Episode Transcript
[00:00:14] Speaker A: Hello.
Welcome to the call like I see it podcast.
I'm James Keys, and in this episode of Call like I see it, we're going to discuss recent reporting coming out of the Middle east that for years now is Israel's government has played a role or has backed the propping up of Hamas and the Hamas government in Gaza through its backing of millions in funds that were from Qatar that were going to Hamas.
And later on, we're going to react to the report that the richest 1% of people in the world are putting out as much climate change causing carbon in the atmosphere as the poorest two thirds of the world, 5 billion people or so. And so just kind of discuss what that means from the standpoint of we're trying to get this. This is something we're trying to get under control.
Joining me today is a man who keeps a positive attitude, even if he tends to look at the downsides of things from time to time. Tunde Ogun. Lana Tunde. Are you ready to show the people why things are only kind of blue?
[00:01:22] Speaker B: Yeah, man. You know, you're supposed to let them get through the show to learn that. I'm going to be glass half empty, you know, negative guy. You know who my new nickname should be is? Remember Eeyore from Winnie the Pooh? Yeah, that's me. Yeah.
[00:01:37] Speaker A: You can't give yourself your own nickname, though, man. Yeah. Okay.
[00:01:40] Speaker B: Maybe someone else can do that. Yeah, there you go.
[00:01:43] Speaker A: Just a suggestion.
But now we're recording this on December 12, 2023, and since the surprise attack on Israel by Hamas, we've seen a lot of reporting on the millions or perhaps billions of dollars that Qatar has been providing to Hamas and Gaza.
More recently, the reporting has gone deeper and focused on Israel's role in this and Israel's backing of these payments.
And then also going into why Israel? The why, so to speak, why would Israel would be backing these, even with Hamas professed intention to destroy Israel and their hostility, so forth? And also members of the israeli government who are outwardly hostile to Hamas and why they would be supporting back channel, uh, money coming to Hamas, um, particularly, you know, looking at where, you know, some of the reporting is coming out that intelligence sources in Israel raised a lot of concerns about this and what the money was going to. So just at a most basic level, starting there, you know, what stands out to you about the reporting on Israel? You know, that. That they were backing the funneling of millions of dollars from Qatar to Hamas over the years.
[00:02:53] Speaker B: Um, I'd say for me, being an american, that is not, you know, constantly looking at the situation there.
I was surprised because it sounded like something that, okay, the israeli government knew and understood that billions of dollars flowed specifically to Hamas in over almost a decade.
That's shocking when you understand the nature of the relationship between both governments, really, because Hamas is the government in Gaza and of the palestinian people at the time, at the moment. So the, you know, I was first shocked to learn that, but then in reading further understanding, this has been kind of an open secret in the israeli world. Their media been talking extensively about, it seems like since 2018, it's been public information in Israel and been a big source of their political infighting among the israeli people. So, you know, I would say I was surprised, but then I was surprised to learn that it wasn't something that was new to many Israelis.
[00:04:01] Speaker A: So, yeah, it's especially in the context of what just happened with this huge attack, you know, surprise attack by Hamas on Israel. It sounds crazy. Like, oh, and they were, you know, blessing these guys getting all this money, you know, for all this time. But, yeah, it actually, it doesn't, once you dig into it a little bit, it seems kind of, it's somewhat understandable at the top level saying, okay, a lot of this money's going to pay salaries of government employees or teachers and so forth. And there is concern, and there has been concern the whole time that money, one, money's fungible. So if money's being provided to pay for these important things, things that are good for the people, then other money can be diverted to buy weapons or things like that, or that that money also was going to buy weapons or things used that ultimately could be used to attack Israel. And so you understand the concerns from that standpoint. But at the same time, there's just, I mean, there are a couple million people there. And so the, the idea in general that money is going there, like, there does need to be, you know, money that is spent to, to make that society work there. And then that Hamas is in charge, I think, complicates it because Hamas, and they're their outward and kind of just, they're their principled saying, or they're their, their bottom line Stan, I should say more so, like, their stand, that is their defining, Stan is the best way I want to say it, that Israel shouldn't exist. And so that's what complicates if Hamas isn't that. If Hamas is just seen as a government and saying, okay, yeah, this is government aid going to them so that they can do their operations, then, you know, it doesn't sound as shocking, you know, so I think it's the who, the who with Hamas, and then also the who with some of the people in Israel who were okay with this. That really makes this stand out.
[00:05:49] Speaker B: Yeah, I think, yeah, that's why, look, this conversation is great because what we're doing and going to continue to do is do something called nuance. I say it with a smile because everyone knows what I'm saying.
And I joked, I think, on a recent show we weren't talking about Israel, but I made this whole conflict that's been happening since October. But I made a comment that I said, I just did a side comment about something in the region, and then I said, I'm not going any further because there's a bunch of landmines in that conversation and we're guaranteed to step on them. Right. And so I think that we can say that today that this is one reason why I enjoy this kind of conversation, because this is probably one of the most complex issues in the modern world right now, the whole Israel and its neighbors and the last 75 years of that experience. And there's a lot of people that have built up emotional kind of cash capital on both sides of the issue. Both the Israelis and the jewish population has very strong feelings. And of course, there's Arabs and the muslim population that also have very strong feelings. And we are sitting here in the United States watching it from the outside but still heavily involved. So what made me think of just in reading this and kind of getting reminded is really, this is geopolitics and this is, you know, it's nation state stuff, even though we're talking about the idea of whether a two state solution within one nation with the Palestinians and Israel, can they figure that out? But Israel, I want to pass it back to you to more like your thoughts on this, because in reading about this whole thing with Israel, understanding and allowing Hamas to have hundreds of millions of dollars a year, which led to billions over a long period of time funneled through Qatar, is like, I feel like there's always these calculations and assumptions being made by leaders of all sides with various circumstances. So what can we discuss about the circumstances prior to, let's say, October 7 that might have motivated Israel to want to pursue this kind of strategy after it had pursued other strategies that maybe it felt didn't work?
