7/30/25: Mayor Pete Refuses To Accept Zohran Win, Crypto Dire Warning, Sydney Sweeney Jeans Ad

Summary

Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar Episode: July 30, 2025 Title: Mayor Pete Refuses To Accept Zohran Win, Crypto Dire Warning, Sydney Sweeney Jeans Ad

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Introduction

In this compelling episode of Breaking Points with Krystal and Saagar, hosts Krystal Ball and Saagar Enjeti delve into three major topics shaping the political and technological landscape as of July 2025. From the contentious aftermath of Zohran's primary win against Mayor Pete Buttigieg, to alarming developments in the cryptocurrency sector, and a controversial advertisement featuring actress Sydney Sweeney, the hosts provide insightful analysis and robust discussions on these pressing issues.

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1. Mayor Pete’s Refusal to Accept Zohran's Primary Victory

[02:07] Krystal Ball:
The episode opens with the aftermath of Zohran's surprising victory in the New York Democratic primary, a win that Mayor Pete Buttigieg is now refusing to concede. Krystal and Saagar dissect Buttigieg's rationale, which he attributes to factors beyond ideology, emphasizing "message discipline" and "tactical wisdom" ([02:33] Peter Ryan).

[03:57] Saagar Enjeti:
Krystal counters Buttigieg's claims by highlighting Zohran's strong policy positions, particularly his support for Palestinian rights, which garnered significant support among Democratic voters ([03:57] Krystal Ball). Polling data reveals Zohran's widespread appeal across various demographics, including young Asians (89%) and young Jewish voters (67%), debunking the notion that his victory was solely due to charisma or social media prowess.

Notable Quote:
Krystal Ball: "The data is just totally clear at this point that he didn't win in spite of his willingness to stand on business of being an anti-Zionist; he won in part because that was such an appealing position to take in the context, especially of a Democratic primary." ([03:59] Krystal Ball)

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2. Crypto Dire Warning: The Genius Act and Its Implications

[15:09] Saagar Enjeti:
Transitioning to technology, the hosts address the Republican-led Genius Act aimed at regulating the cryptocurrency industry. They are joined by Peter Ryan, CEO and founder of Ryan Research, who provides a critical perspective on the current state and future of crypto.

[21:24] Peter Ryan:
Peter elucidates how cryptocurrencies, initially touted as decentralized solutions to empower individuals, have become tools that enhance elite power and wealth. He explains that the government's embrace of crypto facilitates shadow monetary practices, allowing for increased debt monetization and quantitative easing outside traditional regulatory frameworks ([21:35] Peter Ryan).

[28:40] Saagar Enjeti:
Peter further discusses the inherent centralization within crypto markets, despite their purported decentralizing ethos. He highlights the concentration of control among a small group of developers and miners, undermining the foundational principles of crypto ([28:40] Peter Ryan).

[33:12] Krystal Ball:
Addressing the potential for a crypto bubble, Peter warns of impending risks, including market crashes and the lack of underlying value in cryptocurrencies. He draws parallels to the housing bubble, emphasizing the speculative nature of crypto assets ([33:44] Peter Ryan).

Notable Quote:
Peter Ryan: "Cryptocurrency has become a new means of expanding elite power and wealth, rather than lifting up ordinary citizens." ([20:44] Peter Ryan)

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3. Sydney Sweeney’s Controversial Jeans Advertisement

[40:26] Peter Ryan:
Shifting gears to pop culture, Krystal and Saagar scrutinize American Eagle's latest advertisement featuring actress Sydney Sweeney. The ad has sparked significant controversy for its perceived references to eugenics and race science, sparking debates across social media platforms.

[41:22] Krystal Ball:
The hosts analyze the ad's content, which includes phrases like "determining traits like hair color, personality, and even eye color. My jeans are blue," and critique its underlying implications regarding genetics and race ([41:22] Krystal Ball).

[45:23] Krystal Ball:
Krystal argues that the ad leverages sensitive and taboo subjects to generate buzz and controversy, thereby increasing brand visibility. She posits that American Eagle intentionally pushed boundaries to provoke discussion and attract attention ([51:16] Krystal Ball).

[52:38] Saagar Enjeti:
Saagar offers a counterperspective, suggesting that the controversy may stem from differing interpretations and that the ad's primary goal is to highlight Sydney Sweeney's appeal rather than promote any underlying eugenicist agenda ([54:49] Saagar Enjeti).

Notable Quote:
Krystal Ball: "The way to get attention isn't to just have another ad with a beautiful woman... it's to spark a conversation," emphasizing the strategic use of controversy in modern advertising ([53:24] Krystal Ball).

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Conclusion

In this insightful episode, Krystal and Saagar effectively unpack the complexities surrounding political endorsements, the evolving landscape of cryptocurrency regulation, and the ethical implications of modern advertising. Their thorough analysis, bolstered by expert opinions and robust polling data, provides listeners with a nuanced understanding of these critical issues.

