couple of podcasts, like, um, you had a prediction on when we would have a vaccine. I, I think I predicted end of September because of the way that they set up the, uh, the production cycle in parallel with the testing cycle and the way that they were fast-tracking a lot of the testing in a way that wasn't normal, um, for this sort of a, a development. And, um, it was, it was gonna happen this fall. If I'm an executive at one of these companies, I don't want my vaccine to become a politicized event, right? Like, I just wanna be like... I think it's, it's the reasonable thing to say, like, "Let's just put it on hold. Let's deal with it all after the election." We're still moving forward. We're not holding anything up in terms of production and getting this thing across the finish line. It's just the announcement of where we are, so why make that part of the news cycle, you know? Um, and I think, like, people learned their lesson with Hillary's server last time. It's like, this one news- you know, bombshell drops in the news cycle, spins up, and she loses the election, and everyone blames her losing the election for that coming out. No one wants to be culpable for that, right? I'm a Pfizer exec. I'm just trying to make fucking medicine. Like, I don't wanna be on the, the hook for-

    21. JC

      Said another way, Chamath-

    22. DF

      ... someone winning or losing an election.

    23. JC

      Said another way, Chamath, nobody wants to go to a Warriors finals game versus the Lakers and have the refs call, you know, decide the game in the final couple of minutes. So do you think, Chamath, this is... If you were running Pfizer, if you were on the board of Pfizer, and you have this information, and you know it can come out in this two-week window at any time, what decision would you make, Chamath?

    24. CP

      Well, just imagine that the vaccine was 90% ineffective, and it was announced two weeks before the election. Um, you'd have an entire cohort of people saying this was meant to basically sabotage the election in the other direction. So, the point is it's a no-win situation. The only answer is to wait until after the election, um, because that's the only way that you can actually say, you know, we were not, um... we were being impartial. So, um, I'm sympathetic to this idea that, uh, all the news had to wait two or three days, um, or maybe it was two or three weeks. Now, knowing in advance what the answer was, obviously, you can read into that. Um, but I think even if it was 90% ineffective, it should've waited till after the election as well.

    25. JC

      Sax, do you agree with that?

    26. DS

      I, I, I just think that-

    27. JC

      I don't get the sense that you do agree with that, Sax.

    28. DS

      Well, l- let's put it this way. I mean, we, we know from our time working at large companies that it takes them weeks to even approve a, a press release. And so Pfizer had this news weeks ago. Um, now, I understand their reason for not wanting to appear to be influencing the outcome of the election, so I, I... That's why they held onto it. I think everybody saw the way that Facebook was scapegoated four years ago for the election, and no one wants to... No corporation wants to put themselves in that position of being accused of affecting the election outcome one way or another. I'm sure that's why they did it, as opposed to a conspiracy against Trump. But y- you know, this news was available, I think we all find out, weeks ago. And so I guess you'd have to blame, or, or there'd be some culpability on the part of Trump's election team or, you know, his, his head of the FDA, or, or what have you. They must have known some of this information, and you would think they would have done a better job getting it out there.

    29. JC

      No, he did say at every rally, "It's just around the corner. It's just-"

    30. DS

      I know.

  4. 21:54 – 28:45

    COVID endgame scenarios

    1. DF

    2. JC

      Mm-hmm.

    3. DS

      So-

    4. JC

      So how do we each feel... I'll just go around the horn. How do we each feel about the COVID-19 end game? When will we see all schools open, all NBA arenas open with no distancing? Give us a quarter in 2021 when, in America, enough vaccines will have been delivered and distributed and rapid testing, that life goes back to, let's call it 85% of normal.

    5. DF

      Yeah, I don't think you ever get there. I mean, it's like we talked about this a couple episodes ago, but it's after 9/11, you know, the TSA emerged and American travel never went back to the way it was before. Um, and I think there'll be a lot about the way we live that's gonna be, you know, kind of permanently scarred and permanently changed here for a while. Whether it is taking people's temperatures at football games, uh, wearing masks in, you know, farmer's markets, who knows? There's gonna be all these weird rules that are gonna pop up. They're gonna last for years, regardless of how much, uh, um, immunization takes place, regardless of how cheap and available testing is. Uh, w- we're gonna have this scar for a long time, um, in terms of how we live as a society. I don't think we should kid ourselves that we're gonna go back to, quote unquote, "normal." Um, and I do think kids are gonna get tested and schools are gonna be like this frigging, you know, almost like TSAs now. Uh, you know, kids are gonna go into school and get tested regularly and they're gonna do all sorts of stuff that we would have never dreamed imaginable in a, in a free country a year ago. Um, and I think that's permanent. Um, I think, you know, we're gonna... You're already seeing people going nuts at bars and restaurants and people that have had it are out there partying and living their life again. Um, so there's certainly a lot of-

