Joe Rogan Experience #2021 - Mike Baker

Narrator 0:00 (drumming music) Joe Rogan podcast, check it out. The Joe Rogan Experience.

Joe Rogan 0:06 Train by day, Joe Rogan podcast by night, all day. (rock music)

Mike Baker 0:13 That's a fine cigar.

Joe Rogan 0:14 It's not bad, right?

Mike Baker 0:15 Yeah, it's really nice.

Joe Rogan 0:16 Foundation Cigars, shout on to them.

Mike Baker 0:18 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 0:18 What's up, Mike Baker? How are you?

Mike Baker 0:19 (inhales deeply) I'm doing well, thank you.

Joe Rogan 0:20 What do you got in those pa- pieces of paper to scare the shit out of me with?

Mike Baker 0:23 Yeah, you know what?

Joe Rogan 0:24 (laughs)

Mike Baker 0:25 This. I've got-

Joe Rogan 0:25 You've got notes. (laughs)

Mike Baker 0:26 I, I got notes, 'cause you know why? 'Cause I, I'm always being accused of, uh, of, of wandering, uh, not being as organized as I should be, right?

Joe Rogan 0:33 That's just this podcast does that to people.

Mike Baker 0:35 Yeah. Maybe so, but I, I said to myself, "Fuck it. I'm gonna, I'm gonna write some things down."

Joe Rogan 0:39 Okay.

Mike Baker 0:40 Because so much has happened since the last time we sat down.

Joe Rogan 0:42 Yeah.

Mike Baker 0:42 And so and, and I made a list. I'm gonna, uh, I'm gonna run through that if you don't mind. Um-

Joe Rogan 0:46 Okay.

Mike Baker 0:47 Since the last show, see I even headlined it. Uh, Chinese spy balloon, failed mutiny in Russia, four indictments of Trump. No, last night was the fourth. Um, bank account records showing the Biden family took over $20 million. Um, Pee-wee Herman died.

Joe Rogan 1:06 (laughs)

Mike Baker 1:06 Um-

Joe Rogan 1:06 (laughs) Glad you've got that in your notes.

Mike Baker 1:08 I've got that ... I, I actually have, yeah, I've got it.

Joe Rogan 1:10 (sniffs)

Mike Baker 1:10 It's right there, and it's right before, um, the two-year anniversary of the Afghan withdrawal. I probably should've put that above Pee-wee Herman.

Joe Rogan 1:14 W- why did you put Pee-wee Herman in there?

Mike Baker 1:17 You know what? 'Cause I d- it ... when, when I found out that Paul Reubens died, I was sad. I mean, it was, it was like I, I ... I'm old enough, I actually went to a, uh, a show that, uh, Paul did wh- when he was kind of working out as Pee-wee character, right?

Joe Rogan 1:31 Oh, really?

Mike Baker 1:32 And so... And it was fantastic. It was a great show.

Joe Rogan 1:33 When was this?

Mike Baker 1:33 This was ... oh, fuck, it was years ago, so it would have been, uh, it was before, uh ... it was probably like '80 ... shit, uh, '82? '83? '81?

Joe Rogan 1:45 Oh, wow.

Mike Baker 1:45 Somewhere in that timeframe, right? It was a long time ago. It was at, uh, Georgetown University, in DC. And, uh, and it was a great show. Anyway, point being ... and then, and I always thought, like, he didn't get enough credit for like Pee-wee's Playhouse and I know that people are like, "What the fuck is he talking about?" But-

Joe Rogan 2:01 (laughs)

Mike Baker 2:02 But he was, he was really ... he was a, he was a, he was a good guy. He kinda got ... he got off the rails with the, uh ... a little bit, for a period of time, with that he was, he was, uh, wanking in a, in a porn theater.

Joe Rogan 2:12 Yeah, but isn't that what they do in those things? Especially a gay porn theater?

Mike Baker 2:16 I guess, yeah. I- it's gotta sound weird, right, to kids though?

Joe Rogan 2:19 Yeah.

Mike Baker 2:19 Like, "Porn theater? What?"

Joe Rogan 2:20 I know.

Mike Baker 2:21 Yeah, yeah. It does.

Joe Rogan 2:22 That's ... They used to have to go to places.

Mike Baker 2:24 You had to ... I don't, I-

Joe Rogan 2:25 I don't know if you had to.

Mike Baker 2:27 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:27 Back when he was doing it-

Mike Baker 2:28 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 2:28 ... I don't, I don't think there was a law.

Mike Baker 2:30 Yeah. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 2:30 But, uh, I think, uh, back when he was doing it, there were still ... VHS tapes were out.

Mike Baker 2:35 Uh-

Joe Rogan 2:35 And I think DVDs were out back then, too, 'cause this was like ... I wanna say he got busted in like '90 something?

Mike Baker 2:41 Yeah. Yeah, it was, it was e- easily-

Narrator 2:43 '91.

Mike Baker 2:44 '91? Okay.

Narrator 2:44 '91, yeah.

Mike Baker 2:45 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:45 So definitely VHS tapes were ... that was back-

Mike Baker 2:47 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:47 ... when you had to go through the curtains.

Mike Baker 2:48 Or laser discs or something.

Joe Rogan 2:50 Remember like there was beads?

Mike Baker 2:51 Yes. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:51 These kids today, they don't know jack shit. They're getting their porn-

Mike Baker 2:54 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 2:54 ... off of a phone.

Mike Baker 2:55 Well, that's just it. I don't think ... they don't have an appreciation for how hard you had to work back in ... certainly-

Joe Rogan 2:59 Yeah.

Mike Baker 2:59 ... in the '70s and '80s, I mean, it got easier by the time the 1990s rolled around, but it was ... you had, you had to, you had to go on like a, uh, like a quest or something.

Joe Rogan 3:07 Yeah.

Mike Baker 3:07 You had to, you know?

Joe Rogan 3:07 You had to be shamed.

Mike Baker 3:08 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 3:09 There it is. (laughs)

Mike Baker 3:09 What is it, what is that you seek?

Joe Rogan 3:11 Simple facts of what happened Friday night in Reubens' hometown of Sarasota, Florida, are familiar by now. According to the county sheriff's office, three detectives-

Mike Baker 3:19 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 3:19 (laughs) They sent three guys to catch people jerking off at the Triple X Southtrail Cinema to watch the audience that was watching a triple bill of Catalina 50-Tiger Shark, Nurse Nancy, and Turn up the Heat.

Mike Baker 3:33 Ugh.

Joe Rogan 3:33 After the sting operation had hauled in three men on charges of violating Florida State Statute 800.03 Exposure of Sexual Organs-

Mike Baker 3:43 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 3:43 ... Detective William Walters-

Mike Baker 3:45 Wow.

Joe Rogan 3:45 ... allegedly saw a man "masturbate," in quotes. That's how the rap sheet spells it. Spells it wrong.

Mike Baker 3:50 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 3:50 Instead of ur it says e.

Mike Baker 3:52 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 3:53 Um, i- in the darkened theater at 8:25 PM and again at 8:35. Twice. He caught him twice.

Mike Baker 3:58 Yeah. Yeah. The first, the first sighting wasn't enough. He had to go back to get it. Second-

Joe Rogan 4:02 Meanwhile, the guy's got amazing recovery powers.

Mike Baker 4:04 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 4:04 8:25, he blasts off-

Mike Baker 4:06 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 4:06 ... and then he's back at it at 8:35. That's a fucking stud right there.

Mike Baker 4:10 Yeah, and that was before Viagra.

Joe Rogan 4:11 Placed under ... I don't know if that's true. When did Viagra come around?

Mike Baker 4:15 Oh, I don't know. We should look that up.

Joe Rogan 4:15 Uh, placed under arrest upon leaving the theater. The alleged offender quietly told the detectives his famous pseudonym and according to the police made a novel, Pee-wee-esque attempt at a buy off.

Mike Baker 4:27 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 4:27 He offered to perform at a children's benefit for the sheriff's office if the charges were dropped.

Mike Baker 4:33 Ah.

Joe Rogan 4:33 A department spokesperson said that the deputies did not feel at the time they had enough probable cause to charl- charge Reubens with attempted bribery. Well, is that bribery really when you say you're gonna-

Mike Baker 4:43 Hmm.

Joe Rogan 4:44 ... per- perform at an event?

Mike Baker 4:45 Eh.

Joe Rogan 4:46 Isn't it money, only bribery?

Mike Baker 4:47 It's ki- ... No. It's, it's you're bartering, you're bartering-

Joe Rogan 4:49 Anything?

Mike Baker 4:49 Yeah. It's a trade-off.

Joe Rogan 4:49 Like if someone says, "I'll suck your cock."

Mike Baker 4:51 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 4:52 That's bribery. Uh, a local reporter recognized Reubens' name on the arrest sheet the next day. Within hours, the scandal machinery was roaring at full throttle.

Mike Baker 5:01 Oh, boy.

Joe Rogan 5:02 (inhales deeply) Yeah.

Narrator 5:03 Okay.

Mike Baker 5:03 Yeah. But then he, you know, he did ... okay, so everybody makes mistakes. Um, but then he recovered, and, you know, he went on to, to, uh ...

Joe Rogan 5:13 It's a fairly-

Mike Baker 5:14 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 5:14 ... harmless crime.

Mike Baker 5:15 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 5:15 First of all, if you're in a porn theater, I think you should assume that those dudes with raincoats on are beating off.

Mike Baker 5:21 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 5:22 You know? I mean, just ... you're wearing rubber gloves in there and like those things are disgusting-

Mike Baker 5:26 And to be fair-

Joe Rogan 5:27 If people don't recogni- like I never went into one of those-

Mike Baker 5:30 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 5:30 ... so I'm just s- on anecdotes, but I would imagine like porn theaters are fucking gross.

Mike Baker 5:35 You'd have to, you'd have to think so, right?

Joe Rogan 5:37 Yeah.

Mike Baker 5:37 I mean it's, it's ... a, a regular theater is bad enough. Your feet stick to the floor-

Joe Rogan 5:40 Yeah.

Mike Baker 5:41 ... and that, and that's just from the Pepsi.

Joe Rogan 5:43 Yeah.

Mike Baker 5:43 Um, yeah. No.

Joe Rogan 5:44 But a porn theater?

Mike Baker 5:45 I gotta tell you and, and, uh, honestly the, the ... Nurse Nancy was an underrated film, I think. Um, so, there was that. Um, so that's Paul Reubens. (laughs) That's Pee-wee Herman. He died. I, I, I just made a note because I thought-

Joe Rogan 5:58 My friend Phil Hartman-

Mike Baker 5:59 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 5:59 ... worked with him.That's how he-

Mike Baker 6:00 Oh.

Joe Rogan 6:00 ... kinda got his start in show business, on Pee-wee's Playhouse.

Mike Baker 6:03 That's interesting.

Joe Rogan 6:03 Yeah.

Mike Baker 6:04 I didn't know that.

Joe Rogan 6:05 Yeah, he was on Pee-wee's Playhouse. He was one of the writers for Pee-wee's Playhouse.

