Trump's Big Week: Middle East Trip, China Deal, Pharma EO, "Big, Beautiful Bill" with Ben Shapiro

Jason Calacanis 0:00 All right, everybody. Today on the All-In Podcast, we're joined by our friend Ben Shapiro, and we have a full docket, including Trump's trip to the Middle East, the executive order on pharma benefits. We talk a little bit about mock meat being banned in Montana, and Friedberg is really upset. He drops a disgraciada on the tax bill being supported by Republicans. All that and more on the number one podcast in the world, the All-In Podcast. Stick with us.

Chamath Palihapitiya 0:31 One thing I'm trying to figure out. Do Daily Mail stories actually end? Because-

Jason Calacanis 0:36 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 0:36 ... I've scrolled up, like, seven times-

Jason Calacanis 0:38 No, no, no.

Chamath Palihapitiya 0:39 ... and then eight times-

Jason Calacanis 0:40 The Daily Mail-

Chamath Palihapitiya 0:40 They never end.

Jason Calacanis 0:41 Those guys are like the methamphetamine of clicks. It's like click, crack.

Chamath Palihapitiya 0:45 Yeah, they're like, "One more paragraph."

Jason Calacanis 0:47 Every time I see a Daily Mail article, I'm like, "Okay, do I have 15 minutes here?" Because I'm gonna-

Chamath Palihapitiya 0:51 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 0:51 ... click on one, I'm gonna look at the photos-

Chamath Palihapitiya 0:53 Absolutely.

Jason Calacanis 0:53 ... then I'm gonna go to the right rail. I'm gonna click on-

Chamath Palihapitiya 0:55 Oh, you're on the right rail.

Jason Calacanis 0:55 ... nine other articles.

Chamath Palihapitiya 0:56 See, that's disgraciada.

Jason Calacanis 0:57 Yeah.

Chamath Palihapitiya 0:57 When you go on the right rail, you're a true degenerate.

Jason Calacanis 1:00 Oh, I love it. Yeah.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:00 Stay off the right rail of The Daily Mail. (laughs)

David Sacks 1:01 That'll keep you on the carousel for hours.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:04 Oh my God.

David Sacks 1:05 They call it the carousel.

Ben Shapiro 1:06 My favorite Daily Mail story. One time that Jared and Ivanka were, were over at our house and the paparazzi were, were following them around. They were like, "Can you give us a tour of the area?" So we drove them outside for a hot second, and the paparazzi immediately captured a picture of them on the back of our golf cart, because we're in Florida, and me and my son in the front. And the Daily Mail, it was the Daily Mail paparazzi, and so the headline was, "Jared, Ivanka, Unnamed Driver, and Small Boy."

Jason Calacanis 1:29 (laughs)

David Sacks 1:31 Nick, Nick 5-

Jason Calacanis 1:32 I'm trying to find that picture immediately. (laughs)

David Sacks 1:34 And cut it in.

Narrator 1:36 Going all in. Let your winners ride.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:41 Rain Man David-Sa...

Narrator 1:44 Going all in.

David Sacks 1:45 And I said- We open source it to the fans and they've just gone crazy with it.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:49 Love you, Betsy.

Narrator 1:50 Queen of quinoa. Going all in.

Jason Calacanis 1:53 If you want to come to our next event, it's the All-In Summit in Los Angeles. Fourth year for All-In Summit. Go to allin.com/events to apply. Hold on one second. Let me do the intro properly.

David Sacks 2:05 (laughs) Yes.

Chamath Palihapitiya 2:06 Now I have to do an apology.

David Sacks 2:07 Ben, this is gonna be so good right now. You're gonna feel so uncomfortable. It's gonna be amazing. Go ahead.

Jason Calacanis 2:11 It's gonna be great.

Chamath Palihapitiya 2:12 Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 2:12 So, look, Ben has a hard out in an hour and 40 minutes, so we're gonna get the show started. However, Ben, I, we need to take a pause. Jason will explain what happened last week.

David Sacks 2:20 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 2:20 He is gonna issue a formal apology. If that formal apology is not good enough, I will step in.

David Sacks 2:26 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 2:26 Over to you, Jason.

Chamath Palihapitiya 2:27 Okay. (sighs) Now, we the members of the-

David Sacks 2:31 (laughs) He's so uncomfortable.

Chamath Palihapitiya 2:31 ... All-In Podcast, including Chamath Palihapitiya and myself, Jason Calacanis, would like to formally and respectfully apologize to poker legend Phil Hellmuth for our previous comments about his relationship with Hollywood actor Timothee Chalamet and the Los Angeles celebrity community more generally. On a previous episode of this podcast, a number of inaccurate, potentially illegally actionable statements were made by the host regarding Mr. Hellmuth. It was strongly implied on this program that Mr. Hellmuth was not acquainted with Mr. Chalamet, and it was further suggested that he had harassed and manhandled the Oscar-nominated performer during a social event in Miami, Florida. This was a flagrant misrepresentation of the facts, for which we are sorry. We here at All-In are committed to journalistic responsibility and integrity, and we hope to use this time to correct the record. In fact, as a noted bon vivant and publicly visible representative of the gaming community, Mr. Hellmuth is acquainted with many celebrities from the worlds of film, television, athletics, business modeling, finance, and beyond. The list of celeb- celebrity friends is far too vast to list here in its entirety-

David Sacks 3:31 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 3:31 ... but we have prepared this section we feel demonstrates how his overwhelming popularity among this demographic. Matt Damon, Steve Martin-

David Sacks 3:42 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 3:42 ... Charles Barkley, Bill Clinton, Khloe Kardashian, Mr. Beast, the guy from Billions, Tiger Woods, Mario Lopez, Drake, and of course, Jay-Z. Once again, we here at All-In regret the error, we should publicly apologize to Mr. Hellmuth and recommit ourselves to truth and accuracy in reporting. Thank you.

Jason Calacanis 3:58 Jason, that was great. I would just like to add a couple things.

David Sacks 4:02 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 4:03 Phil is my best friend, has been for a very long time. I love him. He does have a lot of friends and he opens his Rolodex to us. And so, to the extent that Phil was hurt, 'cause he was a little bit hurt last week-

Chamath Palihapitiya 4:17 Mm-hmm.

Jason Calacanis 4:17 ... um, 'cause we were ribbing him. We rib him a lot. We make jokes in the group chat a lot, but it's because we enjoy it. He enjoys it, but I think-

Chamath Palihapitiya 4:26 Yes.

Jason Calacanis 4:26 ... the way that we said it really hurt his feelings. So, Philly, I love you. We love you.

David Sacks 4:30 We love you, Phil. We're sorry.

Jason Calacanis 4:31 Sorry, Filipino.

Chamath Palihapitiya 4:32 And I'm sorry specifically-

David Sacks 4:33 Sorry, bro.

Chamath Palihapitiya 4:33 ... I'm sorry because, to be honest, I probably started the whole thing and got everybody... Yeah. We, we just try and have fun with you, Phil. Sorry. We love you.

David Sacks 4:42 I'm sorry I called you a panda eating, eating bamboo.

Jason Calacanis 4:45 And I did not mean to say that you put your meat hooks into Timothee Chalamet.

Chamath Palihapitiya 4:50 And I didn't mean to say that you took credit for and, you know, didn't have a major contribution to the All-In Podcast, obviously.

Jason Calacanis 4:58 But Phil-

Chamath Palihapitiya 4:58 As executive-

Jason Calacanis 4:58 ... honestly, you're, you're the best. You, you've-

David Sacks 4:59 You are.

Jason Calacanis 5:00 ... been really instrumental in a lot of these important relationships that have joined our group, so thank you and-

David Sacks 5:05 Mm-hmm.

Jason Calacanis 5:05 ... we love you and let's keep going, okay?

Chamath Palihapitiya 5:08 Yes, absolutely. And we wish you well in the World Series of Poker.

Jason Calacanis 5:11 Go get 'em.

Chamath Palihapitiya 5:12 Hope you hit your-

Jason Calacanis 5:13 Go get 'em, world's greatest.

Chamath Palihapitiya 5:14 ... 18th, 17th, 18th, 19th, who knows what it is-

David Sacks 5:16 Isn't he, isn't he not playing-

Chamath Palihapitiya 5:16 ... I know on getting-

David Sacks 5:16 He's not playing this year. Isn't he, isn't he skipping a year?

Chamath Palihapitiya 5:19 He's not playing in the main event.

Jason Calacanis 5:20 No, he's not playing the main. He's not playing the main because-

David Sacks 5:22 Probably the main.

Jason Calacanis 5:22 ... the WSOPs are ridiculous in how they set up these tournaments. It's stupid. We will-

David Sacks 5:27 You guys-

Jason Calacanis 5:27 ... do a better version, by the way, of the WSOP to announce this. We will be doing an event during the F1 in Las Vegas where we will be launching our poker tournaments.

Chamath Palihapitiya 5:39 Ooh.

Jason Calacanis 5:39 So for those-

Chamath Palihapitiya 5:40 Yum, yum.

Jason Calacanis 5:40 ... of you who would like to have some quality, high-class poker tournaments and some ridiculous cash games-

Chamath Palihapitiya 5:46 Oh, oh.

Jason Calacanis 5:47 ... let us know. Late November, guys. Book it. Make sure you got five, six days where you can pretend you have COVID (laughs) and get out of your job-

Chamath Palihapitiya 5:56 Yes.

Jason Calacanis 5:56 ... and come to Las Vegas.

Chamath Palihapitiya 5:57 What about you, Ben? Do you like to, uh, gamble? You, you ever play the horses, the ponies?

Ben Shapiro 6:01 I can't say that I've been big on the gambling.

Chamath Palihapitiya 6:03 Huh.

Ben Shapiro 6:03 It hasn't worked out well for me. I, I have a, I have-... an, an addiction. So-

Chamath Palihapitiya 6:07 Got it.

Ben Shapiro 6:07 ... I, I wouldn't want that to get out of control, you know?

Chamath Palihapitiya 6:09 All right. Well, we'll, uh... We will absolutely take advantage of your addiction and invite you to-

David Friedberg 6:13 Oh, Ben, have you ever, have you ever rolled the dice? Have you ever rolled dice? No?