    6. JC

      W- wait. D- don't you think if you get the vaccine, you're just gonna be like, "YOLO, I've had enough of this?"

    7. DF

      Yeah, but I don't think that, that systems are gonna change, uh, back to normal. I think systems have changed to the point that we've now got a way of living that we think is safer, that we think is... We, we, we are now kind of inhibited because of the system.

    8. DS

      ... and-

    9. JC

      Shamath, you agree?

    10. CP

      Yeah. Yeah, there'll be a lot fewer... It's what Dave Chappelle said on Saturday, there'll be a lot fewer mass shootings. The pandemic has done a great job of keeping the whites at home.

    11. DS

      (laughs)

    12. JC

      (laughs) So... I think that's-

    13. CP

      We watched it together.

    14. DS

      All y- all you four whites-

    15. JC

      Three out of four besties watched it together. (laughs)

    16. DS

      (laughs)

    17. CP

      All you, all you guys got on your mass shooting rant pages. You know, the whites are at home. They're frustrated, but they're at home, thank God. Uh...

    18. DS

      Yeah.

    19. CP

      So I think there'll be some advantages.

    20. JC

      Well, I mean, but let's talk about it, Shamath. Does, does 2021 mean-

    21. CP

      No.

    22. JC

      ... kids go back to school 2021 September? No problem.

    23. CP

      No, I think Friedberger is right. I think that the best we'll get back to is sort of this 80% state, and I don't think it happens until probably 2022 and maybe 2023, but probably 2022, because you have to remember, like, we have to ramp up now billions of vaccine production. Like, it's... This is a non-trivial path from here to "mass market" and, uh, that takes a long time. I think we have to figure out how we're going to administer it. By the way, it's... And, and the way that the Pfizer vaccine works and maybe these other folks is you get the shot and then, you know, three months, three weeks later, I think you get a booster. So you have to take two cycles of this thing. Um, so-

    24. DS

      And it's not going to last forever.

    25. CP

      And it's not going to last forever. So this is, uh... Friedberg's right. It's the beginning of a very different way of living. Um, I think, I think that the, the good part about it is that, um, you know, we've made a lot of changes that makes our lives a lot more efficient. The bad part about it is, we're even more detached from our neighbors and, you know, we're probably even more likely, uh, to be a little bit, uh, more separated if we don't make an effort to be together.

    26. JC

      Sax, do you buy this? Because I get the sense that you might be more optimistic than Friedberg and-

    27. DS

      Yeah.

    28. JC

      ... Cha- Chamath.

    29. DS

      I guess, I guess I am. I think COVID is going to be a distant memory by next summer. I think we'll have one to two quarters of transition, but I think that once the vaccine is widely available, plus the treatment and the testings, um, for the people who slip through the cracks, um, yeah, I, I tend to think things are going to snap back very fast and COVID will just be this bad memory, a very distant bad memory. And I think, in fact, I think things may bounce back the other way, um, e- everyone having been cooped up and afraid of getting some life-threatening illness are going to come out of this really wanting to party. I think the whole world is going to be like Tel Aviv for, you know, a few months or something.

    30. JC

      (laughs)

  5. 28:45 – 34:43

    Public markets ripping, gridlock great for the economy

    1. JC

      What a rip did we see when that Pfizer... I mean, the election and Pfizer this week led to a huge rip. Obviously, there's a little bit of cyclical, uh, movement. The tech stocks were the big winners. Now people are starting to buy Disney back up to 140. I guess people assume the parks will reopen. What's our outlook for the stock market in David Sax's, you know, scenario three? You know, I don't want to say gridlock government, but-

    2. CP

      Mm-hmm.

    3. JC

      ... forced to compromise government. What do we think the markets look like the next two years?