Mike Baker 6:08 I'll be damned. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 6:09 Yeah, he always spoke very highly of Pee-wee.

Mike Baker 6:11 Yeah. Oh.

Joe Rogan 6:12 (laughs)

Mike Baker 6:14 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 6:14 I fucking loved that show when I was a kid.

Mike Baker 6:16 Yeah.

Narrator 6:17 Turn it, back, again.

Joe Rogan 6:17 It was hilarious. And Pee-wee's Big Adventure is a fucking amazing movie.

Mike Baker 6:22 Yes, exactly. And that was, uh ... When did that come out? That was, um-

Narrator 6:25 That was like ni-

Mike Baker 6:26 (laughs) I wanna say '80 ...

Narrator 6:28 Close to the s- Yeah, '89, must have been.

Mike Baker 6:29 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 6:30 Yeah.

Narrator 6:30 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 6:30 Well, I was dating this girl. I remember specifically the girl that I was dating at the time, that I was dating, like, right around ... I was graduating high school, 'cause we were cryin' laughing.

Mike Baker 6:40 (laughs) Yeah.

Joe Rogan 6:40 It was so funny. Like, back then, it was so unique, "Don't forget to tell them Large Marge sent ya."

Mike Baker 6:47 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 6:47 Fun fucking movie.

Mike Baker 6:49 Yeah, I took ... I, I remember I took a date to Pee-wee's, uh, show, his comedy show, and, uh, I mean, the place was rolling, right? It was ... He w- he really was. It was a, it was a ... Yeah, it was an interesting, uh, cat. But anyway, yeah.

Joe Rogan 7:00 I like that I'm seeing that side of you, Mike Baker.

Mike Baker 7:02 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 7:02 The Pee-wee Herman figure.

Mike Baker 7:03 Pee-wee Herman. I still have a, you know, a d- a pair of his, uh ... This is gonna sound weird. Signed big underpants.

Joe Rogan 7:09 (laughs)

Mike Baker 7:11 I kept them all these years (laughs) 'cause they're so fucking funny. And, um, yeah, I'll give them to one of my boys. I'm not sure which one.

Joe Rogan 7:17 Yeah.

Mike Baker 7:17 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 7:17 Maybe put it in a museum somewhere.

Mike Baker 7:19 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 7:19 Probably worth a lot of money one day.

Mike Baker 7:21 Uh, yeah, I don't even know where we go from Pee-wee Herman. Um-

Joe Rogan 7:24 We go from that to whatever notes you got.

Mike Baker 7:27 Yeah. Oh, yeah. Uh-

Joe Rogan 7:28 Anything else crazy?

Mike Baker 7:29 Yeah, well, um, we're gonna unfreeze a lot of money, um, for, uh, the Iran, uh, prisoner swap. That's a- that's another story. But we could start with the Chinese spy balloon, since I ... I don't know-

Joe Rogan 7:41 Yeah.

Mike Baker 7:41 ... why I got started there first, 'cause-

Joe Rogan 7:42 So, what is your take on the Chinese spy balloon?

Mike Baker 7:46 Um, well-

Joe Rogan 7:46 They said that Trump w- that there was a bunch of those that were happening while Trump was in office, but they didn't tell him about it 'cause they were worried he was gonna shoot them down-

Mike Baker 7:54 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 7:54 ... which I thought was fucking amazing.

Mike Baker 7:56 (laughs) That might ... You know what? I'm, I'm not gonna ... At this stage of the game, I'm not gonna say anything that doesn't sound plausible. Everything sounds plausible now, guys.

Joe Rogan 8:05 Yeah.

Mike Baker 8:05 So, um, the Chinese regime continues, just like with the fucking Wuhan lab, the Chinese r- regime continues to just say it was a weather balloon, right? It got blown off course. It was a weather balloon. Well, A, it didn't get blown off course. It had a massive array of propellers. It had a rudder. It had solar panels to keep those propellers churning. They knew exactly what they were doing and where they were going. Um, and, you know, it shows up over whatever, Alaska, the end of January, whenever, and, uh, proceeds to travel across the country in a path that is clearly designed to, you know, collect intelligence from sensitive facilities, right? It flies over Montana. Um, it flies over-

Joe Rogan 8:49 And what's in Montana?

Mike Baker 8:50 Uh, a lot, but there's, uh, Malmstrom, uh, Air Force Base, and that's a ... It's part of our, our, where we put our land-based nukes, right?

Joe Rogan 8:58 What part of, uh, Montana is that in?

Mike Baker 9:00 Um, the northern part, uh, if you square it up-

Joe Rogan 9:03 Close to Canada?

Mike Baker 9:04 Yeah, yeah. Not ... Well, a little further f- south than Canada, but it's, it's, it's like the top quarter, I guess. I think that's right. Um, and it does about 150 or so, um, you know, uh, silo-based nukes there. Um, so-

Joe Rogan 9:21 There it is.

Mike Baker 9:21 There it is.

Joe Rogan 9:24 So, that's the base?

Mike Baker 9:25 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 9:26 And so it was flying over that.

Mike Baker 9:27 Flying over, flying over Malmstrom, um ...

Joe Rogan 9:30 And so they were aware of it? The air force base was aware of it?

Mike Baker 9:34 Um, they w- by the time ... Yeah. The, and, and look, it's not as if we're not, you know, uh, taking measures or countermeasures to prevent, um, surveillance, because, uh, the Chinese have spy satellites. Very technical, very, very advanced. So, we know how to protect communications. We know how to protect ... And we also know what's available, right? So, satellite imagery is gonna give you a fair amount of information anyway. So, the, the question is, okay, well, what, why the hell was this thing, which was as tall as the Statue of Liberty, why was it floating around up there with an array of antennas, obviously there to, to collect? Um, but it went over there. It went over, um, uh, Omaha or near Omaha, uh, where we've got, uh, US, uh, Strategic Command, uh, and Offutt, uh, Air Force Base. Um, and, you know, the, the, the US government, the military was like, "Well, we don't believe ..." after the fact, after we shot it down. They're like, "We don't believe that it was, uh, collecting." You know? "And we took measures to prevent it from collecting. And not only that, we didn't shoot it down at the beginning because we were monitoring its capabilities and, and learning from that." Now, part of that is true, right? If you've got a target, you identify a target, unlike with law enforcement in the intelligence world, you, you let that run, right? Because you wanna learn everything you can about that target. You know, who's there to support it? What, what does ... You know, what's that look like?

Joe Rogan 10:53 How do they lear- how do they know that? Can they figure out what it's transmitting? Can they, can they tune into it?

Mike Baker 10:59 Um, it most ... Uh, yes, most of it's signals intelligence and, and capabilities. It's not really imagery that you're getting from it, although that's part of it. Um, but, you know, so I have no doubt that, you know, 'cause everyone was saying, "Well, why wouldn't you just shoot the fucker down when it showed up over Alaska on the, whenever, the 28th of January?" And, or when we became aware of it, um, initially, and, you know, because we live in a, you know, this highly partisan world, everybody was saying, "Well, because Biden's inept, and, you know, they didn't know what they were doing, and they let it float all the way across the states." So, you can't discount the argument that says, "Well part of it is we let it go because we were gathering intelligence ourselves from their capabilities." It's always interesting to know. It's just like when we ... Uh, here I go disappearing down a rabbit hole. When we lost that, uh, platform, that air asset, uh, during the Abbottabad raid, right? Um, and we had to leave it behind, and they destroyed, you know, to the degree they could, uh, everything that was in it of, of interest. But the platform itself was of interest, right? It was, it was ... 'Cause s- the two things that are important nowadays are stealth and speed. And that was, you know, that was ... Uh, there was a stealth design involved there. And there's also material science that's interesting. So, left it behind, um, after they bagged, uh, bin Laden.... literally. And, um, then, uh, three days later, uh, the- the Pakistanis had invited, uh, the Chinese to come in. And they were swarming all over that helicopter, right? Gathering intelligence. So you always ... if you have the opportunity to observe a target, I guess, like I said, you know, then you do. You- you can gain intelligence from. So I'm not one of those people who said, "Oh, they should've shot it down immediately," because I don't know what they were getting from it. But I do know that the purpose (laughs) of the balloon was to gather intelligence, uh, on us, on our sensitive facilities, to some degree. So anyway, uh, and then they- they sent all the remains, after they recovered them off the coast of South Carolina to, wherever, Quantico. Uh, and that was kind of the last we ever heard of it, right? Because we've all got attention deficit disorder. Nobody wants to, you know, think, okay, what did we learn? Can we do a hot wash on it and figure out ... and- and to what degree can you tell the public what the hell was going on? Right? Because honestly, I- I- you know, I don't know that we ever would have learned about it if it hadn't been so large (laughs) and, you know, members of the public hadn't seen it or spotted it.

Joe Rogan 13:14 Right.

Mike Baker 13:14 So ...

Joe Rogan 13:15 What altitude was it hovering around at?

Mike Baker 13:17 Hmm. It went, uh ... it cut a path through a couple of other bases, Minot and, um, uh, I forget where else it was to the, to the south of there. But it- it, um ... the fact that it hovered, uh, over a period of time, over Malmstrom, right, is really all you need to know, right? (laughs) 'Cause if it's a weather balloon y- y- uh, you know, it ... so it d- it doesn't ... I guess, one point being, you know, we never really pushed

Mike Baker 13:47 the Chinese regime under Xi for anything, right? We haven't- we haven't forced the hand on- on the pandemic. And we're gonna have another pandemic, so it would be nice to know what the fuck actually happened, right? Not to just spirit up that one.

Joe Rogan 13:59 Why do you think we're gonna have another pandemic? Everybody keeps saying that.

Mike Baker 14:01 Yeah, well, because-

Joe Rogan 14:02 It's very disconcerting. We haven't had-

Mike Baker 14:03 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 14:03 ... one in a hundred years, not a legitimate one.

Mike Baker 14:06 Well, you know- you know, um, not to, um, toot my own horn, which I guess, you know, that would be an interesting thing if you could do that. (laughs) But, um, I- I ... it was a few years back when we were talking and I said, you know, we'll have a ... the next big thing will be a pandemic, right?

Joe Rogan 14:24 Mm-hmm.

Mike Baker 14:24 And someone had pointed that out to me. I- I'd forgotten about it, but they sent it to me. And so my point back then, and the point now, is that it's just ... it's bound to happen, right? We're an increasingly shrinking globe, there's more people, we're in- in contact, we're ... you know, with- with everything that goes on, right? Whether it's in the natural based or just what we're doing in- in- in biotech and pharma, it's bound to happen. And so I guess you'd think that if we were serious minded, we would demand answers, and we wouldn't just allow the Xi regime to just shrug it off constantly, right?I mean, you know that there would be a massive, uh, debrief on this whole situation if it happened in the US or the UK or, you know, started in Australia, wherever, right?

Joe Rogan 15:09 Mm-hmm.

Mike Baker 15:10 The rest of the world wouldn't let it go. But there's just some- there's something about it. We just ... we never push the Chinese regime to the degree that we need to to get an answer. And- and- and so s- and s- so the point being it's the same with the damn balloon.

