E15: “The Besties” All-In’s inaugural award show covering the best, worst & most memorable of 2020

Narrator 0:00 You got to rise up. Before you sink in. You've got to dive in. Before you can swim. You've got to give it. All to win. We're going all in.

Jason Calacanis 0:13 Hey, everybody. Welcome back. Besties are back for the All-In Podcast. The queen of quinoa, Freiberg is here, the dictator Chamath, and of course, Rain Man, David Sacks. And, uh, it's been a big week here in Silicon Valley with Airbnb and Wish both going public for over a hundred billion dollars combined. Anybody get their beak wet on that one?

David Sacks 0:36 Oh, hey, guys.

Jason Calacanis 0:39 (laughs)

David Sacks 0:41 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 0:41 Oh. Well, how are you, David? Did-

David Sacks 0:44 Yeah, I might ... I might have gotten my beak wet on, on, on a couple of those, so ...

Jason Calacanis 0:49 Oh, a little beak wet, huh?

David Sacks 0:51 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 0:51 Well, uh, you know what? In celebration of your recent victory with Airbnb and Wish, I will ... Oh, no, I can't zoom in on my merch, but I've got my-

David Sacks 1:01 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:01 ... unofficial wet your beak mug. So for those of you wondering, we have to, uh, get a little bit of housekeeping out of the way, uh, first here. Uh, the merch has gone crazy. Have you guys been watching merch on Twitter?

David Sacks 1:18 Of course.

Jason Calacanis 1:20 Anybody ... Anybody got favorite-

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:21 I got ... I got-

Jason Calacanis 1:22 ... merch with lots-

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:22 I got some of those ... I got some of those mugs. I think they arrived today. They look great.

David Sacks 1:27 It's amazing. And, you know, the best decision we made was, was not to let you s- sell T-shirts, Jason, 'cause you would have, you would have, you would have, uh, milked this for every, every nickel you could.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:39 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:40 (laughs)

David Sacks 1:40 And instead, and instead, we, we open-sourced it to the fans, and they've just gone crazy with it.

Jason Calacanis 1:45 I mean, they're literally-

David Sacks 1:46 I know it's ... I know that hurt you. I know that hurt you a little bit.

Jason Calacanis 1:49 I mean, the, the problem I'm having here, no advertising. I'm picking up all the production-

David Sacks 1:53 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:53 ... cost here. I'm sending you guys equipment. You maniacs lose the equipment every time. You go from one of your estates to another estate. I'm sending equipment to four different places. Ugh. Anyway, uh, we've got a special, very special episode for you today. We are doing, drum roll please, (imitates drum roll) we're gonna add some sound effects to this afterwards. We're gonna do the Bestie Awards today. So we're gonna go through the biggest winners in politics, in business, in cultures, and of course, the losers, the flashes in the pan, the best business moves, the stupidest business moves. We got a lot to get through. Um, but just in terms of housekeeping, again the All-In Syndicate is up and running. I think there's 4,000 people have applied in 10 days.

David Sacks 2:35 Let's just talk about the market cap of Airbnb.

Chamath Palihapitiya 2:38 (laughs)

David Sacks 2:38 Or Wish, for that matter. (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 2:41 What round did you invest in Airbnb?

David Sacks 2:43 Uh, series C.

Jason Calacanis 2:44 Oh, good. So-

Chamath Palihapitiya 2:44 Was that the Founders Fund round?

David Sacks 2:47 Yeah, yeah. It was Founders Fund.

Chamath Palihapitiya 2:47 Cong- congrats.

David Sacks 2:49 Thanks.

Jason Calacanis 2:49 Oh, that's so yummy. But to be honest, that was already over a billion-dollar valuation, correct?

David Sacks 2:54 Yeah, it was. It was. I mean, it's still like a-

Jason Calacanis 2:57 But it's still like 80 or 100X, right?

Chamath Palihapitiya 2:58 It's like a 40X, right? 40X-

David Sacks 3:00 It's like a 40 ... It's like a 40X or something like that, so thank-

Jason Calacanis 3:03 Well, that's-

David Sacks 3:03 Thank you, thank you Brian Chesky, thank you Peter Thiel. Peter led that round, and, um, Brian was looking to include founders in the round, uh, a- and in addition to it being led by Founders Fund and ... So Peter introduced me, and that's how it happened.

Jason Calacanis 3:17 Wow. Fantastic. I, uh, did not get my beak wet on that. But I did mention Airbnb on my podcast and, uh, you know, I'd been trying to get Brian on the podcast for, I don't know, a decade. And I said, "You know, I ... uh, I know you guys want to have him on the pod. I've asked him, like, literally every year for 10 years, but I, I don't think he likes me." And then he emailed me and said, "I listened to the podcast."

David Sacks 3:37 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 3:37 "I like you." (laughs)

David Sacks 3:38 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 3:38 I was like, "Oh, okay, great. Will you come on?" He's like, "I'll come on." So he's gonna come on this year, I think. Uh, which will be great-

David Sacks 3:43 Okay, great.

Jason Calacanis 3:44 ... for this week in start-ups.

David Sacks 3:44 Well, I think, I think, uh, Brian and the whole team really did a masterful job of, uh, navigating through the whole COVID crisis. I mean, everybody forgets how negative the publicity was. People were talking about Airbnb as COVID roadkill back in April. I, I tweeted a CNBC headline from back in April wondering whether Airbnb was even gonna survive. And they navigated the crisis. They did have to cut headcount, but they made the company much more profitable. Uh, but they also did, um, great things for, uh, both the renters and the hosts, um, at the company's expense. They refunded something like 250 million dollars, um, to the, to, to, to, to users who had canceled reservations, but they gave the money to the hosts to keep them afloat. So they really did a great job navigating this whole crisis.

Jason Calacanis 4:40 It's a pretty great company. He obviously cares deeply. Um, it was very, uh, hard, I think, for him to cut all that staff at that time.

David Sacks 4:48 Right.

Jason Calacanis 4:48 Uh, it was kind of a, a tough decision.

David Sacks 4:51 But they were very generous in how they did it. Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 4:53 So congratulations on getting the beak wet. Sacks and, uh, Chamath, I got a bunch of inbound, uh, you had filed to sell some shares of Virgin Galactic. I saw you tweeted about it and you wanted to be transparent. People asked you ... for you to address it, um, up front on the show, so go ahead.

David Friedberg 5:08 Yeah, I have, uh, a lot of, uh, projects that I, um, intend to fund in 2021. I'm probably gonna put another, I don't know, I think the forecast was almost two billion dollars to work. And, uh, I needed to manage my liquidity, um, for this year and make sure that, you know, um, I could continue to make all those investments and, um, fund my, uh ... fund all of the other things that I need to do, and that's why I did it.

Jason Calacanis 5:39 And you're still a significant shareholder, I assume, and you believe in the company?

David Friedberg 5:44 Yeah, I mean, uh, I remain completely committed to that business. Um, you know, I, I ... it, it would have been better if I could have sold something else, but it's not quite possible. And when we're entering ... when we, when you leave the tax year, you just have to make these decisions to lock in some gains against other losses, and, um, would have loved to have, uh, not had to do it, but I needed to manage my liquidity, and so I sold, you know, it's a small portion of what I own.So I wouldn't, uh, I wouldn't take it too seriously.

Jason Calacanis 6:08 Yeah, that was sort of my point, this is a small, a small portion of what you own. And I mean, this is something that, you know, in poker and in business, you gotta manage your chip stack and you gotta manage your bankroll. So today we're gonna do the besties. Uh, this is our first, uh, attempt at talking about, uh... Or it's our award show for 2020, let's leave it at that. Let's start out with the

Jason Calacanis 6:31 biggest winner-

David Friedberg 6:32 Wait before, before, hold on, hold on a second. Um, how much weight did you lose? Because it's either that you're still fat-

Jason Calacanis 6:37 What are you talking about?

David Friedberg 6:37 ... and you have a... Wait, wait, wait. It's either you're still fat and you have an incredible camera or you've actually lost weight. And this reminds me, by the way-

Jason Calacanis 6:45 Oh, no.

David Friedberg 6:45 ... I would like to tell a story.

Jason Calacanis 6:47 No, no, no, no.

David Friedberg 6:48 Four years ago, four or five years ago-

Jason Calacanis 6:50 Oh, my God. Here we go. (laughs)

David Friedberg 6:52 ... Jason, Jason and I make a weight bet.

Jason Calacanis 6:55 Okay, just don't say the dollar amount.

David Friedberg 6:57 Now, it was like, you know, it was like... I think it was like, uh, $10,000 a pound.

Jason Calacanis 7:02 Whatever it was, anyway.

David Friedberg 7:03 And, uh, Jason, Jason, he would get 10... He was about to do... And this is incredible. Jason comes to us five years ago and says, "Guys, you won't believe it. I'm doing a show on NBC."

Jason Calacanis 7:14 (laughs)

David Friedberg 7:14 Uh, a reality TV show.

Jason Calacanis 7:16 A pilot.

David Friedberg 7:16 A true pilot with (beep) .

Jason Calacanis 7:20 Not (beep) .

David Friedberg 7:21 Beep.

Jason Calacanis 7:21 With (beep) .

David Friedberg 7:22 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 7:22 Please beep that out.

David Friedberg 7:23 Okay, beep that out.

Jason Calacanis 7:25 Beep that out so I don't get canceled.

David Friedberg 7:27 And I thought, "Oh, my... I thought, 'Oh, my God, that guy, that guy seems like a train wreck, but okay, that's fine, you're gonna do this pilot with (beep) ."

Jason Calacanis 7:34 Beep, beep. (laughs)

David Friedberg 7:36 Don't, don't, don't you-

Jason Calacanis 7:36 On NBC.

David Friedberg 7:37 On NBC. "And don't you need to, you know, be in fighting shape?" And he said, "Yes, I need motivation." So I said, "Here's motivation. Let's make a weight bet. You need to be under 190 pounds, and I'll pay you 10,000, $10,000 a pound that you're underneath, you pay me 10,000 a pound over."

Jason Calacanis 7:55 Or whatever it was, yeah.

David Friedberg 7:57 It was like six months later and we're hosting a, I'm hosting a poker game.

Jason Calacanis 8:03 (laughs)

David Friedberg 8:03 And I realize, "Oh my God, this is the last, this is the last day of the bet."

Jason Calacanis 8:08 The day before.

David Friedberg 8:09 Oh, sorry.

Jason Calacanis 8:09 Midnight.

David Friedberg 8:09 We started the day before and then the last day of the bet is midnight.

Jason Calacanis 8:13 Yes.

David Friedberg 8:14 I wait till midnight.

Jason Calacanis 8:15 Yes. (laughs)

David Friedberg 8:15 And I jump up and I'm like, "Weight bet." (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 8:20 That is so funny.

David Friedberg 8:20 And so I say, "Jason, you gotta be under 190, 192.5 or 193 pounds."

Jason Calacanis 8:27 Yeah.

David Friedberg 8:27 He literally goes ashen white.

Jason Calacanis 8:30 (laughs)

David Friedberg 8:30 And he says-

Jason Calacanis 8:31 "More white than I am now."

David Friedberg 8:32 Okay.

Jason Calacanis 8:32 "Because I just ate and I was maintaining my weight."

David Friedberg 8:36 He says, he says, "Okay, okay, that's fine." He had been eating pizza, tacos. I mean, just everything-

Jason Calacanis 8:40 (laughs) You, you so tagged me. You so tagged me.

David Friedberg 8:45 He ate, he ate a brick, he ate a brick of brie. I swear to God.