    4. CP

      I think you have to... Go ahead, Saxey-poo. No, go ahead, Sax.

    5. DS

      Well, I was going to say gridlock is great for the markets. Um, both when Bill Clinton was president with a Republican House and when Obama was president and there was a Republican House and I guess, uh, Senate for a period of time. Uh, gridlock is great for, uh, the markets, especially given the amount of stimulus that's taken place. I mean, you had the Trump tax cuts, especially those corporate tax cuts, really set the market on fire. And then you've got this pumping by the Fed and the Treasury, all the stimulus money for COVID. I mean, those conditions and then, you know, they're do-

    6. JC

      Why is gridlock good? Uh, we didn't explain that here.

    7. DS

      Well, because what, because it's-

    8. JC

      Explain to somebody who doesn't understand why gridlock is good, why gridlock is good.

    9. DS

      Well, because it creates predictability for business. And it means that Washington's not going to get in the way and do something to screw up the good times.I mean, we have fundamentally, you know, great underlying conditions for economic growth, which is, we have now pretty low taxes and we had this, for better or worse, we had this tremendous amount of s- uh, stimulus, fiscal stimulus.

    10. CP

      Here's, what we know historically is over the past 100 years, right, since the '20s, independent of Republican administrations or Democratic administrations, you know, more progressive, less progressive, more conservative, less conservative, during world wars, not during world wars, uh, the markets go up 8% a year. So the Do No Harm solution is that things inflate naturally by 8%, especially if those things are public stocks. So, you know, the markets love the fact that there's, uh, nothing that could theoretically get in the way of that natural 8%. And then when you layer on top of it, as David said, uh, all this free money that's just like rocket fuel, jet fuel. Um, but, you know, but you saw though that there was a, a rotation, right? There was a rotation out of these high growth software names, particularly the work from home bid kind of got crushed, you know. I mean, I think Zoom was off 25% over two days or some crazy thing like that. Um, meanwhile, sort of all of these theme park stocks and cruise lines and airlines all of a sudden ripped. So I mean, look, the reality is, the scary thing about all of this is if any of that stuff actually comes to pass, we're going to see inflation. And the reason is because if you start going out and spending a bunch of money on tickets and vacations and flights and this and that, and pumping money into the economy and taking all that stimulus money and putting it back to work, prices will go up. Um, and by the way, that's not such a bad thing for the economy, which, which needs a little bit of it. So, um, all of this is, I think, generally very, very good news.

    11. JC

      Friedberg, do you have a position on what you think will happen in the coming, let's, let, I would, I would think that midterm is what people care most about, so that would be, let's call it two to six quarters. So it's, uh, 18-

    12. DF

      There's, there's one, there's one potential speed bump still, which is what I mentioned at the beginning, which is Georgia. Uh, the, the Democrats could still win both runoffs in Georgia for Senate. And they could, um, because Kamala Harris would then have the breaking vote. It would be a 50 Republican, 50 Democrat Senate and, and the, uh, vice president would, uh, would, would break any ties.

    13. CP

      The question is, if you have that same turnout, where do the Libertarians break? 'Cause I think the Libertarians were almost 2% of the vote.

    14. DF

      Well, I think, well, yeah, well, what's interesting is, um, the... uh, I don't know if you guys have, but I've gotten emails from a lot of (laughs) people asking me to donate money for this, uh, uh, runoff campaign in Georgia. I think we're-

    15. JC

      Oh my God. I got so many...

    16. DF

      I think-

    17. JC

      So many VCs are so interested in this.

    18. DF

      I think, I think, I think, I think we're gonna see literally the biggest, um, the, the biggest funding for a R- Senate runoff race in history by far. Don't you think, Sax? Like, probably north of $100 million being spent, maybe $100 to $200 million being spent on advertisements in Georgia to try and get people to go vote one way or the other. The Democrats think they have a real run at this. They think it's make or break, two years to kind of get their, you know, um, uh, history-changing policies i- in effect. Republicans think it save the, the nation time. So everyone's rushing to Georgia right now. Um, so the markets are gonna have a very close eye on what's going on over there, I think. Um, I'm, you know, I'm, I'm very nervous about it. Um, if the Democrats look like they're getting much more money, uh, into the state and they're actually gonna, you know, get people to the polls and, um, to the voting booths and actually get into this runoff on January 5th and actually flip, um, get both of those seats to be, uh, um, uh, to be blue, uh, it's gonna be a very different market environment. I mean, you could see the market drop by 30%, 40%, uh, in the next six months.