Joe Rogan 15:23 Is it because we don't think we'll ever get an answer and it's kind of a waste of time?

Mike Baker 15:27 That's p- (laughs)

Joe Rogan 15:27 'Cause it's not like they're transparent.

Mike Baker 15:29 That's part of it. Yeah, yeah. I think that's it.

Joe Rogan 15:30 They would just not tell us the truth.

Mike Baker 15:33 Yeah, I think that's- that's part of it. It's like doing business in China. Um, if you're investing in- in- in a pseudo state-owned enterprise or whatever, you always know there's going to be three or four or five sets of books, right? It's always ... there's ... they're just very good at obfuscating, and they also think they don't need to answer. We don't care. They d- they don't care. And Xi believes that they are still on, despite some problems in their economy, they're still on the slow march to the top of the food chain. So he- he certainly doesn't care. Um, anyway.

Joe Rogan 16:04 Do you think anything would be different if someone else was in office?

Mike Baker 16:07 Um, no, I- I don't think so. I don't think so. I'm not- I'm not gonna say that. I'm not gonna say if we got, you know, if Trump or, you know, a Republican was in office that we'd get a different result. I don't think so. We've- we've had s- sort of a unsatisfactory relationship related to China for decades, right? We just ... uh, we haven't ... uh, no administration has really pushed back appropriately against their theft of economic intelligence or research and development or whatever. S- so all those things keep happening and

Mike Baker 16:38 we never make the effort, right? I mean, look at the ... some of the things they're doing now. I've gotten bizarrely focused on the issue of- of, uh, we've talked about this before, critical minerals, right?

Joe Rogan 16:49 Mm-hmm.

Mike Baker 16:49 Because one of the things that I find really interesting is this push towards, uh, uh, net zero, you know, carbon production and getting rid of fossil fuels, stopping fossil fuels. Well, you can't stop fossil fuels, um, and, uh, regulate mining out of existence at the same time. You've gotta- you've gotta do one or the other to, um, to fuel, you know, production, to fuel manufacturing, to heat people's homes, to produce whatever you're gonna produce. And so if we want to get rid of fossil fuels, by definition you have to increase mining of critical minerals, right? There's just no way a- no way around it. You ... if you do both, which the Biden administration is basically trying to do, they're ... I think they're placating their- their base by, yeah, we're gonna get rid of fossil fuels, and they're also making, um, decisions that are overregulating the permitting process for mining. And we have a lot of critical minerals available in this country, right? We got, you know, lithium, phosphate, which should be on the critical minerals list. We got all these things that- that we- we need if we're gonna continue to march away from fossil fuels. But the current administration just keeps, uh ... under this theory of keep it in the ground, right? And so ... and that's a big push by environmentalists, right? Keep it all in the ground, right? Lock it up.

Joe Rogan 18:10 But how do they ... the only way to do that is to keep allowing what's essentially slave labor.... to extract cobalt and, and things from the Congo.

Mike Baker 18:19 Right. And you, you've talked about this and it absolutely-

Joe Rogan 18:21 So, Siddarth Kara's book is insane.

Mike Baker 18:24 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 18:24 And the videos that he got when he was ... you know, he risked his life to get footage of this stuff in the Congo. It's-

Mike Baker 18:30 Right.

Joe Rogan 18:31 It's horrendous. And anybody thinks that, in any way, that that's a good solution to our problems is, is fucking insane.

Mike Baker 18:38 Well, but that's where, that's where this is going. If, if the US continues and, and this is where I'll, I'll bring China in. And by the way, China, uh, they own or operate, I think it's like 15 of the 19 cobalt mines in, in, uh, the Democratic Republic of the Congo. So, it doesn't matter whether they're leading the way. And China controls 30 of the 50 critical minerals anyway, they produce more than anybody else, and they certainly control the refining process for most of the critical minerals. But it doesn't matter whether they're mining it in their own country, they've also been busy locking up opportunities elsewhere, right? To, to control these things. And so, you know, there's, there's very little pushback but if you, if you look at, at, uh ... if you look at one case, 'cause we've talked about cobalt, we've talked about lithium, which is here, we could be mining, but, you know, the government's, you know, shutting down opportunities to do that. Either by declaring things off-limits in terms of the land area or just making the permitting process so damn difficult. Um, but, uh, you know, phosphate, I mentioned that as an example, I got, I disappeared down some rabbit hole looking at all of this, it's not on the critical minerals list. Right? And there's 50 critical minerals. Now, phosphate, along with two other things, uh, nitrogen and pot- ... uh, potassium, are the key nutrients that you use for fertilizers, right? To feed the world, not just the US, right? You c- y- you can't do mass farming, right? And everybody wants to grow local but the reality is, is, it's a lot of people, right? And if you want, you know, the, the, the least privileged people around the globe to eat, you gotta do large-scale farming. You can't do that without phosphate. Right? And so, China is the number one producer of phosphate in the world. And r- I think Russia is fourth. And they produce like five times more combined, five times more than we do in the US. And yet, there is significant pushback here in the US, in part because it fits a Chinese narrative, and the Chinese have decided, the regime has, again, not the people, the Chinese regime has decided that one of the best ways to get what they want, in terms of US behavior, is not to try to influence, you know, the White House, but it's to reach out to local and state officials. So, here's where I'm going with this. When you look at, at decisions made at state level or local level, the Chinese regime and, and the, the, uh, ODNI, the Director of National Intelligence released a report, and they talked about this. They said that, that the Chinese are d- doubling down on their efforts to exert influence through a variety of means, um, environmental groups, um, encouraging litigation, right? Against mining operations or whatever it may be. Um, social influencers, to try to get a message out, right? That influences local and state regulators to do things such as saying, "No, gotta keep it in the ground." You know? "No, we don't want phosphate mining," as an example. Um, and that serves the purpose. Whether, whether an environmental group or whether a, uh, a group, um, that's out there that, that focuses on these things and, and files lawsuits constantly for environmental purposes, and then by the way, those, those lawyers, y- you know, usually recoup their funds from (laughs) , you know, what is called an Endangered Species Act that allows them to get their money back. So, you think, "Oh, wow, these lawyers are fighting and it's pro bono." No, it's not. They're getting paid. So ... but they're doing it whether they do it knowingly or whether they do it, uh, unwittingly, it still serves the purpose of the Chinese regime which is looking to say, "Keep it in the ground 'cause we wanna control all of this." And again, whether it's cobalt, whether it's lithium, whether it's phosphate, whatever it may be, it's, it's, it's a fascinating thing. But the, the point being that we can't pursue a green future and at the same time over-regulate, uh, the mining process. And, uh, it just doesn't work.

Joe Rogan 22:40 China has so much influence on America, it's, it's, it's crazy how different the playing field is between like what we're allowed to do. Like, Americans can't own businesses in China, they can't own land in China, they can't buy property, but China can do all those things here. And they can influence our universities, they b- bring their students over here, their students siphon up data and information and oftentimes get caught. I mean, it's-

Mike Baker 23:10 (laughs) Yeah.

Joe Rogan 23:10 It's kind of crazy.

Mike Baker 23:11 Yeah, possibly. Yeah. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 23:12 Yeah. They get caught, right?

Mike Baker 23:13 Right. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 23:13 There's been quite a few of those cases.

Mike Baker 23:15 There have been.

Joe Rogan 23:15 The, the di-

Mike Baker 23:15 But, but you think about-

Joe Rogan 23:16 The sp-

Mike Baker 23:17 ... that's, uh, that's the tip of the iceberg, right? That's a, that's a, that's a small number that ... because it's, it's, it's incredibly heavy lift, right? A counterintelligence operation is, is really tough. And so, I look at that and I think, "Yeah, I'm, thank God we caught that person." But then you think, "Well, how many more there are out there?"

Joe Rogan 23:32 Right.

Mike Baker 23:33 So ...

Joe Rogan 23:33 That's the thing. It's like-

Mike Baker 23:34 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 23:34 ... how many of them are just more careful?

Mike Baker 23:37 Yeah. Yeah. It's, um ... it is interesting. Uh, in a way, we used to talk about during ... when (sighs) you know, when we were on the war on terror, right? Everybody's forgotten about that, uh, uh, you know, for the most part, although we probably should talk a little bit about-

Joe Rogan 23:49 It's on the back burner.

Mike Baker 23:49 Yeah. It's, and it's, it, it's bubbling away in Afghanistan which we should also talk about but, but we used to talk about war on terror and how, uh, the, the terrorists were using our open society against us. Right?

Joe Rogan 24:02 Right.

Mike Baker 24:03 And, and you know, the Chinese regime does the same thing. Right? They understand and they, they look at how we operate and they say, "Okay. Where's the, where's the, where's the weaknesses?" Right? "Where are the, what are the leverage points that we can use to turn that against them?" And you know, we (sighs) this, this idea-Um, I mean, look, China produces more carbon than all the developed nations combined.

Joe Rogan 24:29 Which is very important to talk about-

Mike Baker 24:31 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 24:31 ... when people are talking about going green. Because the amount of impact that would happen even if United States went to zero, went to zero carbon output, you're not going to put a dent in what's happening-

Mike Baker 24:42 No.

Joe Rogan 24:42 ... to the world-

Mike Baker 24:42 No.

Joe Rogan 24:42 ... because most of it is coming from China and India.

Mike Baker 24:45 India, India, right.

Joe Rogan 24:46 Yeah.

Mike Baker 24:46 Right.

Joe Rogan 24:47 That's most of it. So, all this shit about don't eat meat-

Mike Baker 24:51 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 24:51 ... because we're going to save the world, you're not saving jack shit.

Mike Baker 24:54 No.

Joe Rogan 24:54 And I don't understand where that message is coming from or why there's not a nuanced perspective where people are taking into account all these other variables.

Mike Baker 25:03 Well, in part, uh, again, uh-

Joe Rogan 25:05 It doesn't fit the narrative.

Mike Baker 25:06 It doesn't fit the narrative, but also, there is this, this effort. Look, I mean, we, we talked, you know, th- there's ... You remember the, uh, what was that called? Internet Research Agency, right?

Joe Rogan 25:16 Yeah.

Mike Baker 25:16 It was y- and so, it, we, uh, the, the potential for influence on the elections, right?

Joe Rogan 25:22 Yeah.

