
WarRoom Battleground EP 778: Big Tech Dominance Crushes Small AI Firms...
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Mr. Altman
Mr. Altman, now this is going to. I'm going to count this as a highlight recently. Like, I know the work that you've done, and you're really one of the people that are moving AI and now it's an opportunity. I was excited to meet you. And now people, you know, people ask me, it's like, if you're going to talk about AI and now I get to ask you. I mean, like the literal, the expert, you know, some people are worried about AI or whatever, and I'm like, you know, what about the singularity? So the people like that. If you would address that, please, please.
Senator
Thank you, Senator, for the kind words and for normalizing hoodies in more spaces. I love to see that. I am incredibly excited about the rate of progress, but I also am cautious and I would say, like, I don't know, I feel small next to it or something. I think this is beyond something that we all fully yet understand where it's going to go. This is. This is, I believe, among the biggest, maybe it'll turn out to be the biggest technological revolutions humanity will have ever produced. And I. I feel privileged to be here. I feel curious and interested in what's going to happen. But I do think things are going to change quite substantially. I. I think humans have a wonderful ability to adapt, and things that seem amazing will become the new normal. Very quickly. We'll figure out how to use these tools to just do things we could never. And I think it will be quite extraordinary. But these are going to be tools that are capable of things that we can't quite wrap our heads around. And some people call that. As these tools start helping us to create next future iterations. Some people call that singularity. Some people call that the takeoff. Whatever it is, it feels like a sort of new era of human history. And I think it's tremendously exciting that we get to live through that. And we can make it a wonderful thing, but we've got to approach it with humility and some caution.
Stephen K. Bannon
This is the primal scream of a dying regime. Pray for our enemies. Because we're going medieval on these people. I got a free shot on all these networks lying about the people. The people have had a belly full of it. I know you don't like hearing that. I know you try to do everything in the world to stop that, but you're not going to stop it. It's going to happen. And where do people like that go.
Senator
To share the big L. MAGA media.
Stephen K. Bannon
I wish in my soul, I wish that any of these People had a conscience. Ask yourself, what is my task and what is my purpose? If that answer is to save my country, this country will be saved. War Room here's your host, Stephen K. Banner. It's Thursday, the 29th of May. Your valor 2025. Two of my favorite people in both experts. One a practitioner, the other a theoretician on artificial intelligence. Brian Costello, the practitioner, and Joe Allen, the philosopher. The philosopher theoretician. Join us. Brian, you're in this day to day. Are we in the big bang? You know, Elon Musk is talking about it. Are we in the big bang phase of artificial intelligence now, as far as exploding knowledge and understanding of this, at least technologically, to drive technological progress. And since you're the one economic nationalist populist that I think is in this space, there may be others, but you're the most vocal. Are we heading down a path that you see that this can actually be done from a populist perspective and, and avoid a white collar job killing apocalypse? Sir.
Brian Costello
So, yes, I think we are in a big bang. We're seeing these models get more sophisticated. As Joe talked about earlier on the show. You're starting to see these agents come out which replace a lot of work in terms of the humans. And I think what you generally see here, what's happening with us, Steve, is we're seeing 10, 15 years of innovation be consolidated down to months. What used to take a year from a software development standpoint with a whole big team, machines can do in hours and days better than humans can. So that's certainly a big bang and there's a lot of changes there. To your second question, we're not headed down the right path right now. There are, I think, 10 companies that control 90% of the AI infrastructure. And we're not, we're seeing a lot of announcements in terms of investment into AI, but what you're not seeing those announcements is jobs, right? You're seeing a lot of announcements into capital and AI factories. And there will certainly be the construction jobs and the jobs in the short term around that build this AI infrastructure out, but you're not seeing a lot of employment commitments towards that. So we really need to step back and we need to look at this and say, like, okay, we're not even asking the right question now is how do we make AI work for the American people right now? The question is how do we do big deals for big businesses? But we're not stepping back and saying how do we make this work for everybody in America? And I don't think the answer is universal basic income. I think there's other strategies we could take.
Stephen K. Bannon
Okay, let's hear those. Because what we're hearing, you talk about big deals. This deal in UAE to build these data centers is pretty shocking that there's going to be another node outside the United States. We have Dave Walsh on here all the time talking about the massive energy needs. You've got deal after deal after deal. And of course President Trump cut off chips to China, which sounds to me kind of like cutting off oil to Japan in 1941. I fully support it. I'm saying you just got to be ready for the blowback. But nobody but you, Brian Costello, are talking at all. And this is why Costello is so important. You're the first guy to give me a heads up and say, hey, look, there's two models here. One model is efficiency. And of course Wall street loves that because that means cut jobs, higher margins. This happened. This efficiency model goes back way before AI to other investment opportunities, particularly offshoring jobs and then what you call the productivity creative model that they're not pursuing. So walk us through because, brother, as you know, to get this pointed in the right direction or to bend the arc here is going to be a herculean task since the accelerationist are in charge of the big bang, brother.
Brian Costello
Yeah, let's. I mean, listen, I'll walk. I mean, what I have good insight into, Steve, is what China's doing here. Right? So what China did is they open source their models. There's two companies, Deepseek and Quinn. So they gave the access to AI to everybody. They open sourced the technology behind robotics in a firm called Unitrate. And then they launched a $1 trillion CCP guidance fund to guide all the private capital into. These are the areas and the segments we want to win. Right. And so China kind of aligned a strategy around it. And you have to appreciate when they've kind of focused on an industry, they wanted to be a leader and you know, they've done it right. What we're doing is we're letting the free market, the biggest tech companies just buy up all the infrastructure. And then you're seeing companies like Tesla and Google, Google through Waymo and Tesla through its Robotaxi that's launching, you know, go to replace the Uber and lifts that employ a lot of the people. So you say okay is bad. But what you could, what we could see and what we need to start seeing is how does somebody create an Uber or Lyft with drivers? That is the whole back End imports more money into the driver's pockets. Right. Those are the types of things we need to see, actually help.
Stephen K. Bannon
You say free market. You see, Castella knows my trip bars. You say free market, but in a sense it's actually nine, as you said, 10 companies. And I would actually say probably weighted to the top five or six. Ten companies control right now in your estimate, 90% of the AI infrastructure. Correct?