    19. JC

      So we have, we have a situation where it's 48-48. There are two seats up for grabs. Those two seats are in a runoff. The s- and I want to get into the exit polls.

    20. DS

      Uh, let me correct that, Jason. It's-

    21. DF

      It's 48-50.

    22. CP

      Yeah, yeah.

    23. DS

      Yes. Uh, the Republicans have a 50 to 48 advantage with two open seats in the runoff. Actually, sorry, o- one seat is open, the other, it has an incumbent, Perdue, who's facing Ossoff. Perdue won in the last election. He got like 49.9%.

    24. DF

      But yeah, you have to get, you have to get 50.

    25. DS

      Yeah. You have to get 50% or you get kicked to this runoff in January.

    26. JC

      George, you're the only place that has this where you have to get to 50 in order to win?

    27. DS

      Yeah. It's crazy.

    28. DF

      It's crazy.

    29. JC

      It's so weird. Are the, is this just they want the e- extra attention or who came up with this idea? This seems just like-

    30. DF

      Every state's got its own history. It's crazy.

  6. 34:43 – 50:57

    Analyzing exit polls, death of identity politics

    1. JC

      Let's talk about exit polls. Uh-

    2. CP

      Well, this is what's incredible. Here, let me tee this up for you. So in, in 2020, um, Biden got 80% of the Black vote, Trump got 6. This is aggregate, so we could break this down by man and age group and you get... and it looks even, uh, even more interesting. Latinos, Biden got 67, Trump got 22% of the Latino vote. Between the ages of 18 to 34, so boomers, or sorry, pardon me, uh, Gen Z, uh, and Millennials, again, I would have thought 100% Biden. It was al- it was 62% Biden, 23% went for Trump, one in four. Uh, amongst women, uh, and again, you know, we thought, "Oh, okay, uh, you know, suburban women are, are breaking Biden 80/20." It turned out Biden got 58% of women, Trump got 35% of all the female vote. And the coup de grâce, whites with a degree, um, again, you would have thought this would have been 80/20, 90/10 and said it was 53% Biden, 38% Trump.

    3. JC

      So this really was, uh, something, y- the... I- if we look at this, if we look back on this, the pollsters...... were completely wrong in thinking, uh, once again, that these groups of people are monolithic. The, the-

    4. DS

      Completely. Yeah, completely.

    5. JC

      And then I think the m- the most m- the most mind-boggling to me, and I, and I had a candid discussion about this, was, um, the term Latinx is a, a, a catchall term for people f- who are of Latino, Spanish-speaking, uh, descent. And what somebody told me who is in this Latinx group is that it's the most insulting thing they've ever been told. It's almost as a term like the term saying Oriental to describe people from Asia. You're, you're just grouping us all into one thing. People from Cuba, Venezuela-

    6. DF

      Right.

    7. JC

      ... and Mexico all think the same. This is the absolute, you know, end game of identity politics, which is, "We have to put you in a corner. We own you. We own your opinion, and you belong to our party," whichever party it is. "Oh, you don't have a degree? You're a GOP hillbilly. Oh, y- you, (laughs) y- you're Latinx? Okay. Well, then we own you. You're a Democrat." David, w- what... A- and the, and I know that this is an area where, you know, uh, you have a lot of expertise. What are you, what are your thoughts?

    8. DS

      Well, as it turns out, um, promoting socialism to people who fled Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela to escape it, uh, turns out not to be a great, uh, election strategy. And, um, and so yeah, it's, uh, the, this, this idea that Latinx is, is one bloc. It's not. It consists of a bunch of different, um, of immigrants from a bunch of d- uh, different nations. And the ones who fled socialism are not eager to reenact it in the United States. Um, the Republicans flipped, uh, two House seats in South Florida, uh, where, uh, there's a lot of Cuban Americans. And even in the, um, the heavily, uh, m- m- Mexican American counties, uh, in the, along the Rio Grande in Texas, uh, Trump improved, uh, let's see. He, it looks like he improved, um, 59 and 30 per- 39%, respectively, over his, uh, 2016 showing. So this is not just some fluke of the exit polls. Um, it seems like Trump really made progress in a lot of these groups that seem to defy their, you know, what, what the promoters of identity politics, the way that they wanted them to vote. Um, gay Americans were another one. I think Trump improved his share of the gay vote from 14% in 2016 to 28%, um-

    9. JC

      (laughs) Oh.