Jason Calacanis 8:47 (laughs)

David Friedberg 8:48 And then, and the, and he, and then he says, he says... Freeburg, you won't believe this. He goes, "Guys, I just need five minutes before the weigh-in."

Jason Calacanis 8:54 (laughs)

David Friedberg 8:55 And then he goes to our guest bedroom and tries to take a shit.

Jason Calacanis 8:58 Oh, that's not true. That's not true.

David Friedberg 9:00 What is that saying? It's absolutely true.

Jason Calacanis 9:00 There was no truth in this story.

David Friedberg 9:03 He tried-

Jason Calacanis 9:03 You're fabricating now.

David Friedberg 9:04 He tried, he tried to shit out five pounds.

Jason Calacanis 9:07 I took a leak. I took a leak.

David Friedberg 9:08 Which, who can, who can do, who can do that at midnight?

Jason Calacanis 9:08 I took a leak. That's fair.

David Sacks 9:10 (laughs)

David Friedberg 9:11 After, after eating all that pizza and cheese and nachos and everything.

Jason Calacanis 9:14 All right, any... Anyways, he loses the weight bet and he says, "Chamath, this is completely unfair. I'm not gonna pay you." He was like 196 pounds. No, no.

David Friedberg 9:22 "I'm not paying you this money."

Jason Calacanis 9:23 It was like one pound over.

David Friedberg 9:27 Hold on. And he said, uh, "This bet is not over until midnight the fol-..." Obviously, it's midnight.

Jason Calacanis 9:32 Yes, obviously. Yes, yes.

David Friedberg 9:33 Twenty-five seconds.

Jason Calacanis 9:34 Fair enough.

David Friedberg 9:35 So I said, "All right, fine, Jake, I'll find." He goes home, he literally takes every diuretic known to man.

Jason Calacanis 9:41 (laughs)

David Sacks 9:42 That's not true. (laughs)

David Friedberg 9:43 Come on.

Jason Calacanis 9:44 (laughs)

David Friedberg 9:45 And, and then he loses. He doesn't even for a walk-

Jason Calacanis 9:46 I did go for a walk in two pairs of sweatpants (laughs) and sweated it out.

David Friedberg 9:51 I, I checked in with this guy 10 times this day. He walked like 12 miles. He took four shits. You know, he took every diuretic.

Jason Calacanis 9:59 I sweated it out. Steam room.

David Friedberg 10:01 He los-

Jason Calacanis 10:01 Hot bath.

David Friedberg 10:03 Sexy.

David Sacks 10:03 He did a, he, he did a colonoscopy.

David Friedberg 10:06 He did a colonoscopy.

David Sacks 10:07 (laughs)

David Friedberg 10:08 To his credit, he lost five pounds by midnight.

David Sacks 10:10 (laughs)

David Friedberg 10:10 And he won the bet.

Jason Calacanis 10:10 I did drop it. (laughs)

David Sacks 10:12 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 10:12 But then I said, then I said, "You know what? Because there were two different weigh-ins, uh, we were gonna go play in a poker tournament." So we went and played in the poker tournament. I said, "Chamath, buy me into the poker tournament. We'll, whatever we win, we'll chop it up if it happens." So we just made it into a friendly thing. Um, but great-

David Friedberg 10:28 And obviously we won nothing.

Jason Calacanis 10:29 ... now that story is out there and now it... I, I'm gonna, everybody's gonna be on Twitter with the code their teams-

David Friedberg 10:35 I want a t-shirt and-

Jason Calacanis 10:36 Yes.

David Friedberg 10:36 I, I hope somebody in the all-in army does the T-shirt that just says "192.5" and we'll all know what it means, which is the weight that-

Jason Calacanis 10:43 (laughs) The one, the one idea was 193. (laughs)

David Friedberg 10:46 193.

Jason Calacanis 10:47 Which is crazy that I'm one, was 193. Anyway, here we go. Getting into the categories. Our first category is

Jason Calacanis 10:54 The Biggest Winner in Politics. Biggest Winner in Politics. I'm gonna ask you gentlemen to raise your hand if you have a strong feeling on this. I'll call on one of you. Who's got a, a big winner in politics? Go ahead, Chamath.

David Friedberg 11:08 Joe Biden.

Jason Calacanis 11:10 Joe Biden. Okay, going out on a limb there.

David Friedberg 11:12 There is, there is, there, there are...

David Sacks 11:13 There, there-

Jason Calacanis 11:13 Joe Biden.

David Sacks 11:14 I mean, let's be honest, there's nobody bigger. And actually, if you wanted to abstract it, what I would say is, centrism was the big winner. And, uh, and it, it kind of feeds the losers, which is sort of the extreme left and the extreme right. But I would say that centrism and Joe Biden were the huge, huge, huge winners. Well, I'll, I'll give a, I'll give a, um, an orthodox pick, which is, uh, Xi Jinping, the Chairman of the Chinese Communist Party. You would have thought he would have had a bad year starting off with, you know, COVID, uh, starting in his country at the beginning of the year. But he was able-

Jason Calacanis 11:48 The Wuhan virus. (laughs)

David Sacks 11:49 Th- they, you know, the, the... A global plague came from China, but they were able to kind of, uh, they were able to use a, a very gullible WHO to launder, uh, responsibility for the catastrophe.

Jason Calacanis 12:02 (laughs)

David Sacks 12:02 And they took advantage of the crisis to build more client states in Asia and Africa with promises of vaccines and, and money.... and finally, his, uh, biggest global nemesis, uh, Trump, and then, you know, Pompeo, lost in the election. So you have to say he came out on top at the end of this year.

Jason Calacanis 12:20 Freeburg?

Chamath Palihapitiya 12:20 Yeah, I, I, um, I put... I have the exact same answer as Sacks. I put the Chinese Communist Party as a whole, actually.

Jason Calacanis 12:27 Right.

Chamath Palihapitiya 12:27 And I feel like, um, on the world stage, they're, uh, they're strengthened, uh, in, in the post-COVID world, so.

Jason Calacanis 12:33 I had Kamala-

Chamath Palihapitiya 12:34 I totally agree. Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 12:36 ... because she went from the famous quote in the debates, "There was a little girl in California who was bused to school, that little girl was me," where she took on Joe Biden, and then she winds up getting the VP slot. And, I think, she winds up actually becoming president, and will be the first female president of the year, of the, of, of, in the history of the United States. And that could happen in the first term, or if Joe Biden doesn't run for a second term, and they do a halfway decent job, Kamala plus Pete Buttigieg is a pretty great

Jason Calacanis 13:08 ticket as well. Who's the biggest loser? Who's your biggest loser, Chamath, in politics?

David Friedberg 13:15 Uh, Donald J. Trump.

Jason Calacanis 13:17 Biggest loser.

David Friedberg 13:17 And, uh-

Jason Calacanis 13:17 Okay, the obvious answer.

David Friedberg 13:18 ... the extreme left, the extreme left, and the extreme right.

Jason Calacanis 13:22 Got it.

David Sacks 13:22 I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll, I'll agree with that, but I'd also add, uh, Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the House. Uh, her impeachment of Trump at the beginning of the year went absolutely nowhere, wasn't even a, an issue in the election. And her majority in the House has almost completely disappeared. She lost a, a dozen seats. I think the, um, the, the... I think she's down to about four or five seats, there's a razor-thin majority in the House, and she's set to lose more in the midterm elections. I predict that she is set to not be Speaker anymore in two years, and headed for retirement.

Jason Calacanis 13:58 Okay. Freeburg, you got one? Biggest loser?

Chamath Palihapitiya 14:00 I have, I have the, uh, institution of American democracy- (laughs) ... as the biggest loser of 2020.

Jason Calacanis 14:06 (laughs)

David Sacks 14:06 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 14:07 I feel like we're coming out of this year with, like, no belief that our election was valid for a vast majority, for, for, uh, s- sizable minority of this country that, um, that the whole, uh, system-

Jason Calacanis 14:18 Well, actually some, some Democrats believe that the election was fraudulent now too.

Chamath Palihapitiya 14:23 Yeah. I mean, if you say something enough times, everyone believes it. So, um, here we are coming out of this year where, with a crippling, um, lack of faith in our electoral system, and, uh, it's scary that American democracy is being fundamentally questioned by its own constituents. So, um, so I think that's the biggest loser of the, of the year.

Jason Calacanis 14:41 I had, uh, I had, uh, two choices here. One of them was already said. I said the hysterical left as my runner up, Bernie and Warren, just dismissed by Biden and Kamala. They, they are not even part of the discussion anymore, and they didn't even get cabinet positions. So the hysterical left and the Socialist Communist Party is out of the Democratic Party, thank the Lord. But my biggest loser, I have to say that this is the worst run of any politician I've ever seen in a year, which is Rudy Giuliani-

Chamath Palihapitiya 15:09 (laughs)

David Sacks 15:10 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 15:10 ... under investigation for-

15:12 (laughs)

15:12 ... Les Parnas and Igor Fruman-

Chamath Palihapitiya 15:14 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 15:14 ... then the bogus lawsuit elections, then farting during a hearing-

Chamath Palihapitiya 15:19 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 15:19 ... then doing the Bharat shirt tuck. I don't know if we have feelings on if that-

Chamath Palihapitiya 15:24 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 15:24 ... was a tuck or if he was trying to wake up the genie.

Chamath Palihapitiya 15:27 (laughs)

David Sacks 15:27 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 15:27 And then he bleeds hair dye. (laughs)

15:31 (laughs)

David Sacks 15:31 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 15:31 Then he starts bleeding hair dye. Wake up the genie-

David Friedberg 15:34 And, and he got COVID, no? Like, hey-

Chamath Palihapitiya 15:36 And he got COVID.

Jason Calacanis 15:36 Wait. 0000-

Chamath Palihapitiya 15:38 And he's in the hospital, and he's in the hospital with COVID.

Jason Calacanis 15:41 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 15:41 (Laughs) I mean, like... just think. If, if you think you had a shitty year- (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 15:47 ... I think there's gonna be... The fans of the show are now registering domain names of things we say. (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 15:55 The upside for him is that Donald Trump's campaign is paying him $20,000 a day in legal fees, so-

Jason Calacanis 15:59 Oh, no, I think it was 200.

Chamath Palihapitiya 16:01 Yeah. No, it was 20 grand a day.

Jason Calacanis 16:02 Oh, it was only 20? (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 16:04 That, that, that's his going rate for making a, a fool of himself.

David Sacks 16:07 I've a, I've, I've, I've a feeling that rate was adjusted when, uh, Rudy couldn't get, uh, the case to the Supreme Court. (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 16:15 Well, we all know that Trump pays his bills on time, so- (laughs)

David Sacks 16:18 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 16:18 (laughs) Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 16:18 ... it shouldn't be a problem, right? (laughs) All right. Uh, now we're gonna have some more fun.

Jason Calacanis 16:24 Biggest winner in business. Biggest winner in business. Freeburg, you wanna lead us off? You haven't led us off yet.

Chamath Palihapitiya 16:29 I'll, I'll take this one. I think that the biggest winner in business this year is a company that started a few years ago called Moderna. This company had a IPO in December of '18 at seven and a half billion dollar market cap. It traded between four and five billion throughout 2019. And all of a sudden, COVID hits, and this becomes a vaccine candidate, uh, driver for Moderna, and the stock shoots up, it's worth 60 billion today. This company has not had a product that's gone to market prior to COVID, and they struggled, uh, getting this business, um... Well, I wouldn't say struggled, but they, they never really had a, a, a, an application for their mRNA technology. They looked at it for years iterating and pivoting this business, and COVID, un- like a lot of other businesses, really gave them an unbelievable, uh, kick. And as of tonight-

Jason Calacanis 17:14 What about it say? A shot in the arm.