Brian Costello
Yeah. And they're also, they also happen to be 30 to 40% of the entire market cap of the stock markets. And guess what? They're making all these AI announcements and investments and their employment's not going up. And it's why? Because they're investing in capital and they're wasting an AI and they're investing in automating the jobs away.
Stephen K. Bannon
So that's the efficiency model, automating the jobs away. Do you see any way what needs to be done to bend to your model, which is the productivity, the productivity, the creative slash productivity model.
Brian Costello
So we need to have the conversation then we need to look at what are the industries where I can help us that we don't have today that are additive. Right. And I would argue we even need to get down at the county level, Steve. I think we have 3,100 counties in the country and the counties now have abilities to. They need to look at where the money's being sucked out of the county from their people into the big tech and how do they execute strategies locally around this? We need to look at the problem is our free market, or what we call our free market likes to go where there's the least amount of friction and the least amount of friction in AI right now is replacing jobs. It's not building that new industries. It's automating away workers in existing things. So we need to look at how do we align capital and form capital and net out of IT industries, the robotics, the automation, bringing them, you know, here's the reality. Manufacturing is highly automated now, right. Like it's gone a lot away from cheap labor. Right. So we're fooling ourselves to think, you know, somebody up in Boston is then going to be employed in a factory down in, you know, on the Mexico border in Texas. Like it's just not going to happen. Right. So we need to look at what are the strategies. Go ahead.
Stephen K. Bannon
But, but, but it, this is why in the big beautiful bill, they slipped in that no states, you talk about the counties, they're powerless because we slipped into the big beautiful bill that no state, no state can have authorization over federal law. Over federal law, to, to, to, to do anything here. So when you talk about the county level, that's kind of meaningless, isn't.
Brian Costello
Is? I think the way it's structured right now we need to have the conversation. We need to look at the count. We can't. Like the counties need to look at. They need to look. Okay, we now the cost of building technology is essentially zero. It's the access to the infrastructure. Right. So they could be building their own Uber eats locally, right. And keeping the money there instead of sucking all the money out to all these big tech oligarchs. So they could, you know, so you have strategies you can execute now at the local and the county level in terms of technology and facilitating things in that environment. Like I'm a big believer this is controversial, but I put an AI plan in when President Trump asked for it. But I believe we need a fund at the national level that invests locally. It doesn't just put all the money in Silicon Valley. It turns around and it helps the people of Iowa, the people of. How do they figure out AI and how do they start things around agricultural in the local regions? Because the reality is everybody.
Stephen K. Bannon
You do agree that this efficiency model is all focused on. On the cutting of jobs, correct? On just taking out the labor part of the whatever the business model for this industry, whatever industry they pick, it's all an efficiency model to basically. And this is how you get to the white collar apocalypse.
Brian Costello
And we're seeing it right now, Steve. We're seeing, we're seeing record corporate profitability. We're seeing job postings decrease. Right? And we're seeing the value of AI is basically going to the shareholders in these big companies, which is 15% of the market. And candidly, when we have the foreign investors in, a lot of the value and AI and sucking value out of the country would go to other countries.
Stephen K. Bannon
This is what you mean by we talk, they were talking the other day that you could have not, you know, we're arguing about 1.7% growth versus 2.5 or 3. You could have 10% actual GDP growth but also have 10 to 15% unemployment, particularly among white collar workers. Is that correct? Is that a potential. That's a potential. That's a potential future for us.
Brian Costello
Listen, it's the guarantee, right? We have companies now announcing huge Capex spendings and this idea of, you know, Nvidia announced their earnings last night. He's the biggest player in the space. And announced AI factories. Right? What's AI factories? That's, you know, when Wall Street Cheers. The fact that you're going to make a huge capital investment in technology, that means one thing. Your employment is going to go down. You're not going to hire the labor anymore. So you're seeing it play out right? Right now.
Stephen K. Bannon
What else before I turn to Joe, what else do you find important in videos announcement last night?
Brian Costello
Listen, I think that they, the growth rate is staggering. Like it's, we've never, I mean they're talking about being 4 or 5 trillion dollars. We've never seen it show how fast this is growing. Right. We've never seen a company add trillions in market cap over its lifetime, never mind in a couple of years. Right. And the infrastructure is incredibly important. And candidly as a country we need, you know, and I'm a little biased here because we're doing something here. We need to diverse like having one company control all the AI infrastructure in the world is not a good thing.
Stephen K. Bannon
This is our thing about, this is our thing about going after the oligarchs. How do you, this is what we're the lead on and we're saying right now, Nvidia is something that in the argument, oh, you can't do this because this is what's the bulwark against the Chinese Communist Party. Clearly Nvidia is way too powerful right now. No one company can have that type of market power in advanced chips. So what do you do about it? You're a free market guy.
Brian Costello
And they're going deeper in Taiwan and we all know the geopolitical risks, you know, you covered earlier, early in the week, the geopolitical risks we have with China and actually in Taiwan. Right. And they're going deeper. All just, all Nvidia stuff is made by Taiwan Semiconductor tsmc. Right. Who's, who's committing to do here? So we need to, we need to be investing more as a country and infrastructure, you know, so we have variety of infrastructure in different place there, do you think?
Stephen K. Bannon
Last night the Trump administration also banned any sale of the Nvidia CEOs bellyaching about but they correct me if I'm wrong, didn't they ban 100% any advanced chip design to be sold to the Chinese Communist Party.
Brian Costello
They told the software companies that helped them do the chip design that they can't, there's three big players that they can't sell into China anymore.
Stephen K. Bannon
Candidly, I think is that the equivalent, is that, is that the equivalent of cutting off the oil of Japan in July and August of 1941? Because what's happening in Taiwan right now are not. They're not exercises, they're rehearsals. We've talked about this ad nauseum here, how these are rehearsals for the invasion of Taiwan is what President Trump and the team did last night against the good tell the Nvidia and the software companies opposed it. Is this the equivalent of what happened in the summer of 1941 with the Japanese?