    10. DS

      ... this year. So, um, I mean, really, it's, it's pretty amazing. People are not voting the way that they're supposed to vote. Um, Trump also improved from 12 to 18% with Black men and 4 to 8% of Black women. I mean, those were still pretty low numbers, but there was improvement there. And I think part of the reason is that not all of the African American community is on board with defunding the police. Um-

    11. CP

      Well, I also think what it means is identity politics is a stupid strategy. Forget whether you're offended by it or not. At this point, what's clear is it's a stupid, fucking strategy. It doesn't work. It's a path to losing. Because the more and more you do it, the more and more you're going to disenfranchise individuals who want to be judged sort of of sound mind and body, right? I mean, if we took 1,000 Sri Lankans and put them in a room and said, "Shamath, I'm gonna judge you as a Sri Lankan vote, I would tell you to go fuck yourself." You know-

    12. DS

      And, uh, yeah.

    13. CP

      ... I would be deeply offended by that.

    14. DS

      And, and, uh, this is where I think the radical left is gonna have to retool, because their theory of how they take power in America was always that demographics is destiny, that, you know, as the country simply becomes more diverse, we're gonna, they're, they're automatically gonna vote for us. And there's a lot of data in this election to show that that's not what's gonna happen. You actually have to run on issues that-

    15. JC

      Yeah.

    16. DS

      ... people care about.

    17. DF

      Let's think about this in the context of internet advertising, right? Uh, i- i- the, the, the world prior to internet advertising, you had, um, you know, uh, channels, uh, and you would, uh, have an audience that was estimated to, to be made up of some demographic set on that channel, and you would buy an ad spot on that channel, and that's who you would reach, and so you would create a message for that. Now, today, we can create personalized ads and personalized messages, and, uh, internet advertisers are much more thoughtful about targeting, targeting based on psychographic profiling, behavioral, uh, targeting. And I think that's where politics has to head in the United States, is kinda keeping up with this personalization of both products, but also of media and, and ads. And, um, and I think that's what we're gonna see. If you listen to James Carville, who's, like, you know, a, a classic kind of, um, Democratic, uh, uh, campaign advisor, um, and he did a podcast just leading up to the election, and if you listen to this podcast, these guys are very old school. It's like, "The whites are gonna do this, and the Blacks are gonna do that, and the, the, the college-educated are gonna do this, and the others are gonna do that." And they don't realize that the segmentation that's possible today, I think, reveals a lot more about the character of the, uh, uh, of the population, um-

    18. JC

      They're basically... I think it's such an astute point, Friedberg. They're basically living in the level of granularity of, of cable-

    19. DF

      Of network TV. It's like network TV.

    20. JC

      ... cable TV. Yeah.

    21. DF

      And it's like-

    22. JC

      Like, it's like they got to cable TV, and they were like, "Okay, BET, ESPN, NASCAR."

    23. DF

      And g- guess what? Like, like, w- the, the world is much more complex. Individuals have found their own personal voice, and they found their own personal voice through social media, through Instagram, through this ability to kind of define themselves, not fit within a cohort. And I think that's what-

    24. JC

      Or, or maybe they always did feel that way, and we just had never had the technology to get there.

    25. DF

      Yeah, but I, I think it's, I think it's also about people. Like, people have complex points of view. You know, the four of us sit here, and none of, neither of us, none of us identify as a party anymore. We all identify with, with, um, certain, uh, points that we think are important to us individually, and then we have a point of view on those points. And I think that's the case for the majority of the population in the United States. I don't think people are like, "I'm just a fucking Democrat no matter what," and, "I'm a Republican no matter what." People care more deeply in a more complex way. And I think politics needs to resolve to that. Um, and, uh, and that's gonna require a shift in how you communicate, how you message, how you, uh, get feedback, how you drive, um-

    26. CP

      ... uh, blocks for voting and, uh, it's gonna, it's gonna, uh, you know, be a really interesting change over the next 15 to 20 years. And it may be what saves the republic.