Chamath Palihapitiya 17:15 A shot in the arm. And tonight, they got approval from the FDA, and they're gonna be shipping starting t- on Monday, I think.

Jason Calacanis 17:21 Sacks, who you got for the biggest winner in business? We're moving at a good pace here.

David Sacks 17:25 Elon Musk, uh, our friend.

Jason Calacanis 17:27 Okay.

Chamath Palihapitiya 17:27 Oh.

David Sacks 17:27 Ro- rose, uh, to become the sic- second richest man in the world ahead of Bill Gates, uh, and, you know, uh, right on the heels of Jeff Bezos. Uh, his company, Tesla, had something like a 8 or 10x gain, so over a $500 billion company. Of course, the products are awesome. It joined the S&P 500. And SpaceX is doing amazing as well. Uh, we saw the launch of s- Starship the other day. And I have just been mesmerized by all these unboxing videos for Starlink, which you can see on YouTube. And it is just magic that you can unbox this little satellite dish, plug it in, and you have broadband internet from space. So, um, I think, you know, Elon seems to be on track to be, uh, not only the world's richest man, but the world's first trillionaire-

Jason Calacanis 18:13 Wow. Big, uh, big, uh, big ups there to E. Uh, Chamath, what do you got for the biggest winner in business of 2020?

David Friedberg 18:22 Yeah, I have to agree with Saxypoo. Uh, Elon is the... Elon basically has had, over the last 10 or 15 years, an incredible amount of challenges that he's overcome. He's had an incredible amount of haters. He's had... Probably had to deal with stuff that most of us would have broken under, and, uh, he just fought through it. And the guy just basically bended all the haters until he crushed their souls, and I just think that that's incredible.

Jason Calacanis 18:50 Absolutely.

David Friedberg 18:50 Uh, so Elon Musk is the, hands down, the biggest, biggest, most obvious winner of 2020.

Jason Calacanis 18:57 That's the obvious winner. Uh-

David Friedberg 18:59 In business.

Jason Calacanis 18:59 I'll give a couple of runner-ups here. Um, I thought also on the runner-ups, uh, after Elon, Zoom beating Skype, Slack Video, Google Hangouts, and fixing all their China issues and getting to a $100 billion valuation is notable. Obviously Amazon did a great job, um, be- because of the pandemic. Uh, and then just as an oddball out there, I just thought Adam Silver and the NBA Bubble was an incredibly bold project that was executed so well and was such a delightful business moment and also a cultural moment that, you know, you had the NBA shutting down during the pandemic. Remember that dramatic night on a Thursday night? And they canceled the games. And then they do the bubble and it works, and that gave me hope that we could get through the virus. So, those were some of my other runners-up.

Jason Calacanis 19:47 All right, the biggest loser in business in 2020. Go ahead, Chamath.

David Friedberg 19:53 Facebook and Google, exiting the year with umpteen antitrust lawsuits. Um, I think morale must be pretty brutal over there. Um, there's no amount of money at some point that people are willing to get paid to walk in the door every day and just have to do... Have to deal with those kinds of accusations. And so, um, for all the good in the world that they do, um, which... So it just must be really tough that they have to deal with it, but, uh, those guys are, I think, are the biggest losers in business.

Jason Calacanis 20:22 Who do you got, Sax?

David Sacks 20:23 The small business person. Um, you know, whether it's restaurants, retail, hospitality, what have you, small business people really took it on the chin this year. I agree with Chamath about, you know, companies like Google and Facebook losing esteem in the eyes of the public for good reason, censorship, so on. But tech still are... You know, stocks are at all-time highs. The politicians got to keep eating at French Laundry, but it was the small business people who got absolutely decimated by these lockdowns, which don't even work. And so they are the big loser of 2020-

Jason Calacanis 20:56 Freedberg, what do you got?

David Sacks 20:58 ... in business.

Chamath Palihapitiya 20:58 I, I'm a little more vanilla than the rest of you guys. I went with AMC Entertainment Holdings. Talk about a fucked business in COVID.

Jason Calacanis 21:04 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 21:05 Restaurants, at least you can do takeout. You can't take out a movie from AMC. They're, they're shut down all over the country. Their creditors are telling them to declare bankruptcy. It's a total shit show. No one's going to go back-

Jason Calacanis 21:16 You think people go back-

Chamath Palihapitiya 21:16 ... to the movie theater.

Jason Calacanis 21:16 ... to movies?

Chamath Palihapitiya 21:16 You know, it's like...

Jason Calacanis 21:17 You don't think they'll go back?

Chamath Palihapitiya 21:18 I don't think they'll go... I don't know what the hell-

Jason Calacanis 21:19 Wow.

Chamath Palihapitiya 21:19 ... like AMC is gonna do. What do you do with all those theaters? They're awesome. I love going to the movies, but I'm not going to the movies for at least another year, so. And it's sad because honestly, like, movies are a big part of my life, always have been, and it's sad to see movie theaters-

Jason Calacanis 21:32 I think they're gonna come-

Chamath Palihapitiya 21:32 I- you know. Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 21:33 They're gonna come back strong... They're gonna come back stronger. I think Amazon will buy one chain. I think Netflix buys the other.

Chamath Palihapitiya 21:38 Right.

Jason Calacanis 21:38 And then with your membership, you get to go and see all the range of stuff, and maybe even see, like, Queen's Gambit in the theater-

Chamath Palihapitiya 21:46 It's such a... It's such a great-

Jason Calacanis 21:47 ... a week before.

Chamath Palihapitiya 21:47 ... experience, right? Yeah, like there's... There's-

Jason Calacanis 21:48 Yeah. I would have loved to see Queen's Gambit in a theater.

Chamath Palihapitiya 21:50 Totally. There's so much-

Jason Calacanis 21:51 Okay.

Chamath Palihapitiya 21:51 ... you could do with theaters, and I think, um, there's an opportunity. But man, did those guys get screwed this year.

Jason Calacanis 21:56 Well, I always thought they should do an extended edition. So imagine if when HBO or one of those did, you know, Game of Thrones, if they had it out the day before in movie theaters or the week before, uh, or two days before, and they did an extra 10 minutes. People would love that. My biggest loser was, of course, same as David, uh, real world businesses absolutely demolished and the government... After that first stimulus, which was incredible. Trump did an amazing job of just dropping buckets of money, whether it was the PP loans and... PPE loans, whatever the... PPP loans? PPP loans. All this stuff was incredible. And then what complete utter bullshit and incompetence from our government that they couldn't get the second one done. It's absolutely fucking infuriating that the Democrats and the Republicans, these selfish fuckers, couldn't get another billion dollars dropped on people's head. And here we are in December. That shit needed to drop in August or September, not December. It's just absolutely disgraceful. It's... The- They're... I'm... I'm just disgusted that they couldn't even get some more money to people who are suffering unemployment and these restaurants. 100,000 restaurant closures by the end of 2020. It's just unconscionable that the, the stock market is ripping and we can't get just some money in people's pockets. Just drop the money. It's infuriating. I was sitting here at the taping of this that it might actually happen.

Jason Calacanis 23:22 Um, okay, biggest winner in culture. Who's got a big winner in culture? Anybody got one?

Chamath Palihapitiya 23:28 I got the, um, the Black Lives Matter movement, and I think it-

Jason Calacanis 23:33 Hmm.

Chamath Palihapitiya 23:33 Um... I think it was such a, like, meaningful, um, and impactful, uh, um, kind of shift in how people were thinking fundamentally about behavior in society. It's still persisting. You know, there's corporate action, there's state action, there's regulatory action. Um, and I think it's, uh... It's a meaningful movement that's gonna persist. I think it came at a time when we all felt... Like, you know, a lot of people felt locked up in their homes. People were angry. People were frustrated with the system. And, um, just, uh... It just was a very poignant moment, uh, especially occurring during COVID that it really took hold. Um, and it... I think it's going to last, and I think that the, uh, um, the movement itself is gonna spawn a lot of change.

Jason Calacanis 24:17 Yeah, I think that's well said. David, who do you got, uh, in culture? (clears throat)

David Sacks 24:20 Uh, Baby Yoda, uh, star of-

Jason Calacanis 24:24 (laughs) So you went pop culture on that one. (laughs)

David Sacks 24:26 Yeah. Star, star of the Mandalorian show, uh, that has... His ascent to icon status, uh, helped Disney get 86 million subscribers for-

Jason Calacanis 24:35 Grogu.

David Sacks 24:36 ... for, for Disney+, uh, which just blew away expectations and, uh, has established Disney+ as the main rival to Netflix.

Jason Calacanis 24:45 Do you think Netflix... Uh, you think Disney will pass Netflix, correct?

David Sacks 24:49 I don't know if they'll pass them, but they're now certainly gonna be a, a major rival to them.

Jason Calacanis 24:53 I think that, I think they pass them. Okay. Chamath, who do you got? Culture?

David Friedberg 24:57 I would pick, uh, a combination of Fortnite, Roblox, and Among Me, which I think has for at least, um, a lot of high school and middle school, uh, kids, but, I, maybe a lot of adults, the only form of social interaction that we've had-

Jason Calacanis 25:17 Wow.

David Friedberg 25:17 ... for the entire year.

Jason Calacanis 25:18 What a great-

David Friedberg 25:19 Um-

Jason Calacanis 25:19 ... what a great selection.

David Friedberg 25:20 And, uh, and I think it's important to understand how much lonelier we all would have been and how much more mental illness and depression we all would have dealt with if we couldn't have even just talked to our friends. And I think that there is something really beautiful that those games did for people.

Jason Calacanis 25:35 Ah, that's a good one. That's a good one. I, I went with podcasting. I think on a cultural basis, Joe Rogan and what's happened in podcasts, these long-form discussions, even this podcast, um, has become just an amazing, amazing movement. And people are having better discussions, and I, I consider it the antidote to what's happening on social media. When people hear us discussing stuff on this podcast, they feel like they ate something nutritious. They had a great salad. They had some healthy food. And then when they're on social media and they consume the same tweets that we're doing, they feel like it's junk food, right? And so I think that podcasting, long-form discussions, listening to each other, maybe, you know, Republicans and Democrats, left, right, everybody listening to each other, and podcasting is just such a great meeting- (instrumental music plays) ... medium for discussion.

Jason Calacanis 26:24 Who is the biggest loser on a cultural basis in 2020, Mr. David Sachs?

David Sacks 26:30 The media, starting with the New York Times and other sort of elite media. They ripped the umpire jersey off their backs to go after Trump. Well, they got him, but at what cost? Half the country will never trust them again. Uh, this makes conspiracy theories more likely. It makes cultural divides deeper. And they've been revealed to be corporate journalists, journalists who, uh, subscribe to and serve a- an agenda of their corporate masters. They've lost the public's trust.

Jason Calacanis 26:58 Friedberg, what do you got on the biggest cultural loser?

Chamath Palihapitiya 27:03 Uh, climate change, took a backseat this year. Um, it, you know, it had momentum. (laughs) As a, as a cultural meme, it's, uh, it's lost its, uh, its luster. And it's been, um, shattered a little bit this year with BLM and, uh, and COVID, and lack of faith in institutions and all the other stuff that's been going on.