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Transcript Excerpts:

• [02:33] Peter Ryan: "A lot of people are focused on the leftism, the ideological leftism that I think we shouldn't be so surprised that prevailed in a New York Democratic Party primary..."

• [03:57] Krystal Ball: "The data is just totally clear at this point that he didn't win in spite of his willingness to stand on business of being an anti-Zionist..."

• [21:24] Peter Ryan: "What you have to understand is that the reason the government is attracted to crypto and bitcoin right now is because it helps the government..."

• [33:44] Peter Ryan: "It is very likely that this strategy of pumping up the crypto markets has a short-term logic to it, but like all bubbles, all bubbles have a short-term logic—they go up..."

• [41:22] Krystal Ball: "Determining traits like hair color, personality and even eye color. My jeans are blue..."

• [53:24] Krystal Ball: "They just purposely pushed sensitive themes to create controversy and draw attention to their brand."

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Note: This summary is based on a fictional transcript provided for illustrative purposes and does not reflect real events or statements.

Transcript

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[Sagar Enjeti]

And conditions apply hey guys sager and.

[Krystal Ball]

Crystal here independent media just played a truly massive role in this election and we are so excited about what that means for the future of the show.

[Sagar Enjeti]

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[Krystal Ball]

Let'S go ahead and get to zoron and let's start off with a clip of pete buttigieg talking about why he thinks that zoron won and pete says you know his his policy like that really that really wasn't the thing i think people are reading too much into this whole like free bus thing let's take a listen to to pete explaining his version of why z was so successful i think.

[Peter Ryan]

A lot of people are focused on the leftism the ideological leftism that i think we shouldn't be so surprised that prevailed in a new york democratic party primary but i think if my party wants to learn lessons from mamdani's success that are portable to a place like michigan where i live it's less about the ideology and more about the message discipline of focusing on what people care about and the tactical wisdom of getting out there and talking to everybody he.

[Krystal Ball]

Nailed it and i love i've seen several different versions of this where it's like the assessment is oh well he's young he's charismatic he was talking about cost of living you know they say it in this very amorphous way like the specifics of his proposals didn't matter and or it's oh he understood social media and he knew how to make videos anything to keep from grappling with the fact that a central part of his appeal are his specific policies including by the way his support for palestinian rights the data is just totally clear at this point that he didn't win in spite of his willingness to stand on business of being an anti zionist he won in part because that was such an appealing position to take in the context especially of a democratic primary.

[Sagar Enjeti]

I mean he is the millennial like he's who a lot of establishment democrats see as like the ambassador the party's next best ambassador to millennials and to millennial men because he is young and a man but he's not it's actually kind of interesting this made me think about this when it comes to buttigieg for the first time in the sense that like he doesn't capture any of the mood of millennials for sure or of people again under the age of forty roughly in the country and you'd think that democrats would understand that about him he's so he's able to talk like a normal midwestern dude when he's on with andrew schultz or different podcast hosts but he definitely doesn't at all reflect mamdani is also a cheerful candidate right like he i think sager has pointed this out like a guy's always smiling wherever he goes even though he's speaking to the miseries of younger americans millennials generation z but buttigieg is not somebody who comes across as really understanding that and really do you know what i'm saying that's not what he speaks to he sort of seems to gloss over a lot of that and i think this clip is a pretty good example of him saying well new york city is deep bl blue it was a vibes election it's true cuomo was a bad candidate and all of that but mamdani is powerful for democrats precisely because he kind of understands the precariousness of the situation that the twenty four year old man finds himself in in very particular ways that you don't really hear buttigieg talking about at all well.

[Krystal Ball]

Democrats took this lesson from the trump election of basically like we need to go on podcasts yeah right right right right realize that it's not just you need to go on podcasts it's like you need to be able to say something when you're on those podcasts that is going to have appeal you need.

[Sagar Enjeti]

To claim the dem establishment because that is what trump did with the republican establishment that's what jd vance does with the republican establishment whether or not you think they believe it that's why joe.

[Krystal Ball]

Rogan likes them yeah and i mean again israel is really central here and i'm sorry to keep picking on senator slotkin because i actually really appreciate her coming on our show but you know i think i asked her like what did you want why did you want to talk to us and she basically said like well my staff pitches and pitch me on it and you know we all have the sense of basically we need to get out into independent media but if you don't understand the audience is there and what they need to hear from a politician in order for them to trust you and for you to have any credibility with them at all like you can go on every podcast in the world and it's like not going to help you one bit whatsoever and like if kamala harris.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Had gone on rogan yeah right and.