Mike Baker 25:22 Back in the day, um, which wasn't that long ago. And the Chinese regime actually does it better than the Russians, right? They've got way more resources. Uh, they've got a much longer view. Um, like, frankly, they're more sophisticated, right? Um, and so sometimes you look at things and you think, "Well, that doesn't make any sense. Why, you know, why are we, you know, acting in this way?" And then you think, "Well, because you've got like a, a local or a grassroots community activist group," right? And they're not, they're not Chinese spies. They're not work- but they're, uh, the Chinese regime identifies them and says, "You know what? If we can influence them, it's just pure, you know, propaganda or a covert action campaign, if I can influence that activist group to go out and tell those ... whomever, the city officials, or the county commissioners, or whatever, that this is bad," right? And this is, "We, we need to stop this," right? "We shouldn't be mining for lithium in Nevada or wherever. Uh, we shouldn't be pursuing, you know, uh, logical steps to get a, you know, uh, control over the critical mineral supply chain issue," right? Um, w- why wouldn't you do that, right? It's, it's smart activity on the part of the Chinese regime and the intel service there. So, that part of it, to me, makes, makes sense. The problem we have is that there's a lack of awareness, right? Now, there was a ... again, this shows you I've been spending too much time reading on this shit, but I, I'd- I'm fascinated by this, this idea that we're trying to do two things that are completely opposed to each other: stop fossil fuels, and also keep critical minerals in the ground that we're going to need to pursue green energy. I'm f- I f- that, that part is amazing, but I did actually write down ... well.

Joe Rogan 27:11 But that is part of the problem with green energy is that it's not really green, because you do have to mine, and when you do mine-

Mike Baker 27:18 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 27:19 ... there is consequences.

Mike Baker 27:20 There's consequences, and that's ... but as, I mean, as you pointed out, w- I mean, look, we, we mine cleaner and safer than anybody else. And that's why there was a, I'm, I'm gonna, I'm gonna actually read a quote. This shows you (laughs) look, see, I feel like I'm maturing. I've gotten more organized.

Joe Rogan 27:33 You're so prepared, Mike.

Mike Baker 27:33 I know.

Joe Rogan 27:34 I'm so proud of you.

Mike Baker 27:34 I know, look, this, see? I know. There, there have been times-

Joe Rogan 27:36 (laughs)

Mike Baker 27:37 ... when you've been staring at me thinking, "What the fuck is he talking about?" or, "Is, is he going, is he taking a nap?" Um, so they had a hearing in, in Arizona not too long ago, uh, about critical minerals, the issue of critical minerals, and the importance of them, and the importance of speeding up the permitting process. If we want, again, if we wanna pursue a green future, you gotta do it. And, uh, this guy, congressman, uh, I know I've got it noted, Gozar, Paul Gozar, from wherever, Arizona, said, and this is a quote, "The anti-mining actions by the Biden administration hurt America's economy, threaten our national security, and push mineral production abroad," okay, "where environmental and labor standards pale in comp- comparison with our own." Right? And that's absolutely correct. And, and again, you, all you have to do is look at what goes on in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It's, it's, uh, it's insane. But I, I don't see that we're going to walk that back, right? Because there's just, there's too much pushback. And no matter what mineral you're talking about, I don't see that necessarily changing unless you get maybe a, a change in administration, and then you get the effort to deregulate, and then you speed up permitting. But at some point, we're gonna be screwed. China, China recently, uh, put the brakes on exporting a couple of minerals that are critical to producing mineral systems and solar panels. Um, and they've done it, that in the past, right? And it, that should be a clear signal to us that we gotta change our thought process on all of this. But I, I'm, I'm not confident that will happen. So-

Joe Rogan 29:12 Mm-hmm.

Mike Baker 29:12 ... anyway.

Joe Rogan 29:13 Yeah, I'm not confident either because it seems like that narrative is just in the American public. You know, the mining is bad. We need to go green. But they don't see the inconsistencies of taking those two positions at the same time, same time.

Mike Baker 29:28 Well, they, they, uh, the, the, the Republicans have never done a particularly good job of messaging, right? And they need to, they need to get better at it. So, and I think they will. There's a few, there's a few bills passed around apparently, um, that may help the situation. But, uh, for now, I guess, you know, uh, with, with China's kind of significant control over the minerals as it stands, um, we don't have any option other than to deal with them, right? In a, in a ... and so no wonder we sometimes don't push back. And I guess that's where I was coming back around. You said, "Well, why don't we push back?" Or how we ... you know, there's, uh, we, we don't have that much leverage right now. So, I think that's part of the answer.

Joe Rogan 30:09 Mm-hmm. Well-

Mike Baker 30:10 Well.

Joe Rogan 30:11 ... there's also, we need a push for nuclear. Where-

Mike Baker 30:14 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 30:14 ... legitimate new nuclear power plants in this country, which is, uh, it's so hard for people to wrap their heads around because of Three Mile Island and Fukushima, but that is the safest, cleanest-... electricity that we can generate in this country.

Mike Baker 30:29 Well, you would think that that would be a logical... It's, it's not a big leap, right? But you're right, there, you get, oh, it, people are so emotive, right?

Joe Rogan 30:39 Yeah.

Mike Baker 30:40 And they stole... You could say Three Mile Island and they'd... E- everybody knows, right?

Joe Rogan 30:43 Right.

Mike Baker 30:43 I mean, and most people can't retain a lot of information about historical facts.

Joe Rogan 30:47 Chernobyls, Fukushima.

Mike Baker 30:48 Chernobyl, yeah. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 30:49 Yeah.

Mike Baker 30:49 Yeah. And so... And we've gotten better at safety systems and redundancies, right? So, absolutely. But (sighs) you know, it's... People talk about, "Well, we gotta expand, uh, nuclear energy." And, and you're right.

Joe Rogan 31:00 When you look at the deaths from nuclear, they're so small just in comparison to the chronic illness that comes from coal.

Mike Baker 31:07 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 31:08 I mean, th- we watched this documentary on this, uh, one town. Was it... Is it Indian- Indiana, Jamie, that one town? Yeah. Where there's multiple coal plants near the area, and these people have like a fine dusting of particulate in their cars every day. So they're breathing this air-

Mike Baker 31:26 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 31:27 ... that has this coal particulate that's in- And there's a host of chronic illnesses that are coming with this.

Mike Baker 31:33 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 31:33 So many people have respiratory conditions.

Mike Baker 31:35 Y- And... Yeah, but... And, and w- and we have been, we've been busy trying to shut down, you know, use of coal. And, and, and fine, but you gotta replace it with something that's, that's, that's pragmatic, right? And right now, solar and wind i- isn't gonna cut it, right? And we're gonna... Yeah.

Joe Rogan 31:49 You see these people exaggerate about the efficiency and efficacy of solar and wind. They really do love to sort of exaggerate how m- how effective it is.

Mike Baker 31:59 (sniffs) Yeah.

Joe Rogan 31:59 And also, how much energy i- it takes to generate a windmill, just to build one and maintain it.

Mike Baker 32:06 Right. And I, and also, what going green is going to mean to the grid system, right?

Joe Rogan 32:11 Right.

Mike Baker 32:11 And the demand for electricity. And-

Joe Rogan 32:13 Right, all the cars.

Mike Baker 32:14 And... Yes. And hap-

Joe Rogan 32:15 That was a thing in California. They said-

Mike Baker 32:17 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 32:17 ... by 2035, we're not gonna sell any internal combustion engines. Also, don't charge your car 'cause it's hot out.

Mike Baker 32:22 Yeah. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 32:23 I said, "The fuck?"

Mike Baker 32:24 (laughs) Everybody, stay home.

Joe Rogan 32:26 California.

Mike Baker 32:27 Stay home. Yeah. Oh God.

Joe Rogan 32:29 It is the test case for stupidity.

Mike Baker 32:31 (sighs) Yeah. Well, you know, who knows? Maybe, uh, the, the current governor is gonna, you know, throw his hat in the ring and-

Joe Rogan 32:36 I think he is.

Mike Baker 32:37 Yeah. You think so?

Joe Rogan 32:38 Yeah. I think... I mean, I'm a armchair, uh, conspiracy theorist, but, uh, if I had to guess, I would say that all this stuff that's coming out slowly but surely about Biden is on purpose, and they want-

Mike Baker 32:50 (sniffs)

Joe Rogan 32:50 They wanna get rid of him. I think he wants to run again.

Mike Baker 32:53 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 32:53 And I don't think the Democrats think that he could win. I think they're right, and I think they're gonna slowly but surely expose more of these, uh, th- like, very clear pieces of evidence of corruption.

Mike Baker 33:05 Yeah. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 33:06 The $20 million is fucking bananas. The fact that this isn't all over The New York Times and The Washington Post and mainstream news, that they're not blaring it from the rooftops, 'cause you know they would be if it was Trump.

Mike Baker 33:19 Oh, n- d- absolutely. Or really any, you know, any... It wouldn't matter, Trump or, or whomever would be on the GOP side.

Joe Rogan 33:27 Yeah.

Mike Baker 33:27 Um, no, look, I've got a, I've got a, um, intelligence and investigations firm. You may have heard of them.

Joe Rogan 33:34 I did. I was... Yeah.

Mike Baker 33:35 Yeah, Portman Square Group. Uh, for all your information and security needs. And, um-

Joe Rogan 33:39 You've changed the name a couple times, huh?

Mike Baker 33:42 (laughs) I just avoided-

Joe Rogan 33:42 What it used to be.

Mike Baker 33:42 ... bill collectors. (laughs) So... (laughs) Um, yeah. And, uh, but I've got investigators, great people. That's, that's the, the most, been the most rewarding thing about building a business, is just the wonderful people that you eventually get to work with, and they raise families, and they stick with you. And, um, so I've got some investigators that... I guess the point is, they could have wrapped this puppy up, uh, some time ago, right? It's an asset tracing exercise, is what they're engaged in. And (sighs) you know, maybe they'll, maybe they'll stay focused, maybe they'll keep going, right? But when you've got an asset tracing exercise and you've got a, a myriad of, of single purpose companies set up, you know, around the world... Um, first of all, when you look at a, at a, at a case and you say, "We've got 20 plus single purpose companies set up here for pass through of funds," that's, yeah, what we would call a clue about money laundering, right? That's, that's why you do that, right? Hol- uh, to hide beneficial ownership, um, to hide the flow of funds and transactions that are involved, to, to obfuscate and make it difficult for the obvious because they, their feeling is, uh, most people maybe dig once or twice, but then they'll get bored and they'll move on, right? Let's make this as complicated as possible. And so you start to see, there's always fraud indicators. You start to see certain things in an investigation. And the great thing about asset tracing also is that there are records, right? And that's what they're finding out now. So, and, and, and I'm, I'm glad because whether it's a, whether it's Biden, whether it's Trump, it wouldn't matter. If you've got an asshole who's in, in office and is engaged in pay for play, right? And there's no way, frankly, that this president didn't know that he was being used as the dog in the dog and pony show, right? And so they've got these, these records available to them. And with the power of the government, their ability to subpoena and do all these things that they can do, they will have the case figured out at some point. The problem with Washington is, do they have the, the, you know, uh, do they have the grit to stick with it, right? And then, then the next question is, does anything happen as a result? But it is, in my mind, anyway, for what that's worth, um, there's no doubt, this is, this is money laundering. And it is, it's, it- it's pathetic, as you pointed out, that there's so little interest, right? From a completely incurious... well, uh, n- not incurious, but just a completely partisan, uh, significant majority of the media. They don't... It's not that they don't care, it's that they do care and they're taking every effort and they're now having to contort themselves into certain ways (laughs) because it's getting more and more difficult to provide top cover for the Biden administration. But they've been trying. And you know, they're just... A- at some point, maybe the dam breaks and there's so much paper evidence that they can't ignore it anymore. But you would have thought that some enterprising young journalists...... who understand the importance of objectivity, whether it's a Democrat or Republican, would have gotten off their ass and really pursued this story, because it's a Pulitzer Prize-winning story at the end of the day. But...