    27. JC

      I- I- I think this is an incredible observation. I think you- it might be the observation of the episode. And I just wanna point to a tweet I did because I- this is- this election has really led to me doing, um, two things. One, I've been just thinking deeply about what do I actually understand about Americans and America. Um, and then I also, you know, there's all these red pills around so I decided I would crush up a red pill and I would just, you know, put a little on my finger and I'd try a little red pill for a second. Uh, and everybody told me I've been red-pilled now on Twitter. (laughs) And that I'm a Trump fan. I am not. I hate the guy.

    28. CP

      (laughs)

    29. JC

      I think he's horrible. But I- I- I did this quick survey here. I said, "If you voted for Trump, I want to understand what percentage of your vo- vote was based on the combination of A, cancel culture; B, identity politics; C, socialism; D, coastal elites telling you how to live. Explain other issues that contributed in a reply, i.e. spending, immigration, SC, the Supreme Court, et cetera." And I just said, "0%, 1 to 25, 26 to 50, and over 50." And- and I got 12,000 votes. Go ahead and look at the results. Uh, not the replies, but go ahead and vote. And it doesn't matter which one you pick. Over 50% of people who voted for Trump, and I know this is unscientific, it's my followers, but it's definitely feels directionally correct. The people who felt 26 to over 50% was part of the cancel culture identity culture, was what they were s- trying to communicate with their vote.

    30. CP

      Well, this is, this is such an important thing because I think this is what we're fighting over. The every single pol-

  7. 50:57 – 57:43

    Biggest loser of the election: Journalism

    1. JC

      You know who the biggest loser's going to be coming out of this, I think? Not- when you think holistically about the ecosystem, it's gonna be the media because they have made an absolute fortune over the last four or five years picking a side. What is the point of watching Rachel Maddow January 20th? What is the point of tuning into Fox News or reading the hysterical opinion page of The New York Times? All of these places that were being propped up by either Trumpism or anti-Trumpism are now gonna find themselves where they started, which is-

    2. CP

      Without a job.

    3. JC

      ... w- without a job and we just wanted you to tell us the news and tell it to us straight.

    4. CP

      Right.

    5. DS

      There was a- there was a great article-

    6. JC

      Why does The New York Times have an opinion page? Rip the opinion page out of The W- New York Times, rip it out of The Wall Street Journal.

    7. CP

      Well, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. I- I- I- no, I disagree. I think the opposite happened, which is that opinion page was meant to be where people could have an opinion so that everything else was fact. And the problem is that all the other pages became opinion as well-

    8. DS

      Yes.

    9. CP

      ... and nobody told anybody. (laughs)

    10. JC

      But- but I don't think that-

    11. DS

      Yes, exactly.

    12. JC

      But nobody can tell the difference. So I agree to that-

    13. DS

      And- and look at that exposé-

    14. JC

      ... but nobody can tell the difference.

    15. DS

      That's right, they can't tell the difference. And look at that exposé about how Barry, uh, or Barri Weiss was run out of The New York Times. It- basically, the activists, uh, ran her out. Um, and the- the reality is, activists have completely captured The New York Times and CNN and MSNB. And there is no-

    16. JC

      And they always had Fox and The New York Post.

    17. DS

      They always had Fox, but- but now we have no objective neutral media. And so who's gonna call the election? I mean, you complain about the fact that Trump is sowing dissent, but who is the universally trusted, uh, spokesperson for neutrality the way that Walter Cronkite was when he could just declare it and that's the way it is and people believe that's the way it is?

    18. JC

      Who did the best job, Friedberg, that night? When we were doing that... Let's reflect on the live stream. I have two questions for the live stream. Number one, who was your bestie-guestie? Who d- who did you think get it the most as a guestie, uh, and why? And then number two-

    19. CP

      We're do- we're doing... What... (laughs) We're gonna do, we're t- we're gonna do a poll, a human value poll?

    20. JC

      Yeah, I just, who contributed the best?

    21. CP

      Wait, before- before-

    22. JC

      I got- I got a lot of feedback on the guesties.

    23. CP

      Before-

    24. JC

      There were girly people-

    25. CP

      Can I, can I say one more thing on this topic?

    26. JC

      ... there were people who loved Brad.

    27. DS

      Yeah.