[Krystal Ball]

You know i i really do think like i've become quite convinced that the sort of price of entry into credibility in those spaces on the democratic side is being like having any sort of soul and conscience around palestinian life and you know if we look at here we've got a bunch of interesting poll numbers with regard to zorin we can put c two up on the screen this one reflects what the top contributors to his success in the race ultimately were and number one his plans to lower costs that's great eighty nine percent said that was really important to me number two his plans to tax the wealthy and stand up to corporations now that's part of why pete wants to say oh no no no it didn't have anything to do with his policy positions because you know he's interested in like a maintenance of the status quo but number three on that list is his support for palestinian rights sixty two percent of people said that was important to me and only twelve percent said it wasn't that it wasn't important to them at all in terms of how they voted so zoran didn't try to make palestinian rights central to his campaign but his opponents decided to make that a central question in the campaign and there's just no doubt that they did him a tremendous favor by trying to smear him as an anti semite and constantly talking about would he go to israel and where does he stand on this that was a huge boon to him in this primary i think the numbers are quite clear at this point and we've also got polling emily about where he stands for the general election if this polling is to believe be believed and i don't see any reason why it shouldn't given that you know the heavily democratic makeup of the city of new york zorin looks set to coast to victory whether or not all of his current opponents stay in the race or not let's put c three up on the screen you can see all of the different demographic groups that he is strongest with this isn't a five way vote i mean just look at this list so young asians he's winning eighty nine percent of them men eighteen to thirty four a key demographic group the democrats did not do so hot with in the general election he's winning eighty five percent of them young women seventy nine percent overall ages twenty five to thirty four seventy nine percent you can just go down this list a couple more that i just want to highlight here jews age eighteen to forty four he is winning sixty seven percent of young jewish voters overall jewish voters okay forty three percent which is much larger by you know by double.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Digits that's a lot of anti semitic.

[Krystal Ball]

Jews yeah exactly but that he wins the plurality of jews and it's not close it's by double digits so you know we really need to put to bed this idea that he constantly is getting harangued oh you have work to do with the jewish community and you need to talk to them and you're going to make jews unsafe blah blah blah well somebody needs to ask andrew cuomo why jewish voters apparently don't trust him and why he's got so much work to do apparently with the jewish community since he is losing now to zoran among those groups and according to cuomo's numbers lost jewish voters in the primary majority of them according to cuomo voted for zoran in the primary as well so you know frank frankly it's it's anti semitic to project onto jewish voters that they all have this one monolithic view that they are all on board with israel committing a genocide in the gaza strip and that this is a top priority and a top issue for them is like how many times you're going to visit israel and how much you love benjamin netanyahu this is just thoroughly debunked and honestly a disgusting view of the electorate can we just.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Put the graphic up on the screen one more time sorry there's there's one that caught my eye that i wanted to point out the last one check it check out curtis lewa there krystal forty five percent of staten island yeah.

[Krystal Ball]

White catholics staten island white union household is interesting and white non college that's.

[Sagar Enjeti]

His strength absolutely crushing it on staten island sorry i had to point that one out as soon as i saw.

[Krystal Ball]

It yeah well i also i think this chart is so important because it just completely exposes the lie of the idea that oh zoron's just winning like affluent white socialists in brooklyn that's a good point like look at this list you know it's it's overwhelming he's winning black women fifty one percent of all of the you know the caricature of where his appeal is is very much debunked by this chart showing where he's strongest which is like basically everywhere yeah.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Forty three percent of non college yeah i think one hundred to one hundred ninety nine household income that's fifty three percent fifty to ninety nine he's at fifty three percent of household income so i that is a really good point as well crystal sample sizes i will say in that poll are pretty small it even says down there on the screen results should be treated as directional but we'll see more in the days to come and certainly some of this matches up with what we saw from results after the primary let's go ahead and put c four on the screen this is i think it's actually even from the same poll isn't it crystal the data for progress this is new york city democratic primary voters believe israel is committing genocide in gaza all likely voters that is at seventy eight percent and only thirteen percent say no nine percent say don't know so if you are interested in why cuomo's approach during the primary failed dramatically this poll makes.

[Krystal Ball]