Jason Calacanis 27:24 Do you think that people now, when they see the collective response to COVID and the pan- uh, the, the vaccines and us- our ability with science and technology to solve the pandemic, we will have a newfound appreciation for coordinated global action on global warming, David? Friedberg-

Chamath Palihapitiya 27:41 I think... Are you asking me? I think, um, I think the, uh... I think the faith in institutions has eroded tremendously this year. The WHO telling people not to wear masks and then telling them, "Hey, masks are good." Uh, the FDA-

Jason Calacanis 27:55 So you think that that hits the, um-

Chamath Palihapitiya 27:58 I think just-

Jason Calacanis 27:58 ... the global warming movement as well?

Chamath Palihapitiya 28:00 I think, I think, yeah. Yeah, I think the, the lack of faith in-

Jason Calacanis 28:02 Okay.

Chamath Palihapitiya 28:02 ... institutions as well as in the media, um, makes it really difficult for things that require a coordinated effort, uh, and a coordinated cultural shift, uh, to take hold, um, you know, are really challenged, uh, uh, in this new kind of model where, where you don't know what to believe and you don't believe institutions and you don't believe old school and you don't believe states and you don't believe, you know, anything structural anymore. So it's, it's a scary, it's a scary kind of moment. I don't know. I think climate change is gonna have momentum with the new administration at least coming into office in the US, but, um, but generally, like institutional guidance is, has lost its luster.

Jason Calacanis 28:38 Chamath, what do you got?

David Friedberg 28:41 Wokeness.

Jason Calacanis 28:41 Biggest loser culture.

David Friedberg 28:42 Wokeness. Wokeness.

Jason Calacanis 28:43 Whoa, I just got it.

David Friedberg 28:44 And I, I think when you now look at the realization of what we've gone through, um, people have realized that, you know, you can, you can be extremely anti-racist and think Latinx is just a stupid label. You know, you can be an entirely complete 100,000 million% supporter of LGBTQ but think that, you know, all these complicated pronouns aren't really necessary. Um, and I think that people are coming to a point where you can have, um, nuance. Um, and I think that that's really important. I think that this whole cancel culture and wokeness was, um, incredibly corrosive, um, and I think that, that they lost.

Jason Calacanis 29:28 I, I think it's actually a great... Um, I think it's, I think it's a great p- pointer making, Chamath, because on the last episode, I fumbled the word "MX", which none of us-

David Friedberg 29:39 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 29:39 ... had ever seen. We all laughed about it. And then I just had this little thing, I was like, "Okay, I guess this is when I get canceled," because I laughed at the fact that- or I mispronounced it, right? And the fact that I thought even for a second that mispronouncing this term MX, which I then did research on, and I said, "Does anybody know how to pronounce word MMX- MX on Twitter?" So I figured I would preempt the, the dropping of the, um, podcast by bringing it up on my Twitter. And people are like, "Are you trolling?" I'm like, "No, I'm asking." And I found videos, and it turns out there is an actual controversy in the trans community where MX some people believe means mixed-... M-I-X-E-D. Other people m- think it's, um, M-X as X the variable, as in the variable X. And so they're having their own debate, they're figuring it out. That's great. Everybody loves them, everybody supports them. But the fact that I mispronounce it, you know, should I be canceled for mispronouncing it?

David Friedberg 30:35 Do, do people that are struggling with that?

Jason Calacanis 30:37 Yeah.

David Friedberg 30:37 Well, Jason, can I tell you, can I tell those people-

Jason Calacanis 30:39 Yeah.

David Friedberg 30:39 ... that are struggling with whether X equals anything or X equals mixed. Hum- just to touch upon Friedberg's point, um, the human race has caused 8% of all the species in the world to go extinct, and we have put another 22% of every single other species at the, at the brink of extinction. At the same time, we have now expanded our footprint to touch 75% of the earth's land surface. So, until somebody fixes those problems, I don't actually want to know what the X stands for.

Jason Calacanis 31:14 Yeah. I mean, we, we're, this idea that we're gonna cancel each other-

David Friedberg 31:17 Until we put, until we put-

Jason Calacanis 31:19 ... and the politics of destruction-

David Friedberg 31:19 ... until we put stimulus checks ... Put the fucking stimulus checks into people's hands. Get these small businesses back to work.

Jason Calacanis 31:25 Right.

David Friedberg 31:25 Then you can tell me what the X stands for.

Jason Calacanis 31:27 Yeah. Okay. My, uh, biggest loser on culture was the same exact as you, David. We're thinking similar. I have taken the red pill you gave me. I crushed it up. I've been snorting these, the red pill like crazy. People think I'm turning into a Republican. But I thought mainstream media and late-stage journalism sacrificed objectivity specifically to get subscriptions, and they used the anti-Trump feelings and they worked 'em and got the, the ratings from them. And they literally used that. New York Times is the, is the, the best example. Uh, I think the work you guys use for best example is canonical. Of, like, using their anti-Trump feelings to get people to take out their wallets and subscribe. Everybody realizes it. They drove out Bari Weiss, they drove out their editor of the page for making people feel unsafe with their words. And then New York Magazine drove out Andrew Sullivan, and then Glenn Greenwald gets, leaves his publication. I mean, anybody who dissents inside of one of these publications, they cancel them inside of a publication for an opinion on an opinion page. It's crazy.

Jason Calacanis 32:31 (dramatic music) Okay, let's keep everything moving here. Biggest turnaround in, I guess this is biggest turnaround anything, but I did business. I'll lead off with mine. My best turnaround was Airbnb. They laid off 25% of the company in July, 1,900 of 7,500 employees. They cut their marketing budget by 800 million, and then they IPO five months later. Uh, and they had raised a billion dollars, an $18 billion evaluation according to PitchBook and now worth 88 billion a week after the IPO. That is a turnaround of all turnarounds. David, who did you have?

David Sacks 33:08 Uh, this is where I had Joe Biden.

Jason Calacanis 33:10 Got it.

David Sacks 33:10 He finished fourth in Iowa, fifth in New Hampshire. No candidate has ever bombed that badly in the first two contests and gone on to win the nomination. Biden roared back in South Carolina and then won big on Super Tuesday, and wrapped up the party nomination by March. Uh, biggest political comeback ever.

Jason Calacanis 33:27 Hm. Who do you got, Friedberg?

David Friedberg 33:31 I got Airbnb as well. I mean from, yeah. (items thuds on table) And here's the cr- here's one of the craziest stats. They're sitting there in Q1 with a great business, revenue drops 67% in Q2.

Jason Calacanis 33:41 Oof.

David Friedberg 33:42 Can you just imagine the experience of 67% of your revenue going away in one quarter? Uh, cash burn skyrockets and just having to respond quickly and still maintain integrity with your customers and your employees as a leadership team. I mean, it was an incredible leadership, um, uh, demonstration by Chesky and-

Jason Calacanis 34:00 It's a five alarm, it's a five alarm fire, right? I mean, it's literally you gotta get everybody out of the building.

David Friedberg 34:04 Here, here we go. Here we go.

David Sacks 34:05 I agree with that.

Jason Calacanis 34:05 Here we go. Sax? (laughs)

David Friedberg 34:06 (laughs)

David Sacks 34:06 I agree with that. I agree with that.

Jason Calacanis 34:08 Sax agrees. (laughs)

David Friedberg 34:10 Sax is wearing his beak. Yeah.

David Sacks 34:13 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 34:13 Who do you got? Chamath, I'm curious. Who is your biggest, best turnaround-

David Friedberg 34:17 Censorship.

Jason Calacanis 34:17 Biggest, censorship.

David Friedberg 34:18 Sensor- censorship. Censorship existed in, in Draconian and the dark ages of our, of our journey as a country and in the world. And it came roaring back this year. The amount of people that have been muzzled, stifled, the amount of fact and science that literally just gets judged willy-nilly by our distribution points like Facebook and Twitter and Medium. It's really scary. So censorship made a roaring comeback in 2020.

Jason Calacanis 34:47 I, I like it. I like it a lot.

Jason Calacanis 34:49 Okay. Now we go on to the biggest flash in the pan. You can interpret this any way you like. What do you got, Sexy Poo? Rain Man.

David Sacks 34:59 The WHO.

Jason Calacanis 35:01 Who?

David Sacks 35:01 The WHO. Nobody knew-

Jason Calacanis 35:04 Who?

David Sacks 35:05 ... who the W- the World Hor- Health Organization, nobody knew what the WHO was before this year. Then they have become, you know, somehow this global authority on COVID despite getting everything wrong. They initially said that we didn't need to wear a mask, they didn't update that until June 5th. This was about 10 weeks after my blog saying that, you know, masks were a good idea. They got the method of transmission wrong. They were saying that transmission mainly occurred through fomites, which is contagious surfaces instead of respiratory particles. They, uh, initially said that lockdowns worked, then they modified their policy on that because of its impact to marginal groups. And so the WHO has just gotten everything wrong this year. And despite that fact, you now have, to Chamath's point, Google, YouTube, and even sites like LinkedIn or Nextdoor are now censoring people's statements if they contradict the WHO. Apparently without irony, because nobody has contradicted the WHO more than the WHO itself. I look forward to next year when nobody cares about the WHO anymore.

Jason Calacanis 36:11 Great. Friedberg, what do you got? Flash in the pan.

David Friedberg 36:16 Uh, I put hydroxychloroquine.

David Sacks 36:19 (laughs)

David Friedberg 36:19 You guys remember hydroxychloroquine?

Jason Calacanis 36:21 Yeah, that was good, good point, good point.

David Friedberg 36:22 It was gonna, it was gonna save the world for a minute or two and then-

David Sacks 36:26 (laughs)

David Friedberg 36:26 ... you know, here we are and, uh, so I'm just gonna leave it at that. Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 36:31 Here we... Okay.

David Friedberg 36:32 Yeah. Go ahead. (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 36:32 Everybody knows, you may have heard of hydro-

Chamath Palihapitiya 36:35 ... Clara Quinn.

David Friedberg 36:36 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 36:36 Okay? America. Some people say it's America. I tell you, it's great. Chamath, what do you got? It's a flash in the pan.

David Friedberg 36:43 Uh, it's actually quite re- it's actually quite related to this, and I thought that she was marvelous, but I do think she will disappear off the scene, which is Sarah Cooper. Which, uh, you know, basically in the last month of the campaign, um, kind of just disappeared and now is, uh, I don't think, uh, anybody knows who Sarah Cooper is and probably in a year from now won't. But for, for the period, for those dark months of the pandemic, her mockery of Trump was some of the funniest stuff on Twitter that I'd ever seen.

Jason Calacanis 37:13 Oh, Sarah Cooper's amazing, yeah. She, she got on Netflix and I don't think she'll be a flash in the pan. I think she'll come back. Um, I would have loved to pick, um... Who was the press secretary for, um, with the Southern accent for, for Trump? Sachs?

Chamath Palihapitiya 37:30 Sarah Huckabee? Sanders?

Jason Calacanis 37:31 Yeah, Huckabee. She wa- But I think she was gone in tw- by 2020, so I can't pick her. But she was amazing at defending Trump. She's like, "You all are dumb, and Trump is smart, and he has 150 IQ, and he owns Mar-a-Lago, and he has a jet, and his jet hasn't hit the yard yet."

David Friedberg 37:53 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 37:53 "And you are the fake news media. And I don't care what you say, American public don't care what you say, and Trump is amazing in bed. He was banging porn stars when y'all were jer-..." I mean, he's just... She would defend him. I, that's who I want as my PR person. She defended him for all time. My biggest flash in the pan though is-

Chamath Palihapitiya 38:12 I don't think you need a PR person. Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 38:15 I don't need a PR person. I got this... We got this podcast now. We don't need the press or PR (laughs) . We just go right to the audience.