    28. CP

      Before- before we go there, um, there was a- there was a really good article in The New York Times about Maggie Haberman, right? And Maggie, uh, who's a fantastic journalist but built an entire career, uh, really amplified, came to a head in 2016, um, and she just scoop after scoop, um, about Trump. But the most compelling thing about that whole article was somewhere near the, you know, third of the way from the bottom, uh, she's like, "Look," uh, at the end of the day, uh, she said something like, "I'm dispensable and I know it." And it was the most honest thing because it's like despite her popularity and despite sort of, you know, how big of a stick she carries, the reality is, sans Trump, uh, there's just nothing to do. There's nothing to leak, there's- there- there just is not nearly as much to do.

    29. DF

      I did just put in the, um, the chat here, the Washington Post, Fox News, The Hill, basically, like, the full gamut of, um, of, uh, of, uh, media opinion have highlighted that the media generally is the biggest loser of the, uh, of the 2020 election. And I think- I- I think they've just lost the, um, uh, the faith of their audience and, um-... you know, it's- it's, uh, I mean, to Sax's point, I don't- I don't know how many people were (sighs) . You're either looking for objective and you've lost it, or you're looking for opinionated and you feel like your, um, you know, your aligned opinion setting media partner has betrayed you. Um, you know, the fact that Fox called it for, uh, uh, for Trump and Trump's now saying Fox is- is- is a liar. The fact that New York Times doesn't feel like they're being objective anymore and they're, you know, they're running people out of the, uh, out of the newsroom. I- in general, I just feel like we've been disenfranchised. Um, and I think that's, uh, that's something that's gonna be really hard to kind of recover from and resolve.

    30. JC

      And for the love of God, can somebody please get... I- I- I don't want you to break any laws, but however, if we could read the Slack channel of the New York Times (laughs) reporters leading up to the 100 days of this election, that would become the greatest best-selling book of all time. To watch the-

  8. 57:43 – 1:07:37

    When will Trump concede? What will his next move be?

    1. JC

    2. CP

      When, uh, when- when does Trump call this thing?

    3. JC

      That's a great question.

    4. DS

      Well, I think he has to run out these court challenges, which will take a few weeks. But I- I predict by Thanksgiving. Um, but it may have to go up to the Supreme Court. But he's gonna, he's gonna dot the i, d- dot every i and cross over t that he's got legally. Um, but he's got, like, we talked about at the very beginning, he's got a huge uphill challenge. I'd, I see the court ultimately ruling against him or throwing it out.

    5. JC

      What is the point, David? What does he-

    6. DS

      Well, because why- why shouldn't he exhaust every-

    7. JC

      If he knows he doesn't, he's not gonna win?

    8. DS

      No, I don't, I don't know that he, he knows that. He- he- I think it's his right to exhaust every legal, uh, possibility. And let's remember, Al Gore didn't concede for 37 days after the election. So I thir- certainly think Trump is within his rights over the next few weeks to run this out. In terms of what the point is, I mean, other than the obvious, uh, attempt to challenge it legally, I do think this is partly a branding exercise by Trump. Um, it's a marketing exercise. I don't think he's gonna come up with enough malfeasance to overturn an election. But I do think he'll probably produce a lot of smoke. And this is about protecting his brand as a- as a winner. And, you know, if he kicks up enough, um, you know, examples of voter fraud or- or- or what have you, he will always be able to say, you know, years from now that this was a-

    9. DF

      It was stolen.

    10. DS

      ... it was a stolen election. And when you combine th- th- the fact that COVID really did drive this, this election, you could c- call that Chinese election interference if you want. The fact that the vaccine is now here already, you could call that, um, you know, some sort of election interference. He's gonna have enough arguments where if he wants to run four years from now, um, I think he probably gets the Republican nomination again.

    11. JC

      What- what's the percentage chance, Chamath, that he runs again in four years?

    12. CP

      Zero. Um-

    13. JC

      Friedberg?

    14. DF

      Trump?

    15. JC

      Yeah.

    16. DF

      I think he's gonna be making so much money, he's not gonna know what to do with himself.

    17. DS

      (laughs) .

    18. DF

      He's gotta go back to that fucking torture, torture house.

    19. DS

      (laughs) .