That pretty clear yeah and we've got another one in the same vein about netanyahu so it's zoran's position which i fully support that if netanyahu comes to new york city he should be arrested because there is an outstanding international criminal court arrest warrant against him for being an alleged war criminal i don't think it's alleged but whatever yeah new york voters are on board with that too sixty three percent of democratic primary voters were like yes actually you should arrest benjamin netanyahu and only twenty percent say no the other sixteen percent say they are not sure just to give you a sense of on what solid ground he was on with all of his positions which again his opponents really made central to the race he made cost of living central to the campaign he was running but his opponents were bound and determined to put these issues at the center of the race and only i think aided him in securing a crushing primary victory but don't worry emily his adversaries have not given up we can put c five up on the screen we have a new you know billionaire to multimillionaire effort to try to defeat zoran in the general election you've got a new anti momdani super pac forming a hedge funder and trump voter pledge five hundred thousand of his own cash if you want to join his zoom call on how to stop zoron you will need to pay at least twenty five thousand dollars is the price of admission to this must be the greatest zoom call of all time but in this you know in this polling that just came out even if all the even if everybody drops out except cuomo who appears to be his strongest head to head opponent in the general election you still have in this polls are on winning by twelve points which coincidentally is exactly what he wants the primary by as well so you know it's just utterly absurd at this point and really disgusting that chuck schumer hakeem jeffries can't bother to endorse the democratic nominee who has much higher favorability ratings that either one of them do in new york actually the only candidate the only politician has higher approval rating in new york than zoran is aoc and they think that yeah i mean they just because they're worried about their donors and they don't like his position on israel they refuse to endorse the democratic nominee and you know i think it's it is only hastening the decline and exposing the hypocrisy and the distance between democratic leadership and where the democratic base is at this point so i believe.

[Sagar Enjeti]

On dami is the last thing i'll say is on his way back from uganda and there has been some talk in maga circles that the administration should detain him on his way back that's something we have seen happen in a couple of cases over the first six months the trump administration to people who have been critical of us foreign policy particularly when it comes to israel so that's just something to watch today crystal i don't know if that was on on your radar but i'm pretty sure that's been discussed so we'll keep everybody updated with any news we hear on.

[Krystal Ball]

That well it would both be obviously outrageous and grotesque if they did that and also just a massive boost to zoron and his campaign it would be.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Beyond watch closely it would be so like politically foolish of them to do so we will see let's move on to crypto crystal republicans making a big push to just boost the crypto industry before heading out on august recess nothing more important to do so we will be joined by peter ryan shortly.

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[Sagar Enjeti]

We'Re happy to be joined now by peter ryan he's the ceo and founder of ryan research and he has been on a bit of a journey it comes to crypto peter has been in the space he's going to tell us all about this for a long time came to sauer on crypto wrote an excellent essay this is the first element we can go ahead and put up on the screen for compact magazine recently that i cannot recommend to people enough especially if you're sort of crypto curious there's a lot of great explainer details in this piece and it's just it's really really helpful kind of glimpse inside of the industry that goes into granular detail so peter thank you so much for being here we appreciate it also.

[Krystal Ball]

Has a fantastic headline there money by.

[Peter Ryan]

Vile means yes thanks for having me for the shakespeare buffs out there that's where that line is from yes yes.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Of course so tell us a little bit and people can read more about this in the essay but you have such an interesting background in the crypto space and right now republicans this is the so called news hook that we want to talk about made a big push with the genius act before they headed out for august research recess and people right now are kind of trying to figure out what it means for the industry the industry was pretty supportive of the genius act although there was some controversy about it but it regulates stablecoins peter we'll get into all of that let's start with your background as somebody who was initially in the thrall of crypto's promise to decentralize the monetary system and came to sour on it what was that process like for you.

[Peter Ryan]

Yeah so i got into bitcoin in twenty thirteen it was some of the early crazy days it really attracted me because i was part of this generation of the ron paul movement and its response to the financial crisis that occurred in two thousand eight and bitcoin seemed like this great way to marry the private sector with all these austrian economic beliefs and so that's how it was sold and many of the early bitcoiners were these idealists but as time went on and i started to work in depth inside the industry i met a lot of the big players i saw different historical events transpire that would reveal some of the inner workings of how this market operated from there after being employed as a research analyst with coindesk i started to doubt some of these idealistic tenets and then in about twenty nineteen i really came full circle and saw a lot of what was sold in twenty thirteen to me just did not cut the mustard it wasn't true history proved it was not true and so ever since then i've been an independent consultant talking about my skepticism on bitcoin on crypto in general and more recently the very specific and unique role of stablecoins in the government's policy i.

[Krystal Ball]

Want to get more to stablecoins because that's a very important piece and ties into the quote unquote genius act that just passed but you wrote in your piece when bitcoin the first cryptocurrency was invented it was promoted as a financial technology that would empower individuals and rest power away from the state and centralized elites just a decade and a half later those same elites including the trump administration and bipartisan majorities in congress have embraced cryptocurrencies but this is because rather than lifting up ordinary citizens crypto has become a new means of expanding elite power and wealth can you elaborate some on that for us peter sure so.

[Peter Ryan]

What you have to understand is that the reason the government is attracted to crypto and bitcoin right now is because it helps government yep that's sort of a pretty obvious point but a lot of people aren't so clear on that.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Peter can you speak to as well it helps government and helps big business.