[00:08:11] Speaker A: Yeah. Well, yeah. And I don't want to get actually to specific, you know, because there's, there's a lot of discussion on the motivation. And I want to talk about the motivation right now. Just kind of, before I get there, though, one of the things I think, and I think this is the piece that is the most important because if you frame this issue as, and I touched on this briefly, but I just want to make it more clear, if you frame this issue as Qatar provides millions in aid to Palestinians in Gaza, that doesn't sound that bad. You know, it sounds like, hey, that's probably, you know, like that these people that, you know, they need power, they need teachers, they need all these things that, you know, and not, and that's not a big economy there to generate that kind of money. And so it makes a lot of sense when you say that Qatar provided this money to Hamas. It's received completely different. And, you know, Hamas part of the issue, I think, and this is going to get into the motivation is that what really looking, observing Hamas over the past, you know, however many years and then particularly, most recently, um, and just kind of their approach to the, the difficult situation is that Hamas seems to be an organization, and I'll use a word, actually, we use it here in the United States from time to time. But I think it's an interesting kind of parallel. They're built on grievance. Like everything that they stand for is about we've been wronged and so therefore we have to, the only way to make it right in their mind is to, to, to get rid of Israel and to, you know, to take the land barrier, have all of the land for themselves. And so as that being the organization, everything that is, every interaction with them is going to be clouded by that. And so, as you pointed out, aid going from one nation to another is not something really we blink about normally, you know, and so, but it's the fact that it's hamas that's in charge here that that's going to then benefit from and be, in many cases, some people call to put the term propped up by this aid, that it gives us all this pause to say that, hey, should we be providing aid to a entity, a government type entity who doesn't want to? Like, their main goal isn't necessarily to take care of the people that they're governing. Their main goal is to try to take out somebody else. And so that's what raises the question to make it a little bit, to make it a lot more complicated in terms of this, this aid package. But ultimately, like I said, the money going to the palestinian people is like, well, yeah, that's good. Somebody should be helping them out. You know, that's, they're in a tough spot there.
I do want to get to the motivation, though, you know, and then the motivations of, well, you know, like there's humanitarian motivations, you know, in terms of why this money could be going or why Israel could be allowing it to go. There's other motivations that have been raised in terms of why Israel, you know, particularly like Israel has a political spectrum as well. There's people that are more hardline against the Palestinians or that don't want to have a two state solution. There are people that are interested in coexistence and possibly talking about that. And so one of the revelations is that some of the people that are considered to be in the camp that's more hostile to Hamas, including current prime minister Netanyahu. Netanyahu, were okay with this money going to Hamas, which is in opposition to their kind of public facing. Hey, this group is, we got a, you know, this group is a problem, so to speak.
Do you buy, you know, that the motivation here, you know, from, you know, Netanyahu or like minded people, and as you've pointed out, there was argument even amongst his allies whether that was good. But amongst the people that actually made it happen, do you buy that this was more about humanitarian, more about possibly moderating Hamas? Like if Hamas is getting this money, then they may moderate, they may become less obsessed with destroying Israel. Or do you think there were more sinister kind of motivations in play which some people have raised that by propping up Hamas, you keep the Palestinians divided between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority and so forth. And it makes, it takes the pressure off, so to speak, to have to negotiate a two state solution or even go down that path. How do you lean in that?
[00:12:12] Speaker B: Well, I think you're hitting to the crux of what comes up in a lot of societies with all this stuff. And I think you did a great job of saying and acknowledging that there's a spectrum of political ideology in Israel itself. You know, that like any other group, the israeli people aren't a monolith, that all just think one way and same.
[00:12:32] Speaker A: Most notably to this conversation also, so are the Palestinians.
[00:12:35] Speaker B: That's what I was going to say.
[00:12:36] Speaker A: Palestinian Authority, which is more moderate, versus the Hamas, which is more, you know, like extreme.
[00:12:41] Speaker B: And so, and with its neighbors. I mean, look, every large group of human beings is going to have a spectrum of people's opinion, and that's where you look at democracies, which generally allow some of those ideas maybe to compete and people vote in their leaders periodically and all that, versus an authoritarian regime which won't allow certain ideologies to come up. But it doesn't mean that the human beings in those societies don't still share a diverse spectrum of beliefs. And so the point I make with that is, yeah, I think to answer the question directly, it's probably a bit of both. And that might not be an answer that satisfies some people because, look, I can see it's like any other issue when you have humanitarian stuff and all that and you're dealing with different groups, culturally, ethnically, and in this case religiously that don't trust each other. Because I think that most people, even the harder right Israelis that aren't too rabid in their views will acknowledge there's humanitarian issues in Gaza and the West bank in these areas where if you just don't have a lot of food or sanitation and all that, you can have disease and all that. Like people generally will accept that as.
[00:13:51] Speaker A: A fact when there's blockade and, you know, like you're not allowing a lot of like, stuff coming in. Like you're not allowing for the place to really to reach its potential, so to speak. So there's going to be created, you know, humanitarian concern.
[00:14:05] Speaker B: Yeah. And so with that said, there's going to be people genuinely in the israeli community that do believe, like, hey, look, if we do allow the more humanitarian side to enter and all that, number one, we may be able to prop up the more moderate forces within the palestinian area and Gaza Strip because they can then point to the fact that things are happening that are benefiting them, that aren't the result of kinetic violence. It's not. They had to go attack Israel to get something maybe through negotiation. Again, politics, right? Talking to people, negotiating, compromising. Now I recognize post October 7, I just want to say this for the audience, that they don't think that we're sitting here with some utopian vision.
I recognize the idea of compromise for both sides now is out the window and having some sort of succeed at the table. So I'm just saying in general, how do we get here? And to answer your question about do I believe that there was a, like a certain weight that there was more to one side that thought was, let's allow this for humanitarian and more another side that said, let's figure out how to divide and conquer, because if we keep the Palestinians divided within themselves, we never have to negotiate for a two state solution. I think that there is a truth that there's both in there. Now the problem is for Netanyahu's government. I'm going to quote some things that have been said by people in his cabinet is that people within his own government administration have openly spoke of having a strategy to not support a two state solution. And part of that strategy was undercutting the Palestinian Authority, who was more of the true political arm that was kind of designed to negotiate and all that, and to prop up Hamas, which is, like we said, stated in their founding that their military wing, they want to destroy Israel. So I'm a quote here, a gentleman named Bezalel Smotridge. Apologies for any bad pronunciation.
He now serves as Mister Inanyahu's finance minister now. So he's a government official under Netanyahu's cabinet. He said in 2015, one effective way to prevent a two state solution is to divide between the Gaza Strip and the West bank.