Brian Costello
Listen, I think they're going to react and they'll probably overreact back. I don't. I don't. I think with AI, you can actually replicate building the software so the software is not as important as it once was, and that they probably already had efforts to do that. I mean, the thing that people need to understand on this is Xi was up in Russia a few weeks ago when Putin seemed to make his big pivot with Trump. And if I'm Xi, I'm up in Russia and saying, hey, listen, we've got huge efforts in AI to replace their biotech and pharmaceutical industry, their chip industry, the automobile industry. We can give Russia everything you need. Keep your foot on the gas. You don't need to back down. I mean, we're missing that, you know, we're missing Ukraine.
Stephen K. Bannon
You agree with me? They were playing footsies like two teenagers on their first date.
Brian Costello
Yeah, we're forgetting that she, that we're. Listen, she's going all in on the AI. Like, he's out meeting with the AI startups in China, right? He's going up to Russia basically, you know, on an anniversary of World War II and has his troops marching in a parade. Right. He wants them to stay on Ukraine. Right. And he's promising what he's promising to Putin. And what we now have, that we never had with Russia in the last Cold War, is you have another economic power who's promising everything they need, right?
Stephen K. Bannon
The last real big meaning they had. Look, we spent two years negotiating a deal with them. Lighthizer did that, took out all the issues with the Chinese Communist Party, integrated them into the Western thing. And In May of 29, 2019, after two years negotiation, after they had the first One Belt, One Road meeting, Putin comes, I think it was in Shanghai, they spit in our face, rip it up and say, hey, we're going to go. We're going to go it alone. They. They decreed a people's war three weeks later, and also decreed they're going to be technologically, they're going to uncouple. We're not us uncoupling. They're going to uncouple. You come back what? Five years later they're playing, six years later they're playing footsie at the, at the 80th commemoration of the Victory in Europe, day of which they got Chinese troops marching. And since that time, people got to wake up. What they've done in Ukraine is, and remember, we're 100% get out of the Ukraine war and we're a big believer in the Russian rapprochement to break them off of the CCP. That's a lot harder today. And I think you're 100% correct. What she told him is that, hey, we got this AI thing covered. You keep the pressure on in Ukraine and, and quite frankly, don't help the Americans get off of this Persian situation with the Israelis. I want to go bomb. Hang on a second. So, Joe Allen, everything you've heard from a practitioner of, of Brian Costello, who's putting money to work every day in this area. Your thoughts.
Brian Costello
Steve?
Joe Allen
Brian, I think it's important for me to say first and foremost, some of my best friends are AI developers and cybersecurity experts. So while I myself am very much kind of an anti tech extremist, I think that it's important to remember that there is no one model for how to go forward into the future. And you have the two extremes, right? You have the one extreme all in on the sort of singularitarian, transhumanist, post humanist mindset. I'm going to become a cyborg. You have something much more on my wavelength of being extremely technical or extremely skeptical of all of these technical solutions for spiritual problems. But there is this huge middle ground, people. You know, I still use phones, I still use cars, right? Nobody is a good Luddite. You never heard of them because they live in the woods. So, you know, with Brian's efforts to steer AI and provide tools for people to survive in this environment that's being foisted upon us, I can't do anything but just say I support these efforts. But one of my best friends, Justin Lang at Culture Pulse, is trying to do something very, very similar and others whom I can't mention on air. And I think that this is going to be an important part of it. So I don't mean to suck up all the oxygen with kind of anti tech skepticism. I think that's going to be one of the most important shields going forward for people morally and spiritually to have these cultural barriers. But the reality is that much like Bitcoin provides some sort of alternative to fiat currency, and much like, you know, natural remedies or generic Drugs.
Stephen K. Bannon
Stop. Stop. Yo, yo. What do you mean you're an extremist? What do you mean you're extremist? I don't hear anything extreme of that. The extremist Elon Musk and. Hold it, Dario. Look, we gotta get some definitions here for nomenclature. The Accelerationists are extremists. You're not an extremist. You're kind of trying to put common sense on this. You're not an AI professional practitioner like Brian Costello, putting money to work and managing companies, investing in companies that are at the cutting edge of AI. But you're certainly why you say you're extremist. You're not an extremist. The Accelerationists are extremists because it takes 10 times more regulation on Capitol Hill in the imperial capital to open a nail salon or a hair braiding operation than it takes on all of artificial intelligence. They're the extremists. And they got a political class here that's bought off, that is essentially stepping back and saying, hey, it's a free market. You know, this is like, oh, when it ain't the free market. Because 90% of this has been underwritten by American taxpayer dollars through the universities and through the weapons labs and the national labs. Joe Allen.
Joe Allen
Well, you know, everybody has to draw their lines on how far they're going to go on all this. And my lines are drawn as close to the human as possible. As a writer, I am completely. I'm an absolutist. I do not use AI for anything for any of it. As a reader, a researcher, I don't use AI for anything. In fact, outside of seeing the AI overviews that are posted on me, I don't use AI for anything. But there are people who will. I think that in the case of the extremists on the accelerationist side, that some of the kind of Luddite impulse is a reaction to that. These people have a totalizing vision for where all of this goes, including putting chips in people's brains so they can survive in this hyper technological society. But in the case of Brian Costello, we've had Max Tegmark on.
Stephen K. Bannon
Hang on, hang on. It's their totalist maximalist vision that is. Actually, we're heading down the arc on. One of the reasons is they have a totalist maximalist vision and you don't and I don't. And I'm with you, I don't use any AI and any reason. And I've. People I greatly admire have told me over the last month, they said, you're an idiot. You've got at least perplexity or take a pic. You've got at least get involved here so you understand it. I'm an extremist in that right now because I can see what he's doing to people already. But the maximalists and the accelerationists, they have a vision and they're pretty smart about rolling it out. And you've got Brian Costello who's like one small boat right in a sea of ocean liners and battleships and carriers that are all heading toward destination and that destination is a singularity. You heard Altman right there. Fetterman. And God bless John Fetterman. He asked the question every senator should have been asking. What's the convergence point on this? What leads up to it and then what comes after it and force Altman to answer the question. Joe Allen.