Ben Shapiro 6:16 Hmm?

David Friedberg 6:17 Uh, n- I've never rolled dice, no.

Chamath Palihapitiya 6:18 Okay, so this is perfect.

Ben Shapiro 6:19 No.

Chamath Palihapitiya 6:19 We have to take-

Ben Shapiro 6:20 (clears throat)

Chamath Palihapitiya 6:20 Okay, Ben, we're... You're coming to our All-In event in Vegas, and I'll tell you why.

Ben Shapiro 6:24 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 6:26 You... We'll do something on stage. But more importantly for me-

David Friedberg 6:28 He's called The Dictator for a reason, Ben. Go ahead.

Chamath Palihapitiya 6:30 More importantly for me, there is an incredible rule in craps where when you have a virgin shooter-

Ben Shapiro 6:37 Virgin shooter.

Chamath Palihapitiya 6:37 ... somebody who's never touched the dice- Absolutely.

Ben Shapiro 6:40 I don't know what it is, but you are the people that go off where you can make millions.

Chamath Palihapitiya 6:47 Yes.

Ben Shapiro 6:48 I have seen this 20 times in my gambling life in Las Vegas. I remember I took my father-in-law... I took my father-in-law and my kids while my wife was pregnant. She was like, "Get out of the house." (laughs) So my father-in-law and I took our... the three older kids to Vegas. He had never shot dice before. He touched the dice, broke the casino.

Chamath Palihapitiya 7:05 Wow.

Ben Shapiro 7:06 It, it is the most fun game, Ben, I'm telling you. So you need to come November 22nd. We'll make the arrangements. We'll make sure you get out there. You'll have a really great time. You'll do something with us on stage and-

Chamath Palihapitiya 7:16 And?

Ben Shapiro 7:17 ... Ben is gonna touch those little dice-

Chamath Palihapitiya 7:20 Hmm.

Ben Shapiro 7:20 ... and he's gonna break the win, and I'm gonna be there to finance it. (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 7:24 Absolutely. You are gonna get such great parenting and husbanding advice from Chamath, Ben.

David Friedberg 7:30 (laughs)

Ben Shapiro 7:30 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 7:30 All of this dedication you have to your family, we're gonna teach you a new approach which is to just fuck off to Vegas and, yeah, take your kids and your father-in-law and leave your pregnant wife at home. She's, she's got work to do. All right, everybody, welcome back to the All-In Podcast. Really excited to have Ben Shapiro back on the program. Yeah, listen to the Ben Shapiro Show, you know, by Daily Wire. And, uh, Ben, you've been covering this Trump Middle East trip, uh, all week, so let's get into that as our first topic here.

Chamath Palihapitiya 7:58 As everybody knows, Trump was in the Middle East. He secured a huge investment from the Saudis, $600 billion, $140 billion for a defense partnership, and MBS said he wants to make it a trillion. Bunch of high-profile CEOs joined Trump, including friends of the show, Elon and, of course, uh, Darrah from Uber, Andy Jassy from Amazon. Who else was there? Alex Karp, Jensen, tons of people, including our, uh, fourth bestie here, David Sacks was there. He also closed a $200 billion deal with Qatar, or Qatár, which includes $96 billion from Boeing to send 160 planes there with an option of 50 more, and he removed sanctions against Syria, a little controversial, we'll get into that, to, quote, "give them a chance at greatness." He gave a speech at a Saudi-US investment forum in Riyadh where he powerfully outlined his vision for a new Middle East, basically rejecting 20 years of American interventions and forever wars, and, uh, he gave big credit to a, quote, "new generation of leaders," including MBS, for building better societies. Ben, what do you think here? What was your take on the trip? Is this the best Trump? Of all the versions of Trump, this did seem to me to be the best version. He seems really comfortable with this category of leader in this region in particular. What were your thoughts?

Ben Shapiro 9:24 Oh, for sure. I mean, there's no question about that, right? I mean, he likes MBS. Uh, he obviously likes the, the Emir of Qatar. Uh, he likes the, the folks in, in UAE. Uh, they... We've known that for a while, and he's, he's really signaling a, a shift away from the Obama-Biden policy toward a lot of these places, where Biden liked to say the word democracy and then immediately divide off from Saudi Arabia on the basis of that and chide MBS and all this kind of stuff and then try to cut a deal with Iran, for example, at the same exact time, which of course pisses off the Saudis. Yeah, Trump is going over there, and he's in deal-making mode, and you can see he's in deal-making mode. And his entire sort of approach to the Middle East is what he said in the speech, commerce above chaos, right? Let's do some business here. And he understands that there are a lot of people in KSA, uh, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and, and also in Qatar, UAE as well who are really looking to do business, and I think there are a bunch of strategic aspects of this that are really good. One of them obviously is driving these places away from China. And the more business ties you have with places like Saudi Arabia or Bahrain, UAE, Qatar, the, the further away they're going to get from China. I think you do have to be careful with Qatar in particular which has some divided priorities, shall we say. When it comes to terrorism, obviously, Qatar... The, the case they will make to sort of steel man what, what Qatar says about itself is that they have to have good relations with terrorists so that the West can talk with the terrorists on occasion. Uh, to, to not steel man the case, they gave $2 billion to Hamas over the course (laughs) of the last several years and have funded the American university systems to the tune of $6.3 billion. For a country that has a grand total of 2.6 million citizens, it's smaller than the state of Connecticut in terms of its citizenship. It spends something like two-thirds what China spends on lobbying, which seems, you know, pretty weird. But with that said, the idea of bringing dollars into the United States, combining on things like AI, so what David Sacks has been working on over there, like that stuff is all really, really good. The other warning that I'd issue to, to President Trump is just make sure that, that you have strings attached too, meaning clearly there are strings attached from the other side when you're talking about Qatar, so also the United States should have strings attached. So you mentioned Syria there. If you're talking about, you know, getting rid of the sanctions on Syria, there's an argument to be made. Obviously, Erdoğan in, in Turkey would love that because basically the, the, the leader of, of Syria now, uh, al-Juhlani, he changed his name. He's kind of like the, the prince of terrorists, right? He... Like, he- he's the artist formerly known as al-Juhlani, now he's Al-Sharaa, I think he changed his name to. He was Al-Qaeda, then he was ISIS, then he's HDS. He basically works for the Turks. And so obviously the Turks would love for al-Juhlani to have sanctions removed. That's fine. I mean, I think there's a case to be made for it, but you have to make sure that he actually delivers on the other end of that, which would be getting rid of the terrorists in his country.

Chamath Palihapitiya 11:50 What do you think, Ben, about Qatar, Qatar... Uh, for people it's, it's the same word, just said differently here in the West, uh, and in their country. Um, do you think we should have deep ties to them, and is the steel man argument that their relationship with Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood acceptable to you, Ben Shapiro, or do you think-We should hold the line with them and say, "Hey, you got to cut off these relationships if you want to have a relationship with the United States."

Ben Shapiro 12:17 I mean, it seems to me that we have a lot more leverage in, in the latter situation. And, and Qatar has obviously been paying some $8 billion to have this airbase on its own territory, but then puts restrictions on how the United States can use that sort of airbase. That airbase was previously located in Saudi.

Chamath Palihapitiya 12:33 Mm-hmm.

Ben Shapiro 12:33 And, and so, uh, you know, it's, it's my perspective that after October 7th, for example, the United States, under Joe Biden, should have gone to Qatar, which, which obviously has a deep relationship with Hamas, as proven by the release of that American hostage while President Trump was in the Middle East, which was done at the behest of Qatar, that, that probably the United States should have gone to Qatar and said, "Listen, the airbase goes away unless all the hostages come out and the Hamas leadership goes into exile, and you avoid the entire war." So, the- there is leverage that can be exerted. Uh, I'm, I'm not sure that the leverage is being properly exerted on Qatar. Let's put it this way. I'm much more enthusiastic about the ties that President Trump is fostering with Saudi and UAE than I am the ties that he's fostering with Qatar.

Chamath Palihapitiya 13:10 All right.

Ben Shapiro 13:10 I mean, back in 2017, there was nearly a war between Saudi and UAE and Qatar.

Chamath Palihapitiya 13:14 Yeah.

Ben Shapiro 13:14 I mean, that's how bad the relations were back in 2017. And President Trump was on the Saudi-UAE side of that. So, you know, moving, yeah, let, let, let's just say trust but verify, I think, would be a much better strategy than just trust. Here's some stuff. We'll hope that you, you give us back on the back end.

Chamath Palihapitiya 13:29 Chamath, let's go to the business side here. Uh, Trump making a lot of deals. A little bit of a brouhaha over a $400 million plane given to Trump. Uh, I'm not sure how relevant that is, or if he's even accepted it personally, and, and I'm sure you've, you've got some thoughts on that. But what did we see there? I, I saw Sandeep, our friend, uh, from Grok, one of your investments was there. We're seeing a level of investment and collaboration between Saudi, UAE, and America, and the West that, hey, let's face it, we haven't ever seen. And they do seem to be leaning more towards, I won't say democracy, but a lot of social reforms, and, uh, a lot of women, uh, w- was pointed out by David Sacks, uh, in the business community there. I've, I've made a couple trips there. It seems to have changed on a human rights basis more in the last three or four years than in the last, I guess, 20. So, what's your take generally on this position Ben has of, "Hey, better they be doing business with us, and let's build and foster these relationships, as opposed to have them fall into the arms of Russia, North Korea, or China"?

Jason Calacanis 14:31 Let's just go do a little cleanup on a couple of these things, and I'll give you my take.

Chamath Palihapitiya 14:36 Sure.

Jason Calacanis 14:36 First thing is, we announced almost $2 billion deal, 1.7, I think, was, is what it was, for-

Chamath Palihapitiya 14:42 This is Grok did a deal.