David Friedberg 38:20 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 38:20 Um, Nikola Trading at $34 billion. They took your precious SPACs, Chamath, and they perverted it with a dipshit, Milton, who was on my podcast and couldn't answer basic questions. It's now worth six billion. I predict it will be worth 60 cents. I kid you not, this company will go to zero, is my prediction. If you are buying companies and I made Jason's rule based on this-

Chamath Palihapitiya 38:48 Jake L., you are gonna scare all founder... All founder CEOs are gonna avoid coming on your podcast now.

Jason Calacanis 38:54 No, no. No, no. I, I'm delightful.

Chamath Palihapitiya 38:56 Boo.

Jason Calacanis 38:56 But for this kid-

David Friedberg 38:57 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 38:59 ... um, he's, he's under investigation.

Chamath Palihapitiya 39:00 Your company is worth nothing. (laughs) Yeah. Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 39:03 You're weekless, you're worthless. (laughs) No, he's under investigation. The thing's a disaster. They're obviously riding on Elon's coattails. He couldn't make a decision if it was hydrogen powered cars or electric trucks, or whatever. And, uh, the company's in chaos and I, I made a rule which is, if a company has not released their product and it's worth over a billion dollars, be careful, because it could be a fraud, um, a- or it could be a disaster. That's my biggest flash in the pan, Nikola.

Jason Calacanis 39:32 Um, biggest breakthrough. Friedberg, you want to start us off on this one? I have an idea. I think I know what you're gonna say.

Chamath Palihapitiya 39:38 I'm gonna say AlphaFold. You know that we talked about it in the last podcast, I think. Um, AlphaFold feels to me like what ARPANET was, which was the origins of the internet, you know, back when it was first installed and no one really k- kind of grap- grappled with the ramifications of what would emerge. And I think, you know, once we have the ability to design proteins to do things, um, a, a lot's gonna change in the world of medicine and human health and longevity, and the kind of environment. And it's gonna be pretty powerful. So I'm excited about AlphaFold creating a foundation for, for humanity's ability to do those things.

Jason Calacanis 40:11 Chamath, what do you got?

David Friedberg 40:12 100% AlphaFold. By, uh... There's not a close second, to be honest.

Jason Calacanis 40:18 Okay. Sachs?

David Friedberg 40:20 Well, I, as a, as a close second, I guess I would, uh, I, I would mention the mRNA vaccines which we talked about on this show. The ability to basically, um, print a vaccine in two days. And hopefully they will follow our advice about challenge vaccines for the next time we have one of these pandemics.

Jason Calacanis 40:37 Challenge trials. Challenge trials.

David Friedberg 40:39 Challenge trials. We can, uh, we can respond much more quickly. And then just quickly, in politics, I thought the biggest breakthrough was Pete Buttigieg. He made the unlikely leap from mayor of South Bend, Indiana to being the first credible openly gay candidate for president. He won Iowa, sort of, along with Bernie Sanders, and was a very close second in New Hampshire. Uh, he's gonna be, uh, the, the, um... He's gonna be-

Jason Calacanis 41:06 Transportation.

David Friedberg 41:06 ... Director of the Trans- Transportation Department in the Biden administration.

Jason Calacanis 41:10 Uh, my biggest was-

Chamath Palihapitiya 41:11 By the way, Sachs, I, I want to just point something out on your... Sorry, JCal, but, um, you know, the mRNA vaccine technology has been around for like 15 years. And regulatory barriers and regulatory constraints have largely kept this stuff from coming to market. And it's interesting how, you know, in a year where we have this pandemic emergency, we can take this technology that has been around and has been available to us for so long and suddenly, you know, all the regulatory barriers get dropped and things come to market that change the world. I think it, it's a great highlight of, like, what's possible when some regulatory constraints are, are diminished a little bit and technology is really allowed to flourish and see the light of day. Um, and, you know, we all act so surprised that this technology works but it's been here for a while. It's pretty, uh, pretty astounding that it hasn't worked or hasn't been allowed to work in the past. Um, that's just an observation, I think is worth adding.

Jason Calacanis 41:59 I- in a previous episode, Friedberg, y- yeah, I think it's a really valid one because it wasn't a breakthrough that occurred this year. The breakthrough was they broke through the regulations. You said you wanted to wait and see some people get the vaccines first, um, and then that led to some accounts, uh, on the Twitter saying, "Are you still anti-vaccination?" And I, I had to correct them that you've never said you were anti-vaccination. To be clear, you said you might want to wait.

Chamath Palihapitiya 42:23 Oh, I'm not, I'm not anti-vax. Not at all.

Jason Calacanis 42:25 No. You wanted to-

Chamath Palihapitiya 42:26 No, no you watched it. My point, my point-

Jason Calacanis 42:26 You said you wanted to wait.

Chamath Palihapitiya 42:27 My point... Yes. No, no. I think my point is, um, I think a lot of people are gonna latch on... Uh, sorry. Let me just be really clear. I think a lot of people are gonna latch on...... to the small number of cases that are gonna be amplified of people having adverse reactions to this, you know, new technology vaccine, in Alaska the other day, like, two days ago, there was a nurse who got the vaccine and she had a really bad anaphylactic reaction to it and she had to be given epinephrine twice to survive. And she came out and she was fine. But it's that storytelling, that's like, you know, they, they, they assume it should be some small percentage of people will have some reaction to this thing. But that is the storytelling that will keep people from doing this and I think that is the, the, the biggest kind of concern. And that's why you've got guys like Mike Pence doing the, the vaccine tomorrow, you know, he's gonna do it on, on live TV and, uh, celebrities like Ian McKellen doing it. They're, they're trying to kind of create a little bit of fake reverence.

David Friedberg 43:17 Wait, wait, wait, wait, are we gonna see Mike Pence's naked shoulder and bicep on television?

Chamath Palihapitiya 43:21 (laughs) Yeah. We're gonna blur it. We're gonna blur it out. They're going to blur it out.

David Friedberg 43:24 Will Mother allow it? Will Mother allow it?

Chamath Palihapitiya 43:24 Because Mom doesn't want to see that. No, not allowed in his-

David Friedberg 43:27 No, but is, is Mother, is Mother gonna be beside him?

Chamath Palihapitiya 43:29 (laughs)

David Friedberg 43:29 That's his wife, by the way.

Chamath Palihapitiya 43:30 Yes. They'll, they'll pixelate it. They'll pixelate it.

David Friedberg 43:31 He calls his, he calls his wife, Mother.

Chamath Palihapitiya 43:32 Actually, Mother's gonna give it to him because if a, if a woman doctor gave it to him, he would be kind of like cheating 'cause she stuck something in him, you know, and that's just not right. Um, uh, okay. (laughs) Uh, I can't wait to take it. If anybody doesn't want their vaccine, I will take it 'cause I'm losing my mind in quarantine. I mean, for the love of God.

Chamath Palihapitiya 43:51 Uh, smartest business move, Chamath.

David Friedberg 43:58 I think, uh, 2020 was, uh, the year of the SPAC. I think that it is a, it is-

Chamath Palihapitiya 44:05 Hey-oh. (laughs)

David Friedberg 44:05 It's just, it's an incredibly... it's done, it's, it's done something really, really, really important in the capital markets, so that, uh...

Chamath Palihapitiya 44:14 Can you give Chamath his Besty Award now, JCal? Yes. (laughs) Accepting his Besty Award.

David Friedberg 44:19 (laughs) Here you go.

Chamath Palihapitiya 44:19 Given to him by himself-

David Friedberg 44:21 Myself.

Chamath Palihapitiya 44:22 Would you like an acceptance speech? I've-

David Friedberg 44:24 I would like to thank me.

Chamath Palihapitiya 44:24 The smartest business move... This is classic Chamath.

David Friedberg 44:27 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 44:28 The smartest business move, me. (laughs)

David Friedberg 44:31 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 44:31 Zacks, what was your smartest business move or-

David Friedberg 44:34 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 44:34 ... the smartest business move in business?

44:36 Well, I, I'd like to thank Chamath for the SPAC thing too, because I was in Open Door and, uh, I was in Porch and both of them are SPACing this year, so...

44:44 Oh, I-

44:44 Thanks.

44:44 I'm in desktop metal. I'm going to go with... We have to agree. Chamath is the best in business.

44:49 Yeah, thanks for... Yeah, you've, you've wet, you've wet all of our beaks, so...

David Friedberg 44:52 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 44:52 Yeah, I mean, I mean, actually, if you think about it, I, I've done, uh-

44:56 (laughs)

44:56 ... six deals this year.

David Friedberg 44:58 Are we still talking about me or

David Sacks 44:59 (laughing)

Chamath Palihapitiya 45:02 We have to play the music, you know, the walk-off music on the Oscars. << Da-da-da-da, da-da-da-da >>

David Friedberg 45:08 Oh, my God. Except the second besty is Chamath.

Chamath Palihapitiya 45:12 I wish, I, I, I wish, I wish that I-

45:13 He's been nominated three times, but this is the only besty he's won.

David Friedberg 45:16 I really wanted to be in that reality show with you and (beep) .

Chamath Palihapitiya 45:20 (laughs)

David Sacks 45:21 (Laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 45:21 Oh, beep, beep. And beep, beep. I mean, talk about dodging a bullet.

45:26 (laughs)

45:26 We went with this trailer to the fi- top five studios. They all wanted it. In the room, NBC says, "We'll take it." In the room, the, the head of NBC says, "We'll take it." We taped the pilot and then beep's whole career life blows up. And thank the Lord that show didn't get on TV because I, it would have been executive produced by beep, uh, and yeah, that would've been bad. So, uh, no reality TV for me. Uh, I had a, I had another smart business move I just wanted to point out, which was Salesforce buying Slack. I think it's brilliant for them. I think they're going to look back on the 10% they paid of their capital for Slack. And I think Slack will be more important than Salesforce ultimately in business.

David Friedberg 46:13 It's a huge-

Chamath Palihapitiya 46:14 I think it'll be the most important brand there.

David Friedberg 46:15 Oh, what a crown jewel. What a great, what a great move by Benioff and, and Bret Taylor. And I just think what, what a great asset. Totally agree.

Chamath Palihapitiya 46:22 Will it be better for them than YouTube is for Google or Instagram is for-

David Friedberg 46:27 I think, I think it's on that level, actually. I think it's of that order of magnitude, where the importance of those assets to those companies, Slack will be to Salesforce.

Chamath Palihapitiya 46:35 Costs, costs 20 times, 30 times as much though, so less upside, but still.

David Friedberg 46:41 Less upside, but, but in terms of like lock in and value and, you know, the prevention of churn, uh, over time, I think it's going to be huge.

Chamath Palihapitiya 46:48 I mean, it could be at some point the company is Slack Salesforce, like, Slack will be the, the preeminent brand there. David, did you go for this, for smartest business move-

46:59 I, I agree.

47:00 ... Greenberg?

47:00 I, I agree with both the ones you've already done.

47:03 Okay. So let's go- I'm gonna, I'm gonna rat- I'm gonna, I'm gonna rattle one off real quick. I got- Go ahead. Um, I think people miss this, but at the bottom of the market, Silverlake did this massive debt deal into Airbnb, which if you'll remember, is reminiscent to me of Warren Buffett, you know, giving $5 billion to Swiss Re and Goldman Sachs, and he earned a 12% coupon and got warrants in both those companies. And it just paid a tremendous return for him. Silverlake swooped into Airbnb in April, gave them a 12% debt deal for $1 billion, and they got warrants that, that warrants today are worth, um, about $1.4 billion. Ugh. And, and this debt is probably worth three times what they put in. So in like five months, six months, these guys have basically turned a billion dollars of debt into $4 billion of value. Uh, it was an incredible deal, incredibly gutsy. If you think about what we were all feeling in early April about the market and where the world was headed, we had no fucking clue. For these guys to swoop in and do that, I thought it was super impressive. The, the other one I, I, I had a couple on this 'cause I just, I, I want to rattle these off. Yeah.