Joe Rogan 36:48 Yeah, but the question is, what kind of pushback do they get in pursuing that story?

Mike Baker 36:53 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 36:53 How dangerous is it for them to pursue that story?

Mike Baker 36:57 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 36:57 Because it seems like it would be fairly dangerous. I mean-

Mike Baker 37:00 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 37:00 ... you're talking about extraordinary amounts, amounts of money, and this is just what's been uncovered, right?

Mike Baker 37:05 Right.

Joe Rogan 37:05 So we've only gone back to what, like, 2000 what, 13 or 14 or something like that?

Mike Baker 37:10 Yeah, back to the VP days.

Joe Rogan 37:12 Right.

Mike Baker 37:12 Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 37:12 So what about before that? Like, what, uh... When did this start?

Mike Baker 37:16 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 37:16 Did this only start when he was VP? Did he get his son involved to give him some sort of a meaningful business?

Mike Baker 37:24 It seems like he was the bag man, right?

Joe Rogan 37:26 Yeah.

Mike Baker 37:26 And, and, um, and that, that's another part of this (laughs) story that's fascinating. So it's not like he was producing anything. It's not like Hunter Biden was producing something. Right?

Joe Rogan 37:34 He was producing some good videos.

Mike Baker 37:36 Yeah, well, spe-... Yeah, they were-

Joe Rogan 37:37 Made some great photos.

Mike Baker 37:38 They were fine, yeah.

Joe Rogan 37:39 He seems like-

Mike Baker 37:40 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 37:40 ... the kind of guy that you would expect to be involved in that kind of behavior.

Mike Baker 37:45 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 37:45 I mean, he's a wild boy.

Mike Baker 37:47 And he's also the sort of guy that you would identify immediately if you were, if you were on the Chinese side of things, as an example. Whatever, 8-

Joe Rogan 37:54 Oh, yeah.

Mike Baker 37:54 ... $8 million, whatever, he's the target, right?

Joe Rogan 37:56 That's the guy.

Mike Baker 37:57 Look at that, that's your weak link w- next to, with the greatest access possible to the second most powerful person, theoretically, in, in the, uh, in the country. That's a fantastic target, right?

Joe Rogan 38:08 Yeah.

Mike Baker 38:09 There's all sorts of weaknesses there that you can play off of, right?

Joe Rogan 38:12 And for them-

Mike Baker 38:13 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 38:13 ... $20 million over a few years, that's a fucking-

Mike Baker 38:17 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 38:18 ... minor drop in the bucket.

Mike Baker 38:20 It's, it's, it's literally nothing, and, and that, that's... It's a great payday for them, and whether it's Burisma and, and... Look, there is no reason he was being placed on boards other than access to his father. That, any... I mean, even if somebody who's highly partisan on the Democratic side has got to at least be honest enough to admit that. So then the question becomes, all right, was the v-... at the time, vice president, and then after that, uh... Was he aware? Did he know that Hunter was out there doing all these things and using access? And at first, it was like, "I had no idea, wasn't talking," and then suddenly it's like, "Well, you know, I was on some phone calls, but it wasn't important," and now the media has got a spin that narrative. "Well, he wasn't talking about anything of substance."

Joe Rogan 39:05 Well, there's a new photo-

Mike Baker 39:06 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 39:06 ... that just got released of him on a plane to Ukraine in 2015.

Mike Baker 39:10 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 39:10 So I think this is, uh, to my point, that-

Mike Baker 39:13 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 39:13 ... I think they're slowly releasing this stuff because they plan on getting rid of him.

Mike Baker 39:17 Yeah. Well, if they do, then what happens to Kamala Harris?

Joe Rogan 39:21 She's gone.

Mike Baker 39:21 Yeah?

Joe Rogan 39:22 Yeah. Yeah, there's no way. You can't keep her. She's got the lowest approval rating of any vice president ever, including Dan Quayle. (laughs)

Mike Baker 39:33 (laughs) Oh, God.

Joe Rogan 39:34 It's a good story also. People forgot about that guy.

Mike Baker 39:36 Oh, yeah, yeah, though-

Joe Rogan 39:37 He was the... What they used to-

Mike Baker 39:39 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 39:39 Comics used to joke that that guy was assassination insurance.

Mike Baker 39:42 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 39:43 Nobody wants to kill the president-

Mike Baker 39:45 Oh, shit.

Joe Rogan 39:45 ... and have that fucking guy take over.

Mike Baker 39:46 I forgot about that, but... No, but you're right, and, and I think if... Yeah, they can't, yeah, they can't move Kamala Harris out as long as Biden's the candidate, right? Because that-

Joe Rogan 39:56 Right.

Mike Baker 39:56 ... they, they wouldn't weather that optic. Um, but if he has to step aside, then obviously it's a brand-new ticket, it's a brand-new day, and they'll come up with something. So, you know, I, I guess the question is, do they firmly believe that Biden can't win again if it's Trump or whomever?

Joe Rogan 40:13 The only way-

Mike Baker 40:14 You know?

Joe Rogan 40:14 ... Biden's going to win again is never Trump. These never-Trump people.

Mike Baker 40:18 Yeah, yeah.

Joe Rogan 40:18 There, there are people that will vote for a fucking box of hammers before they would vote for Trump, and that's a-

Mike Baker 40:24 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 40:24 ... that's a real segment of our, our population. I don't know what percentages, but it's probably fairly high, who are... They have enough trust in the Democratic establishment that they think that the Democrats would figure out a way to run the country better, even with, uh, a puppet-

Mike Baker 40:41 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 40:42 ... than they would with Donald Trump in office.

Mike Baker 40:45 Yeah. Well, and I think, uh, there's also the independents. Don't forget, you know, the independents-

Joe Rogan 40:49 Uh-huh.

Mike Baker 40:49 ... are sort of the, the moderates that, um, you know, previously had voted for Trump, and then got tired of the chaos, and then in the-

Joe Rogan 40:56 Yeah.

Mike Baker 40:56 ... last election, said, "No, I'm not going to do that again." Uh, I don't think they walk it back and say, "Yeah, actually give me..." You know, 'cause I, I don't... People, again, very emotive. So-

Joe Rogan 41:06 Well, there's also this... The, the indictments.

Mike Baker 41:09 Uh-huh.

Joe Rogan 41:09 Now, what is your take on this Georgia thing? Because the Georgia thing is interesting, because I was just-

Mike Baker 41:13 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 41:13 ... watching this video today that was detailing what they were claiming was evidence of fraud in the Georgia election.

Mike Baker 41:21 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 41:22 And there's apparently some videos of people moving boxes around and doing some things that seem a little, at least on the surface, suspicious without an adequate explanation.

Mike Baker 41:31 Yeah. Um, I think it's, um, I, I think they don't care whether they win or not, and I think they brought a, uh, the fairly massive racketeering or RICO, you know, charge at, at the top of this sort of a criminal-

Joe Rogan 41:44 Ten counts, right?

Mike Baker 41:45 ... conspiracy. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 41:46 Yeah, yeah.

Mike Baker 41:46 But it involves, uh, Trump plus 18 others. And, um, I think... They can't be stupid, so they probably understand that it falls apart in, in appeal, right? And I don't think that that's gonna hold up, but I don't think they care, because last night... I mean, again, it shows you how bizarre this is, they held a press conference, right? They rushed this thing through. First of all, well, here's an interesting fact, first of all, the indictment showed up, uh, on the, uh, county, uh, website, right, uh, I- in the afternoon, before the grand jury had voted, right, before they had come across with what the charges would be. And, and so-All of a sudden, that comes across on the, on the public domain. And, uh, I think it was, uh, I think it was Reuters that snapped it and, and kind of ran with it as a story. But then it was taken down off the county's website, right? And then they were asked about it later on, and they said, "Ah, it was, uh, fictitious," or some bullshit, right? So you wonder, okay, how did that get leaked? Because then those charges that showed up earlier in the day matched what ended up being voted on by the grand jury. So, that's a little odd, and it's, as far as I can remember, I think it's illegal to, uh, leak that sort of (laughs) information, right, ahead of time. But also, how would they know? How would they know how the grand jury was gonna decide at the end of the day what indictments to, to throw out there, or to put out there in this, in this charge? So, that's something that probably should be looked at, but in today's world, may not. Um, but I think really, she was pushing last night at whatever, 11:30, 12:00 at night, I mean, who holds a s- press conference at, at this point, at that time of night?

Joe Rogan 43:18 Wow.

Mike Baker 43:18 Um, but she was saying she wants it out there and, with it, you know, to start this, uh, trial in six months. And so, you know, six months from now is, is, uh, whatever, February? So, right in the middle of, of, uh, all the caucuses and all the, all the campaigning that goes on. And whether it's that one or whether it's the one from DC, or ... it doesn't matter. They just, they, they're, they're creating a very, um, lasting narrative that's gonna go through the election season, and I think that's really what they want. And whether any of this actually holds, I don't think they give a rat's ass. You know, some people-

Joe Rogan 43:54 Could you imagine-

Mike Baker 43:54 Some people do.

Joe Rogan 43:55 ... if this was happening in the other direction?

Mike Baker 43:57 Oh.

Joe Rogan 43:58 And by the way-

Mike Baker 43:59 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 43:59 If Trump was in office and Biden was running against him, and this, this evidence was available, this evidence of the c- all the corruption with his son-

Mike Baker 44:07 Mm-hmm.

Joe Rogan 44:08 I mean, that's far clearer.

Mike Baker 44:11 (sighs)

Joe Rogan 44:11 This is like real clear stuff.

Mike Baker 44:13 Well, but it, they always come back with, (sighs) um, "Well, look, it was, you know, the, you know, the, uh, the Trump kids were working and doing business." And, you think, well, you know, but they had a business, right? They were real estate developers. There was, there was tangible activity there. Now, um, you know, it, it ... I, uh, that's, that's part of the problem. That's how it gets muddied, is, is that people, you know, in the media or people who are supportive of an administration will say, "Yeah, but everybody does it, right? Everybody's engaged in pay-for-play. Everybody's engaged in influence peddling." And there's, you know, some truth in that. But not everybody's engaged in money laundering.

Joe Rogan 44:49 Right.

Mike Baker 44:49 Right? That might, you know, be worth some investigation. But, uh, again, um, I don't think that the point of this exercise on the part of the, the various DAs, and, and that's another thing. Like, the, the DA down in, in Georgia is, is, uh, j- that's an elected position, and she's running for office again, and she's campaigning based on getting Trump, right? And she's raising money off, off of, uh, "This is what I'm gonna do, I'm gonna get Trump," right? Uh, uh, that seems a little odd too, right? I mean, I, I don't know. There's y- i- i- it's no surprise that people are losing (laughs) confidence in, uh, in the government. And-

Joe Rogan 45:28 Have you looked at any of the evidence of, uh, election manipulation?