Joe Allen
Yeah, you know, outside of the just the big picture, just on a practical level, and this is what Brian is talking about on a practical level, what do you do? You know, I think Max Tegmark makes a really good argument on this Future of Life Institute. The audience should be well familiar with Max Tegmark at this point. And he says that the key to AI regulation is to leave allowances for tool AI. AI that human beings are in control of. Narrow eyes for medicine, narrow AIs for financial analysis, things like this. What should be off the table is any AI that is out of human control and I think that should include control of the populace. That the populace doesn't have a say in what is deployed is abhorrent. The populace should have a say as to what flies and what does not.
Stephen K. Bannon
Okay Joe, we got a bounce right now. Where do people go? Social media, all your works. Will continue this tomorrow at Goe Bot.
Joe Allen
X Y Z and Joe Bot xyz. Thank you very much Steve. Thank you very much.
Stephen K. Bannon
Brian Bryant, you're a lonely voice out there in the. In the middle of this massive new post industrial revolution. Where do people go? Your Twitter feed is on fire about this. Particularly the two models of efficiency versus creativity slash productivity. Where do people go? Brian?
Brian Costello
Yeah, thanks Steve. It's on, on X. It's BP Costello.
Stephen K. Bannon
Keep up the good work. Well we're going to get back to you maybe tomorrow, the next day to go back to more through this because this the the Axios articles, two of them. And then Morning Joe hit on the coming white collar apocalypse. We ain't talking five years, you're talking in six to 12 months. It's upon us as I told you. You look at cognizant you look at IBM, you look at Microsoft, you look at McKinsey lays off 10%. You look across the board of all these earning announcements where they're talking laying off 5 to 10% of their workforce. They don't want to say that AI is driven. AI is driving all of it. All of it. Okay, short commercial break. Make sure you go to birchgold.com times of turbulence. Find out what gold has been a hedge for 5,000 years of mankind's history. The end of the dollar empire. Understand what the dollar is, the prime reserve currency and the importance it is in your financial life. Check it out. It's all free. Birchgold.com promo code. No promo code. Bannon. 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Remember every day you get your the max you need of your fruits and vegetables in this real organic superfood. That's field of greens.com code Bannon for 20 off and free shipping. Did you get laid yesterday? I didn't. I'm concerned that someone forgot to validate my time or something. Oh that's funny. Paid not laid. There's no way he gets elected, Dash. But I'm afraid we can't take that risk. It's like an insurance policy. God, Hillary should win. 100 million to zero. Just went to a Southern Virginia Walmart. I could smell the Trump support. Vomit, vomit, vomit, vomit, vomit. You can come hang out in 4012 with me. I have remnants of Cubota chips and salsa. It's going to be a Clinton Trump race. Unbelievable. What? Exclamation point, question mark. Exclamation point, question mark, Question mark, question mark. Please don't ever text me again. Okay. Welcome back to My Favorite People. And two of the most creative people in the country, in particular, the Maga Movement, Philem, McAleer and McElhenney. You guys are filmmakers. You also produce plays. You do. Of all the stuff you've done. I love all your material. What you did, I think it was on the Molar Report. You did a live, like, stage reading of it. Yeah.
Philem McAleer
And released it as a podcast. We also did the FBI Lovebirds. You just saw the trailer there where we took the, the actual text messages of Struck and Paige and their congressional behind teenagers. The, the teen. The lovers.
Stephen K. Bannon
Struck. Teenagers.
McElhenney
Oh, yeah. Fantastic.
Philem McAleer
But also, it's, it's, it's, it's teen romance meets John Le Carrier, you know. Oh. Oh, Lisa, I love you. Come and. Come on. I'll give you a debriefing in the quiet room, you know, and then let's take down Trump tonight. You know, let's take down your panties and take down Trump tonight.
Stephen K. Bannon
He went there. That's.
McElhenney
Yeah.
Stephen K. Bannon
Talk to me about this moment as creatives who just finished. You know, we've been all over this. AI. You guys have always been at the cutting edge of filmmaking, particularly being independent filmmakers, always bootstrapping it. Are we going to lose something of the creative talent of individual filmmakers with this? AI? Is it. Is it? We have the efficiency versus the productivity model.
McElhenney
Where do you think a lot of people. There's a lot of people very scared. I mean, you're seeing that from people in Hollywood. They're really worried. Screenwriters are really worried. Actors are worried. I mean, I'm just seeing people like Zach Levy have written a lot about it. He's been talking a lot about it. People, People are. Yeah, people are worried about it. However, I think we're. I think we're still in a good place.
Philem McAleer
I think bad. It's going to hurt bad. Filmmakers and, and people who write by rote.
McElhenney
Yes.
Philem McAleer
You know, it's, it's. And you can see that even so.
Stephen K. Bannon
90% of broadcast TVs and got problems.
Philem McAleer
You know, 90% of a lot of. A lot of these industries, these so called creative industries are let's say 60% because a lot of it's bad like this. So like we used to go to the movies all the time. We never, we don't go now because, because. And I say go to the movies. Would say, let's go to the movies.
McElhenney
Let me say something really controversial. I think the Tom Cruise latest edition of Mission Impossible is awful controversial.
Stephen K. Bannon
But it hasn't, but hasn't filmmaking. We don't. I, we. I screened the Searchers for some people on the tcm. We put it up on a bigger screen and they were absolutely stunned by the photography, color and not just the acting. The story is amazing. But I, and I told people, you can't make that film today. They're so green screen. The films look awful. Like we don't. The DPs have lost it. Technology has actually destroyed great Hollywood filmmaking.
Philem McAleer
Yes. Yeah, no, that's what I'm saying. This AI will, will, will wipe out bad filmmakers because it's, it's, there's no real skill there. So it's, it'll make us hopefully all raise our game.
Stephen K. Bannon
So we got about 18 minutes. I want people to get to know you and also support your work. So talk to us. What are you guys. Because this moment in history is be remembered for 100 years. Yes, we have. And obviously we have never really built a creative chops.
Philem McAleer
Yes.
Stephen K. Bannon
Culture. We're trying to do it. You guys have been always at the tip of sphere. Where are we now in this historical moment? What are you guys working on and what do you need as far as help goes?
Philem McAleer
Well, I just wanted to say we're here because of Andrew Breitbart, as many of us are. Like, we met Andrew in a bar. Was it 15 years ago. He said, come to LA. Okay.
McElhenney
Yeah.