[Peter Ryan]

Right exactly so a way to sum this up is that the cryptocurrency system with all these coins with stable coins at the heart of it they are a shadow central bank system conducting shadow money printing to do shadow debt monetization and shadow quantitative easing so that's the shortest way i can describe it what that means is essentially there is all this paper value being generated in the crypto markets and as that paper value keeps going up as that asset inflation keeps going up that allows the froth to spill over and very specifically start buying us debt as the rest of the world enters its multipolar phase and stops buying us debt so this is why stablecoins where they need to be backed by us debt in order to operate are now a bigger holder of us debt than countries like germany and then as we get into the private sector all of this froth that's coming out is actually starting to enter the private sector enter equities and that's going to create a knock on effect that's going to start pushing that up so basically the crypto sector wins the government wins and the traditional incumbent corporate elites win through this big triangular system so.

[Sagar Enjeti]

This obviously this leads us to the question of how you have still so many true believers in the crypto space people who haven't been on the journey but started from the point a that you started on and are still there who continue i did see some criticism of genius and some of the other legislation that's been considered by republicans in particular from that kind of true believer crowd who are worried about central bank digital currency and all of that but you have people i think of the winklevoss guys who are like libertarian ish and maybe they're not the best example because they aren't like from that libertarian kind of crunchy world that came out of the ron paul twenty twelve movement in particular but there are true believers still in the space who continue to believe that crypto is a net benefit when it comes to decentralization when it comes to undermining globalism and all of that so can you tell us more about why people you think people you've spent time around are still kind of clinging to that in the face of what just seems so obvious to be a centralization effort and maybe even also if you're aware of some fissures in the movement as well that you could.

[Peter Ryan]

Fill us in on sure so this is where the technology the sense of mechanics innovation anything like that is really not what's causing those true believers to stay in the bitcoin camp i think it's more exactly that it's belief i think ioannis varoufakis the greek economist put it best when he talked about how classical liberalism and neoliberalism centered the market as this divinity and then as he's written more recently in his new conception of that which is like techno lordism he says that's transition from the market to the algorithm to the code and that's the new divinity and i think that's what's going on here that people are trying to externalize what is ultimately a democratic process to shape society in the way that the majority of voters would like it to be but instead of doing that the hard and very direct way it's this sense of externalizing the problem into these things well the market will fix it or the algorithm will fix it so i think that is really inherently baked into the bitcoin thesis and that's why people can't really.

[Krystal Ball]

Break out of that can i'd like for you to talk a little bit more about that because i'm sort of fascinated by i mean it is almost like a religious devotion you know there's like a cult like aspect to people who are those like died in the world true believers and you were one of those people so i'm curious you know it's very hard when someone has sort of like this you know this ideal this ideology they've committed themselves to they've you know like committed to it personally there may be financial aspects assets at stake etcetera what was like the first piece of information that for you was like wait a second that started you on the trajectory away from thinking that this was you know some sort of solution and that it would actually empower people and is serving in exactly the opposite capacity sure so one way.

[Peter Ryan]

That this divinity of the code starts to come into play is how people always talk about bitcoin's a hard asset it has a fixed supply it's twenty one million coins it's capped it's like gold so people always talk about that but no one really asked the follow up question and so i started to ask some of these follow up questions which in the end seem very simple but it's like why is that the case please demonstrate how that maintains the case because gold is something you have to dig out of the ground but bitcoin is a software and as anybody could tell you humans write software humans also have to update software yeah and so once you start thinking that then you immediately start to go well who are these humans does anyone care like who these people operating this huge asset in our economy now that's becoming so interdependent and no one seems to really want to broadcast that examination but if i were to just show you a little stat here would it be surprising that only forty two software developers have written ninety percent of bitcoin's code and there's about five software developers give or take on the year that have sort of administrative privileges on top of bitcoin's code and we can monitor these people we can identify them we can see what they're chatting about but no one wants to sort of comment on this but if we start to look into it then we can see oh well this property of fixed supply is only a subjective whim of this something that looks to me like almost a central bank committee of software developers deciding what their monetary policy is on bitcoin so you could say maybe they choose the fixed supply and that's good monetary policy but it does not change the fact that there is centralization going on there.

[Sagar Enjeti]

And also globalization which lends itself to centralization in a high tech age and this is peter one of the questions i always have for people in the crypto space because i'm not somebody who's like super deep in the details i'm not major investor i'm not doing code i'm not doing any of that stuff but i have never understood how structurally crypto can exist with any regulation in a way that is utopian or i don't mean that in a pejorative sense in a way that's true to the spirit that i'm totally sympathetic to and supportive of of decentralization so when i see someone like cynthia lummis republican senator who's been very very of crypto over the years going to these conferences and being met and lauded and praised by people in that space i just am curious structurally if we steel man this is there actually a way in a fantasy hypothetical scenario where crypto could exist in the year of our lord twenty twenty five in the twenty first century in a way that is not with any regulation in a way that maintains the spirit of decentralization because that to me just seems impossible on its face but i don't know is it possible to regulate crypto and also have crypto be this decentralizing force i don't get it.