And then he says, if the division gets. This is not the article saying the division gives Mister Netanyahu an excuse to disengage from peace talks, Mister Brown said, adding that he can have no partner.
It says, Mister Netanyahu did not articulate this strategy publicly, but some on the israeli political right had no such hesitation. And then it quotes this quote to the gentleman that says that I just mentioned, the Palestinian Authority is a burden. He said, Hamas is an asset. When your finance minister is quoted as saying that, that's kind of tough, particularly.
[00:17:06] Speaker A: Because that's the cynical view. And I think that is what's going on here, honestly. Like, there are a lot of steps that Israel could take if it went for from a humanitarian construct that don't involve this kind of, like you said, open secret funneling of money. You know, like, there's a lot of ways that they could do, ways that they could use to actively build goodwill amongst the people. Like, this doesn't even actively build goodwill. Like, so Israel doesn't even get the full benefit from allowing this money and from humanitarian concern in terms of winning hearts and minds and saying, hey, we don't necessarily need to be your enemy here. Um, like, they're not even benefiting from that. You know, they're still seen as the bad guy here, so to speak. Because if money is getting brought in, you know, like, it's not, not super officially. And so I think it's definitely that the people in charge, or the people who have been in charge want to maintain a hostile relationship with the Palestinians to avoid either negotiating a two state solution or giving back territory or stopping settlements and so forth. And so Hamas is an asset for that. As long as Hamas is prominent, then the israeli population can be point. It can. You can point them at Hamas and say, hey, we gotta maintain a very adversarial relationship with them because this is their stated goal. We can't, essentially, this looks like Israel, or there's some of the brain trust in Israel decided they can't allow Hamas to fail. One of the things that happens a lot of times with these extreme groups is once they get in power and are unable to deliver a better life, then, well, they come to power when a lot of times the moderates aren't delivering a better life for people. And it's like, hey, you know, you guys are talking about negotiation. You guys are talking about all this other stuff, and none of it's working. And that's how Hamas in large part came to power, is that the Palestinian Authority was preaching moderation and wasn't getting anywhere, you know, and so the Hamas comes in, and then a lot of times that these guys, these types of groups become, you know, the, the dog that caught the car, so to speak. And, you know, and the way that, like, you know, ISis, you know, in certain areas of the Middle east, once they took over, they didn't. They couldn't govern. And so they start flailing. They start, they start losing the hearts and minds of people that they just won, because it's like, oh, you guys are no better, or you guys may be worse, you know, because you want to run around and fight and stuff, but you're not making anybody's lives better. So the propping up of Hamas includes allowing the Palestinians to feel like Hamas is making their lives, you know, is not making their lives worse, so to speak. And so that, to me, is like, it's a cynical view, but it looks like that was the view that was taken by many that were in charge, is that, hey, we want Hamas there. We want an adversary there, not someone who's willing to work with us to keep the pressure off of us having to work with them. And that's a dangerous game to play. You see it in some of the quotes that are. I mean, I saw you pull some of the quotes, but some of the quotes talking about. But they didn't think Hamas, like, there were certain reports they didn't think Hamas was willing or able to attack anymore. You know, from a large scale standpoint, it. It's like, I mean, it's a lot of, you know, like, there's like, fairy tales and fables about this stuff, like the, like, oh, yeah, they can't get me anymore. La da da. And then they came and got you and it's like, oh, man, like that's, that's, that's a very, very, very, I mean, it's a betrayal of the people really, you know, like in my view, in the sense that someone who says they're trying to get you and you're saying, oh, I don't think they're really going to get me. Let's, let's keep them propped up and then they come and get you and it's like, oh, now the people who pay the price are, isn't the prime minister who made the decision, it's the people that were on the ground and, you know, like the citizens. So I mean, I feel really bad for them from that standpoint. And like Hamas, you know, being openly saying, hey, we are violently opposed to you. And you know, if you don't take them at their word and something happens to you, then it's like, man, you know, or something happens to your people, then, you know, you've really dropped the ball.
[00:20:55] Speaker B: Yeah, well, that's where, I mean, there's a lot of correlation, even though they're two very different events that unfolded very differently, that's where I see a lot of correlation with 911 for us. Right? Like this idea that obviously al Qaeda wasn't our neighbor on our border and all this stuff, but this idea that through grievances by a group like al Qaeda and someone like Osama bin Laden to whatever they felt the United States had done in their region in the past, there was 3000 people on the morning of 911 that paid for that, unfortunately. And then the similar kind of flow after that. Our discussions internally as a nation of how do we respond to this? And remember there were some Americans who I remember specifically certain names like Phil Donahue, Bill Maher. Remember he got a show politically correct on the public airways canceled because he was going against certain responses we had to Iraq and Afghanistan afterwards, after 911. And so there was this idea or not idea, but conversations about, well, this happened and so should we. Then one answer could be to prop up, try and do more humanitarian over time, prop up the more moderate, help them build democracies and get out of this authoritarian streets and all that. And another was, no, we got to go get those guys and get them out and this and that. And if you remember, that's where it's, this is why it was a good reading, this stuff about how Israel's handled itself in these recent years around this topic because it just kind of reminded me that, yeah, people do have ideologies in leadership and all that. And that's part of being a human. So I'm not saying that you shouldn't. But to your point, the ideology of the Netanyahu government did not help the case for not having Hamaz be such a dominant player and their ability to, like you said, money is fungible. And we're hearing this not from detractors of, let's say, political stuff or people that are peaceniks and all that. Again, I'm reading here from a gentleman named Yossi Cooperwasser, a former head of research for Israel's military intelligence. I mean, that sounds like somebody who's deep in the game.
Said that some of some officials saw the benefits of maintaining an equilibrium in the Gaza Strip. And he quotes him as saying the logic of Israel was that Hamas should be strong enough to rule Gaza but weak enough to be deterred by Israel. And so again, that's a policy. I mean, again, at the time, that probably seemed to be the best way to deal with that situation. He's like, let's play this equilibrium where if we can keep it in balance, it'll be okay, it'll be strong enough and we don't have to go to Gaza.