    20. DF

      He's gonna be thinking about the White House like some terrible Blumhouse Productions movie set. He's like, "Fuck that, I'm not going back there." (laughs) It was awful.

    21. JC

      He's gonna be-

    22. CP

      Where is he going? Where is he going?

    23. JC

      He's gonna be-

    24. DF

      Is he gonna go to China? He's going to Shanghai. Is he going to Russia?

    25. DS

      He's gonna launch a-

    26. DF

      He's gonna be in, he's gonna be in New York. He's gonna buy a law firm, 'cause he's gonna need a law firm to keep everyone at bay.

    27. DS

      (laughs) .

    28. DF

      And he's gonna be probably printing 100 million bucks a month. You know-

    29. JC

      I'll put it at Dubai, Saudi Arabia. I think ...

    30. CP

      Yeah, I think, I think he's definitely gonna launch a media business. And, uh, he'll str- he'll try to become king maker.

  9. 1:07:37 – 1:15:30

    San Francisco's collapse - will it eventually go bankrupt?

    1. DF

    2. JC

      Uh, as we wrap here, San Francisco's, uh, continues to devolve. Revenue down 40% in terms of taxes. Budget is double what it's been, uh, just a few years ago. Crime is going crazy. Walmart is closing their stores and leaving-

    3. DF

      Walgreens.

    4. JC

      ... because of the... Walgreens, I'm sorry. Walgreens. We don't have a Walmart here. Um, and there's 20, there's more homes on the market now than there have been months-

    5. DF

      Too much of anything is a bad thing. If you eat too much broccoli, it's a bad thing. You know what I mean? So too much of a single party monoculture is bad, whether it's Republican or Democrat. You need a diverse centrist plurality. And in the absence of that, many cities that veer in one direction or the other will decay and die. And San Francisco is going to be the tip of the spear for the left's version, and there's been a bunch of cities that have already been the examples of the right's version. So you know what, um, apparently the water is warm and they want to join.

    6. JC

      Anybody else? Fred Berg?

    7. DS

      I can't, I can't find a lot to disagree with there. I think San Francisco, we- we're basically in Atlas Shrugged. I mean-

    8. DF

      (laughs) .

    9. DS

      ... the, uh, you know, half the storefronts are closed. They're boarded up. Uh, the city has completely surrendered to the criminal element. You can't park your car anywhere in the city without having it getting broken into. They won't prosecute people for crimes, including, uh, increasingly violent crimes. Um, the, uh, you know, the, the, the, the, the, the city's about to go bankrupt and the entrepreneurs are all disappearing. They're all leaving. I mean, it's right out of Atlas Shrugged.

    10. DF

      Yeah, I mean, it's, it's the, uh, the action is the wrong action, right? So San Francisco, the biggest disappointment of election night for me was the new business taxes that were passed, um, for San Francisco businesses. Um, and, and there was also this like, um, for, for 99.9999999% of people, they're gonna shrug and say, "I don't give a shit." But there was this new tax of 6% for homes that get sold over $10 million. Now, uh, if you're a successful entrepreneur or an investor or a CEO of a company in San Francisco and, you know, it's, it's like a slap in the face. Um, you add the business tax with that kind of high-end property tax, and it's almost like an invitation to leave the city. And some people are nodding their heads and saying, "That's exactly what we want."

    11. JC

      Wait a minute. This 6% is on leaving or buying?

    12. DF

      Uh, s- transaction.

    13. DS

      I think it's a sale.

    14. DF

      When you sell. So you, literally 6% off the top, uh, when you sell a home.

    15. DS

      The city basically-

    16. DF

      Yeah. Yeah.

    17. DS

      ... just took 6% of my house.

    18. DF

      It's an estate tax. Yeah.

    19. DS

      The s- the city just took 6% of my house.

    20. DF

      Literally. It's an estate tax.

    21. DS

      And they're now, they're now a part owner of my house.

    22. DF

      Yeah. It's an estate tax.

    23. DS

      (laughs) .

    24. DF

      And so there, there are people like-

    25. JC

      Wow.

    26. DF

      There are people in San Francisco, uh, who we all know...

    27. JC

      How much warning did you have before they took your-

    28. DF

      None.

    29. JC

      ... bedroom?

    30. DF

      Yeah. Uh, I mean-

Episode duration: 1:18:14

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