Philem McAleer
Never look back. I mean literally, it was Andrew Breitbart who encouraged us to come here.
Stephen K. Bannon
So once in a generation, talent.
McElhenney
Well, I think, you know, we met him in. The first time we met him was in Washington D.C. and I had somebody yesterday describe Washington D.C. as just a soup of mediocrity. And then in the middle of that, and you can imagine exactly that experience, we. Andrew walks into this room where everyone was wearing the typical uniform. You know, the, you know, the D.C. uniform. Right. I was like, I was like, don't just bring me with you. You know. And he basically said, yeah, you guys need to Come to la. And we did come to la. And he introduced, the first time we went to la, we. He introduced it to John Voight and.
Philem McAleer
Yeah, but you remember the first time we met Andrew, it was in that man's house, which has since burned down. I won't say his name. Yes, from the palaces. And Andrew was standing in front of his fridge freezer saying, I'm thinking of setting up this website. The question is whether I should call it after my name or not. Because, like, we've got Drudge Report and Huffington Post and Breitbart. And I was going, I was going. I don't know which.
Stephen K. Bannon
He helped launch both of those.
Philem McAleer
Yes. I said, I don't think Breitbart will work. I literally said to him, I don't think you should call it Breitbart.
Stephen K. Bannon
You know, I was pretty adamant it had to be Breitbart because, listen, he was also. Got something very deep that nobody in politics got. That culture is upriver from politics. It drives the politics and it does it in a very powerful way. It's one of the reasons we've been such a great fight. And President Trump has changed the culture a lot. But when you look at high culture and how that rolls down and pop creative culture, we're still relatively nowhere. We're getting there and we've got leaders like yourselves. So what do we need to do?
McElhenney
Well, there's a number of things, by the way. I'm just looking at the backdrop here and it makes me think about, about, you know, we're looking at the image of Jesus there, and I'm thinking, like at this moment, what's the most evil thing right now that's threatening the whole world? The most evil thing we think is the trans madness that is destroying children forever, making them infertile, making them sterile. You know, just.
Stephen K. Bannon
I mean, isn't that a precursor to transhumanism? Isn't that the. Isn't that the preamble? If you get people to think they can be anything and change anything. Yeah, right away from what they're God given. So that genders and spirits.
McElhenney
That's one of the, that's one of the projects we're going to be working on.
Stephen K. Bannon
What are you going to do? What are you doing there?
McElhenney
We're going to. We're thinking of doing a documentary with a friend of yours, Miriam Grossman, who just talking to her and she was, she basically said, please tell. Please tell Steve I was asking for him. She is an amazing person. And I'll tell you one thing. It's like the hand of God. Because we interviewed her last week and then she came to Los Angeles and she said, look, I've been thinking of making this documentary. We're like, okay, we're in, you know, because what, what a great idea. And it's, it's extraordinary what has happened to the medical establishment, how they've been, how they've let everyone down. And I think that's what we've tried to destroy.
Stephen K. Bannon
Her and the people that stood up.
McElhenney
Absolutely. That you're, you know, that suddenly you're not, you're, you lose your voice. The pd, pd, the pediatric establishment can't be trusted. It's, it's really scary time for people.
Philem McAleer
Nobody can trust doctors now. I mean, that's funny. What really brought that home to me was the weird thing when they introduced medical marijuana in California. You had all these pop up shops where doctors were in there signing prescriptions for people if they went in and said they had to throw back. And I realized, my God, there's thousands of doctors who will do anything for money.
McElhenney
Yeah, we never knew that before. It wasn't our experience. Our families are full of doctors, so we kind of, you know, they're the good ones.
Philem McAleer
And so when you add in ideology and the God given complex, you know, I can change people. I know what's best. It's a, it's, you should not trust your doctor like, you know, or any doctor or any establishment.
Stephen K. Bannon
If we take your film slate and we take your life theater slate. Right. Walk us through what you're working because we want people to go to your site, get to know you better and particularly if they want to participate in, in funding this or helping produce it or being an executive producer.
McElhenney
Thank you. We're a 501C3, so anyone who does donate to us, it's a, we're, we're a charity and tax, tax deductible.
Stephen K. Bannon
So it's tax deductible, tax deductible.
McElhenney
I mean, one of the things that people, maybe a lot of people know us from is the Gosnell movie, which we, you know, we wrote a New York Times best selling book and we had a movie with Dean Cain starring in the role of detective Jim Wood, who found this extraordinary doctor like Mengele character in West Philadelphia.
Philem McAleer
An abortion doctor.
McElhenney
An abortion?
Stephen K. Bannon
No, he was a butcher. And it was, it was, the film was magnificent. Hard to watch because it was so. I mean, it drew you in as a great film, but the guy is so insane in a way. He abused those people that Minority community.
McElhenney
Yeah, absolutely.
Philem McAleer
Remember, that came from a cover up by the mainstream media. Like, there would be no Gosnell story if the media had. Funny, if the media had covered it in the first place, you know, and this idea that the COVID up of Joe Biden is a shock to the media. They have been putting their thumb on the scale for decades. They're just getting exposed for it now. And they covered up. They didn't go and cover the Gosnell trial. I mean, if it bleeds, it leads. You know, it had abortion, it had murder. It had a minority community. It was Philadelphia, so you could just take the train from New York. I mean, it wasn't like I was out in the middle of nowhere.
Stephen K. Bannon
When you made that film with top talent and you went to get it distributed, what was the response you got? It was worse than Passion of the Christ.
McElhenney
It was incredible. And actually we did. We did distribute it in theaters, I think 700 theaters across the country, but no one. And people. But weird stuff happened. Like you'd. People. And people wrote to us and told us they would arrive at a cinema, they'd have hired a boss and brought a whole bunch of people to go and see the movie. It wouldn't be up on the. You know, they wouldn't. They wouldn't put in the marquee. They. The guy, people wrote and said that when they went to buy a ticket, the guy said, you really want to see that? I think you should go and see this thing instead. Like, unbelievable. Like the list of things that happened, you know, we had. The unions came after us, by the way, during the filming to try and shut the whole thing down. We lost money there. But I mean, unbelievable. It was. It was at every level of that film, we found opposition.