[00:23:39] Speaker A: It's a really tough balance if you just hear it and just for a little context, because some of the alternatives, you know, like the hardliners are saying, hey, we should invade. We should like what's happening now, you know? And so they're like, oh, like, so it was a middle ground, so to speak, to say, well, let's try to keep an equilibrium. And if we don't know if Hamas fails, we don't know if somebody worse is going to come in, you know, so to speak about what you just.
[00:24:03] Speaker B: Said, because I want to stay on that because you're right, it was a gentleman who's also an ally of Mister Netanyahu was trying to get Benjamin Netanyahu in 2016 when he was, when Netanyahu was prime minister prior to basically like you're saying, invade the Gaza Strip. And Netanyahu was like, nah, dude, we can't do that. And like, I was thinking about it, I'm not gonna blame Netanyahu for what happened in October, for that decision in 2016, because in 2016, the world was in a different place. Imagine if Israel just went without provocation and we saw the images we've been seeing now, the airstrikes and the amount of people being hurt, civilians without any provocation. I mean, what would the world have done then?
[00:24:45] Speaker A: Well, I mean, you see how public opinion has turned against Israel now. Even saw yeah.
[00:24:51] Speaker B: So, so now it's with provocations, without provocation. Imagine how much worse would be. So that's, again, why it allows me to see that this just sucks. Honestly, that's my professional definition.
And it just, no, I mean, because here's the thing that I think no one again wants to really discuss with this specific powder cake. And we've discussed it on the top discussions we've had on this topic. So one is the fact that it's the sad reality that you've got a group of people and european Jews, this is their descendants primarily. I mean, there's a few Holocaust survivors left that were so discriminated against in their own homelands in the continent of Europe, that they got kind of pushed out of the continent and said, okay, you guys go over here. And it was still at a time in the mid 20th century when the western world powers, and this is where we have these issues now, even in our country, with how people see this, this idea of the colonial powers, you know, the western european nations and their, and, you know, the nations like ours that are offshoots of them in Australia and Canada and our allies like that, that, this idea that unfortunately, at the time, there was still that type of attitude amongst the western nations and they weren't as concerned about what's going to happen with the people that are already in the palestinian region. And let's just shove the Jews here from Europe, and then we can just leave that alone and we'll figure it out. So, because no one's really gone back to the start of this and said this was set up kind of in a way that didn't, you know, it's kind of messy and we still haven't dealt with that.
Everything after that has been an offshoot of. And the second thing is, and this is going to be very inflammatory for me to say, but I think we need to look at, you know, this is all also stems from the influence of religion on humans, unfortunately, that everybody feels like that's their homeland.
And why don't we just say, yeah, every, it either is everyone's homeland and you got to figure out how to share it, or, you know, let's have a greater discussion about why are we, this is 2000 year old bronze age stories that we're still like, think about all the emotional, mental, physical, financial energy that's going into these conflicts. And so I'll hand it back.
[00:27:10] Speaker A: I mean, and that's kind of the thing. You tie it in with the religion and saying that, well, that's the reason why everybody can't just share it is because it has this religious basis. You know what?
[00:27:22] Speaker B: I wonder if someone would invent a country where the founding principles were that it was not to be governed by religion, but by the idea created within.
[00:27:32] Speaker A: Documents from the United States, the experiment we call the United States, that doesn't stop people from saying that it's a religious country, even if the first amendment of that country is no establishment of a religion, even if that people will turn around and say, no, this is a religious country. This is. And try to govern based on religion. So that's kind of just embedded in the human, in the human psyche or in the psyche of many people. Not all people, but just many people, just want to view the world in those terms, want to govern the world in other those terms. And most notably, which we'll get into, you know, like, repeatedly, not govern the way that they live based on their religion, but govern the way that everybody else lives based on their religion. And that's, you know, just what we see here. It's, it's always a lot of times with these religious disputes, it's about imposing what you want on other people, not about, oh, okay, I, I believe that you should be good to people and so forth. So I'm going to be like that. You know, it's always about, or not always, but it's oftentimes about imposing on other people.
This is the one piece I'll say on this, and then I want to move on to the last part on this is just that this is where we see, like, a lot of times, the more moderate approach is taken for granted. Because if you, this effort to prop up a more extreme faction in order to, so to speak, allow your more extreme facts faction to garner support in your nation, hey, if, if the other guys are crazy, you better put the crazy guys in your, in your group in charge, too, to go against their crazy guys. Is that it real to me, the illustration that, or what's illustrated by this is that the, you don't see this level of effort oftentimes. Hey, let's prop up the moderate guys. Let's prop up the guys who are trying to find a solution, so to speak, where everybody can live, a cooperation, a coexistence type of thing. Let's prop up those guys. You don't see that as often. And that, to me, is the solution. The solution is the people are responsive. And I say the people, this is any society they're responsive to, who delivers for them as far as meeting their needs or creating a society where their needs can be met. And so if the moderates, people who are coming at this from a cooperation standpoint, are treated a certain way, and because they're not out there pointing a gun at you and saying, oh, we'll take it for granted, let's see. Let's take them as far as we can go, then you will, they will lose support within their own faction, which is what happened with the Palestinian Authority, you know, earlier this century, basically, and that's how Hamas cut, rose to power in the first place, is that the moderates weren't making progress. They weren't delivering, you know, quality of life and so forth. And then, then when the extremist gets in, then you say, hey, let's appease them. Let's prop them up. And it's like, well, hold on. That same mentality. You could have a different approach, one that doesn't involve violence, if you take effort to support and prop up the people who aren't preaching violence against you. But it doesn't go like that because the people who, again, the extremists, extremists around the world essentially beget more extremists, like, it's interesting that they're the ones that most passionately hate the other side, but they actually empower each other, because by making it a more extreme world, the moderates are pushed out in a lot of societies or in societies in general. And so it's one of those things that, you know, like, it goes back to one of those axioms from, like, the sixties where it's like, yeah, you can't shoot your way to peace, so to speak. You know, like, you shoot, then you're just creating more people that want to shoot back at you. And in this instance, what we're seeing here is that if you prop up the, or even if you're, even if you take away the cynical view, even if your thought is, hey, let's maintain an equilibrium and so forth, if you prop up, maintain an equilibrium by propping up the moderates or by helping them, you know, deliver for their people so that they, so that the people stay behind them. Cause like, yeah, yeah, these guys, you know, like it, it may not be as emotionally satisfying, but it's something as far as, you know, we're going to get payback for all this stuff. Emotionally satisfying in that way. But, hey, I can eat, my kids can go to school. They're safe. You know, we can put dinner on the table. So I'm good with these guys, you know, these moderators real quick.