Jason Calacanis 14:44 For... Yeah, yeah, for AI inference. We're starting to build some enormous data centers in Saudi. I'll get to why Saudi is a critical place to do that. But they've been exceptional partners. We are the only inference company in the world with an export license from the United States to do this. So yeah, it was great. That's why Sunny was there, and Jonathan Ross, our founder and CEO. So that was, that was really big for us. This has been company that Jonathan and I got off the ground 10 years ago. It's been a long, long slog. So yeah, there's a lot of commercial activity that happened there. Our friend, Brian Uko, who was just announced as the head of the commercial plane development group at Boeing, who's making all the next-generation planes, Boeing was there. Kelly Ortberg, they announced a $160 billion deal for Boeings, and a bunch of other stuff. Elon announced that Saudi allows Starlink now for maritime and aircraft usage. He also announced robo-taxis are coming to Saudi. So, the business community, I think, was quite central to this trip, which is cool. With respect to the plane, just to do some cleanup, this is a gift that is being handled between the Department of Defense and the Department of Defense of Qatar. If and when that plane does get transferred over, it will then be scanned and retrofitted to military-grade spec that then can be used by the then-sitting president of the United States. And while people want to be up in arms, just to be clear, this has happened, and Qatar specifically has done this multiple other occasions. You may dispute the countries, you may not like the fact that it's happened, but they've, they've given a plane as a gift to the leader of Iraq, to the then-sitting leader of Turkey, to the then-sitting leader, I believe, of Yemen. So, there are customs, I guess. And again, who am I to judge these customs? But that s- to us may seem excessive or untoward, or maybe an attempt at graft. But to them, it's just actually a sign of deep respect or relationship-building. I think that we should not over-judge this thing and let the DoD do their job, and it's a gift to the United States of America and move on. I don't think it's a particularly big deal. What is the big deal? Here is what Trump did that I think is historic. I think the most important thing to recognize is that we, America, has been a global hegemon since World War II. But I think that what we did was we took our eye off the ball, and over the last 20 years, and particularly the last 17, we have seen China slowly erode our global influence through an initiative that they, frankly, were very open and honest about and branded called Belt and Road. And in Belt and Road 1.0, what China did was use the balance sheet of China to invest incredibly aggressively and thoughtfully in all these critical geographies of the world, Southeast Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. Specifically in the Middle East, and specifically between Saudi and Qatar, China, I think, has invested about $200 billion over the last 15 years. What does that do? It allows them to exert influence and economic cooperation, hard power and soft power, right?In one week, the sitting president of the United States announced $2 trillion of investment from those countries into the United States. What does that effectively do? I think what that effectively does is say that the Middle East is turning a page, that they are beyond these regional conflicts, that they wanna thrive as a society, and that they are 100% aligned with the United States. How do you know that? Because I don't think that there's another $2 trillion of deals to be done with any other country other than America. That's number one. And then number two, the reciprocation of how American companies are investing in that region is to the tune of several hundred billion dollars. Now, why is that region critical? It's critical for two things. The first is that when you draw 1,000-mile radius around Saudi Arabia, you touch four billion human beings. Four. Half the global population is within a 1,000-mile radius of Saudi. And so if you can establish cooperation and strategic alignment with that area, it is an incredibly important thing to do. The Saudi coastline, as an example, is thousands and thousands of miles. These are all these huge strategic things that we've known in the context of other conflicts and other geopolitical things that we've done for decades, but what Trump basically did was clean the slate. He wiped the floor with all this neocon establishment nonsense. That's what his speech did, which we can talk about in a second, but he created and forged an economic alliance that I think is going to be very difficult for any other country to undo. That is what I saw. $2 trillion. That is an enormous bet for a country to make on, with another country, and I think the fact that he did that with Saudi and Qatar and UAE speaks a lot to a really important strategy.

Chamath Palihapitiya 20:20 Freeberg, your thoughts on this trip and the growing and deepening relationship between UAE, Saudi, and the United States, and apparently Qatar as well?

David Friedberg 20:32 I think the biggest moment was the speech that Trump gave. It underscored, I think, a really important narrative shift for me. This was a powerful embrace of Saudi, Qatar, of their choices, their way of life, their way of being, basically showing, I would say, respect to those peoples without judgment, which I think is quite different from leadership of the past. I'll just highlight, the mainstream media narrative is, "Oh my gosh, Trump goes to Russia, Trump goes to China, he goes to North Korea, he goes to Saudi. He embraces dictators." So the narrative has been that these individuals in leadership positions in these countries are dictators, and Trump embraces dictators. He loves Xi, he loves Putin, he loves Kim Jong-un, he loves MBS. That's a bad thing because the liberal view, and I would say largely the American view in the past, has been that there's right and there's wrong. There's our way of governing, and then there's the other way of governing, and the other way of governing is always wrong, that our form of American democracy is the only model that is right, and all the others have to be wrong. And fundamentally, that's a colonial mindset is what he's highlighting in this speech. He's saying that the point of view that all others are wrong means that they should come a- around to our point of view, our model of democracy, our model of governing. And in the speech, he basically underscored that that's not really the case anymore. We are no longer going to be colonizers where we are going to enforce our view of government on the rest of the world and say, "This is the only good path," but there are other paths and we can respect them. We can work together so long as we aren't harming one another, so long as terrorism goes away, which he underscored in his speech has gone away. And by the way, I'm not trying to highlight or kind of prop Trump up for the speech itself, but I, I, I do think that this underscores a shift in the political viewpoint that has now come to power in America that, you know, we are no longer gonna have this kind of moral or sociopolitical framework that says it's our way or the highway, but we are now going to go to folks like Xi, like North Korea, like China and say, "We can respect your way of living, we can respect your way of governing, and we can have partnership and continue to build a world together without saying that if you don't follow our path, we're never gonna be true partners." So for me, the biggest thing that came out of this whole visit was that shift in narrative that I think really is different than what we've seen in the past and it counters a lot of how the mainstream media has kind of, you know, framed his, quote, "embrace" of, you know, differing ways of governance.

Chamath Palihapitiya 23:18 Ben, this was obviously a Republican position as well. You know, just we're going to have a hard line on human rights and democracy, and in fact, the entire Republican position in terms of... and globalists, Clinton too, was, "Hey, let's embrace China and we will lean them towards democracy." That obviously didn't happen. They did build a vibrant economy and took 400, 500 million people out of poverty into a middle class, but here we're seeing something different. You know, I've, I've spent a lot of time in the region, maybe four or five trips in the last couple years. Last couple times I was there, women doing business, dancing, music, and now there's alcohol in the kingdom in some select locations. There's a casino coming to UAE. We're actually seeing maybe this strategy of less judgment, more engagement actually result in more modernization. So what's your take on this?

Ben Shapiro 24:13 I mean, I think that one, one of the things that's happened in the media coverage of President Trump's speech is, is this sort of false binary that isn't really what's going on. So it was sort of posited as...... neoconism versus isolationism, and he mentioned both of those sorts of concepts in, in his speech. But the reality is that I think we should be careful about how we define these terms. What we really mean is that Wilsonian interventionism has been completely rejected by the American people and by President Trump.

Chamath Palihapitiya 24:36 Hundred percent.

Ben Shapiro 24:36 And President Trump is, is saying that we are not gonna go into these... Like to pretend that President Trump is being isolationist is obviously not true. I mean, he's literally cutting trillion-dollar deals with foreign countries and traveling there and making common bonds with them. It's the opposite of isolationism in a lot of ways. It's a realism, right? He's a foreign policy realist who wants to make deals where he can make deals, and he wants to make the best deal for America.

Chamath Palihapitiya 24:56 Y- You're correct. It's the exact opposite of isolation if they're doing projects, you know, in the Trump family and the plane. Th- this is the opposite of isolationism. (laughs)

Ben Shapiro 25:04 Right, exactly. And so I think that-

Chamath Palihapitiya 25:05 Yeah.

Ben Shapiro 25:05 ... that all the debates that are currently happening within sort of the Republican ecosystem are sort of which version of realism are we pursuing, right? There, there's a more hawkish version of realism that suggests that you oughta be more skeptical. I mean, I think that's where I am of, of, you know, what you want from these countries in addition to the money. And then there's a sort of more dovish realism that says, you know, basically as long as the deals go forward, maybe no strings attached. And that's a, that's an interesting debate and, and it depends on sort of what levels of trust you have in various countries. And again, I think it differs country to country in terms of what they're asking of you.

Chamath Palihapitiya 25:32 How would you measure success?

Jason Calacanis 25:33 And Ben, I wanna ... Ben, I wanna build on what you're saying and just ask a question because I f- I completely agree that, that that rejection has all of these downstream consequences. The most interesting consequence for me, but I would just like your opinion on this, is Trump goes there, cuts all these deals, announces all of it. There's just an incredible show of force, frankly, right? Economic force and political alignment. And then within one or two days, Iran caves. Now we don't know what the final contours of that deal are gonna look like, but that also has incredibly important implications to the safety and security not just of that region, but for everybody. I don't know what you thought about just how quickly it seemed-

Ben Shapiro 26:10 Yeah, I mean again, it kind-

Jason Calacanis 26:11 ... that there was a capitulation there.

Ben Shapiro 26:12 Y- you know, so I, th- this is where, again, I remain pretty skeptical. I, I think that, that one of the issues that we have when it comes to negotiations with Iran, the, the sort of phrase that's been used by Saudi, Israel, UAE with regard to Iran is that Iran has never won a war or lost a piece. Uh, so Iran is very good at negotiation. Uh, they're, they're quite sophisticated in how these, they approach these issues. And when President Trump says they can't have a nuclear weapon, that's all we need to know. All the rest is details. But actually when it comes to things like negotiating a nuclear deal, the devil is the details because is it going to be JCPOA Part Two, which is basically you can enrich to civilian levels with a certain level of transparency, but also you get money and the money can be used for terrorism or for ballistic missile development or rebuilding your air defenses. And what, what do those details actually look like? And, and, you know, obviously Qatar is very, very close with the, with the Islamic Republic of Iran. And, and so they, uh, they've been negotiating again as sort of a representative of Iran in, in those negotiations. And so I'm gonna hold off. Let's just say I'll, I'll be, I'll be, I'll be-

Jason Calacanis 27:07 Yeah.

Ben Shapiro 27:08 ... skeptical until ... Right.