David Sacks 48:00 Go on.

Chamath Palihapitiya 48:01 The other one was Bill Ackman bought a fucking S&P put, sorry, bought an S&P put for $27 million that he sold for $2.6 billion.

David Friedberg 48:09 No, no, no. Yeah. He, he bought, he bought credit default insurance on a whole strip of, uh, of debt.

Chamath Palihapitiya 48:12 Credit default insurance. Yeah.

David Friedberg 48:14 Yeah, yeah.

Chamath Palihapitiya 48:14 But he turned a $27 million-

David Friedberg 48:17 ... insurance instrument into 2.6 billion of returns for his fund, and he still didn't sell his portfolio. In fact, he bought at the bottom. And, I mean, the- the- the- the foresight this guy had going into the down market ahead of March, he saw that the market was gonna tank because of COVID. Um, he made a bet on it. It was a tiny bet for him, but man, to turn 27 million into 2.6 billion in like 60 days or 90 days, unbelievable. A- and then he bought stock in his companies at the bottom. Um, what a gutsy investor. And then I... My third-

Jason Calacanis 48:45 Was there anything... Yeah. Was there anything fugazi on that with where he had gone on CNBC and talked, and he did this whole big, you know...

David Friedberg 48:53 No, no, no. He did, he did...

Jason Calacanis 48:54 He did a longer... Yeah.

David Friedberg 48:55 He did it afterwards, but I think, I think he's, I think he's great. I think he's great.

Jason Calacanis 48:59 Okay.

David Friedberg 48:59 Yeah. I think it was, it was incredible. And my third one, which we don't talk about a lot, is Larry Ellison. Bought a billion dollars of Tesla stock less than two years ago that is now worth over $10 billion (laughs) . And he did-

Jason Calacanis 49:10 Unbelievable.

David Friedberg 49:10 ... it, and he joined the board and, um, you know, you put your money where your mouth is and you take ownership and, um, you know, I don't know much about Larry, but, uh, there was a lot of naysayers about Tesla saying they were bubbly and overvalued at that time, and it was really-

Jason Calacanis 49:25 Tesla Q.

David Friedberg 49:25 Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 49:25 He did it in the middle of the Tesla Q shorting movement, and now he can buy not just Lana'i, but he could probably get Kauai to go with it.

David Friedberg 49:33 Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 49:33 He could buy another island.

David Friedberg 49:34 Anyway-

Jason Calacanis 49:34 Um...

David Friedberg 49:34 ... those were three gutsy bets that I thought were worth highlighting that, that-

Jason Calacanis 49:37 Absolutely.

David Friedberg 49:37 ... just really impressed me. And, and, you know, it's when the markets are down, when you're facing the abyss, when everyone else is telling you you're wrong and you make a big bet like that, um, and it pays off, th- that's the kind of stuff that I think returns are made from and characters built and it, those are, those are just really impressive moves for me that, that stood out.

Jason Calacanis 49:53 All right. Well, so there was a lot of impressive moves this year. The tide went out and came back in real quick.

Jason Calacanis 49:58 Uh, so there were some dumb business moves as well. Sachs, you got a dumb business move that was a highlight for 2020?

David Sacks 50:07 The City of San Francisco biting the hand that feeds it. For years, these politicians have been shitting on the tech community, acting like the tech community was somehow a parasite on San Francisco. Well, you know, now because of COVID-

Jason Calacanis 50:23 Congratulations.

David Sacks 50:24 ... the tech community has the option to leave. You have a lot of people leaving, and there are gigantic budget deficits for the city. The schools have giant, uh, budget deficits. It's not clear how they're gonna close these things, and it's looking th- more and more like it wasn't tech that was a parasite. It was the politicians who are the parasites, and nobody, uh, knows how to fix the City of San Francisco anymore.

Jason Calacanis 50:50 Yeah. Okay. Uh, dumbest business move. Chamath?

David Friedberg 50:58 Um, I think it was-

Jason Calacanis 50:59 It's a tough one.

David Friedberg 51:00 I think it was probably, for me, um, the Governor of California's handling of COVID. Um, well, I guess that's more political than business, but, um...

Jason Calacanis 51:11 Well, no, I mean, it did impact businesses, so I think you're, you're... I'll-

David Friedberg 51:14 I think that-

Jason Calacanis 51:14 I'll allow it. I'll allow it.

David Friedberg 51:16 I think that, I think that what he showed was how naked partisanship was in decision-making that had, that should have been based on science and fact. And the quality of the decision-making just eroded every single decision that he made. And then now, you know, as, as David said, it's kind of like you have this just, just, you know, um, uh, you have this moment where it's like, you know, the Just Eat Cake moment where he's eating (laughs) at French Laundry, and then the day after he's basically shutting the whole world down again. It's, it's very frustrating.

Jason Calacanis 51:49 And...

David Friedberg 51:49 So, so I think that that-

Jason Calacanis 51:50 And he also was shutting down beaches, right? And then, you know, the stay-at-home orders. And not letting people leave their house and go to a beach or eat outdoors, all that does-

David Friedberg 52:00 There was a-

Jason Calacanis 52:00 ... is send them inside. They're gonna have a party inside their house.

David Friedberg 52:03 But there was a great tweet-

Jason Calacanis 52:04 So it's stupid.

David Friedberg 52:05 There's a great tweet that said, um, "You know, I'm not allowed to go to the store. I'm not allowed to go to the shopping center, but I'm gonna take my child on a walk, and if anybody stops me, I'm just gonna tell them I'm taking her to the nail salon." (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 52:18 (laughs)

David Friedberg 52:18 And the reason is because you couldn't walk to the park, but you could, you could go to the nail salon. And so, you know, this tweet was just reminiscent of just how arbitrary and random this stuff was, and it had just so many downstream impacts. So I think that was a huge fail of 2020.

Jason Calacanis 52:32 And nobody loves hypocrisy. I picked my smartest business move was Salesforce buying Slack. Conversely, I'm picking my dumbest business move was Slacksboard selling Slack. This is the stupidest thing I've ever seen. I understand they felt like maybe it was a great deal, but I would have much rather them see, seen them do what, uh, Jeff did at Twilio.

David Friedberg 52:51 I, to be honest with you, to be honest with you, I mean, I left the board, and I just don't know why... I- I wish I could have gotten the call 'cause I would have bought it.

Jason Calacanis 52:58 Yeah. That's interesting.

David Friedberg 52:58 I- I- I agree with you. I think network effects are incredibly unique assets. They're very, very rare. I think we've all been around them. We've worked in them. David has. David, the other David has. I have. Jason, you have. It is the single most incredible moment- momentum driver and, you know, sort of tailwind. And when it exists, you just never give it up. And so I agree with you. I would have bought Slack if I could have, if they would have given me a shot.

Jason Calacanis 53:22 So we ride our winners and you appreciate network effects. If you look at what Jeff Lawson did at Twilio, he started with much less, I think, uh...

David Friedberg 53:33 He started with nothing.

Jason Calacanis 53:34 Started with nothing-

David Friedberg 53:35 Jeff Lawson-

Jason Calacanis 53:36 ... with Twilio.

David Friedberg 53:36 Jeff Lawson is a good example.

Jason Calacanis 53:37 And then he buys SendGrid and Segment.

David Friedberg 53:39 S- oh, incredible.

Jason Calacanis 53:40 Their market cap has gone 12... It was... It's 12X market cap. They went from $29 a share to $365 a year in three years. They're at 60 billion. Slack should have been buying other companies with their equity and they sh- and they should have built and rolled up all of the other HubSpots or whatever else is out there that they could-

David Friedberg 54:03 Well, I think it's-

Jason Calacanis 54:03 ... have forked by Zendesk, whatever.

David Friedberg 54:05 I'm not sure that the M&A strategy was the hard part. I just think that it's... When you're in the bowels of these companies, as we all know, it's super hard, right? So, I mean, I don't think you can fail Stewart, uh, and the team, but I think that...

54:18 ... somewhere along the way, just the realization of how special and unique that network effect was, um-

Jason Calacanis 54:26 Hmm.

David Friedberg 54:27 ... didn't happen because it would have given a different team a level of energy or comfort to kind of really go for the brass ring, as you said, and, um... But, you know, hopefully there'll be able to execute it at Salesforce.

Jason Calacanis 54:39 Okay. Did I get everybody's dumbest business move?

Chamath Palihapitiya 54:42 My dumbest business move was myself. Um...

Jason Calacanis 54:45 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 54:45 So I will take, uh... I will take the Chamath-style investing. Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 54:48 Accepting the award for being a schmuck is Friedberg. (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 54:51 I think for me, me and anyone else that fucking hedged or shorted the market or sold during the dip in March, uh, I learned the most valuable lesson I've learned in my investing career to date. You just wanna invest in whole shares in great businesses and not try and time markets 'cause, um, that's always a loser's game and a fool's errand. Um, and I think, you know, worrying about the market going down or up, as long as you hold shares in great businesses, it doesn't matter. Trading is not for me. It was stupid. Um, and I just feel like a lot of people learned that lesson this year. I've heard a lot of people that kind of freaked out and got out of the market, and then they regretted it and tried to get back in, it was too late, and yada yada, so.

David Friedberg 55:30 I, um, I read a document, um, that someone wrote, um, for me, um, and she wrote this incredible quote that I had never heard from Buffett. And I'll give it to you, Friedberg, 'cause it's re- it's very, uh, apropos of this. Buffett had this statement which is that, you know, um, "It's not about timing the market. It is about time in market." And I just think-

Jason Calacanis 55:54 Wow.

David Friedberg 55:54 ... that's so, that's so beautiful because it's so simple but it's- basically summarizes exactly what you said, which is get in, close your eyes, and if you... if... again, unless for liquidity, you just don't ever sell.

Jason Calacanis 56:08 Yeah. It's a fool's errand to try to time the market. Sit on your hands, ride your winners. Um, and i- and he always said, "Listen, if a business is u-... if I own this business and I love it, and it's at a discount, I should wanna own more of it." I believe that was another Buffett. I don't know the exact quote.

Jason Calacanis 56:25 Uh, let's go to smartest political move and, and we'll go to our token, uh, Republican, David Sacks, for that.

Chamath Palihapitiya 56:31 (laughs)

David Friedberg 56:31 Well, uh, well, it's, it, it's, it's f- yeah. It's funny you identify me that way because, uh, my, my smart- the smartest political move goes to Congressman Jim Clyburn, uh, Democrat of South Carolina, for endorsing Joe Biden just before the South Carolina primary. Uh, a number of people on the Biden campaign were, uh, panicking. They wanted him to do it early because Biden had bombed in Iowa and New Hampshire. And, uh, Clyburn kept his powder dry and endorsed Biden at the absolute perfect time. It caused Biden to win South Carolina and that led him to sweep on Super Tuesday. Jim Clyburn was the kingmaker of 2020. Without him, Joe Biden would not be president.

Jason Calacanis 57:12 Wow. Okay. Who do you got? Friedberg?