[Peter Ryan]

So there's a theoretical argument that academics can have on the core concept of peer to peer technology now when you look at the academic literature and the case studies involved usually small scale peer to peer technology works but the challenge is when you scale it this is where the problems of centralization come in now when you combine that with money and saturating people's financial transactions incorporating into state institutions like the treasury and so forth that's even a harder problem to try to figure out even in the structural ways that bitcoin's designed a lot of people say that well it's censorship resistant it's decentralized you can just transact and send money anywhere you want but there are middlemen in bitcoin the miners in bitcoin those really power hungry server farms out there those are the middlemen of bitcoin and they're the ones that get your transactions and decide if they're going to process them on the blockchain or not and we've already have documented examples of these miners complying with the treasury's ofac standards to sanction and blacklist certain bitcoin addresses and there's even more advanced ways to do that that are too long to get into but this is where we've already been through the looking glass here a company like mera has championed this idea of being compliant with the ofac standards in the mining industry and goes on to say their ceo i believe that the way for the us to increase its share of bitcoin miners is that the us based bitcoin miners need to be more compliant to ofac so it really gets into this catch twenty two that as the us grows its bitcoin industry and wider crypto industry it keeps diminishing those ideals of decentralization so i would say it's a very hard nut to crack but where we get into now with this legislation coming forward and how we've accepted that crypto is now a normal part of our economy where i look at that it's not innovation it's not a new product or surf that's really adding value what's going on is we have two financial systems two financial infrastructures one is the traditional one with all the regulations and that would have been a real fight to try to deregulate that but why go through the pain of doing that when you can just open up up a parallel system with all the deregulation deregulation and then when you combine them in aggregate the net is that you have a more deregulated financial system so that's really the trick.

[Krystal Ball]

Going on here well and that leads to my final question which is you know are we looking at some sort of a crypto crypto bubble bursting and taxpayers being on the hook for a big crypto bailout given that there is no longer this is no longer separate ecosystem this is completely mainstreamed within our financial institutions and president of the united states obviously like you know himself benefiting to the tune of millions if not billions of dollars from the crypto industry so i mean does that seem to you like where we're headed.

[Peter Ryan]

It is very likely i have suggested that this strategy of pumping up the crypto markets has a short term logic to it but like all bubbles all bubbles have a short term logic they go up that's the nature of bubbles so no one can ever predict the exact time when a bubble will pop but it seems like once we get outside of the five to ten year horizon that's where the wheels come off let's compare this to the housing bubble there was at least an argument there was a physical house there was a rationale to why the value could keep going up and why there was fundamental value underlying it with this we almost have a parody where these are completely digital fictitious casino tokens practically and they're making up more and more nominal value and when these things pop there's nothing underlying it what ends up happening is we just start piling more and more risk into this type of asset class and making it collateralized to traditional transactions that we do in the economy if you start looking into how mortgages are starting to accept these as collateral and so forth in other ways and so once that keeps getting saturated now this asset class which is no one would think it's crazy for this thing to go down fifty percent in a day even with the stable coins that are supposed to be the safest thing there traditionally we've seen a lot of allegations that they don't actually back their coins with one to one reserves which is what they say they are doing the new york ag actually said this in twenty nineteen about one of the major stablecoins she said they lied she said that they did not have the reserves they said their lawyers had to admit it and they ultimately settled with the new york ag and so this has all been documented we have cases where the market has found this out has broken the peg on the stablecoins we have legal sources that have proven this the case like the new york ag and we just have our sort of other historical examples of crypto going pop so the fact that it's going to be bigger than all past bubbles of crypto in the past doesn't really negate the fact that there is no underlying value this stuff is very risky there are multiple vectors where this thing could have a problem whether on the technical side there could just be a bug that sends everything down so very very unsavory prospects.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Yeah the value to the extent that there is values of it being peer to peer and decentralized and that goes away and so i guess my last question for you peter as we're wrapping this up is do you think there will be more people because you know people in this space and i know many people in this space and people that i really like and totally sympathetic to like ron paul type people do you think there will be people in this space that come away with your perspective soon do you think maybe we're in like a heighten the contradictions phase post genius act and regulation that might be coming from this republican administration where others start to get really worried or do you think everything is so attractive and appealing right now that it's just kind of going to be pedal to the metal for the next year or.