Philem McAleer
I think Marx was wrong. It's wrong by many things. You know, it's not who controls the means of production, certainly in entertainment, it's who controls the means of distribution.
McElhenney
Yes.
Philem McAleer
You know, because, you know, you know this yourself, Steve. You've been banned from so many social media channels, but when you went to.
Stephen K. Bannon
Distribute the movie, no distributor at all. Although you could see the way to make money in this.
Philem McAleer
Look, like we. This was a world record crowd funding, right? This, we raised 2.3 million from. Was it 70,000, 30,000 people? So we had 30,000 evangelical people who had literally put their money where their mouth was, right?
Stephen K. Bannon
So that's opening weekend tickets right there. Put your top five.
Philem McAleer
Imagine if you had funded a movie, you'd invite five people with you, right? You'd say, you got my movies, everyone's coming, I'm paying. Right. And it's like. It's kind of guaranteed opening weekend, a massive box office and then keeping it going. No, no, they wouldn't. They wouldn't. No one would. No one would bite. And that's because it was different times. And I think the world is changing a little, you know, but it's still. You're right. And I think you said, what can we do? We're not there. I think we have to allow each other to feel and we have to allow each other to make bad. The left have been making bad decisions.
Stephen K. Bannon
You don't have that. The problem is you don't have that.
McElhenney
The cushion.
Stephen K. Bannon
You don't have the cushion. Every one of your things has to work. They all have worked. And you don't have the ability. I'm not talking a couple of bombs.
Philem McAleer
I'm not talking about externally, I'm talking about internally. The right are sometimes harder on.
Stephen K. Bannon
Oh, big time.
Philem McAleer
Right. Culture.
Brian Costello
Oh, this is.
Philem McAleer
This is not proper culture. You know. Yes. If we had 40 years of experience making or 50 years of experience making.
McElhenney
Flooded with. Flooded with money from. Money from Soros and from Bloomberg and all.
Philem McAleer
All those.
McElhenney
Because. Because that's something that I've always. I never got the answer to this, but on the left, they really do believe in the arts and it's 100%, huge amounts of money is dropped. On the right, it's really hard. Like, I've. Look, I've spoken to donors many times in the past. I don't really give money to movies. And it's like, really? Why not? Because movies will change people's lives.
Philem McAleer
Yes.
McElhenney
You know, we've had people basically see the Gosnell movie. I mean, we. People we actually know who are very pro abortion, who said 90 minutes, they changed their mind about.
Stephen K. Bannon
It's the Gospel of Andrew Breitbart. Yes. Culture is upriver from politics. It's more. It's not just getting people to vote one time. It's changing. It's having an awakening. The way you do that is great culture and film can do that. Particularly film, where you sit in a theater and have, you know, it comes at you over it and have the communal experience of watching Gosnell. And you've got young people coming out saying, I'm never going to let this happen again.
Philem McAleer
Yeah, yeah. And we. We also got into the theatre. Right. Which is. We do verbatim theatre.
McElhenney
It's kind of a lefty sacred space.
Philem McAleer
Yes. Oh, I mean, you think the Hollywood is Lefty, the theater is. Is. Is. Is the worst. Worst of the. All the arts, I think. Yes. So we. We did Ferguson. So we took the transcripts of the grand jury investigation into the shooting of Michael Brown, which showed, hands up, don't shoot. Never happened, Never happens. And most of the voices are black voices saying this never happened, that he attacked the police officer on several occasions. And as one lady, One lady who spent months dodging a subpoena but eventually was caught, and she had a black liberation tattoo on her arm. And she says, don't get me wrong.
McElhenney
I don't want to be here. I don't want to do this. I don't want to. You know, I don't. I hate the cops. But that guy. That guy was going to kill that cop.
Philem McAleer
Yes. And so we had the first rehearsal in la. Nine of the actors walked out after the first rehearsal. And this, you know, and this is because the truth didn't match what they'd been told by the media and by the culture. Right. So it's an incredibly powerful play, Ferguson, because it's the truth.
Stephen K. Bannon
Where do people go to get access to all your content on reportedstorysociety.com unreported stories, society.com.
Philem McAleer
Yeah.
Stephen K. Bannon
And they get all the films, they get access to everything.
Philem McAleer
Yes.
Stephen K. Bannon
Go through your slate of what you're working on that you want to expose people to say, hey, here's. Here's where we're going. We got a couple of minutes here. Here's where we're going. If. Is that also on Unreported Projects in development? Walk us through.
McElhenney
Well, one of the fun things we want to do, by the way, is we want to bring FBI lovebirds back to dc. We think it'd be really fun.
Stephen K. Bannon
For stage play.
McElhenney
Yeah, for a stage play. And, you know, we could have some very interesting people in the starring roles, and it could be a lot of.
Stephen K. Bannon
Fun because not just that, you get a media firestorm.
Philem McAleer
Yes.
McElhenney
Yeah.
Philem McAleer
Yes. Yeah.
McElhenney
Because it's an incredible story and no.
Stephen K. Bannon
Offense, Cash is our buddy. I mean, he was a contributor here for years. And Bongino is a dear friend. We love Bongino, but, guys, we gotta step it up over there.
McElhenney
Yeah.
Stephen K. Bannon
You agree with that?
Philem McAleer
No, totally. Look, we needed. I know, I know you're not a big fan of Elon, but we need to doge these people. Scorched earth, you know, fair play to. You know, but you've done all the.
Stephen K. Bannon
You've done Molar, you've done all these. Don't you think there's enough there to start a grand jury investigation. Just what you've put into theater.
Philem McAleer
But the, but the. Maybe the statute of limitations has passed, you know, but we need. I think we need an explanation. If we're not doing it, why we're not doing it. You know, this. It's dirty, dirty, dirty over there and it's an echo chamber and, you know, no, there's a lot of bad apples over there. And I don't know if the whole barrel is rotten at this stage. They need a clean house and, you know, they need to go in and maybe get rid of 50% of the operatives. I mean, look at when they were doing all that illegal stuff and the Russia hoax, both investigating the campaign and investigating the president. There was no whistleblower. Think about that.
Stephen K. Bannon
No, I know it.
Philem McAleer
And I don't know whether its people were frightened or maybe they were true believers.