Mike Baker 45:32 Um, some, but I'll be honest with you, I haven't disappeared f- fully down that rabbit hole yet. Uh, I don't, I, you know, I, I'm-

Joe Rogan 45:40 Seems like it'd really suck you in.

Mike Baker 45:42 Yeah. It w- I think it would, and there's, uh, you know, there's a lot of communities I'd, uh, the times that I have looked, there's a lotta, there's a lot of shit out there. Um, and trying to, uh, trying to decipher what is just crazy ass bullshit from what is legitimate and deserves investigation, right? Um, uh, I'll be honest with you, I just, like, I, I run out of time.

Joe Rogan 46:06 Mm.

Mike Baker 46:06 Uh, and I'm just like, "I'm sorry, I gotta go, you know, watch one of the kids' games." Um ...

Joe Rogan 46:11 Yeah.

Mike Baker 46:11 So ... which by the way, one of my kids, the middle boy, Sluggo, is, uh, heading to Florida to go to boarding school at the end of the month. He's-

Joe Rogan 46:19 Oh, boy.

Mike Baker 46:19 Yeah. He's gonna go play basketball at IMG, um, which is an amazing, uh, academy, amazing, amazing place.

Joe Rogan 46:26 Is that gonna be hard for you, having him go to boarding school?

Mike Baker 46:29 Um ... eh, we couldn't wait to get him out of the house. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 46:34 (laughs)

Mike Baker 46:34 No, he's a gr- oh my God, he's a great kid. He's ... all, all the, all the boys are fantastic. But, but he's very focused, he's very competitive, he's been ... this is all he wants to do, is ... and, and, um, he's been down there before, and they're, they do a great job, um, academically and sports-wise. It's, it's very much a sports-focused program.

Joe Rogan 46:50 Does he want to play professionally?

Mike Baker 46:52 Uh, w- uh, y- yeah. I guess any kid that, you know, is, is serious about what they do at the time-

Joe Rogan 46:56 How tall is he?

Mike Baker 46:57 Oh, he's about three foot two. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 46:59 (laughs)

Mike Baker 47:00 He's a white kid from Idaho.

Joe Rogan 47:02 (laughs)

Mike Baker 47:02 I think he's got a big future. Um, no, he's, uh, he's, he's growing. He's making his way towards, you know, he's, he's just turned, just turned, uh, whatever, 14, and, and he's making his way towards six foot. And he'll, he'll get, he'll get h- as tall as he needs to be for a point guard, but he's a, he's a focused, uh, he's a focused kid.

Joe Rogan 47:20 People are doing all kinds of shit to their kids now.

Mike Baker 47:23 Yeah. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 47:23 They're juicing 'em up with human growth hormone to get them to grow.

Mike Baker 47:26 It's crazy, and they're-

Joe Rogan 47:27 Wow.

Mike Baker 47:27 You know, they're reclassing them f- three or four times, right?

Joe Rogan 47:30 Mm-hmm.

Mike Baker 47:30 Having repeat grades and growing-

Joe Rogan 47:31 Right, redshirting.

Mike Baker 47:32 He's, he's played some kids that are, you know, honest to God, it's, you know, like, they, they, they show up with a baby and they're, you know, and ... and-

Joe Rogan 47:38 Well, it's a f- it's a fucking business. I mean, if you- your kid can become a, a legit professional athlete, I mean, there is extraordinary amounts of money in that.

Mike Baker 47:47 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 47:47 If the kid's good.

Mike Baker 47:48 Yeah. And, uh, y- uh, you know, again, it's, you know, for us, you look at the ... and w- he's very realistic, and he understands that, you know. And, and, and, uh, but he loves the game. He's, he's super into sort of the, the, the (sighs) you know, the, the intricacies of it, right? And he's, uh, he's a selfless kid. He, he, you know, he's, he's all about, you know, getting the ball passed properly, getting the assist, right? He's not, he's not a, a, he's not a selfish player. But, but he's also realistic about the, the tiny, tiny statistics in terms of who gets to even play D3 or D2 ball, right?

Joe Rogan 48:19 Right.

Mike Baker 48:20 And then certainly going on to, to, uh, to professional sports. But, um, it teaches a lot of other things, right? And so, boarding school for the right kid, um, can be a great experience. Could be a terrible experience for the wrong kid, but for the right kid it can be a great experience and, you know, teaches them independence and, and discipline and motivation, and, and, uh, the value of, of, of hard work and, and-... you know, just not taking shit for granted, right?

Joe Rogan 48:45 How often are you gonna see him?

Mike Baker 48:47 Um, (sighs) p- probably, uh, quite frequently (laughs) 'cause um, you know, we- we- we- you know, he's, again, he's only ... he's- he's young, so we'll be down there as, as often as possible. Um, but at the same time you wanna let him run, right?

Joe Rogan 49:01 Right.

Mike Baker 49:01 You don't wanna ... you know, you gotta give him room.

Joe Rogan 49:03 Right.

Mike Baker 49:03 And we've never been those sort of parents for any of the kids, where we sit on the sidelines and watch their practices. That drives me fucking crazy.

Joe Rogan 49:10 Mm.

Mike Baker 49:10 You know, when you got parents that, uh, are at every practice, sitting in their lawn chair just, you know, watching. And you think, "Just let the kids do-

Joe Rogan 49:16 Right.

Mike Baker 49:16 ... well or not."

Joe Rogan 49:17 Yeah.

Mike Baker 49:17 Right? (sighs) But-

Joe Rogan 49:19 Yeah.

Mike Baker 49:19 Yeah. So, I think he's, uh ... he- he again, he's very independent and I think he'll, I think he'll be just fine. But, um, I forget how I, I jumped onto that-

Joe Rogan 49:29 Boarding school.

Mike Baker 49:29 ... thing. Boarding school, yeah. Anyway, f- eh. Yeah.

Joe Rogan 49:32 Yeah.

Mike Baker 49:32 But it's, it, it was a bit of a ... it was a struggle to, to get to the point where we thought, "Okay, w- let's do it." Right? Um, the other two boys were like, "Nah, get him outta the house. It'll be fine."

Joe Rogan 49:41 Ugh. (laughs)

Mike Baker 49:41 Yeah, it'll be fine. The youngest one was like, "Do I get his room?" Um-

Joe Rogan 49:45 Ah, that's hilarious.

Mike Baker 49:46 ... and all his stuff? Um, but yeah. Anyway, and the oldest one was just out at the Naval Academy. Um, there's a, there is a fantastic place. God.

Joe Rogan 49:56 Yeah.

Mike Baker 49:56 He was out there for a visit and, and, uh, had a chance to play some lacrosse, and, and, um, you know, whether he applies or not, uh, again, it's the experience of seeing what's out there and what's possible.

Joe Rogan 50:08 Mm-hmm.

Mike Baker 50:08 And, you know, if you leave all the doors open for the kids, and you try to get them to understand the importance of not shutting doors by stupid behavior or poor academics or whatever it is, it's all you can do as a parent. And then at some point they run and they do their thing. But, you know, from our perspective, you just ... you- you gotta keep every door open for the kids y- to ... so they don't get there and think, "Oh God, I should not have done that, 'cause now I can't go there or I can't do this." Right?

Joe Rogan 50:33 Mm-hmm.

Mike Baker 50:34 So we'll see. But it was, uh, it was a great experience. (clicks tongue) Yeah. Yeah. Anyway.

Joe Rogan 50:39 So how ... We went from election meddling-

Mike Baker 50:42 (laughs) No, we went from Pee-wee Herman-

Joe Rogan 50:44 Yeah.

Mike Baker 50:44 ... to election meddling-

Joe Rogan 50:45 Yeah.

Mike Baker 50:45 ... to, uh, to my kids. Um, yeah. I got ... You know what? Because I've got my list, I'm gonna stick with my fucking list.

Joe Rogan 50:52 All right, stay with the list.

Mike Baker 50:53 Um, yeah. There was one other thing I wanted to mention about how fascinating the, um, the- the- the our relationship with China is, and that is, uh, also since the last time we met. Um, (clicks tongue) the Chinese, uh ... A Chinese company, pseudo-independent supposedly, but there's very few of those, right? They've all have got some level of state sp- uh, sponsorship or cooperation. They bought like F- 300 and s- some-odd acres, right? In, um, uh, near Grand Forks, yeah. Um, and there's a Grand Forks Air Force Base, which is, you know, home to, uh, whatever, the th- 319th Fighter Wing, or Air Wing. And one of the things that the base does is it oversees in part the satellite systems that we run, right? Um, oversees surveillance drone, uh, operations to some degree. And so it's a very sensitive base. So I'll be damned if, uh, this Chinese group didn't buy up hundreds of acres of land about 12 miles from the (laughs) from this base. And they worked with the local officials, the local, uh, folks there, to say, "We wanna build a milling plant, a corn milling plant," right? The company was a food company. "And this is gonna be great. It's gonna give you like 200 local jobs. Let's build it." And then so the local officials were like, "Yeah, that sounds like a great idea." Well, it ran through the investment, um, CFIUS, the investment operation that looks at foreign investment to make sure that it's, it's above board and kosher. And CFIUS said, "Ah, we don't have any opinion. We ... it's not really our domain. We don't see anything wrong with this, so we can't cancel the, the potential purchase." And the Air Force, uh, had an other thought and they said, "Screw it. That's ... No, this is a threat to national security. You can't allow this to happen. You can't allow them to build this plant." Um, and so I'll be damned, in, in one of those rare moments of, of commonsense, they shut it down. They said, "You can't-

Joe Rogan 52:48 Hmm.

Mike Baker 52:48 ... do this." And so ... And then that become a bit- a bit of an issue, and then started to see in Congress, you started to see all this talk about, "Well, oh my God, the Chinese are buying up farmland all across America." And-

Joe Rogan 52:58 So it's Bill Gates, right?

Mike Baker 52:59 So it's Bill Gates, yeah.

Joe Rogan 53:00 Yeah.

Mike Baker 53:00 Bill Gates and the Chinese. Now the largest ... to be fair, the largest landowners, um, uh, in terms of a foreign, uh, country is, uh, Canada. So Canada owns by far the most, uh, US farmland. But it was nice to see that there was some, um, reaction, some commonsense here, and, and th- that they don't do it. And that- and that's happening. It's increasing. So I think the bright spot here is that people are becoming more aware of the problem, and that not every time is nefarious, not every time ... You know, I'm not saying that. You know, it's not always gonna be nefarious. But you should at least be smart enough to look and see.

Joe Rogan 53:36 Mm-hmm.

Mike Baker 53:37 It's like when we talk about, you know, Chinese equipment being put on regional telecoms all over the world, all over the country.

Joe Rogan 53:42 Yeah.

Mike Baker 53:43 Uh, yeah. Little things like that we should probably pay attention to.

Joe Rogan 53:45 I was watching this video where this guy was talking about, um, these Chinese devices like, uh, a Roomba.