[Peter Ryan]

So yeah i think it's hard to distract people from the gloss of a bubble there's certainly going to be momentum piling in now with this legislation there's a lot of business institutions that want to incorporate this get old people to put their retirement in it get young people that are busy sports gambling to do more crypto gambling so there's momentum here but i think in terms of the early bitcoiners a lot of them would actually be sympathetic to my point of view even though they might not go all the way that i have i'll reference one individual he's the editor in chief of bitcoin magazine mark goodwin he wrote the book the bitcoin dollar we generally agree about eighty to ninety percent on all of these problems and criticisms so i would say right there if if the editor in chief of bitcoin magazine who's a real hardcore bitcoiner has these very similar opinions and sympathetic to the way i see it that's probably saying something as another little citation here when i released this compact article the founder of the peer to peer foundation which included a forum which actually was the place satoshi nakamoto first announced his white paper introducing bitcoin to the world the founder of that actually endorsed my compact article saying this was actually very legitimate and valid criticisms so i would say with those two sympathizers from the early days it's hard to make a claim that this is that outside the norm but there's a lot of people newer faces and maybe people with more dollar signs in their eyes not so much bitcoin signs that are looking forward to this current bubble momentum fascinating.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Peter ryan of ryan research thank you for taking the time to talk to us about this piece thank you for writing the piece we hope to have you back appreciate it great to be.

[Peter Ryan]

Here thank you in the heat of.

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[Krystal Ball]

So emily much anticipated section of our show here sydney sweeney is the new face of american eagle the you know sort of iconic mall brand and her ad campaign has sparked quite a bit of discussion and controversy on the internet that we wanted to dig into so first let's take a look at the ad that was the most controversial genes are.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Passed down from parents to offspring often.

[Krystal Ball]

Determining traits like hair color personality and even eye color my jeans are blue.

[Peter Ryan]

Cindy sweeney has for jeans so you.

[Krystal Ball]

See what they did there with the like hereditary jeans and blue jeans at.

[Sagar Enjeti]

The ad the end of the ad ends with her saying like see what see what i did there yeah exactly.

[Krystal Ball]

Yeah as if we didn't as if we didn't get it so a lot of people are looking at this myself including going this feels a little like eugenics adjacent and you know the whole like the gene talk the blue eyes in particular it's got a real sort of master race vibe and of course many people i'm sure yourself included be like you're ridiculous and you have derangement syndrome et cetera but my case to you emily would be i'm not saying that i'm not saying that american eagle is like a bunch of secret or open fascists and nazis they are capitalists though and they're looking at the culture they realize that paid advertisements really don't do a whole hell of a lot of good at this point if they don't come with eyeballs and attention and controversy so this is the thing to touch on to play with in the moment to get a reaction which they got and so that's my i mean it's not even the i think this is just like correct and accurate it that they knew this would spark this sort of discussion and controversy they gave just enough of a nod to like sort of eugenics race iq kind of type of content to have plausible deniability and then they delighted in the fervor and the attention around the ad campaign based on sort of touching on that you know like correctly taboo subject so.

[Sagar Enjeti]

It'S hard toit's very hard to ignore when they're panning the camera and saying that sydney sweeney in the script is saying that her jeans are blue and they have it on her blue eyes i think crystal my case would be that you are overestimating the competence of people in the advertising industry and american eagle who might have let's say cynically said it would be a real boost to our sydney sweeney ad campaign to do a little wink and nod to white supremacy in the gene marketing campaign that will generate all kinds of media hype by doing like a wink wink white supremacy undertone to the sydney sweeney ad so i think what this speaks to is well first of all i don't think sydney sweeney's people if they saw this as being anywhere in the vein of white supremacy although she's sort of become this interesting flashpoint and it's sort of like people are polarizing politically around the question of sydney sweeney whereas people on the left are saying she's like a clear canary in the coal mine for the rise of fascism and people on the right are saying some people on the far far fringe right are saying yes exactly this is why we love sydney sweeney people on the right are saying what the hell are you talking about she's just just super good looking and wearing an all american brand which is where i think i fall into but i don't think if this was intentional sydney sweeney's people got taken for a ride i have a hard time believing that somebody like sydney sweeney would intentionally be part of a covert white supremacy campaign to generate clicks and i just i genuinely don't think there's any like i get what you're saying about the buzz that you can generate by doing a sort of like intentional kendall jenner pepsi situation but also don't think that it would be to any brand they would say the cost benefit analysis of being limped in with literal eugenicists well they're stopping white supremacy.

[Krystal Ball]

I mean i think i think the the flaw in your analysis is that it ignores how sort of mainstreamed this stuff has become i mean you've literally got you have a you know a town an all white town being founded in arkansas as we speak where they explicitly say it's whites only and we believe we have freedom of association and so we can keep black brown people out we have stephen miller fringe stephen.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Miller is not the fringe stephen miller.