Stephen K. Bannon
There's a lot of. I think some people were frightened. So what are the two or three things you're trying to launch? I want to make sure this audience gets it back.
Philem McAleer
FBI lovebirds.
Stephen K. Bannon
We did a stage to do a stage here.
McElhenney
Here in. Here in D.C. have a really fun few nights.
Philem McAleer
We did a play called October 7th. After the October 7th massacres in Israel. We went to Israel, interviewed about 20 people, and boiled it down to about 14 of the most dramatic stories of that day. Some of them are connected, some of them are standalone stories. All of them are tales of trauma, heroism, survival, resilience.
Stephen K. Bannon
Stage that.
Philem McAleer
Right. And it was all you.
Stephen K. Bannon
Stage it again. Unless we would really.
McElhenney
That's what we'd really like to do.
Stephen K. Bannon
And bring it to dc. Yeah, bring it to DC Wouldn't the protests be tremendous?
Philem McAleer
Excellent, excellent.
McElhenney
And we'd like to bring it to Ireland, by the way.
Stephen K. Bannon
Ireland. Ireland. I'd love my native country, but. Whoa, whoa.
Philem McAleer
Yes.
Stephen K. Bannon
And talk about not pro Israel.
McElhenney
Yeah. And as I said, we have the other thing.
Philem McAleer
We're working.
Stephen K. Bannon
Of course, they did. The pla did train the irs. There is some background there. Yeah, no, we have a.
Philem McAleer
We have a relationship there. No, but look, Ireland has.
Stephen K. Bannon
You couldn't stages in Ireland. The cultural guys, firstly, they would take. Wouldn't let you guys come back. Well, by the way, they told you, if you said you. I guarantee you we ought to announce that. Okay, we're gonna stage in Dublin. Let's say. Can we rent the Abbey Theater?
Philem McAleer
We've been there. We've been there.
Stephen K. Bannon
We.
McElhenney
We wrote to them. We had a very leng and forth just to rent the place. You can rent the place because they have dark nights. And by the way, they're desperate for money because all of their money comes from the government and they're still kind of in debt. So, you know, rent the place out on a dark night. Why not? Eventually we got the response. This play does not fit in with our artistic ambitions, which we haven't got an answer of what their artistic ambitions are. But we do know what their artistic ambitions were because what was on stage at the time was something made by a Palestinian poet whose ambition was the annihilation of Israel. You know, so there you go. So we know something about their artistic ambitions, but we weren't acceptable.
Stephen K. Bannon
Could you get a theater here in Washington D.C. to stage it?
Philem McAleer
We're trying. We're trying. If anyone out there knows a theater whose ownership.
Stephen K. Bannon
How many actors for that?
Philem McAleer
14 actors. 14 actors. And funny. There are actors around who will act in this.
McElhenney
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Philem McAleer
You know, they're. And they love it. And you know, some people are very.
McElhenney
Very passionate and quite high profile actors as well. By the way. It's incredible. I really recommend people to go to our website and watch some of the clips from it. It's really, really powerful.
Philem McAleer
Yes.
McElhenney
And then the trans thing, as I said, we are going to. We are, we are working on a, on a documentary.
Stephen K. Bannon
Don't pick any controversial topics.
McElhenney
No, no. But I think the trans thing, I.
Stephen K. Bannon
Think it's first off the protests on Dr. Grossman's play or whatever in the protest on October 7th would be.
Philem McAleer
There's probably quite a bit of overlap, you know.
Stephen K. Bannon
Well, yeah, there 100% is social media. First off, website again. Social media.
McElhenney
Yeah. Unreportedstorysociety.com and also on Twitter. I'm Ann McElhenney on Twitter. On Twitter, yes. And we are Unreported Story Society on Twitter and we're kind of, you know, we're everywhere on social media, so you won't have a problem finding us.
Stephen K. Bannon
Unbelievable. One more time, where do people go?
Philem McAleer
Unreported story society. Society.com go to. Go to the October 7th the play Instagram page. October 7th the play dot com. You know, we want. Look, there's no point in being in this fight if you're not going to fight. If you're not. If you're not getting hitting over the head, you're not doing, not doing God's work.
Stephen K. Bannon
You know, you're fighters. You've always been.
McElhenney
Thank you so much.
Stephen K. Bannon
You've never. Well, you've never backed down all the stuff you could have done.
Philem McAleer
Yes.
Stephen K. Bannon
And you decided to take on the hardest topics. What I love is that you had the theater, which is my first love. You're right. It's absolutely verboten. There's no conservative, no, no voices at all, right?
Philem McAleer
There is in Hollywood. There's some conservative voices in Hollywood, but not in the theater. It is completely taken over and I, I'd like to know why someday.
McElhenney
But it's just the night, the night that we had FBI love birds in Washington, D.C. it was like we did have it once. It was, it was a pan, a pantomime.
Stephen K. Bannon
And coming from Ireland with the Abbey, the all the great Irish playwrights. Unbelievable. Okay, we're gonna, we got a tomorrow morning, 10:00am Eastern Daylight Time. We'll be back in the worm. See you then. It's hard for the ticket. You missed the IRS tax deadline. You think it's just going to go away? Well, think again. The IRS doesn't mess around and they're applying pressure like we haven't seen in years. So if you haven't filed in a while, even if you can't pay, don't wait and don't face the IRS alone. You need the trusted experts by your side. Tax Network usa. Tax Network USA isn't like other tax relief companies. They have an edge, a preferred direct line to the irs. They know which agents to talk to and which ones to avoid. They use smart, aggressive strategies to settle your tax problems quickly and in your favor. Whether you owe $10,000 or $10 million, Tax Network USA has helped resolve over $1 billion in tax debt. And they can help you, too. Don't wait on this. It's only going to get worse. Call Tax Network USA right now. It's free. Talk with one of their strategists and put your IRS troubles behind you. Put it behind you today. Call Tax Network USA at 1-800-958-1000. That's 800-958-1000 or visit Tax Network USA tnusa.com Bannon do it today. Do not let this thing get ahead of you.