Mike Baker 53:54 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 53:54 Like it was one of those type of deals. It was like a ... one of those robots that runs around your house-

Mike Baker 53:59 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 53:59 ... and vacuums things.

Mike Baker 53:59 Sure, yes. Yeah, we got two of them. Yep.

Joe Rogan 54:00 And he said that it connects to a Chinese server, and it says when the thing is loading up, it's connecting to this Chinese server, and that it connects to your network. And this Chinese server has ... potentially has access to your network, and could choose to shut your network off, siphon information, do anything-

Mike Baker 54:22 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:22 ... it wants. It's like-

Mike Baker 54:22 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 54:22 ... the Internet of Things, right? So these things are connected b- via your network and connected to all the devices that are on your network. So if your cell phone's on it, wifi, whatever.

Mike Baker 54:35 Exactly. Yeah. Yeah, and that's been going on for some time, right? I mean, it's been ... The- the capabilities, the- the ability to gather intelligence, uh, from seemingly innocuous things, your, your fridge that talks to you or, or whatever, um, certainly obviously, and, and you've talked about this a lot, that, you know, the, the cellphones, um ...... and, and how hard you have to work to turn off applications that will do that. And most people just don't have the patience, right?

Joe Rogan 55:04 Yeah.

Mike Baker 55:04 You got to really dig, right? If you want to prevent your, you know, 80-inch TV in your home from being switched on remotely as a monitor of what's going on in your home, you got to really dig through the layers on that TV to get to the point where you can switch that off, right?

Joe Rogan 55:18 Mm-hmm.

Mike Baker 55:18 And I mean, I don't know, who's got the time nowadays? But, uh, yeah.

Joe Rogan 55:21 And does that even work?

Mike Baker 55:23 Yeah. And does it ev-

Joe Rogan 55:23 Is there not an override switch?

Mike Baker 55:24 And does it even work? Exactly.

Joe Rogan 55:26 Robot vacuums can be used by hackers to spy on conversations, Singapore researchers say.

Mike Baker 55:31 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 55:31 LiDAR phone attack can take advantage of the device's built-in sensor to gather potentially sensitive data, and US computer scientists discovered to prevent misuse, team advise owners not to connect the robot vacuums to the internet.

Mike Baker 55:44 (sniffs) Wow.

Joe Rogan 55:45 Hmm. Yeah.

Mike Baker 55:46 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 55:47 Jesus Christ. Could be used as a spy-on-pr- private conversations, university said on Monday. The method, called LiDAR phone, repurposes the LiDAR sensors that a robot vacuum cleaner normally uses for navigating around a home into laser-based microphone to eavesdrop on private conversations. Oh, terrific. (snaps fingers)

Mike Baker 56:05 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 56:05 Yeah.

Mike Baker 56:06 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 56:07 Pretty wild. And on-

Mike Baker 56:08 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 56:09 I read something about the use of Wi-Fi to see things in a home, and that there's the ability that Wi-Fi has to gather 3D images.

Mike Baker 56:21 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 56:22 Which is fucking crazy.

Mike Baker 56:24 Um, yes. I, I mean, a couple of th-

Joe Rogan 56:28 Yeah. Scientists now use Wi-Fi to see through people's walls.

Mike Baker 56:31 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 56:31 What the fuck? Carnegie Mellon U- University can map human bodies through walls using Wi-Fi signals.

Narrator 56:38 That's, like, super creepy. But I've read that you can do that with ethernet cables.

Joe Rogan 56:42 Ethernet cables?

Narrator 56:43 Yeah. They can at least use it to hear.

Mike Baker 56:47 You know, anything that emanates, anything. I mean, there's, there's-

Joe Rogan 56:50 (laughs)

Mike Baker 56:50 ... the, the ability to... And it, it, yeah, it does start to look like a Tom Clancy movie, where remember they used to, in the old days, you, you'd see this movie and they could, like, use and they could identify the people moving through the building, right?

Joe Rogan 56:59 Mm-hmm. Yeah.

Mike Baker 57:00 That was, that was all bullshit back in the day, I mean, that was imagined, right?

Joe Rogan 57:03 Right.

Mike Baker 57:03 People were thinking, like, "Wouldn't that be great?" And it is great, right? If you roll up on a, on a target site now and you're wearing the old, you know, highly advanced super soldier Google glasses, right? And you're getting all that data fed into you, right? And you're getting heat signatures, and you're, you know, you're, you know I got four people on the other side of this, this, uh, structure. I mean, that's, that's fantastic intelligence. Or you can, you know, you, uh, again, you know, the, the battlefield has changed completely now. I mean, you have the drone capability and being able to look downfield and know what you've got.

Joe Rogan 57:34 Yeah.

Mike Baker 57:34 Um, to be able to reach out and touch a target without getting your guys in, in harm's way. I mean, it's, it is, it's, it's an amazing th- world. Um, but it's also pretty, um, what's the word? I don't wanna say frightening necessarily, but it's alarming, right? For just the average citizen in terms of in- again, information that's being gathered on you. And I, I think most people just, at this stage of the game, certainly I think maybe younger folks just don't care, right?

Joe Rogan 58:02 Yeah. They're on TikTok.

Mike Baker 58:04 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 58:04 You know, I was talking to my friend Cam's son and I was like, "Do you know that thing's fucking siphoning data off 'cause he's on TikTok all..." He says, "I don't care. It's fun."

Mike Baker 58:10 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 58:11 I'm like, "Okay."

Mike Baker 58:12 (laughs)

Joe Rogan 58:12 Well, I guess, you know, he's just a 24-year-old kid who's got nothing to worry about, but...

Mike Baker 58:17 Yeah. Yeah. Well, that's why I stopped doing my TikTok dances, you know, 'cause I used to post all the time.

Joe Rogan 58:21 You were very good. I think you should bring them back.

Mike Baker 58:23 Yeah. I was doing the, whatever, the flossing, the, the Rumba. I don't even know what the dances are anymore. Um, but, um, anyway. Today, today, this is, look at me segueing. Uh, today is the two-year anniversary of the Afghan withdrawal.

Joe Rogan 58:36 Hmm.

Mike Baker 58:37 Um, and, uh, I was, uh... I forget how I got started on that one. But I was, I was looking at total cost of what we've spent so far in Ukraine. And not only is it a two-year anniversary of the withdrawal from, uh, from Afghanistan, but other comparisons. Um, we've spent in Ukraine since, whenever, January 2022. So, you know, little over a year obviously, year and a half. We've dropped about n- upwards north of $80 billion there, right? More than that, in all honesty, 'cause I don't think we actually know what the full number is. I don't think the State Department knows. I don't think the Pentagon actually knows. They certainly don't know necessarily where all the money's going to, but we've dropped an 80 billion, say, let's call it that. Um, from 2001 to 2020, in Afghanistan, we spent about $73, $74 billion. So think about that.

Joe Rogan 59:34 Wow.

Mike Baker 59:34 Almost 20 years in Afghanistan, we spent about $73 billion. About a year and a half in Ukraine, we've spent $80 billion plus. I'm not saying it's, you know, that we shouldn't be doing it or that we shou- you know, we, we should, you know, not be supporting the Ukrainian, uh, military. I'm just saying it's a fascinating fact, as far as I'm concerned. It just shows the level of support. You know, Ukraine is, is, is, uh, at the top of our, um... Uh, obviously we have- we don't give that much money to anybody, by far, right? And the last time that, uh, last time a, a European was country, uh, was at the top of, of, of the, of the aid list was, you know, the Marshall Plan, maybe. Um, uh, the Truman, uh, Administration. So it's pretty significant. But the Afghanistan thing, um, two years after the withdrawal, we've spent since then, since, since the withdrawal, we've spent, or the US government's allocated about $8 billion. Now the interesting point there is, who's been in control there in Afghanistan since, you know, the withdrawal? It's the Taliban. So we have allocated $8 billion to various humanitarian groups, charities into Afghanistan and no real, no real controls over whether the vast majority of that money-... or half of that money, or whatever, is going to the Taliban. And we can-

Joe Rogan 1:01:01 Really?

Mike Baker 1:01:02 Yeah. And you can guarantee that it's being siphoned off. I mean-

Joe Rogan 1:01:04 How does that work?

Mike Baker 1:01:06 Well, um, I'm glad you asked that. Um, it wasn't that long ago, there was a ... 'cause there, there is an inspector general. They call him the Sp- uh, C- the Special In- uh, the Special Inspector General for Afghan-Afghanistan Reconstruction, SIGAR. Um, and he, uh, testified before Congress, uh, I think, uh, much earlier this year, it might have been the, the, the, uh, January, February timeframe, about Afghanistan. And, um, he said, "I cannot sit here and tell the Sub- the, the Committee or the American taxpayer that w- we are not funding the Taliban through th- this money that is being allocated for Afghanistan."

Joe Rogan 1:01:56 Whoa.

Mike Baker 1:01:56 Oh.

Joe Rogan 1:01:56 Okay.

Mike Baker 1:01:57 There you go.

Joe Rogan 1:01:57 "Unfortunately, as I sit here today, I cannot assure this committee that the American taxpayer, uh, or the American taxpayer that we are not currently funding the Taliban," he continued, "nor can I assure you that the Taliban are not diverting the money we are sending to the intended recipients, which are the poor Afghan people." Wow.

Mike Baker 1:02:15 Yeah. So think about that. 20 years in Afghanistan, (laughs) we leave in a, in a fucking mess of a withdrawal, right, which never should have taken place the way it did, and we've still got ... there's maybe a h- 150, 155,000, uh, special immigrant visa applicants trapped in Afghanistan waiting to get out. We don't kn- we have no idea how many, um, of our former Afghan allies, right, whomever it may be, uh, w- are still there trapped, trying to get out. Right?

Joe Rogan 1:02:46 And how many have been killed?

Mike Baker 1:02:47 And how many have b- exactly. How many have been killed? And in the meantime, w- now, now again, you know, the idea at the top level, you know the theory, we wanna help the Afghan people. We can't just abandon all those poor people, so we're gonna use the money to give it to humanitarian groups, and they're gonna try to feed them and everything. And yet there's no control over this, this fucking thing. And- and so that's, that's a problem that, again, should be talked about. But we don't, w- you know, we get lost in these, in these issues of the day that, that aren't, you know, really impactful I guess at the end of the day. Maybe they're impactful to people's, you know, individual lives. I get it, whatever. What, what the hell? But it is stunning that then the inspector general will come out and say he can't get, um, sufficient, uh, information from State Department and from USAID that's responsible in part for allocating these funds. Um, and in pure typical Washington DC, uh, bullshit, uh, the reason is because the State Department says, "Well, you know, we withdrew from Afghanistan, so therefore the, the, the inspector general, you know, doesn't have the same job. We're not reconstructing Afghanistan anymore, so we don't have to respond to his request for information." So (laughs) which is, you know, it's this, it's like this bizarre ... but we're gonna continue to give him money out. And meanwhile the Taliban's just shitting all over the people, right? Um, if y- forget about women's rights anymore. They've shut down secondary schools. They've shut down ... there's certainly no universities. They've done ... they, they've, they've restricted them basically to, you know, uh, women to, and girls to sitting at home. Um, they, they, uh, very restricted movement outside. They have to be fully covered obviously. Um, recently they just, they just shut down all beauty salons, right, which was one of the few places women could work and only women could go into. Uh, women can't go into parks, right? They can't g- it's, it's, it's insane when you think about it that way and you think about (laughs) y- but we're giving them money. Again, not for a bad reason, right? I mean, w- we wanna help, um, the, the, the, the people that are suffering most-

Joe Rogan 1:04:59 How does that money-

Mike Baker 1:04:59 ... but we have no control.