Chamath Palihapitiya 57:15 Smartest political move of 2020 was Joe Biden staying quiet, hanging out in his bunker, and letting Trump do his own damage. (laughs) End of story.

David Friedberg 57:24 That's it.

Chamath Palihapitiya 57:24 I feel like, I feel like if, you know, the... Biden knew that it wasn't his election to win, it was Trump's election to lose, and I think he let him go out and lose it. And, um, and that to me was, uh, smart advice and, and smart action. You know, sometimes the best action is inaction.

Jason Calacanis 57:36 So he just checked. He just, he just, he just slow played aces, he hid his set, he just checked, and he watched him fire. Uh, who do you got, Chamath? Smartest political move.

David Friedberg 57:47 Smartest political move which you will not see until 2022 or '23, but laid the groundwork this year and I thought it was brilliantly done was Nikki Haley, who I think will be-

Jason Calacanis 57:59 Hmm.

David Friedberg 57:59 ... the Republican nominee for president in 2024.

Jason Calacanis 58:02 Oh, nice one.

David Friedberg 58:02 And she did a an unbelievable job of tricking Trump to believe that he was her supporter, then getting distribution, and then basically subtly telling everybody that she thought that he was an idiot. And I thought-

Jason Calacanis 58:17 Hmm.

David Friedberg 58:17 ... that she was brilliant in 2020.

Jason Calacanis 58:20 So she didn't look like a rat leaving the ship. She looked like sh- you know, a rebel or something getting off the ship, yeah.

David Friedberg 58:25 I think, I think if you wanna find, um, somebody to consolidate center right politics in 2024, uh, my money would be on Nikki Haley.

Jason Calacanis 58:36 All right. I went with the smartest political move. I also went for the long game. Pete Buttigieg going on Fox recently, I think he did obviously a masterful job. You had that, Sacks, earlier. But he started going on Fox and basically being really spicy with them and supporting the hell out of, um, Biden. And then he gets himself this, uh, Secretary of Transportation, and I think he's set up to either be the VP or the presidential candidate, uh, in the future. And he's go- I think he's gonna be one of the bright stars. I also would... Uh, I think Andrew Yang did nothing happened for him this year really, I don't know. But I, I felt like he, he also is g- and my understanding is he's gonna run for Mayor of New York. That was another amazing political winner in all of this. I don't know if anybody has feelings on either of those.

David Friedberg 59:25 I love, I love Andrew Yang. I think he's, uh, fabulous.

Jason Calacanis 59:29 Uh, he's coming on the pod, I just did-

David Friedberg 59:30 Pragmatic s- pragmatic, centrist, smart, capable, competent. Um, he's great.

Jason Calacanis 59:38 Good listener. And I think-

David Friedberg 59:39 He attracts it. He attracts a plurality of people.

Jason Calacanis 59:41 Temperament. Yeah, temperament-

David Friedberg 59:42 Yeah. And I, and I think he's spoken out against, uh, cancel culture. And so, you know, whenever I see somebody on the left speaking out against cancel culture and censorship, like the way Chamath has, uh, that definitely to me elevates them in my book.

Chamath Palihapitiya 59:58 Are you saying Chamath is someone from the left?

David Friedberg 1:00:00 (laughs) Well, it's amazing how much we agree on, you know.

Jason Calacanis 1:00:03 Well, I mean, I think that there's... you have these left and right definitions which have become very hard to understand. And I think what we have to get back to is the American principled idea of freedoms, uh, and opportunity, right? And, and, and, and I don't think either of the parties actually were s- were representing that properly....

Jason Calacanis 1:00:20 dumbest-

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:00:20 Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 1:00:20 ... political move of the year, I think I know where everybody's gonna go with this, but I would like to know-

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:00:25 (laughs)

David Friedberg 1:00:25 Rudy Giuliani.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:00:26 (laughs)

David Friedberg 1:00:26 Rudy Giuliani's press conference at the sex shop.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:00:29 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:00:29 (laughs)

David Friedberg 1:00:29 I mean-

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:00:30 (laughs)

David Friedberg 1:00:30 ... just, I mean, how amateurish is that group of people?

Jason Calacanis 1:00:35 The Four Seasons, gardening, (laughs) were gonna be at the Four... Were they, were they trolling us and trying to get press for it? I don't understand that one.

David Friedberg 1:00:42 Unbelievable. Unbelievable.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:00:43 So stupid.

Jason Calacanis 1:00:43 So you go with Rudy Giuliani for the dumbest political move. Sachs, what do you got? I have a feeling I know what Sachs got. I, I... Well, I got, I got a tie here, um- Okay. ... between, uh... One was, uh, defund the police, you know, as a political slogan. The whole country, you know, the- the BLM movement had the whole country on its side, uh, after the f- you know, the- the- the George Floyd video came out. Everybody was in favor of sensible reforms to control the use of force by the police and then they, they introduced the slogan of defund the police, and it scared voters across the country into voting for, uh, Republicans in Congress and it, uh, probably cost Joe Biden not the presidency but, uh, Congress. And the- my- my tie, the other half of that was, uh, Donald Trump refusing to, uh, wear a mask or to, uh, endorse masks. Uh, he finally did it, but it was two or three months too late. If he had just gotten on board with masks, it would've been a very easy thing to do, uh, politically, personally. Uh, that could have made the- the margin of difference. He might still be president if he had gotten on board with masks about three months earlier. Friedberg, what was your dumbest political move of the year?

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:01:53 I actually, yeah, I- I put making masks political more broadly. Um, both the left and the right pointing fingers about masks. I mean, this is like a human life issue and, um, you know, uh, kind of shaming the Republicans for not wearing masks and making it about, "We're the right guys, you're the wrong guys." Everyone should have avoided pointing fingers and avoided, um, not doing it because the other side was doing it and it should never, ever have been allowed to become political. It was pure science. It was about saving lives. And I think, uh, both sides are to blame, um, for... You know, the Democrats tried to make the Republicans look bad because they were advocating for masks and they shouldn't have done that, and the Republicans should not have tried to avoid wearing masks because the Democrats were telling them to wear masks and it was just a total cluster. Um, really sad and, you know, could've made a- a big difference for thousands of lives.

Jason Calacanis 1:02:43 Uh, I too put Trump not advocating for masks as my dumbest political move. I believe he nailed the stimulus, that first stimulus where he just dropped the $1,200 checks and the PPP and everything. He obviously nailed, uh, you know, the Operation Lightspeed and the vaccines. He didn't get credit for it. Um, I don't know if that was political or not, that they dropped them the week- the weeks after the election. I think it was. I'm- I'm- I'm a- a little bit cynical about that. But my God, is there nobody that this man would listen to? Um, and they must have all been telling him in unison, "Hey, dipshit, put the mask on. We'll win the election." The... In July and August, the numbers started to go down precipitously and everybody, Fauci, everybody with half a brain was saying, "Second wave is coming, wear a mask." And he refused to take that stance and not only did he do that, he doubled down like the moron he is and started doing rallies. This person is such a complete idiot, grifter and just imbecile that he couldn't see the clear path to victory and he- he was tempting fate and, of course, he winds up getting COVID. I mean, the idiocracy of the moment is just so profound. He absolutely would've sailed into that second term. We were sitting here on this very podcast and we all believed he was gonna sail into the second term when the market started ripping back and the COVID numbers went down. And because of the stupidity of not wearing masks, thank God we got him out. But to the families who lost loved ones, he's a murderer, period. (drum roll) We're

Jason Calacanis 1:04:22 moving on. Best political theater. Besides what I just said.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:04:27 Trump inhaling, Trump inhaling-

Jason Calacanis 1:04:28 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:04:28 ... COVID into his body-

David Friedberg 1:04:30 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:04:30 ... and then taking the polyclonal antibodies to heal himself-

David Friedberg 1:04:33 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:04:33 ... and show the American population that it's just not that bad. It was the best-

David Friedberg 1:04:38 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:04:38 ... stunt, the best act- the best theater I've seen and, um, uh, you know, I- I- I don't know what- what the hell else, uh, could have beaten it this year. I mean, the guy literally-

Jason Calacanis 1:04:47 When he went through a balcony, (laughs) when he went through the balcony and could barely breathe.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:04:52 He stormed out, he buckled himself in, he, you know, buttoned up his jacket, he stared at the lights in his face. He was glowing. He had the antibodies rushing through his body, he was healing his body.

David Friedberg 1:05:01 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:05:01 He was on speed, man. Come on.

David Friedberg 1:05:03 It was, yeah. (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:05:03 It was so incredible.

David Friedberg 1:05:04 I thought the best, I thought the best political theater was when the Democratic leadership did like the Colin Kaepernick one knee in kente cloths at the, in the rotunda of Congress. (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:05:18 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:05:18 Oh, Lord.

David Friedberg 1:05:19 Can somebody, Nick, could you just throw the picture up there? (laughs) I mean, I mean half of them are, half of them are so old they couldn't get down on one knee.

Jason Calacanis 1:05:29 Yeah, who picked them back up? They all hit their life alert.

David Friedberg 1:05:32 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:05:32 They got the life alert, "I've fallen, I can't get up." (laughs) Like 20 life alerts have never gone off in the same room.

David Friedberg 1:05:39 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:05:42 (laughs)

David Friedberg 1:05:42 But the, but the kente cloths were just so over the top. Like you didn't need the kente cloths.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:05:47 They really were kente cloths. (laughs)

David Friedberg 1:05:49 Oh, my Lord.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:05:50 Oh, Lord. So funny.

Jason Calacanis 1:05:51 All right. My best political theater in a... I- I'm crying, I'm laughing so much.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:05:56 Oh. (laughs)

David Friedberg 1:05:57 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:05:57 My best political theater is, um, I- I don't know who this congresswoman is, but I am falling in love with her. Um, her name is Katie Porter.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:06:10 Oh, my God. (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:06:11 She- she takes out a whiteboard... (laughs)

David Friedberg 1:06:14 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:06:14 ... and she just-

David Friedberg 1:06:15 She's fabulous.

Jason Calacanis 1:06:16 ... makes-

David Friedberg 1:06:16 No, she's fabulous.

Jason Calacanis 1:06:16 She's so great.

David Friedberg 1:06:17 She- she owns people with that whiteboard.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:06:20 Oh.

Jason Calacanis 1:06:20 It's the greatest.

David Friedberg 1:06:21 The greatest.

Jason Calacanis 1:06:21 She basically does math, (laughs) and people are just... I mean, and she's done this now two or three times where she just takes people down and she did it to Mnuchin. Like, she was like, "Is today Tuesday?" And he's like-... you know today's Tuesday. She's like, "Can you tell me if today's Tuesday?" (laughs) And she just destroys people. Um, like, I, I, I've just never seen anything like it. Um, and, uh, she's awesome. So best political theater for me. I don't know, uh, David, did we get yours?

David Sacks 1:06:51 Well, um, yeah, I mean, so I thought the, the, the French Laundry photos, you know, the, the... All these politicians, uh, violating their own lockdown policies, uh, was some, was some pretty good thea- uh, theater. You had-

Jason Calacanis 1:07:05 Theater? Theater?

David Sacks 1:07:07 -theater. Yeah. You had, you know, you had-

Jason Calacanis 1:07:08 Theater. (laughs) .

David Sacks 1:07:09 You had, uh, Gavin Newsom and, and, uh, London, uh, brie dining at French Laundry. You had Nancy Pelosi going to that hair salon. Uh, you-

Jason Calacanis 1:07:17 Any Republicans do something like that?

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:07:19 (laughs) .