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WarRoom Battleground EP 778: Big Tech Dominance Crushes Small AI Firms Release Date: May 29, 2025 Host: Stephen K. Bannon, WarRoom.org
In the latest episode of WarRoom Battleground, host Stephen K. Bannon delves into the escalating dominance of Big Tech in the artificial intelligence (AI) sector and its ramifications for smaller AI firms. The episode features insightful discussions with economic nationalist populist Brian Costello and philosopher Joe Allen, alongside creatives Philem McAleer and McElhenney, who explore the cultural impacts of AI.
[04:00] Stephen K. Bannon:
Bannon opens the conversation by posing a critical question to Brian Costello about whether the current phase of AI development resembles a "big bang," characterized by explosive growth and rapid technological advancements driven by major players like Elon Musk.
[04:00] Brian Costello:
Costello affirms the "big bang" analogy, highlighting the rapid sophistication of AI models and the consolidation of what used to be a decade-long innovation process into mere months. He emphasizes the concentration of AI infrastructure among approximately ten companies, which now control about 90% of the market. Costello states, "What we're seeing here is we're seeing 10, 15 years of innovation be consolidated down to months" ([04:00]).
[05:29] Stephen K. Bannon:
Bannon probes deeper into the economic strategies, referencing international deals like the UAE's investment in data centers and the Trump administration's move to restrict chip sales to China, comparing it to historical actions such as cutting off oil to Japan in 1941.
[06:43] Brian Costello:
Costello contrasts China's strategic approach of open-sourcing AI models and channeling private capital through a $1 trillion CCP guidance fund to focus on desired industries. He criticizes the US free market for allowing Big Tech to monopolize AI infrastructure without fostering widespread employment opportunities. "We're not even asking the right question now—is how do we make AI work for the American people," he asserts ([06:43]).
[08:18] Brian Costello:
He underscores the lack of job growth despite massive capital investments, pointing out that major companies are automating jobs rather than creating new ones. "They're investing in capital and they're wasting AI and they're investing in automating the jobs away" ([08:18]).
[14:18] Brian Costello:
Discussing geopolitical tensions, Costello highlights China's deepening AI capabilities and their collaboration with Russia. He warns of China's intent to replace key industries and support allies like Russia, posing significant risks to US technological and economic supremacy. "If I'm Xi, I'm up in Russia and saying, hey, we've got huge efforts in AI to replace their biotech and pharmaceutical industry" ([14:18]).
[15:09] Stephen K. Bannon:
Bannon draws parallels between US-China actions to historical events, suggesting that recent US restrictions on AI exports to China might be comparable to the US cutting off oil to Japan before World War II, potentially provoking severe geopolitical backlash.
[18:19] Joe Allen:
Philosopher Joe Allen joins the discussion, advocating for a balanced approach to AI. He supports Brian Costello's efforts to steer AI responsibly and emphasizes the importance of cultural and moral safeguards against unchecked technological advancements. Allen suggests that regulation should focus on "tool AI" that remains under human control, leaving out AI systems that could dominate or manipulate the populace ([20:10]).
[22:13] Joe Allen:
Addressing the need for nuanced AI regulation, Allen references Max Tegmark's ideas on permitting beneficial AI applications while restricting those that pose existential threats. "The key to AI regulation is to leave allowances for tool AI... What should be off the table is any AI that is out of human control" ([22:13]).
Transitioning from technology to culture, Bannon engages with independent filmmakers Philem McAleer and McElhenney. They discuss the detrimental effects of AI on creative industries, particularly filmmaking.
[33:32] Stephen K. Bannon:
Bannon raises concerns about AI's ability to undermine individual creativity and the potential loss of unique voices in the film industry.
[34:36] McElhenney:
McElhenney criticizes modern filmmaking for over-reliance on green screens and technology, lamenting the loss of traditional cinematic craftsmanship. "Technology has actually destroyed great Hollywood filmmaking" ([35:09]).
[35:45] Philem McAleer:
McAleer shares experiences from producing plays that confront mainstream media narratives, highlighting the resistance faced when presenting vérité stories like the Ferguson grand jury investigations. "We had nine of the actors walked out after the first rehearsal" ([35:55]).
[36:32] McElhenney:
He recounts the challenges of distributing independent films that tell uncomfortable truths, noting the systemic barriers imposed by existing media structures. "No one would bite... it's because it was different times" ([36:55]).
[07:58] Brian Costello:
Costello suggests that empowering local economies and investing in regional AI projects could counteract the monopolistic tendencies of Big Tech. He advocates for county-level strategies to retain economic benefits within communities rather than funneling profits to centralized tech oligarchs ([07:58]).
[08:52] Brian Costello:
He emphasizes the necessity of diversifying AI infrastructure to prevent single entities from holding excessive market power, stating, "Having one company control all the AI infrastructure in the world is not a good thing" ([13:53]).
[39:29] Stephen K. Bannon:
Bannon and the creatives discuss the critical role of culture in driving political change. They highlight the importance of independent filmmaking and theater in shaping public perception and countering mainstream media narratives.
[44:36] McElhenney:
McElhenney emphasizes the need for authentic storytelling and grassroots support to combat cultural homogenization driven by Big Tech and left-leaning media influences. "There's no point in being in this fight if you're not going to fight" ([44:35]).
The episode concludes with a call to action for listeners to support independent voices in both technology and culture. Bannon underscores the urgency of addressing Big Tech's dominance to prevent economic disparities and preserve creative integrity. The discussions collectively highlight the multifaceted challenges posed by AI—ranging from economic monopolization and job displacement to cultural erosion—and advocate for strategic, localized, and regulated approaches to ensure AI benefits the broader society.
Brian Costello:
"We're seeing 10, 15 years of innovation be consolidated down to months." ([04:00])
Brian Costello:
"We're not even asking the right question now—is how do we make AI work for the American people." ([06:43])
Joe Allen:
"The key to AI regulation is to leave allowances for tool AI... What should be off the table is any AI that is out of human control." ([22:13])
Philem McAleer:
"If you're not going to fight... you're not doing God's work." ([50:52])
McElhenney:
"Technology has actually destroyed great Hollywood filmmaking." ([35:09])
For more insights and to engage with the content discussed in this episode, visit WarRoom.org and follow host Stephen K. Bannon on social media platforms. Stay updated with expert analyses and join the conversation on mitigating Big Tech's influence in AI and preserving cultural integrity.