Joe Rogan 1:05:00 Right. What, what happens to that money? Like, how does, how could that money possibly get to the Taliban? Like, what's going on?

Mike Baker 1:05:06 Well, it has to go through, um, it has to go through humanitarian groups, NGOs, um, charities, and at some point the idea is it, it's either funds or, or goods, right, that have to be in the country, that have to get to the country to be dispersed, and the Taliban controls everything, right? Now, by the way, we also allocated-

Joe Rogan 1:05:29 (sniffs)

Mike Baker 1:05:29 ... uh, a handful of billions of dollars to recapitalize the Central Bank there in Afghanistan. Well, that would seem to be, maybe I'm wrong, but that would seem to be (laughs) basically putting money directly into the hands of the Taliban. Um, and so it's, it's a problem. You know, they're looking into it. But, uh, I mean, there's, there's so many weird ... uh, if y- if you spend too much time looking at the way the government sometimes operates and going f- switching back to Ukraine and saying, "Okay, um, w- (laughs) as, as an example,

Mike Baker 1:05:59 one of the things we're not doing is we're not fully sanctioning Russian oil, because why? It's a political reason. We don't want the Russian oil taken off the market and driving gas prices up, which is bad for politics, right?" So meanwhile, w- one of the few real, you know, significant sources of revenue for the Russians is oil. That allows them to keep going. So we're spending, what, $80 billion on Ukraine? At the same time, we're not doing everything we can to shut down the ability of the Russian, uh, government to make money by sanctioning oil the way we should, and therefore, um, (laughs) they continue marching on. It's ... I don't know. I, I just find it all, you know, going back to that original thought, you know, it's like we're gonna stop fossil fuels but we're also gonna keep all the minerals in the ground. How about that?

Joe Rogan 1:06:51 But the, the Russia thing seems to be ... the Russia-Ukraine thing, thing seems to be even crazier than the Afghanistan thing in terms of long-term cost-... and in terms of not having any solution of how this could ever possibly end.

Mike Baker 1:07:09 Yeah. No, I- I- yeah, 100% I agree with that. It's- we don't have a- we don't have a, whatever they want to call it, an exit ramp, an, uh, end game. Um, there is talk about a peace settlement, primarily from Zelenskyy, right? He's been, he's been making a real effort. He's been going out and trying to garner support from a variety of countries for his, uh, or for the Ukraine government's peace plan, which basically calls for return of all their lands, including Crimea, and obviously the exit of all Russian forces. And so, he's out there talking and saying, "This is what needs to happen. This- we need to gather, uh, international support for this peace plan if it's going to work." Which is not incorrect, right? Meanwhile, you know, the Chinese are- are trying to, you know, play top dog in the world stage by proposing their own peace plan. Um, you know, Saudis are making an effort. So, but there is no- there's no exit strategy, really, to speak of.

Joe Rogan 1:08:05 But hasn't Zelenskyy openly stated that he wants Putin to step down?

Mike Baker 1:08:10 Well, um, yeah. I mean, he's- he's expressed that desire, but you also think about they've declared him a war criminal, so what's- what's Putin's, you know, what- what- what's Putin's, uh, motivation for- for stopping if he reaches a peace settlement and then is basically, "That's it. Okay, we're done. Uh, there's peace. We've given back all the land, and I'm a war criminal, and now at some point, if I step outside the country, I'll be arrested and..." But I mean, that's- that- that's a thought process. So, um, I don't think, uh, unless Zelenskyy budges a little bit, right? Um, which, you know, again, from an emotive standpoint, why should he, right? But unless he budges to some degree, uh, I don't see that they're going to get, uh, a settlement where the two sides agree. Because Putin, I don't- I don't, still, I've said this before, but I don't imagine the- the Russian government giving back Crimea, right? It's-

Joe Rogan 1:09:07 Right.

Mike Baker 1:09:07 It's, you know, too important from their perspective, from a military perspective.

Joe Rogan 1:09:11 And when did they take over Crimea? What year was that?

Mike Baker 1:09:13 Uh, it was- wasn't that '14? 2014, I think. Yeah. Maybe- maybe '08? Maybe 2014. I don't know. It's- it's ancient history now, and nobody cared back then, right? Really. Really. There was- there was some angry memos written, um, Obama talked about it at the time and said... But nobody did anything. Just like when the troops moved into eastern Ukraine, nobody really cared, nobody did anything, nobody was out there planting flags in their gardens and saying, "We stand with Ukraine." And in fact, Ukraine was viewed as a highly corrupt place. You know, um, where, you know, a Ukrainian energy company would hire the son of the vice president. (laughs)

Joe Rogan 1:09:52 Yeah.

Mike Baker 1:09:52 Oh. Um, but at the same time, you can't, you know, you c- we- we can't allow Putin's, uh, adventurism, right, to stand. You've got to... So, I do believe we- we- we have to support, and without our support, without our NATO allies' support and others, they wouldn't have been able to accomplish what they've done, right? And now whether they can make a counteroffensive, um, a significant victory or not still remains to be seen, 'cause the Russians, you know, they used the opportunity during the lull to really dig in, right? They've created almost their own Maginot Line, although it's more effective than the old Maginot Line. So they- they've created that along their- their- their, uh, perimeter, and it's been a real tough slog. You know, the Ukrainian counteroffensive has gone much slower than people thought, and everybody was all very emotive. "Oh, it's going to be a counteroffensive. They're going to sweep through. It's gonna be done here soon." And I don't think people still have their heads around the fact that this is- there's- there's no exit out there, right, yet. So what are we going to do? Are we gonna continue to just allocate every- every couple of months we'll say, "Well, we're putting another $800 million in there."? Um, you know, we've already, you know, approved F-16s, Abrams tanks, Patriot missile systems. I mean, HIMARS. We're doing everything possible. Intelligence support, satellite support, um, and again, rightly so. You know, Putin needs to be driven out of there if possible. But at the same time, they need a logical thought process about how you have a settlement, if there's going to be one. And-

Joe Rogan 1:11:23 And what are your feelings about NATO's encroaching on Russian territory, like getting closer and closer? Like the treaty at the- the end of the Soviet Union stated that- that NATO would not move any closer to Russia, but yet they have.

Mike Baker 1:11:43 And yet they have, yeah. And it's- it had just the opposite effect, right? I mean, what Putin did, because he's, you know, I think he- he imagined, and he had bad intel, but he imagined that this- this incursion, this invasion was going to, uh, show the cracks in NATO, right? And it had the opposite. It grew NATO. And so, um, look, he legitimately believes ... You have to understand the motivations of- of whoever's on the other side of the table. And with Putin, he legitimately believed that, you know, the collapse of the Soviet Union was a terrible, terrible tragedy, right? And he's been trying to recreate, in some fashion, the whole thing. So, um, he looks at that, and that's just further, um ... It reinforces his mindset, which is, in his mind, I don't think he's, you know, I don't think he's, um, making this up. In his mind, he believes, you know, this is an attack on the motherland. Now, it's bullshit. It's not. But that's how he pitches it, and that's how he tries to keep the population behind him, by saying, "This is- this is the West against us." Right? And-

Joe Rogan 1:12:45 There's no argument for that, you don't think? The- with NATO encroaching?

Mike Baker 1:12:50 Um, well, I think every country has got the right to, you know, take actions to protect their own national security.

Joe Rogan 1:12:55 Right. Like if- if Russia started moving military bases into Mexico.

Mike Baker 1:13:00 (laughs) Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:13:02 Right? Which is kind of similar to what NATO has done.

Mike Baker 1:13:05 Well, think about N- oh, the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Joe Rogan 1:13:07 Right.

Mike Baker 1:13:07 I mean, that was the same concept. There was no- no difference, right?

Joe Rogan 1:13:09 Yes.

Mike Baker 1:13:09 So, yes. I mean, and that's ... And so we ... You have to be...... pragmatic about the world that you live in. And you have to understand, and that requires good intelligence, you have to understand the plans and intentions and motivations of whoever, again, is on the other side of the table, or- or whatever dictator or whatever leader you're- you're dealing with. And, uh, I think that i- i- is it helpful in reaching a peace settlement? Look, if- if all your goal is, and maybe we need- you know, maybe we need to say that. Okay, is the US goal to drive Russia completely out and reclaim all the lands that they had taken since 2000, right? Um, then fine, that's our stated goal, and we just keep doing everything possible to make that happen, short of boots on the ground. But, um, it would seem to me that our goal should also be, uh, instead of that, maybe we find a way to end the war, right? Typically, you get into a war and you want to end it, right? I mean, that's ... you don't want it to go on for 20 years. So-

Joe Rogan 1:14:16 Unless-

Mike Baker 1:14:16 Yeah.

Joe Rogan 1:14:17 ... you are supplying weapons and making billions of dollars. Then you might-

Mike Baker 1:14:21 Well, yes.

Joe Rogan 1:14:21 ... want to keep it going-

Mike Baker 1:14:21 There is that.

Joe Rogan 1:14:22 ... for a little while.

Mike Baker 1:14:22 There is that. And, um, and look, uh, uh, but, um, look, there's- there's ... you get two bites of the apple, right? You get to supply all the weaponry, and then you get the reconstruction.

Joe Rogan 1:14:34 Yeah.

Mike Baker 1:14:35 And I'll tell you right now, there is an undercurrent in Washington, DC amongst contractors that are ju- they're- they're- they're just super gleeful. Uh, no, uh, uh, that's the wrong word, but they're- they're-

Joe Rogan 1:14:46 Enthusiastic.

Mike Baker 1:14:47 ... enthusiastic and anticipatory, I don't know if that's a word, about this potential. And I saw this, um, back during the Iraq days, right? When we went in to reconstruct Iraq, right? Which went on for several years, produced, uh, massive amounts of fraud. Uh, created all sorts of bullshit 8A companies, right? Everybody suddenly ... everybody was looking for women-owned or, uh, Native American-owned or Eskimo-owned (laughs) companies that they could set up so that would allow them to get those government contracts to go in and do some piece of reconstruction, whether they had experience to do it or not. And there were the ... my God, the amount of energy that was involved in DC at the time of- of companies just sh- sh- shooting up out of nowhere, right? I remember people walking through the door. We'd had an office in DC, uh, for the business, and- and- and people walking through the door with, you know, uh, looking for security, right? And saying, "Well, we're gonna start this, uh, company. We're gonna go out there."