Yeah.
[00:31:45] Speaker B: No, but it's good what you're saying. The problem is. I say there's two separate issues that I'm going to discuss. One is that the sad part is because we project, all of us. Right. Me and you included, how we want to see the world. There's a lot of people that don't want to see the world like that.
[00:31:59] Speaker A: Right.
[00:31:59] Speaker B: There are people out there that just.
[00:32:00] Speaker A: Do want to impose and want to dominate and moderate our view of.
[00:32:05] Speaker B: Yeah. And I think that's where religion, unfortunately, that part of religious doctrine, because religion is a wide spectrum, too. We know that, you know, all the three abrahamic religions have beautiful, eloquent, you know, parts about helping the poor and all that. And they also have about smiting people that don't believe in the deity just like you do. So people choose which one of those they want to follow, and the people that choose the one about the smiting the enemy, they're out there. And I think that's what makes this Israel Palestine issue. Just to finish up on your comment. So I think, I wouldn't say unique in that way because there's been other tensions historically, but in our modern world, it's fairly unique for us today to be alive during this, because I could see, while you were talking, I could just see both in israeli and someone from the arab world yelling at you saying, yeah, but they did this first and that's why we got to behave this way. And to your point about the escalation, right? Yeah, but now we've got 75 years of that. So it's too, it's so far back in the history of who started what that no one even can code, make it cohesive.
[00:33:17] Speaker A: Everybody always can point to something as justification for why they don't.
[00:33:21] Speaker B: So that's why.
[00:33:22] Speaker A: Just legitimately not like making up, you know, not. But it's, it's, you know, everybody there, there has been, there's blood on everyone's hands is kind of, that's why I.
[00:33:31] Speaker B: Say there's two issues. One is how the thing was set up in the beginning, that for whatever reason, it just doesn't, it's not conducive for that type of dialogue. The second thing is the religion part, because this, again, where everybody in the world has egg on their face for this. I mean, look at the United nations was developed to try and prevent more world wars and more things like that. But yet the United nations, one of.
[00:33:53] Speaker A: The first things it did, has not.
[00:33:56] Speaker B: Yet point created a big conflict for us to deal with for another 100 years. But then also, like, again, it can't nuance itself because, like, it hasn't been able to just condemn, let's say, sexual violence against the israeli women from October 7. But the reason why I believe it won't do that is because of its belief of religious fealty, meaning people within the UN that don't want to say anything, let's say, in support of a jew and against a Muslim. So that's where the religion part comes in and makes it so difficult because, let's say, hypothetically, the Israelis can maintain their country. They still surrounded by all these neighbors that are going to be upset. So.
[00:34:38] Speaker A: Yeah, well, no, I mean, that's a, you know, an excellent point in terms of just the way that the religion will, you know, like, it's almost like an analogy here actually would be the partisanship when we have extreme partisanship. And it's like, hey, even if my side is wrong, I'm not going to acknowledge that because I just can't, we can't show them that, you know, like, there's either not 100% solidarity or whatever, but it creates the situations where people aren't operating necessarily on right and wrong. They're operating on one side or the other, so to speak. And so it's difficult to a lot of times to find, you know, coexistence, you know, and cooperation in that type of a setting.
But the last piece, and we'll have to make this quick just to keep things moving. But what do you make of Qatar's role in this, you know, in terms of, you know, putting up a lot of this money, or they at least, you know, money's going through them, but a lot of times it's their money, too. It's a wealthy nation, you know, on the other side of Saudi Arabia, but Middle Eastern, asian. And so what's your thought on that?
[00:35:41] Speaker B: It's there. I mean, reading up about their influence in the region, I mean, I've always heard of the country, but obviously reading in more detail gave me a little more clarity. So it's just fascinating that, again, they are a very small nation. They're about twice the size of Delaware, from what I learned. And they have a population of 300,000 people. So I found citizens.
[00:36:03] Speaker A: There's many more people than there. There's like almost 2 million people there. But they're, it's like, there's not all of them are citizens.
[00:36:09] Speaker B: Okay, so, but still, I mean, even just 2 million people, and to have the type of influence they have, yeah, it's pretty big. And obviously, it comes from, you know, fossil fuels and oil. And what I found interesting is they are a player that's kind of, they've got allies all over the place and they're kind of like in the middle of a lot of this stuff. So they share an underwater, under the sea gas well with Iran. So they have obviously a partnership with Iran and are on their border. Then they've got, like you said, on the border of Saudi Arabia and that relation, and Saudi Arabia and Iran hate each other. So they're always in the middle of all these things that we have a massive air base in that country, which again, it's, I'm going to assume that ours having a massive military presence and that's where we house our central command. You know, centcom for, you know, the world is there.
I'm pretty sure that also keeps the region a little bit of a lid on things. So I found Qatar's role in all this very interesting that they seem to be this, this, this small country that's developed a very unique role in the region and therefore the world in keeping these negotiations. They were very instrumental for the hostage release recently and all that kind of stuff.
[00:37:27] Speaker A: So, yeah, I mean, I think that honestly, I mean, I, did you again set aside, you put the labels on all the money's going to hamas and stuff like that, the complexity that I spoke about. But generally speaking, you need people that can talk to everybody, you know. And so Qatar, Qatar has a security partnership with the US largest us presence, as you were pointing out, some of the details of that largest us presence in the Middle east. They, you know, they deal with Iran on certain things. They, they were the ones who, you know, were able to negotiate a lot of the hostage releases, you know, as far as being a go between. So, I mean, to me it seems like it's good to have someone in this instance, you know, like playing the role of Qatar who has a relationship with people on different sides of, you know, like different or different. You know, everything's not one side or the other. There's, you know, they've been four sided or, you know, six sided or whatever, but has, has a relationship with a lot of people and one that can, they can serve as a conduit to try to build some trust for conversations and so forth. So, you know, that they were now from them, I don't know, you know, from what I've seen, I don't know that you look at the same or you look at it as cynically in terms of why they would be looking to provide aid funding, so to speak, to hamas and to the Palestinians in Gaza. I mean, that seems to be, that's been going on a long time. You know, like, that doesn't seem to be about helping hamas attack Israel. Like, they know that that's going to be a part of it or whatever, but, or at least, you know, that's going to be something. But they seem to be really also in that a lot for making sure that the people's lives are decent. It's a wealthy nation, you know, so them helping spread the wealth like that, again, is something that you would look at as something that is, you know, something commendable. So, but it's, again, the complexity of it. If it's Qatars giving money to Palestinians, it's like, okay, yeah, somebody needs to be helping them out. You know, it's a, they're in a real tough spot, but it's as though they're giving it to hamas. It's like, oh, you know, what's happening there? So it's just, it gets received a different way. But overall, like I said, I think their role is, is a vital role here in that they've built up a certain level of, of credibility and trust with people in a lot of different places. And that's helpful when you have these type of, these conflicts. You know, are these issues, situations where there's people that are upset on each side and it's hard for them to talk to each other? It's hard for them to build trust directly.