Jason Calacanis 27:09 I mean I, I agree with you. They need to be in the penalty box for some number of years because th- they have not earned the trust of the world in that they, that they can conform to these things and they're not gonna do nefarious things once they get access to capital and funds. So to your point-

Ben Shapiro 27:20 Right. And so I think they have-

Jason Calacanis 27:21 ... they have to earn their way out, for sure.

Ben Shapiro 27:22 Tha- that's right, and I think th- when, when you look at Saudi Arabia, I think that one of the things that, that would, would be interesting to see is President Trump said in his speech in Saudi Arabia that he would, he would consider it an honor if they would join the Abraham Accords, right? His single accomplishment, obviously, during his first administration was the Abraham Accords, the, the, the notion that he, again, continued to press forward, that commerce matters more than sort of ideological conflict, right? That's why UAE and Israel, for example, now have a pretty solid relationship that's withstood a lot of the, the, the stressors that have been created by October 7th and the, and the ensuing war. Uh, the, the question of whether Saudi actually does that is an interesting one because if you're looking for a, a, a new region in which commerce really does take the fore, then obviously, UAE, Saudi, they're, they're very close. I mean, th- essentially, UAE is a, almost a client state.

Jason Calacanis 28:06 Th- there's no, there's no, I don't think there's any-

Ben Shapiro 28:06 There's no distinction.

Jason Calacanis 28:07 There's no, there's no-

Ben Shapiro 28:08 There's no distinction.

Jason Calacanis 28:08 There's no better place, I think, in the world right now if you're trying to find a, a net new place to put capital to work than the UAE and then Saudi.

Ben Shapiro 28:15 Yeah, no, I mean, I, I agree with that and I think that, that, you know, obviously integrating the region across religious boundaries would be a very, very good thing, and I think President Trump also has an interest in that. So it'll be interesting to see how things develop from here. Now I could, I, it's, it'll be, again, I, I remain skeptical of sort of the idea that, that just commerce alone is going to usher in a new era. I do think that, that the United States typically, when it's, when it's brokering these deals, does put its thumb on the scale in particular ways. Uh, and tho- those ways are not just putting money into KSA or taking money out of KSA, which again, I'm, I'm great with that. I think it's brilliant what President Trump is doing. I know a number of businesses obviously that are working in Riyadh and doing wonderful work in Riyadh and, and I'm, I'm, I think what MBS has done transformatively to KSA i- is incredible. If what you're looking for is a broader sort of regional calm that's going to last the course of time, what you don't need is an upsurge in Muslim Brotherhood or a resurgent Iran or the rebuilding of terrorist groups that threaten both Saudi Arabia as well as, as Israel and other Sunni allies in, in the region. And so, you know, I, I think that there are a couple of ways to see what President Trump is doing. One of them is I hope that there's a step two, right? Which is, okay, now Saudi Arabia, we have a great relationship with you. It would be really great if you did join an Abraham Accords and now you have this very strong regional block that economically is, is more interdependent, which is of course what he pursued during his first administration. Or is he moving in the direction, and this is also plausible, where he's basically saying, "Listen, everybody's sort of on their own. We're gonna cut independent deals with each one of these nations in bilateral fashion with the United States." And I think it sort of remains to be seen which strategy President Trump is taking, a sort of bilateral approach t- to relations with each one of these countries individually or whether he's attempting to forge more of an interdependent regional economic block.

Chamath Palihapitiya 29:58 Two questions for you, Ben, rapid fire. Abraham Accords was brought up. Will the Saudis sign it? Will MBS sign it? And Trump sort of alluded, "Hey, they're gonna do it in their own time." What's holding it up in your mind and if they, if and when they do sign it, what impact will it have on the region? Then number two, your thoughts on this Qatar plane kerfuffle in the media sort of obsessing over it. Are they over-indexing on it, uh, or not?

Ben Shapiro 30:22 So, uh, a- as far as the Abraham Accords, you know, again, I think that this is a diff- it is a shift in tone for President Trump. Abraham Accords was considered sort of his signal foreign policy accomplishment during term one, and it- it- it's my belief if- if he'd been reelected in 2020, by February of 2021, I think Saudi would have been in the Abraham Accords. Obviously, one of the obstacles continues to be the war in Gaza, what actually ends up emerging there. But one... I- ironically, one of the things that actually has undermined the- the kind of incentive for Saudi to join the Abraham Accords is Israel's complete devastation of all of the proxies of Iran. So, one of the things that was driving Saudi and Israel together was the fact that there was this really giant threat in Iran. And so now, it appears, or it could be at least plausibly read, that one of the reasons why President Trump is selling $150 billion worth of military hardware to KSA is to provide a defensive barrier against Iran while assuming that maybe Iran does end up going nuclear. So, you know, it... what- what happens with Iran does have serious ramifications for the possibility of an Abraham Accord, including Saudi Arabia. It... that seems like it's more distant than it was a couple of years ago, uh, and it may take more time than I think the Special Envoy Steve Witkof and- and the Trump administration would like it to be. Uh, as- as far as the, as far as the plane kerfluffle, on my show I said that it looks skeezy. Um, you know, and- and I will, I will maintain that position. I... it doesn't have to be that it's illegal in order for it not to look particularly good, because of course, the other half of the deal is that once the plane is retrofitted and used by the president for a certain period of years, it then goes to the Trump Presidential Library. And that was one of the conditions of the gifting. And Qatar is quite famous for- for putting a lot of money in a lot of various pockets, ranging from the attorney... I mean, the- the current Attorney General of the United States, Pam Bondi was a foreign registered agent for Qatar for a while, uh, being paid by- by Qatar to do that sort of lobbying work. Um, Qatar is pretty famous for- for putting its money-

Chamath Palihapitiya 32:07 Yeah.

Ben Shapiro 32:08 ... in- in a variety of pockets. And it-

Chamath Palihapitiya 32:09 By the way, just- just- just to put a- a number on that. Qatar, uh, it... Sovereign Wealth Fund, the QIA, the investment authority is about a half trillion dollars of capital, about 50 billion of which is invested in US funds. And many of the folks in and around the circles that are associated with the White House obviously have, uh, QIA as an LP or have had funds that they're affiliated with that have QIA as an LP

Ben Shapiro 32:34 And- and- and my point about this-

Chamath Palihapitiya 32:35 ... as... as well.

Ben Shapiro 32:35 ... is that put aside whatever moral qualms, you know, anybody has about this sort of stuff, which again, you can argue either way. The- the- the key to me is, if you like President Trump's agenda, the biggest obstacle to President Trump's agenda, there are basically two obstacles. One is the economy goes south, right? That's an obstacle to any president's agenda. That's why it's really important what he's doing in the Middle East. It's why it's important what he's been doing backing off of the tariff war in a lot of ways. It's why deregulation, passing the tax cut is important. Right? All of that's important. And then the second thing that can really hurt any administration is corruption, and even allegations of corruption can be incredibly damaging. And so for example, there was a crypto bill that was on the floor of the Senate, uh, or was about to enter onto the floor of the Senate just last week, and it ended up being killed by Democrats plus a couple of Republicans. And Democrats, at least publicly, maintained the reason they killed the crypto bill was specifically because of allegations surrounding the Trump family and TrumpCoin, Trump Meme Coin, World Liberty Financial, and all this sort of stuff. And so the question... Listen, I... as a Trump supporter who raised money for President Trump and campaigned with President Trump and campaigned for President Trump, a- as- as a person... what I want is his agenda to be successful. If an obstacle to that agenda is the optics of a thing like taking a $400 million jet from Qatar, which does amount to the single biggest monetary gift ever given to the United States, even if you consider it to just be a gift to the United States generally, not to the- the Trump library personally or anything like that, is that... is that the kind of thing that harms him in the public mind? And if that ties into a broader narrative that his political opponents are trying to drive that he is corrupt or the people around him are corrupt, is that a win for him, right? Just on a practical, efficacious level, is that a win for him? Is that a win for his agenda? Because th- the media coverage this week-

Chamath Palihapitiya 34:11 Yeah.

Ben Shapiro 34:11 ... it could have all been about him doing deals in these various places and bringing money back home to the United States.

Chamath Palihapitiya 34:16 It's an unnecessary distraction, the appearance-

Ben Shapiro 34:17 That- that's kind of, that's kind of my view of it, at the very least.

Chamath Palihapitiya 34:19 ... yeah. And the, and the appearance of impropriety- Yeah, I agree with that. ... amongst half the country who doesn't like him, and he's now tipping into, you know, almost as unpopular as his first term, they're just gonna weaponize that in the midterms, and it's gonna scuttle the important agenda, Doge, you know, and- and getting rid of regulations. So, it's just dumb.

Ben Shapiro 34:36 And, and this is one of the things that I'm- I'm actually afraid of is-

Chamath Palihapitiya 34:38 Yeah.

Ben Shapiro 34:38 ... you know, this is, this is the thing that also ties into, to the economic problem, right? The... right now, everybody is- is basically like, "Oh, who cares about this kind of..." I think a lot of people are like, "Who cares about this kind of stuff?"

Chamath Palihapitiya 34:46 Sure.

Ben Shapiro 34:46 As long as the number goes up and to the right, then all this sort of stuff doesn't matter very much. Uh, if the number starts going down, then you start having all these kind of corruption allegations rise to the surface in a-

Chamath Palihapitiya 34:57 Yes.

Ben Shapiro 34:57 ... in a new way, right? Because that- that's what happens with- with presidents very often, is what you see is there are kind of a- a bunch of little dents that are in the-

Chamath Palihapitiya 35:04 Yes.

Ben Shapiro 35:04 ... in the vehicle, and then there's a car crash, and suddenly, you know, all the dents are very evident to the naked eye. And- and that's what I'd like for him to avoid.

Chamath Palihapitiya 35:10 Or, what if he loses the midterms and then we start impeachment three, four, and five-

Ben Shapiro 35:14 Correct.

Chamath Palihapitiya 35:14 ... and investigation three, four, five, and now we're back to law fair and insanity, which nobody wants

Chamath Palihapitiya 35:18 to be in. Let's talk about another win. It was a pretty great week objectively for Trump. On Sunday, Treasury Secretary Besant announced a trade deal with China in Geneva. The details were basically, here we go, another pause. Tariffs will go down from 145% to 30%. Maybe that's manageable. China's cutting their tariffs for the US from 125 to 10%. And they're gonna end this de minimis rule, also known as the (laughs) like garbage fashion rule, Temu, Shein, all that kind of stuff, when they dropship you stuff that's under, I think the number is 800 or so. The market loved the news.