David Sacks 1:07:19 Well, um, I, I would, I would tell you if I knew of any, but the Republicans-

Jason Calacanis 1:07:23 Trump rallies? Perhaps.

David Sacks 1:07:24 The Republicans, but yeah, but the Republicans haven't been supporting lockdowns, so, um, you know. Look, if there was a Republican who was supporting lockdowns-

Jason Calacanis 1:07:30 How about the Rose Garden, uh, Supreme Court where they s- had a super-spreader event at the White House?

David Sacks 1:07:35 But they weren't... But, but that wasn't political theater because they weren't violating their own policies.

Jason Calacanis 1:07:40 Oh, I see.

David Sacks 1:07:40 They were, they were saying that people could take the risk. Um-

Jason Calacanis 1:07:43 Got it. Okay. Well.

David Sacks 1:07:43 I, I, I'm, I, I'm picking these, um, politicians-

Jason Calacanis 1:07:46 Hypocrites. Yeah.

David Sacks 1:07:46 ... because, because they're hyp- yeah. It's the, it's the hypocrisy.

Jason Calacanis 1:07:49 Yeah. Uh, the one I loved the best out of all the hypocritical politicians was the one who was like, "Please stay..." It was the governor of some place, Colorado or something. And he's like, "Please stay home with your family. Do not travel for Thanksgiving. It's gonna be too dangerous." And then they find out he did that tweet while at a Southwest gate (laughs) going with his family to Thanksgiving. (laughs) And they literally have pictures of him on his phone, and the picture was timed at the timestamp of the tweet, if I have my understanding correct. I forgot the guy's name, uh, but there were so many of these.

David Sacks 1:08:23 Yeah. Well, let me-

Jason Calacanis 1:08:24 Huh?

David Sacks 1:08:24 ... let me give you another one. There was, uh-

Jason Calacanis 1:08:26 Okay.

David Sacks 1:08:26 ... L.A., uh, uh, the L.A. County Supervisor, uh, Sheila Kuehl cast the deciding vote to shut down outdoor dining in Los Angeles, only to be photographed eating at Il F- uh, Fornario in Santa Monica two hours later. So it's just completely hypocritical and, um, you know, this is why there could be a big recall next year in California.

Jason Calacanis 1:08:46 I think we have to put political theater as one category of just loathsome political theater because we're going on to worst political theater. And the stuff we've seen-

David Sacks 1:08:54 (laughs) .

Jason Calacanis 1:08:54 ... has been pretty horrific. I'm going to lead us off with, with my worst political theater, which was the banning of TikTok was absolutely the right thing to do, and then they just handed it off as, like, a gift to Oracle to make money and maybe be their server farm? I don't understand. We were supposed to ban it and get it-

David Sacks 1:09:12 (laughs) .

Jason Calacanis 1:09:12 ... the fuck out of the App Store. And that was just terrible political theater. Anybody else got more political theater that we'll put in our loathsome political theater?

David Sacks 1:09:20 Well, you, uh, J- Jason, just so you, uh, understand that I'm being, uh, politically even-handed, this is where I had Rudy Giuliani and his, uh, tour of self-immolation, uh, from... (laughs) .

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:09:36 (laughs) .

Jason Calacanis 1:09:36 He did melt. He did melt.

David Sacks 1:09:38 Fr- right. From, from the press conference-

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:09:40 (laughs) .

David Sacks 1:09:40 ... in front of the crematorium to the, the, the, the hair dye meltdown, to the...

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:09:46 (laughs) .

Jason Calacanis 1:09:46 (laughs) .

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:09:47 It's just a Borat video.

David Sacks 1:09:48 So, so, so anyway.

Jason Calacanis 1:09:49 All right, we need to... Hold on, hold on. I'm gonna make... I'm gonna call an audible. I'm calling an audible here.

David Sacks 1:09:53 Right.

Jason Calacanis 1:09:53 We're gonna have a new category.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:09:55 To, to, to getting COVID.

Jason Calacanis 1:09:56 Worst Rudy Giu- Giuliani moment.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:09:59 (laughs) .

Jason Calacanis 1:10:00 Because we had a lot of moments. Can we have-

David Sacks 1:10:02 That's...

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:10:02 Can we have the Giuliani award next year?

Jason Calacanis 1:10:03 Yeah. Giuliani award for self-immolation.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:10:05 It's like, what is the most self-destructive... Yeah, right.

David Sacks 1:10:06 (laughs) .

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:10:07 Oh, my God.

Jason Calacanis 1:10:07 Yeah, yeah, the self-immolation award. What is the worst thing, the worst Giuliani moment?

David Sacks 1:10:12 Uh...

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:10:12 Oh, I think, I think the saddest moment was the, uh, in the Borat thing. That was sad because you just felt, you just felt like this is an old, broken man.

Jason Calacanis 1:10:22 Yeah.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:10:23 Um, it was creepy- Definitely. ... and it was just sad.

David Sacks 1:10:25 Yeah.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:10:25 He was, like, desperate and he was creepy, and it was... But the worst, the worst, the-

Jason Calacanis 1:10:28 So the Rudy Giuliani lifetime award.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:10:30 The worst, though, was, was actually if you listen to the testimony when he farted, uh, it was really terrible.

Jason Calacanis 1:10:37 He farted twice?

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:10:38 It was really terrible, actually. If you listen to the testimony, you're just like, "What is this guy saying? It's out of control."

Jason Calacanis 1:10:43 Well, the... Also, I think we have to cut into here, the poor woman sitting next to him-

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:10:48 (laughs) .

Jason Calacanis 1:10:48 ... who's clearly in range.

David Sacks 1:10:50 (laughs) .

Jason Calacanis 1:10:50 Um, I mean, she's in the blast zone.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:10:55 (laughs) .

Jason Calacanis 1:10:55 He, he rips it (laughs) . He rips it.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:10:59 (laughs) .

Jason Calacanis 1:11:00 And she looks him. She gives him side eye, but she is so, like, scared to react to such an obvious carpet bombing-

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:11:12 (laughs) .

Jason Calacanis 1:11:12 ... that she just keeps a straight face, but her eyes go whoop.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:11:16 (laughs) .

Jason Calacanis 1:11:18 It... That was-

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:11:20 It must've been a stinker.

Jason Calacanis 1:11:20 ... unforgivable.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:11:21 Must have been a stinker.

Jason Calacanis 1:11:23 Uh, I mean, it was loud. It had resonance. It, it was... Yeah. Um, but-

David Sacks 1:11:29 Can I, can I, can I give one o- Can I give one other example? And I don't know whether this is best or worst theater. Um, but, um, but the, the, the, the congressional, uh, hearings with the tech CEOs where the-

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:11:41 Yes.

David Sacks 1:11:41 ... the senators grilled all of the tech CEOs. And it was definitely, it was definitely political theater. But on the other hand, they all deserved it.

Jason Calacanis 1:11:50 Yes.

David Sacks 1:11:50 And there's gonna be more of it next year.

Jason Calacanis 1:11:52 Okay, let's do lightning round as we-

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:11:54 I, I put, I put, I put that, I put that one as my, as my worst political theater, because I thought what was so depressing about it was how little the congressional, um, the, the congresspeople actually understood of these businesses. And they went off on rants and, and tirades about, you know, "You're blocking Republican voice on Twitter, and you're doing this." And none of it actually focused on, you know, the, the monopolistic practices that was the intention of the hearing in the first place. When they actually got into those points when they tried to talk about how the ad networks work and how targeting works, they didn't have any clue. And it was really sad-

Jason Calacanis 1:12:25 I mean, the people inside these companies don't even know how it worked, and they built it. I mean, these things are complex.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:12:29 I know. I'll tell you, like, I- I just, I just think it's really sad that, um, that, that folks in Congress, um, honestly, are, are so disconnected from understanding technology and understanding, you know, modern business practices. Um, and they can't actually, you know, tackle the real issues. Um, and it, it, it makes me a little scared.

Jason Calacanis 1:12:45 Well, and neither does the squad.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:12:46 Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 1:12:47 I mean, AOC didn't understand what a tax break was.

David Sacks 1:12:49 Yeah. No clue.

Jason Calacanis 1:12:50 I mean, so even the young ones don't understand stuff. I mean, we just, we're getting the worst pro- possible representation. Okay, now we're gonna-

David Sacks 1:12:56 Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 1:12:56 ... go to lightning round with our

Jason Calacanis 1:12:57 final two categories. Uh, best meme. Uh, for me, it was the funeral dancers, uh, followed up by Michael Jordan. I took that personally. And I, of course, loved Chamath's mix-up that one of you maniac All In Army members made. Uh, who do you got for... What, what got best memes? Any got a best meme?

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:13:15 Tuban.

Jason Calacanis 1:13:17 Oh.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:13:17 Tuban. Tuban.

Jason Calacanis 1:13:18 Tuban. Yeah, that- that's it.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:13:20 For- forever a cautionary tale about what not to do on a Zoom call. (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:13:24 Yes.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:13:25 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:13:25 Yes, that would be... Okay, arguably in political theater? Let's say no.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:13:31 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:13:31 Uh, anybody else got a meme? (laughs) Best or worst?

David Friedberg 1:13:36 I like the funeral dancers, but, uh-

Jason Calacanis 1:13:38 Funeral dancers are pretty great.

David Friedberg 1:13:39 Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 1:13:39 David, anything for you? Sorry, I just-

David Friedberg 1:13:43 I just want to say to everybody that's listening, I really hope that you guys have an incredible holiday and, um, uh, we can put this year behind us. And I hope for all of you guys that have gone through hard times, just know that, um, you know, hopefully you got some friends to talk to and family to see and talk to. And we love you and we really appreciate-

Jason Calacanis 1:14:05 We love you guys too.

David Friedberg 1:14:05 ... that you take the time to listen. And guys, I just want to say to you guys, I love you guys with all my heart. Thank you for helping me get through a very difficult year.

Jason Calacanis 1:14:13 Uh, back at you. And, uh, I was very touched by the, uh, birthday present you sent me last week. That was just, uh, neat.

David Friedberg 1:14:18 Oh, you wanna tell them what- what you got? You wanna tell them what you got, big boy?

Jason Calacanis 1:14:21 I mean, listen, I- I don't wanna... Chemoth, I- I- I get a big crate at the house. It was... I was born in 1970 and he got some of the best wines from 1970 and put them in a box. And, you know, I- I literally had to put them on a shelf and say, "Do not drink these." These things cost as much as the Teslas and the driveways. I mean, some of these bottles are ridiculous. And, uh, I hope to crack them all open with you guys at the house in-

David Friedberg 1:14:50 Happy-

Jason Calacanis 1:14:50 ... 2021.

David Friedberg 1:14:50 Honestly, happy- happy 50th birthday, big boy. It's a big, big milestone.

Jason Calacanis 1:14:54 Thanks. Yeah. Well, you know, it was- it was a little bittersweet, obviously. You know, I was going to have some kind of party or anything like that. And then what made it particularly hard and challenging was my birthday was on Saturday and my friend Tony Hsieh died on Friday, uh, on that day. And I had been dealing with Tony Hsieh being in a coma for the five, for the... no, for ten days before that. And then I found out that- that afternoon that they, uh, tragically had to pull the plug, um, or I assume that's what happened. I- I shouldn't say that. I don't- I don't want to speak out of, uh, turn, but, uh, this has been a shitty year. And I really hope, uh, that anybody out there who is suffering from mental illness, uh, or struggling in any way, call a friend. And I think the reason this podcast, uh, has resonated with so many people, and I hear this from people when they listen to the pod, is our friendship. And they- and they- they- they hear us