[00:39:42] Speaker B: Yeah. And the one thing I just finished off in saying for this section is, you know, even just from preparing for today was another reminder why I think us in the west and in America, we need to be very careful when we discuss and make assumptions about what's going on in the Middle East. I mean, I learned in reading that, remember when Donald Trump, when he was president, I think it was early in his administration, sent a tweet that Qatar was like a terrorist nation or something and it caused a big uproar. I kind of thought about that in preparing for today. So I want to read about it. And what happened was because, again, Trump personally has a fondness and with the Saudis, Saudis don't like Qatar because of Iran and their relationship with Iran. And there's just a whole thing. And so what I read was there's.
[00:40:26] Speaker A: A jockeying thing that's going on there.
[00:40:27] Speaker B: In terms of, check this out, this kind of level of detail, which is that what happened, they're saying is that Iran, sorry, Qatar, paid $1 billion to an al Qaeda affiliate in Iran and that upset Saudi Arabia, said, what the hell are you guys doing here? And so what happened is it said allegedly to free members of the royal family, the qatari royal family, who were captured during a hunting trip. I mean, think about that, because of the vast areas that they're in. So these guys are out hunting, probably went over the border maybe to Iran or something and then get captured by these guys who are this al Qaeda affiliate. And so it's really a ransom. I mean, if this is all true, right? Like, and so they gotta pay a billion over there. That's Saudi. And that's what I mean by all these. We can relate to that. What is tribal and ethnic history that these people have in the region? And that's why I say for us to come in there and always have our opinions about how they should be doing and living their life. And then again, like we said, for the world to put a european group of people and stamp them right in the middle of there when you have all of this pre existing, existing kind of ethnic tensions and all that in the region, it's, it's no wonder this is a powder keg. And it's not going to stop there.
[00:41:41] Speaker A: The religion, and we didn't even mention the sectarian, like within the sectarian, that's what we're saying.
[00:41:45] Speaker B: Tunisia and then the different ethnicities, meaning there's tribes that go, bedouin tribes that go back a 1000, 2000 years where they have history with each other, either, either allies or not. So.
[00:41:55] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, no, for sure. I mean, and that's the complexities. We can, we can, we won't, could be easily manipulated, you know, if we're, if we don't take time to kind of figure out what we're talking about here. And because there's just a lot of complexities, like you said, that we're, we're just, we don't come in with a level of knowledge of all of the stuff that's happening, you know, like with all that stuff.
[00:42:15] Speaker B: So for us to appreciate, it's like when people look from outside and say, how come we still talk about the civil war in this country, right? Like we're very, that's a very complex, I mean, but it seems easy, but it's not, right? I mean, we're still sitting here arguing about it. Oh, it's easy though.
[00:42:29] Speaker A: States rights.
[00:42:30] Speaker B: Oh, I forgot.
Thanks, man. I can go about my cake.
[00:42:35] Speaker A: Glad I could clear that up for you.
[00:42:39] Speaker B: Didn't know it was that easy.
Call me after the show. Let me know what else is just that easy to figure out in life.
[00:42:46] Speaker A: All right, so now. But we got to move to our second topic. It was just something, actually, that you had sent me couple weeks ago, which was, you know, it's one of those shocking headlines. Richest 1% emit as much carbon as the poorest two thirds, you know, in the world. And, you know, like, that's the scale of. That's actually hard to understand, you know, in terms of. Because we're talking about a lot of carbon, you know, like. And so, but basically, in terms of the carbon, our emission of carbon dioxide and carbon and so forth into the atmosphere is a. Carbon is a greenhouse gas. So that traps heat. That's what greenhouse gas means. Venus is hotter than mercury because it has a bunch of greenhouse gases in its atmosphere, even though mercury is closer to the sun. So we're putting a lot more greenhouse gases in our atmosphere. And the understanding that that's going to cause more heat to be trapped, more heat to be trapped in the earth and the climate to change because of that.
What's your reaction to seeing that, you know, in terms. It's not equal opportunity in terms of us as, you know, citizens of the people in the world that are pumping out carbon into the atmosphere and that actually there is some. Some people are bear a lot more responsibility to. How much would, you know, we're putting. How much carbon we're putting in the atmosphere versus others?
[00:44:10] Speaker B: Well, since you allowed me to have such an easy solution to our issues with dealing with the civil war and our culture wars here, I will just say that it was my impression, I was told that it's somehow combined with ESG and the great replacement theory. This whole thing about the. Okay, so you want me to be serious again?
No, I. This is interesting, man. It's not surprising that I felt like they did have some stats that I was like, well, how do they come up with this number? I think when they said, like, just like that guy, Carlos Slim, one of the wealthiest people in the world on his own, is responsible for, like, some huge percent, like, 10% of all emissions, I realized, like, yeah, it's not like him personally, just by flying his jet around 24 hours a day or something.
[00:44:58] Speaker A: It's because things he owns.
[00:44:59] Speaker B: Correct. It's because the way that, I guess, mexican capitalism works is he can own actually a whole infrastructure of the oil and gas utility. So, in a sense, this is probably public information, because I would assume that's the case. Then we could include the Saudis and the Qataris and these other people that are sitting on mass oil deposits. So. But long story short, yes, I think, like most things that we look at, when you deal with a large population, those at the top of the wealth class generally are going to have a larger impact on everything. So, yeah, so if you look at tax policy, we see those stats that, yeah, wealthy people pay more taxes than non wealthy people. And of course, wealthy people who have the means to do things like travel more, maybe get in private jets, have multiple cars, you know, so on and so own businesses that themselves, that businesses may produce, you know, greenhouse gases.