Jason Calacanis 35:56 Don't. Don't. Make America dress well again. Don't do it.

Chamath Palihapitiya 36:00 (laughs) I think this is like an important part of this is like this, you know, ridiculous garbage fashion. I hate it. The market was up massively, but, you know, the Dow and the NASDAQ are basically, eh, flat to slightly negative. Our partners over at Polymarket, you know, have a nice market on the chances of a US recession. That peaked at 66% during the...... Liberation Day chaos fallout and, hey, here we go, now it's 38%. So we're kind of, uh, maybe cleaning up the chaos. He shook the globe, uh, (laughs) the economic globe, Friedberg, and now maybe, as I think a lot of people predicted, he found an exit ramp. Maybe that was the plan all along, maybe it's 4D chess, maybe he's reacting to the market, maybe all that doesn't matter, but here we are. Dave, Friedberg, when we look back on this whole trade Trump tariff turmoil, what are we gonna look back on this a year from now and think? Was it just a distraction or is it actually gonna create a trillion dollars in tariff revenue, and we're gonna get rid of 150 people paying taxes who make under $150,000? Wha- what's gonna happen with this when we look back on it a year or two from now?

David Friedberg 37:14 W- I don't know where the tariff deals are gonna end up, so we don't know yet.

Chamath Palihapitiya 37:18 Yeah.

David Friedberg 37:19 Right?

Chamath Palihapitiya 37:19 Yeah. So I'm asking for a guess, right? Yeah.

David Friedberg 37:20 Yeah. And so I, I don't know. I don't know. Like I said, I think one of the biggest things that needs to happen that is being discussed in these trade deals is regulatory parity, such that US companies can participate evenly in foreign markets. I kind of have highlighted a few examples of why it's challenging for US companies to set up and do business in the local jurisdictions for a lot of our trade, trade partners across multiple industries. I think that's being heavily negotiated. So that doesn't make the headlines, that's not kind of the top of the news. Everyone talks about the tariff number, the tariff number, the tariff number, but at the end of the day, the access to foreign markets for US companies, you can even think about... I mean, a good example for us is a lot of the fines that happen to US tech companies in the EU, and there are just billions and billions of dollars of fines being paid out of our companies, that's another form of taxation. The fact that China won't allow US tech companies to operate, but we allow Chinese tech companies to operate here. So the regulatory parity is kinda the biggest thing that I think needs to kind of be identified in these deals before we have a real sense, Jake out, because this, again, could be a real economic growth driver for American businesses, and that could have a real effect on our GDP. So that's the biggest thing I'm looking for versus just the tariff number, is parity and access to global markets for US companies-

Chamath Palihapitiya 38:38 Reciprocity.

David Friedberg 38:38 ... and I don't think we know. And, and, and those are the details of the deals that are gonna take several months. Normally, these are multi-year trade negotiations with, you know, big trade teams that go back and forth over several years to figure these deals out. So to create maximal leverage and accelerate outcomes, it seems like a lot of this trade hype got everyone to the negotiating table. Now the hard work's being done to figure out the details of these deals, and hopefully we end up in a better place for American businesses because of it.

Chamath Palihapitiya 39:05 Chamath, I, I know where you stand on this. Uh, he creates that big pothole crater, everybody gets excited, it creates a lot of attention, and then, uh, maybe the real negotiation starts. So a year from now when we look back on this, what would success look like for the Trump administration in Chamath Palihapitiya's mind and assessment?

Jason Calacanis 39:25 I think this goes back to what I said at the beginning. I think tariffs have the potential to be the on-ramp to our version of Belt and Road. And I think that that is an incredible jujitsu move of what was an exceptionally well-executed and methodical program by the Chinese government to cement hard and soft power all around the world while the United States wasn't looking and obsessed with cheap garbage that they could buy at Target.

Chamath Palihapitiya 40:00 Hmm.

Jason Calacanis 40:00 Okay? So this should be a wake-up call to us. We don't need all this cheap nonsense. We can live with fewer things. Those things could be of higher quality, they may be of higher price, but more importantly, we need to make sure that we're cementing bilateral deals with as many countries in the world and building the next phase of Pax America, of American hegemony. We need to do it. So the fact that we are negotiating with China I think is very good, I think that they are a necessary partner of ours, but we can't take our eye off the ball. The tariffs was a way of ripping the Band-Aid of all this globalist free trade nonsense, and now we need to reset this in a methodical, calm way. Now, some markets we're not gonna get right, and in some industries, we have some very complicated thinking to do. As an example, which we'll get to later, the Pharma EO is very complicated and very nuanced, okay? But this is the hard and necessary work. So my perspective is, this is the beginning of Belt and Road 2.0. I think we started with a real bang in the Middle East, and I just encourage the administration to go and finish the job and get as many bilateral deals done as possible, and reset how important the United States is as a partner.

Chamath Palihapitiya 41:23 Mm-hmm.

Jason Calacanis 41:23 We always knew it, but we allowed that hard influence and hard power to get frittered away with all kinds of nonsensical, idealistic thinking that was just wasteful. And now we just need to-

Chamath Palihapitiya 41:33 Well, and it was also globalists who wanted to make money, right? It's, like, easier to make cheap stuff over there and then sell it here, and, uh, it's harder to make money (laughs) selling things once.

Jason Calacanis 41:44 I think that was... I think that was short term and non-strategic thinking by many of those companies. I think that we've created dynamics that we can change, we can change the incentives for how consumers consume in the United States, and I think it's worth thinking about how to do that.

Chamath Palihapitiya 41:59 All right. Well, here is the Polymarket on tariffs generating greater than 250 billion in 2025 that we set or Polymarket set. Basically, no chance that that's gonna happen, so we will see, (laughs) I think, everybody coming to the table and reciprocity bend-

Jason Calacanis 42:16 Well, I don't, I don't-

Chamath Palihapitiya 42:17 Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 42:17 ... I don't even know how you're gonna settle this, Jason, because what does it mean, will tariffs generate? I think it's a really interesting bet, but the real question is o- is on the measurement. There is not gonna be...... some number that OMB or somebody else puts out that says, "It generated X."

Chamath Palihapitiya 42:32 Well, I think Lutnick was saying he was tracking that, but we'll see. I mean, e- 'cause y- if it's reciprocity and we see us making more money or getting charged less fines to the examples we had earlier, then you could include those in it, but yeah, it's a hard, it's a hard bet to settle. But I think people believe it's not gonna generate a massive amount of revenue. The relationship with China and this sort of changing concept of consumerism, you think that's a possibility for America? Or do (laughs) Americans just want cheap stuff on Amazon and an unlimited number of Amazon boxes in their recycle bin?

Ben Shapiro 43:06 I mean, I, I'm not sure that's how consumers have ever thought about this sort of stuff. I mean, uh, you know, I remember when I was younger, there was, you know, a lot of talk about made in America cars.

Chamath Palihapitiya 43:13 Yeah.

Ben Shapiro 43:13 Uh, you know, buy, buy, buy made in American. And, and that just kinda failed, because it turns out that the American cars just weren't as good as the stuff that you could get elsewhere. And it turns out that Americans are both producers and consumers, and y- yeah, it's- it's- it's easy to say, "Don't buy cheap crap from China," but it turns out, a lot of stuff that actually is not all that cheap also was manufactured in China. Hopefully now it'll be manufactured in Vietnam or, or manufactured in India or in other third party countries. The idea that we're gonna be, you know, reshoring all that stuff to the United States, we're not gonna be making T-shirts in the United States. Th- that's not a thing. Um, but, you know, I- I- I do think that right now, m- my read is that we- it's too early to tell, um, meaning that, uh, this- this just reminds me of the old Yiddish joke where the couple isn't getting along, so they go to the rabbi and they say, "What do we do, Rabbi?" He says, "I want you to bring a chicken into your house." They bring the chicken in their house and still isn't working, they go back to the rabbi, he says, "I want you to bring a cow into your house." So they bring a cow into their house and they say, "It still isn't working, Rabbi. It's just terrible." They- they go back to the rabbi, he says, "I want you to bring two goats into your house." They do that, they come back and s- th- he, the husband says, "This is awful. I can't handle this." He says, "Take everything out of your house." So they take all the things out of their house and they're like, "Oh my God, this is- this is just fantastic," because that- that's basically-

Chamath Palihapitiya 44:15 (laughs)

Ben Shapiro 44:15 ... what Trump did here, right? He put the chicken and cow and the two goats in the house. I still think he left the chicken, right? And so-

Chamath Palihapitiya 44:21 Yeah.

Ben Shapiro 44:21 ... it's- it's kinda- it's gonna be, you know, a question as to how much impact the chicken has, meaning the 10% tariff rate that we still have on the rest of the world is, you know, more than quintuple what it was at the very beginning of this process. I mean, the average tariff rate, uh, not to use a, you know, a number that David doesn't like, but the average tariff rate right now is higher than it's been any time since the 1930s. Is that gonna have some carryover effect? I mean, Walmart is already suggesting they're gonna have to start increasing their prices. So, I don't think that we're out of the woods, and I do think that the biggest threat with regard to this sort of stuff is less the tariffs than the feeling of uncertainty for investors as to what comes next. And that's where the pharmaceutical EO starts to come in, or the negotiations over- over the tax bill. What actually makes it in? What doesn't make it in? W- when- when it comes to, you know, the stuff that makes investors sanguine, I think one of the reasons why investors are sanguine about Saudi Arabia is because Saudi Arabia is a kingdom, and that kingdom is very wealthy. And that very wealthy kingdom doesn't have to worry about the next election. They don't have to worry about the next policy that- that they just have to throw out there for public consumption. Now, President Trump, because of the rapid shifts in policy, the- the feeling, if the- if the feeling comes away as, "We're now back on a solid path, this was all a tactic and- and we're hunky-dory," great, you're gonna see the markets go up, you're gonna see more investment and all the rest. If the feeling, and it... Basically, more Scott Bessent and fire Peter Navarro into the ocean via catapult-

Chamath Palihapitiya 45:36 (laughs)

Ben Shapiro 45:36 ... would be my advice to the- the-

Chamath Palihapitiya 45:37 Yeah. (laughs)

Ben Shapiro 45:37 ... Trump administration. Uh, and- and if you do that-

Chamath Palihapitiya 45:39 That seems like a reasonable, actionable suggestion, Ben. A very reasonable, action-

Ben Shapiro 45:45 (laughs) .

Chamath Palihapitiya 45:45 But predictability, you know, we were sitting here a couple weeks ago and I was, as I was mentioning, I w- I know a lot of e-commerce folks and they were saying, "Layoffs coming. We don't have predictability." And- and the really hard part is how do you invest in a business? You know, you're running Daily Wire, it's a nine-figure business. You wanna hire people, you know, you need to have advertisers. Many of the advertisers you probably have are somehow related to consumption in America. What's the first thing they're gonna pause? They're gonna pause advertising, right? "Why am I advertising this, you know, uh, mattress? Why am I mat- you know, advertising Eight Sleep, the best mattress in the world?" I happen to be an investor, I'm a little biased. "But why am I gonna market Eight Sleep if I can't get it to the country or if the price is too high?" You know, it's like, it- it could, it causes all these downstream, uh, issues. I guess during all of this (laughs) now, talking about, like, shaking the globe and the- and the economy here,

Chamath Palihapitiya 46:33 Republicans are working hard on the Big Beautiful Bill. It's- it's big and it's beautiful, Ben. I don't know if you wanna get into your Trump, dueling Trumps, but it's a big, beautiful bill.

Ben Shapiro 46:42 "So big, so beautiful, many people are saying..."

Chamath Palihapitiya 46:45 And many haters, Nancy Pelosi, nasty woman, uh, she bet on Walmart, bad bet.

Ben Shapiro 46:51 (laughs)

Chamath Palihapitiya 46:51 GOP's plan (laughs) is to push this bill via reconciliation so they can avoid the Senate filibuster with 51 votes instead of 60. The Trump bill would extend the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act through 2034. That's kind of the big piece here, is these tax cuts. And there's a bunch of campaign stuff like no taxes on tips or overtime, things that Trump promised to, you know, in some cases swing states like Nevada, those are, uh, trying to get in there, and an increase on universities' endowment tax. And the Tax Foundation, this is a nonprofit that analyzes tax policy, estimates the tax cuts would reduce revenues by 4.1 trillion over 10 years. That's 400 billion a year. And, uh, the bill also aims to cut 1.5 trillion in spend over the next decade. Some Republicans think this is weak and are pushing for two trillion in cuts or more. Notable cuts include a stricter SNAP rules, tighter Medicaid caps and removing taxpayer benefits from illegals. Gosh, uh, Friedberg, you actually (laughs) , I understand from our group chat, did a deep dive here and you, I think, are responsible in many ways for bringing the issue of our national debt to the forefront, especially, particularly with this administration and Doj, which we give you a lot of credit for, you being a single issue voter for this. Are you worried about the budget now? We're- we're 100 plus days into Trump. Do you think he's got any chance of cutting the deficit?

David Friedberg 48:16 I'll talk about the House tax bill, which I think is, to use your term, J-Cal, absolute disgraciad.

Chamath Palihapitiya 48:23 Oh. (laughs)

David Friedberg 48:23 I, uh-

Ben Shapiro 48:24 (laughs) .

David Friedberg 48:24 Bill is disgraciad?

Ben Shapiro 48:26 Disgraciad? (laughs) .

David Friedberg 48:26 Disgraciad.

Chamath Palihapitiya 48:26 Oh, shit. (laughs)

Ben Shapiro 48:27 Il est mal, le disgraciad.

David Friedberg 48:28 Oh, wow. It is absolute disgraciad.

Ben Shapiro 48:31 (laughs) .

David Friedberg 48:31 If you're an American, you should feel shame...... that your elected officials are proposing, that this is the bill that gets passed, that we vaporize this much money, that we put ourselves this much further in debt, that we do not treat this situation as the fiscal emergency that it is. The bill ultimately yields no real change in the annual deficit. The annual deficit could climb to $2.5 trillion, being added to the federal debt load every single year going forward. In fact, if you look at the treasury yields, the 30-year is now kissing 5%. So the United States has about $37 trillion of debt. At 5%, we're paying close to $2 trillion a year just in interest on our debt as this debt gets refinanced. In fact-

Chamath Palihapitiya 49:23 Freeberg, do us a favor for the audience. If you could explain why it's going up, why it's so high, and what that means in term-

David Friedberg 49:29 Why, what's so high, the debt or the interest rates? The interest rates-

Chamath Palihapitiya 49:32 The interest rates. Yeah.

David Friedberg 49:32 Well, the interest rates are going up because... The, the probability that the US will default on its debt payments, which is what you're buying when you buy US Treasuries, you're getting the US government to pay you some number of dollars with interest over time. And the market is now demanding that that interest rate be as high as 5% because of this fiscal situation that the United States finds itself in. We are now burning an additional $2.5 trillion a year, adding to our debt load. We are in a fiscal crisis, and we're not willing to admit it. And I've said this from day one, that DOGE can only do so much. And clearly, that's the case where they're now talking about sub $300 billion a year in potential annual savings from, from DOGE action. At the end of the day, Congress needs to take action, and this bill from Congress doesn't take much action. I will tell you that if you look across the board, all of these programs are still being proposed to be run at a cost that is well in excess of their pre-COVID levels. And so I would set two guiding principles if I was, uh, to be the benevolent dictator of the United States of America. My guiding principle number one would be that any program that we intend to continue to persist have its budget level cut to pre-COVID, to 2019 levels. Second would be... And if we did that, by the way, we would be in a much better fiscal situation. The second would be that we add no new programs in the moment. There's a whole bunch of new shit thrown into this bill, as well as increasing the cost and a few cuts here and there. I'll just highlight a couple of things that I think are worth noting. You know, there's a cut in the SNAP program, which is the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program. That's food stamps. And I talked about this with Brooke Rollins in the interview I did a few weeks ago. You can watch it on YouTube. And we talked a little bit about how this SNAP program has absolutely exploded in size from 60 billion a year in 2019 to 120 billion a year today. So in this budget proposal, they're actually cutting it back by about 30 billion, so to 90 billion. So it's still 50% higher than it was pre-COVID. And there's a lot of kind of stories we could go through on what happened during COVID that caused this thing to blow up the way it did. But political wrangling pulled money out of the government into people's pockets, and that is persisting today. I'm a big believer in cutting taxes. Obviously, I'm probably more libertarian than anyone else on this show or that we've ever had on this show. But at the end of the day, you can't just say, "Hey, let's cut taxes and spend more than we're making." It doesn't make sense. A lot of this stuff is gonna be exploitable. The tips and overtime exclusions are a way to pander to people to get votes, and now keeping your promises on those votes. I think at the end of the day the tips and overtime rule could invite a lot of gamesmanship and loopholes-

Chamath Palihapitiya 52:07 Hm.

David Friedberg 52:07 ... that will be created, and people will wake up and be like, "Uh-oh." For example, if I'm an independent contractor, I will enter into a contract with someone that says, "Here's the service I'm providing you for 50 bucks, and then there's an optional tip you can give me at the end." And then I-

Chamath Palihapitiya 52:19 Yes.

David Friedberg 52:19 ... won't pay taxes on that tip. And I can give you 100 other examples that this will create an inordinate number of crazy, insane loopholes. The interest on the debt, at $1.9 trillion a year, equates to 7% of GDP. That means 7 cents of every dollar that moves in every transaction in this country is being used to pay down interest on money we overspent in the past. It has become an absolute crisis. I think that there's a few folks that should be shout out on this, which is Senator Paul and Senator Ron Johnson, who both highlighted how ridiculously under-impressive the spending cuts are in this bill. I think we've got a lot of work to do. I'm deeply disappointed, I'm scared, and I hope that, um, that this all gets kind of fixed up and-

Chamath Palihapitiya 53:04 Do you-

David Friedberg 53:04 ... uh, and reconciled.

Chamath Palihapitiya 53:05 Do you think that we should line item out all the new spending irrespective of what it is?

David Friedberg 53:11 All new spending, line itemed out. That's, that's rule one. And rule two is all existing programs gotta go back to pre-COVID levels. You do those two things, we're in a great place.

Chamath Palihapitiya 53:19 Yeah, and just to put some numbers and some charts behind it, here is the, the debt back to Clinton era. Clinton obviously balanced the budget, so you get this nice, uh, flatness there. Clinton added, uh, 392 billion in eight years. It's barely noticeable on the chart, 40, 50 billion a year. Bush, 5.4 trillion, four years, about 1.3 trillion a year. Obama, a trillion a year. And then we get to Trump 1.0, two trillion a year. Suddenly, we decided we would double it. Biden, same thing. They added almost exactly the same amount, two trillion-

David Friedberg 53:50 But the, but the-

Chamath Palihapitiya 53:51 ... a year and then-

David Friedberg 53:52 Right way to think about this, J-Cal-

Chamath Palihapitiya 53:53 Trump right now is on track to do the same.

David Friedberg 53:54 Yeah, it's not total dollar amount, it's percent of GDP that you're adding.

Chamath Palihapitiya 53:59 Sure.

David Friedberg 53:59 And, you know, right now at, at two and a half trillion dollars a year of deficit, we're talking about a deficit to GDP of like 8%.

Chamath Palihapitiya 54:09 Yes.