It stands to reason that those who have the means of using the tools of our technology and society will probably have more of an impact than those who are still foraging in the woods.
And it's interesting because we pick on the 1% a lot. But to say that most of us probably in western worlds, fall into the top 10%. Many people, I'd say middle class and upper middle class in western countries, they said that just the top 10% in the world makes up 50% of all the carbon output. So I would say most of us in western nations, there's some responsibility, and it's understandable. Understanding who produces fossil fuels.
[00:46:45] Speaker A: Yeah. No, no. And I mean, yeah, this is one of those, like, it strikes you, you know, the headline is to make you click, you know, type of thing. But it makes a lot of sense. I mean, like, the people who are the richest one control a lot more tools of industry and tools of transportation and tools of all that. So I think the bigger takeaway here is that a lot of times we end up in this situation where we have this Jedi mind trick going on where everybody's supposed to, in terms of the solution, everybody's supposed to contribute equally. And that's just not the case. Like, there are some people that need to contribute a lot more in terms of solution, and that's okay. And there's some people that, you know, their contributions to the problem are very low and their contribution to the solution will be very low as well. And so when you talk about, like, a concept like progressive tax rates, you know, like, oh, that's not fair. It should just be a flat tax. Well, no, like, the nature of a progressive tax rate is that as you increase in, let's say, strength, then you should carry a heavier burden. And it's not supposed to be proportional. It's going to be exponential, you know? And so to me, that's really what, what the takeaway I see this is, is that we should be asking more of the people who are doing the best among us in terms of solving the problems. And, and really it's foot in the bill, but also whatever other kind of in kind contributions that need to be made foot in terms of solving the problems of society. Now, the problem is, is that the few are easier to organize than the many. And so while the few are outnumbered by the many, that's always been the case. There's been the haves and the have nots, and the haves know how to manipulate the have nots so that the have nots never look around and say, hey, you guys should be doing more for this whole humanity thing. And so it's a difficult, it's an uphill climb. You know, I'd argue it's only happened once, you know, in history, really. You know, you look at like the post new deal, you know, United States, you know, where you really had this situation, a more egalitarian society where, you know, people still were, there were still rich people, they still made a lot of money. But in terms of the way society worked, there was, you had this largest middle class in the history world and all that. But going beyond just the income, again, I think we should look at this and understand that this is why when we say there should be a higher burden on people who do well, this is the kind of reason why that is.
[00:49:05] Speaker B: Yeah, no, it's, it's a very interesting point. I mean, even when you talk about the new deal, it makes me think of, I mean, you know, again, people can be upset that I say something like this. Right. But the new Deal was an excellent program to lift many Americans out of poverty and build us the largest middle class in world history within a generation or two later. But you know what? The original New Deal excluded blacks.
Remember, that was in a lot of.
[00:49:30] Speaker A: The programs, did a lot of, yeah.
[00:49:32] Speaker B: A lot of the negotiations when they were designed. Again, politics and compromise, right? The compromise was for the southern states to get on board with. Roosevelt was, again, they wanted to make sure that blacks weren't going to eat off this and have some sort of benefit from the new Deal. So it took a little bit while for it to include blacks. Right. So we can even say, and that's why to me, this is a more difficult lift for us as humanity because I just gave an example of within a country where compromises had to be made and not everybody was allowed to participate in, at least initially. And again, the outcome of that compromise in discussing the new deal now we're going to try and get nations around the world to agree that the wealthier nations somehow need to fund the poorer nations and blah, blah, blah. I don't think this is going to work and I think that this doesn't look good for humanity moving forward. The earth will be fine, as we joke, but we're going to have some habit that may not major issues with our habitat and die offs with species that's going to lead, because remember, we need bees to pollinate flowers and all that. Maybe cockroaches don't and fish in the sea don't care about bees dying, but it's going to affect how we deal with food and everything else.
Because I want to pull some things from here, from the UN report on this.
Again, a quote from it. To address climate change, we'll need to dramatically reduce inequality and provide support and climate compensation to the less wealthy nations. And I'm sort of reading like, oh, no, I see here it also suggested a 60% tax on the income of the world's wealthiest 1%, which the report calculated would lead to a $700 million ton reduction in coal emissions.
So that sounds great. And high in the sky, who the hell is going to confiscate Elon Musk?
Carlos Slim? Like you said, the head of this Mohammed Bill Salman's income from Saudi Arabia. I mean, you really want to go to the top world 1% and say we're going to tax you at 60%, and then who's going to collect that tax? Right? And then who's going to make sure? We just had a whole part one about money being fungible and money that was supposed to go to humanitarian stuff in Gaza.
So who's going to make sure that all that money that you're taxing, these top 1%, is going to go directly to help the earth and the climate and not be cycling somewhere else?
[00:52:00] Speaker A: Well, that's why I don't think corruption involved and then it'll just be a whole nother thing. But.
[00:52:05] Speaker B: And that's why I think we're in an inevitable track. And I sound like I appreciate anyone who's trying to do the right thing with the environment. I'm not going to, like, say we shouldn't, but reading this stuff and knowing how human beings are and assuming that the top 1% is going to agree to a 60% wealth tax and the alternative, because they would have to tax.
[00:52:24] Speaker A: Themselves, to your point, correct. It have to be themselves, you know, like, it would have to be. No, they're going to, Saudi Arabia would have to. To tax its own people, which would be the rulers of Saudi, Saudi Arabia and this type of thing. And so it's just not going to happen, so to speak, about this.
[00:52:38] Speaker B: But billionaires are going to spend more money trying to get to Mars or building elysium type of thing because that seems more forward thinking if you're at that level. Right? Like, oh, man, I don't want to trust all these people, these idiots with my money. Like, I'd rather just build something and get out of here and see if we can figure that out. I just don't, I'm very discouraged reading this, actually.