David Friedberg 54:10 8% a year. This is like Argentina. This is, like, insane. Uh, the fact that we don't treat this like a fiscal emergency and everyone goes up and they tout, "Oh, we're gonna make 60 billion in cuts in Medicaid," that's out of $820 billion of annual spend. You know, "Oh, we're making 30 billion in cuts in SNAP." That's still 50% higher spend in total than we were in 2019, a few years ago when we didn't have that much of a problem. This has become, like...... such a reset of expectations. And I worry, again, that we went into this, I think, in a very optimistic way, thinking that this administration was gonna treat things differently. We had DOGE. We had alignment on the importance of the budget. Besant has highlighted it. And then it's kind of back to gamesmanship in DC. All these representatives from Congress show up and try and get money for their constituents in a way that is not sustainable. We're not gonna be able to keep this up, and we're not really having the hard and tough conversations we need to be having. And every year, everyone wants to get elected by keeping programs and keeping money flowing that their constituents elected them to do. And they wanna add new programs so they can go on CNBC and say, "Look at this cool new program I stood up. It's great. This is gonna create the future of America." And meanwhile, there's no future of America because we're burning two and a half trillion dollars a year.

Chamath Palihapitiya 55:24 So would you call this the... Besant wants the 3-3-3 plan. You'd call this the 3-3-8 plan?

David Friedberg 55:30 I don't know if there's a three, but yeah, it's definitely the eight. (laughs) This is eight, almost nine.

Ben Shapiro 55:37 Yeah, I mean, I think-

David Friedberg 55:37 Almost nine.

Ben Shapiro 55:38 I thi- I think all of this is right. I mean the, the reality is the US debt-to-GDP ratio is extraordinary already. Um, it's, it's only going up from here. Uh, and the... W- we have to acknowledge here that the Republican majorities in the House and the Senate are incredibly narrow, that for every Ron Johnson who's saying the right things, you have a Josh Hawley who's saying the wrong things in Missouri and writing full-scale op-eds in the New York Times talking about how not a buck should be cut from Medicaid under any circumstances. And this, you know, does run headlong up against a reality, which is that the... One, one of Trump's signal changes from the old Republican Party was not just a change away, in terms of foreign policy, toward a more realism and less, and less, you know, interventionism, but it really was a change away from the Paul Ryan Tea Party Republican Party as well. And whatever you think about Paul Ryan on a lot of other issues, Paul Ryan was on your side of this, David, when it came to actually trying to fix-

David Friedberg 56:26 That's right.

Ben Shapiro 56:26 ... the fiscal problems with the United States.

David Friedberg 56:27 That's right.

Ben Shapiro 56:28 And I'm old enough to remember the Tea Party when we were out protesting literally in the streets about government overspending as a response to Obamacare, and that's gone completely by the wayside. And so when, when you're looking at Republicans today arguing over whether to zero out waste, fraud, and abuse, the problem is not, in the end, waste, fraud, and abuse. The problem is the programs themselves as they are currently structured. And unless you're willing to make serious systemic changes-

David Friedberg 56:49 Exactly right.

Ben Shapiro 56:50 ... to things like Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security, you're not gonna solve any of these problems. And here's the, the sad reality is nobody is willing to do that. So just as we were saying earlier, maybe Americans are addicted to, to cheap goods from abroad. Americans are certainly 100% addicted to government sustenance. They are, they're absolutely addicted to this. All net taxes in this country are paid by the top quintile, all of them, because below the top quintile, you're getting as much back from the government or more than you are paying into the system. And we are also gaming out to the future, paying away our kids' fiscal future because of all of this. So, you know, when people ask me what's gonna happen, I mean, the answer is we're gonna either wildly inflate our currency or we're going to go into massive austerity measures, you know, five to 10 years from now. Th- there's not gonna be-

David Friedberg 57:29 100%.

Ben Shapiro 57:29 ... a third choice. I mean, a- and so maybe politicians keep kicking it down the road. Maybe that's what this is. But even the kind of cuts that are, that are being talked about by some of the people in Congress who I like are not gonna be enough to actually put us back on the right fiscal road. Even if the Republicans do what they're talking about with regard to work requirements, for example, o- on Medicaid. They're saying there should be an 80-hour-a-month work requirement-

David Friedberg 57:49 A month.

Ben Shapiro 57:50 ... if you're an able... A month. A month.

David Friedberg 57:51 Two days of work a week. (laughs)

Ben Shapiro 57:52 Whoa, that's, that's crazy.

David Friedberg 57:53 Yeah. Yes.

Ben Shapiro 57:53 That's crazy, right? That five hours a w- four hours a week day, uh, for, for, um, for a month to, to get your Medicaid requirement if you're an able-bodied person in the United States of, of working age. You know, th- that sort of stuff is not sustainable, but nobody's actually gonna take that on. And so the question for President Trump is gonna be, is he willing to actually go to the barricades and not just make the case that the tax cuts have to be maintained? 'Cause they absolutely do. But also, that Republicans need to get on board with some of these cuts 'cause you're gonna have a lot of pushback from the purplish Republicans, from, from the Josh Hawleys in Missouri and from the Mike Lawlers in New York.

David Friedberg 58:26 That's right. That's right.

Ben Shapiro 58:26 A- And, and all of the people who are afraid they're gonna lose their seats if there are any cuts.

David Friedberg 58:30 That's right. And existential cuts. I mean, it is like an existential crisis that no one's willing to stand up and highlight just how critical this emergency is. Two and a half trillion dollars of deficit spending on a $28 trillion GDP, tell me when in history that's actually worked out at the end of the day, except when you're in some war and you're gonna end up taking over some country and getting all their resources. This has never-

Ben Shapiro 58:52 And as you mentioned, this actually... This has, this has, you know, knock-on effects with regard to things like de-dollarization. Why are you investing in the American dollar if you believe-

David Friedberg 58:59 That's right. That's why Treasury yields-

Ben Shapiro 58:59 ... that the dollar is going to... Yeah.

David Friedberg 59:01 This is the de- this is the debt death spiral that we find ourselves in because what happens is people stop owning Treasuries when they start to question whether or not 30 years from now the US government is gonna meet its debt obligations. Even the smallest marginal question of that drives interest rates up 1%, 2%. Suddenly, your 30-year Treasury yield is at 6%, 7%. And then your interest rates climb, and then your deficit spending climbs, and that's how it becomes a spiral. So now the debt goes up even more than it did the year before. And then the next year, it goes up even more per year than it did the year before. That's why it's called a debt death spiral.

Ben Shapiro 59:34 Chamath-

David Friedberg 59:35 And I will say that... L- let me... Sorry, let me just say one thing. One of the things I've heard in a lot of members of Cabinet that I've met with over the last couple of months is we've got all these new sources of revenue. I had a interview with Doug Burgum. He talked about unlocking America's assets. We've got this balance sheet with lots of assets. We're gonna do land leases and all sorts of other things. We t- we met with Luttnik. He's gonna sell the Trump gold card, the immigration card. We met with Besant. He's got these ideas on how we're gonna drive... Everyone's got great theory on how we're gonna grow GDP and actually grow government revenue. But until those dollars start to flow in, we have to get our fiscal house in order. We have to cut spending. When those dollars start to flow in, then you can start to spend. But you can't spend ahead because otherwise the cost of the debt and the economics uncertainty is gonna limit our ability to execute on the backend on that revenue generation. And I'm very worried about no one kind of paying enough attention to this. So I just... You know, I feel very passionate having seen this bill that we're just not on the right track. It's really fr- it's really frustrating.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:00:32 Let me pull up a tax chart here, Nick, from the chat and get, Chamathy, your comments on this, uh, bar chart here, just who's paying taxes. As you can see, you know, the top 1%, which I think is this panel here, and the top 5% paying the majority of the taxes (laughs) in the country.Is there any way to increase revenue and is there any way for politicians to say, "Hey, let's cut military"? That hasn't come up yet as a concept, but maybe cut a little bit of military spending and maybe put in some modest austerity measures now before, as Ben's pointing out, we get to, you know, Spain and, you know, Greece. I don't know, what was that, 10 years ago when they had to Portugal a- and they had to do, like, intense things, so your, your home country, Chamath, of Italy. Like, w- austerity measures, Americans, I don't think we've had to ever face austerity measures and certainly not in our lifetime. So income, taxes. Can we get more revenue in or is that unrealistic? And then cutting military maybe on the margins, Chamath? Or do you not see this as a major issue?

Jason Calacanis 1:01:38 It's easy to catastrophize.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:01:40 Okay.

Jason Calacanis 1:01:40 I think, I think that is easy because I think there's enough data there. The harder thing, if you're gonna make a directional bet, is to try to find the nuance. So what is the nuance? The nuance is you can point to all of these countries, but what is singularly different between all of those countries and the United States of America?

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:01:59 Is that a question? It's entrepreneurship?

Jason Calacanis 1:02:00 No, it's rhetor- it's rhetorical.

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:02:01 Oh, okay.

Jason Calacanis 1:02:02 The difference is we are the shining city on a hill-

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:02:05 Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 1:02:05 ... and every other country is not. And as much as we want to believe that there's equality, there isn't. There's a hierarchy and America is the most important country in the world, period, full stop, end of story. What does that give us the ability to do? It gives us very different parameters with which to solve this problem. It gives us, I think, the parameter of time-

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:02:25 Mm.

Jason Calacanis 1:02:25 ... and it gives us the parameter of acceptance from a lot of other foreign governments. Why? Because they need America to also succeed. There's this very funny quote which is, "When you owe the bank a million dollars, it's your problem, but when you owe the bank a billion dollars, it's their problem."

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:02:42 Hmm.

Jason Calacanis 1:02:43 This is true here, and I think that we have to recognize that the right thing to do is obviously what Ben and Dave are saying. I don't disagree with that. But if you panic, I think you're gonna start a cascade that is unnecessary, and by moving to a place where you're all of a sudden trying to cut entitlements incredibly aggressively I don't think sets the stage for a thriving American population that then allows this problem to actually be solved. So what is my proposal? I do think we have to monetize the balance sheet of America. I do think we own probably 100 trillion to 150 trillion of assets, all of us as citizens. We own that. And I do think that-

Chamath Palihapitiya 1:03:33 Explain what those assets are to the, to the people listening, because they may not know.

Jason Calacanis 1:03:36 So the largest landowner in, in the United States is the United States of America. The ability to allow you to drill is given by the United States of America, the ability to do many things.

David Friedberg 1:03:48 By the way, Chamath, I'll just give you the numbers from my interview with Bergam. The federal government owns 500 million acres of land, and they have control over 3.2 billion acres in the outer continental shelf, which is the land under the ocean around North America. The resource availability in that land, uh, under the water and in the, the kind of main land is in the kind of immeasurable trillions of dollars of value. And their business model, Bergam stated business model in the interview I did with him, is land leases and royalties.

Jason Calacanis 1:04:22 Yeah.

David Friedberg 1:04:22 So enter into private partnerships and then participate in the valuation.

Jason Calacanis 1:04:26 I've talked to Doug about this, so I agree with him. We're talking about a balance sheet. Again, I said 100 trillion. You could probably make the case that it's two or three or 400 trillion, but let's just use 100 trillion. My point is that our balance sheet is much larger than our debt obligations, number one. Number two, we owe $33 trillion. It's as much their problem as our problem. And number three, every country that owns debt does so in part because they need America to be successful so that they themselves can be successful. So I think if you look at all of these interdependencies, the right thing to do is we need to monetize the balance sheet of America much more aggressively than we've looked at before. And two, what Dave and Ben said we must do, which is we need to draw a firm line and say, "No new spending." I completely agree with that idea. But I think if you do both of those two things at once, you have meaningful inflows that can fund a lot of the tax cuts that people want to propose. It'll also allow us to show that we have some level of discipline by not overspending and all of these other random pork barrel projects, and I think it allows us to set a path towards this 3-3-3 Plan. Just to be clear to everybody what Scott Besson's 3-3-3 Plan is, it's three percent-

David Friedberg 1:05:46 Which is also Dalio, Dalio's plan.

Jason Calacanis 1:05:49 It's three percent inflation. It's three percent GDP growth, and it's a three percent deficit to GDP percentage. And if we do that, that's a renaissance in the United States mathematically. Okay? We can quibble about the politics, but it would be a economic and mathematical renaissance. So that's what I would do. If this is the best plan that Jason Smith and Mike Crapo can get done between the House and the Senate, if this is the best plan, I urge the United States government to figure out how to start aggressively and quickly monetizing our balance sheet.

David Friedberg 1:06:28 I'll just, I'll just respond to two things on that

Jason Calacanis 1:06:30 So let me-

David Friedberg 1:06:30 ... before you go, hold on.

Jason Calacanis 1:06:31 ... hold on. Before you do that, let me just ask one question. Wh- the land we're talking about here, Friedberg, and the oil, I guess, or the minerals that are under the ocean floor-

1:06:40 Everything, everything.

David Friedberg 1:06:42 Well, I mean what else-

Jason Calacanis 1:06:43 So this is-

David Friedberg 1:06:43 ... is there under the ocean floor is like sort of-

Jason Calacanis 1:06:45 Gold.

David Friedberg 1:06:45 ... the question people are asking.

Jason Calacanis 1:06:47 Rare earths.

David Friedberg 1:06:47 Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 1:06:47 Zinc.

David Friedberg 1:06:48 S- so who's gonna buy that-

Jason Calacanis 1:06:49 Cobalt, lithium, everything.

David Friedberg 1:06:50 Yeah. Okay. Who is the customer, I think is what we're all wondering, of this land in the United States and for what purpose?Okay.

Jason Calacanis 1:06:57 Private companies that, that would then use those resources to manufacture critical requirements for the United States and other countries who want to buy it.

David Friedberg 1:07:05 And export.

Jason Calacanis 1:07:05 And export.

David Friedberg 1:07:05 And so, for example-

Jason Calacanis 1:07:06 Connect.

David Friedberg 1:07:06 ... the US is now the largest exporter of methane. We have four pipelines that go to this facility that I visited with Doug in the interview I did in Louisiana. They liquefy that natural gas, which is methane. They put it on ships, those ships go to India, they go to Taiwan, they go to Japan. So, US companies are selling liquid methane that we're pulling out of the ground to those countries, that they then use to heat their homes and power electricity production. We don't necessarily need to go back today and say, "Hey, let's cut entitlement programs deeply." We should, certainly should make entitlement programs more efficient. We don't need to.

Jason Calacanis 1:07:45 Hm.

David Friedberg 1:07:45 All we have to do is take all the other programs and reset them to COVID or pre-COVID levels.

Jason Calacanis 1:07:49 So, as a man-

David Friedberg 1:07:50 And secondly, is get rid of all the new programs. What's wrong, Bimoh?

Jason Calacanis 1:07:52 Okay, so we all agree on the new programs.

David Friedberg 1:07:54 Shivam, 100% agree.

Jason Calacanis 1:07:54 As a man of science- No, my wife sh- she te- she texts me, she's sitting there- Uh-huh.

David Friedberg 1:07:59 ... and she does things to tilt me and she says this-

Jason Calacanis 1:08:01 Amore.

David Friedberg 1:08:01 ... in the serious moment, my wife and I fought last week-

Jason Calacanis 1:08:04 What did you do? You got in a fight last night?

David Friedberg 1:08:05 No.

Jason Calacanis 1:08:05 And what was the fight about?

David Friedberg 1:08:05 No, we got in a fight last night. And I just sent her a very quick text that said-

Jason Calacanis 1:08:09 I love you.

David Friedberg 1:08:09 ... "I'm really sorry about last night." And she says, "I've moved on." (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:08:12 I've moved on?

David Friedberg 1:08:12 Just between us (laughs) -

Jason Calacanis 1:08:14 From the fight, or from you?

David Friedberg 1:08:15 ... it's like we're starting laughing. No, she moved on from the fight.

Jason Calacanis 1:08:16 (laughs) That's the question-

David Friedberg 1:08:17 She moved-

Jason Calacanis 1:08:17 Did you send her that text while-

David Friedberg 1:08:18 She moved on from the fight.

Jason Calacanis 1:08:18 ... while I was talking about deficit spending? Ben, what was your-

David Sacks 1:08:21 Yeah, bro.

Jason Calacanis 1:08:21 ... what was your last fight with your wife over?

David Friedberg 1:08:23 (laughs)

David Sacks 1:08:23 Let's get it all out in the open here.

Jason Calacanis 1:08:24 By the way, Dan-

David Sacks 1:08:24 What did you fight about?

Jason Calacanis 1:08:26 ... when, when Shivam and his wife-

David Sacks 1:08:27 Man, the fighting, it's like-

Jason Calacanis 1:08:27 When Shivam and his wife get into a fight-

David Sacks 1:08:27 Oh, my God. It's the worst, bro. It's the worst, man.

Narrator 1:08:28 It's like, sitting-

Jason Calacanis 1:08:29 I was on a plane with them.

David Sacks 1:08:30 ... we all have to experience it.

Jason Calacanis 1:08:30 I was on a plane with them, flying back from DC-

Narrator 1:08:32 Oh, my God, this fight. Oh, my God, so (inaudible) (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:08:35 For amore, I saw you, you were talking to the waitress. And you, the way you look at the waitress- No, bro, it's more serious than that. ... is not the way you're supposed to look at a waitress.

David Sacks 1:08:43 It's more, way more serious than that.

Jason Calacanis 1:08:44 Way more serious than that.

David Sacks 1:08:46 Oh, my God.

Jason Calacanis 1:08:46 And it's like, when you're in a, like in a coffee house or a coffee shop in Europe, and there's this, like, European couple speaking some language you don't understand. Yes. (laughs) At some point we have to get there-

David Sacks 1:08:59 Here we are in DC-

Jason Calacanis 1:08:59 ... and figure out- ... and figure out- So when you and Shivam- Ben, Ben, the more you-

David Sacks 1:09:01 Yeah, yeah.

Jason Calacanis 1:09:01 ... the more you hang out with us, there will be a moment-

David Sacks 1:09:03 Yeah.

Jason Calacanis 1:09:04 ... where you will observe me and Nat fighting. It will be a multi-hour affair.

David Sacks 1:09:07 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:09:07 It is not initiated by me.

David Sacks 1:09:08 It's not-

Jason Calacanis 1:09:08 It is not how long I wanna keep it going.

David Sacks 1:09:10 Absolutely.

Jason Calacanis 1:09:10 It does end with a passionate love-making-

David Sacks 1:09:12 Oh, my God.

Jason Calacanis 1:09:12 ... from 12:30 to a 12:36 AM.

David Sacks 1:09:16 (laughs)

David Friedberg 1:09:16 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:09:16 It's a full six minutes of a (Italian) , (laughs) chaotic love-making.

David Sacks 1:09:21 Honestly, right now, six minutes feels like a long time.

Jason Calacanis 1:09:23 (laughs)

David Friedberg 1:09:24 (laughs)

Jason Calacanis 1:09:24 And then we all go downstairs and we eat the ma- leftover manicotti. It's an incredible tradition in Italy. We fight for three hours-

David Sacks 1:09:32 Well, that's-

Jason Calacanis 1:09:32 ... we make love for four minutes-

David Sacks 1:09:33 Oh, my God.

Jason Calacanis 1:09:33 ... and then we eat the, uh, pasta.

David Sacks 1:09:34 Okay, look, l- g- get, get this thing back on track for a second.

Jason Calacanis 1:09:36 Let me get this back on the rails here.

David Sacks 1:09:37 Okay.

Jason Calacanis 1:09:38 I want to ask you an important question, Dave, if I may. Are you, as a man of science, who believes in global warming and who cares about the environment, is it a great idea, is what a lot of people are thinking here-

David Sacks 1:09:48 Ah, great question. Great question.

Jason Calacanis 1:09:49 ... is it a great idea for us to rip everything out of (laughs) the ocean shelf in Alaska and sell all this incredible land we have that's preserved with nature and trees, to foreign governments and people who own our debt? Is this a great idea? Do you have concerns about this? Versus-

David Sacks 1:10:05 Great question.

Jason Calacanis 1:10:06 ... austerity and maybe not buying as many bombs.

David Friedberg 1:10:08 Here's, here's the economic argument.

Jason Calacanis 1:10:10 Okay.

David Friedberg 1:10:10 Energy demand, heating demand, power demand is growing globally, with or without the United States.

Jason Calacanis 1:10:15 Okay.

David Friedberg 1:10:16 Does the United States, which produces that energy cleaner than anyone else, want to participate and benefit from that energy demand? Or do we want to leave it to other countries that are gonna do it in a dirtier way? And what do I mean by