[00:52:57] Speaker A: I just don't see, yeah, it goes into what it would take, so to speak. And there is a, and this goes back, you know, throughout human history, so to speak, at least as far as we can tell, you know, like we weren't around to see the hunter gatherers and so forth. But the, the impetus to externalize your costs and internalize your, your, your profit, so to speak, or your benefit is what we're, what ultimately what this comes down to in a lot of ways is that, you know, like, yes, they're like putting carbon into the air as opposed to having to capture it or something like that is, is a way to externalize the cost. And that make, allows you to make more money. You internalize your profit from that standpoint. I mean, that's taught. And, you know, from a corporate standpoint a lot of times is how can we do this? And so the environment, and therefore the people end up getting a short shaft in that unless there's some government there to create a disincentive to do that. Now, the, the 60% tax, you know, like that hearkens back to, you know, in the United States there was 75% tax, top tax rate at 1.93, top tax rate, percent, 98, 3%. And what that's supposed to do, you're not really going to collect that, you know, that type of tax. A lot of times what it's supposed to do is change behavior. And this is something that oftentimes is not thought about in terms of tax rates. And tax policy is the way that tax rate and tax policy can be used to change behavior. And what you end up doing when you have a conflict, conflicts, confiscatory tax like that is, you change the behavior, say, all right, well, I'm just not going to, at least above board, I'm not going to make that much money because if I make that, if I pull that much money out, then I'm going to, I'll have to give it all up. So I will put money back. I will reinvest the money in other ways or donate the money or do anything. I'll do things with the money to make sure that I don't hit that top tax rate. And the point of a high tax rate on the top 1% to try to try to change behavior from a pollution standpoint would be similar, you know, so, but I think it's not going to happen worldwide. The question would be whether people, particularly in governments that maybe are of the people, by the people and for the people, those type of governments, if they exist, where people get tired of it and said, okay, look, we're going to go about this in a different way and we're going to use tax policy as one of our tools, one of the bullets in the gun, so to speak, to try to change behavior and be a leader in this field. And then other countries would probably get on. Now, you would never get, and you wouldn't necessarily need every country to be involved, you know, but you could get. There are a lot of things that countries have done that defy logic, so to speak. It defies logic. You know, nuclear anti proliferation defies logic in any way. So there are ways, or it is possible, so to speak. It's unlikely. And as long as kind of the, the elements that push, whether it would be, you know, kind of this personal, I, you know, I'm on my own. I'm going to do all this on my own. And I'm not worried about everybody else. As long as those elements are in charge, obviously nothing would happen because every, those elements are always looking to externalize any costs, you know, to everybody else and say, hey, you know, you guys deal with it. I'll be off, you know, in my castle somewhere and, you know, doing what I need to do or whatever. I mean, Castle is probably a 500 year dated, you know, reference, but whatever the people with, with all the, whatever.
[00:56:11] Speaker B: The hazards do now, speak for yourself.
I got a chateau somewhere in Europe. I'm not telling anybody.
[00:56:18] Speaker A: Well, you just told.
[00:56:19] Speaker B: Well, listen, as we conclude the show, this is a great finale because we joked at the beginning about me being glass half empty and we actually had an organic way that I ended the show glass half empty. Because I appreciate that you say with the nuclear anti proliferation treaties and all that, that, yeah, people can, you know, do things that are against, you know, that might be intervention, but listen, that's.
[00:56:45] Speaker A: This ain't gonna be one of them.
[00:56:46] Speaker B: No, because that's between maybe just a few countries that have nukes and that's just something big out there. And they all, I'm sure someone pays someone else to make sure. That's all we're talking about, confiscating people's money.
[00:56:58] Speaker A: Well, again, that's, I don't know that that's the, that's, so to speak, the answer, no.
[00:57:02] Speaker B: But it's also on a serious note why I'm saying just even after the first topic, because you're asking different nation states and cultures that all look at this stuff different and all, like we talked about in the first part, people have paranoia against the other side and all this. I mean, think about us in China. Who's going to blink first with a climate discussion and really be serious and trust that the other ones not got coal factories and all this stuff.
[00:57:26] Speaker A: Same argue about anti proliferation with nuclear. Who's going to blink first? Like, and yeah, but it's a lot.
[00:57:31] Speaker B: It'S a lot, but there's a lot less. Think about it though, because to do that, to not do nukes is a very small slice of any country's kind of budget economy and all that. To ask third world or emerging market countries to not have factories that operate on coal right now when we don't have the infrastructure, they don't have the money to do some other type of fuel, that's just.
[00:57:53] Speaker A: But I agree, until one of them comes up with another way to do it and they become the richest country in the world because they figure out another way to do it and everybody else is trying to copy that.
[00:58:01] Speaker B: I mean, I think that's the argument.
[00:58:03] Speaker A: What it relies on, and I want to, I do want to grab us up, but what it relies on, and this is what I think your comments reveal. Reveal, and I don't disagree, is it relies on what things we don't know yet. And so until we know, because we don't know them yet, it's impossible to see them. If we could see them, then we would be the one to introduce them and then we'd be the one that is the next, you know, ultra rich person. But you don't know yet. And we're counting on it, though. We're counting on, you know, either some type of a solution or some type of an approach that can then be adopted and then take us in a different direction. But right now, yeah, with what we know now, it doesn't appear that there are any kind of direct paths to make something like this happen, to be able to create an incentive to have people not pollute to the same degree that they do. Unless we can get a religion that is anti polluting, then, hey, I mean, from what you talked about in the first section, we might be able to make it happen. Then if there's a religion that says, hey, polluting is anti God, then it becomes an irrational belief that polluting is bad. And you can get people to.
[00:59:08] Speaker B: Again, you got me that guy. I was going to say something else, but now I can say something. This with the glass half empty, all the religions seem to say that God created the earth. If you think that that would be.
[00:59:17] Speaker A: Enough, that would be one of the parts of the religion that people ignore.
[00:59:22] Speaker B: Yeah, we don't want to hurt grasp.
[00:59:25] Speaker A: Focus on the smiting.
[00:59:27] Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. So that's the sad part.
[00:59:30] Speaker A: No, but I think we can wrap from there. We appreciate everybody, for joining us on this episode of call. Like I see it, subscribe to the podcast, rate it, review it, tell us what you think, send it to a friend, check it out on YouTube. Until next time, I'm James Keys.
[00:59:41] Speaker B: I'm tundra Velana.
[00:59:43] Speaker A: All right, we'll talk to you next time.