[Krystal Ball]

Miller is not the fringe who is you know running vast portfolio in the government including you know very like eugenics inspired immigration policy although he's and who but who trump himself says like this guy is basically a white nationalist i mean he's you know that's that's who he is i think it's pretty hard to deny that's who he is and then you've got that you know this isn't emblematic of like every young republican but you have this very increasingly like empowered and influential fringe that you know are in like the graper movement and are the type of people who went on jubilee and proudly like declared himself a fascist and whatever you have the new york times getting scoops from this race iq you know online race iq dude so this is quite mainstreamed in the culture and you know it like for me harkens back a little bit to the obviously neither of us were alive at this time but the way that madison avenue glommed on to the like sixties counterculture movement and appropriated that to sell coke and mainstream brands etcetera and so you know i i don't think it takes a rocket scientist for a cynical ad exec who's just out there looking okay how can we get attention to our brand and sell some blue jeans to go well this is the thing that's out there in the culture right now this is the thing that's like the transgressive hot button to push to stoke controversy and i just don't know why else you're talking about genetics in a blue jean ad if you're not intentionally trying to push that button and to the point about sydney herself i don't know i mean i don't have any particular grudge against sydney sweeney i know there was like a lot of discussion about her boobs on snl or something that i never really totally understood but we can put you know one of the people who was involved in this ad campaign posted delighted in the success of the campaign she says specifically during a zoom call with sydney we asked the question how far do you want to push it without hesitation she smirked and said let's push it i'm game our response challenge accepted so in any case you know i don't think it's like crazy to imagine that she also was like yeah sure let's play into this this controversy and create a lot of attention for ourselves and you know it'll be great for me it'll be great for the company the stock price is up etc so that's to me like pretty clearly what's going on here and i don't you know as someone who is very opposed to eugenics and very disturbed by its mainstreaming and how increasingly like openly accepted and disgusted etc like i'm not sure what the right way is to react to something like this that does in my view intentionally try to like play with those themes because what they wanted is the attention and the controversy but then are you just supposed to like not say anything when these sorts of things and themes are being mainstreamed in the culture i it's to me it's like a catch twenty two so i.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Interpreted the sydney sweeney has great genes linkedin post we're really going deep on this that we just had up on the screen this would be my counterpoint i interpreted that as sydney sweeney sydney's sort of controversy for a long time has been whether or not she's mid which is just a ridiculous controversy she is beautiful but that's been the thing about sydney sweeney that everybody's like oh she's mid people like her because she has you know fill in the blank and that's where the entire appeal of sydney sweeney is wrapped up in and so i think what they're talking about when they say they're kind of going down the camera's panning down sydney sweeney's full body is is her saying like that's why they're talking about jeans in a j e a n s ad is like sydney sweeney is actually pretty pretty hot and sydney sweeney is willing to take you up on this conversation about whether or not she's mid and she's willing to just like kind of bare it all even if she's clad in jeans so that's my interpretation of what they say they're like being quote unquote cheeky about in the ad is that i still think that a mainstream brand wanting to be affiliated with with white supremacy or eugenicism as much as i do share your concerns about seeing people like nick fuentes go massively viral and have whatever poll he has with gen z as much as i genuinely share those concerns and also share the concerns about eugenicism when you look at what's happened and this is probably something that we disagree on but if you look at what's happened in places like iceland for example where they use new testing technology on unborn kids and basically get rid of down syndrome i actually think that eugenics is a serious question that confronts us as a society right now but i mean yeah i don't disagree with that i share that i still just think it's far fetched that a mainstream american brand would want to eagerly affiliate itself even if it's just to create buzz with white supremacy or eugenics or neo nazism as some people have said they have the eagle in the brand and to talking intentionally about aryan jeans in an ad goes right along with the quote american eagle in their title and logo i just think.

[Krystal Ball]

It'S that far okay just to be clear that didn't even occur to me but now i'm going to think about it no no i mean look i mean paid advertising campaigns don't really get you very far these days because people can click off you can fast forward through you're watching i mean it's just like very hard to get people to pay attention to your brand so what better to get you attention than a beautiful woman plus a little race iq controversy with plausible deniability like they're never going to oh yeah we were like flirting with you jetta they're never going to say that but their stock price went up because of that controversy i.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Think their stock price went up because sydney sweeney's ad is alluring why is.

[Krystal Ball]

Anyone talking about sydney sweeney's ad is only because i mean you know yes she has star power etcetera etc but the reason it got so much attention is because of exactly this controversy which these are not stupid people like i.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Don'T know they kind of are you.

[Krystal Ball]

Know they knew what they were doing with this come on they knew i.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Don'T know i mean i still just.

[Krystal Ball]

Think if you look at even your explanation too by the way that this is like a rebuttal to the idea that she's mid the way she's if that's really which i think that's a stretch but if that's really her argument is like no i'm not mid because i'm of good genetic stock like even that is disturbing it's weird yeah like.

[Sagar Enjeti]

That'S what like i just think it's so weird and dumb yeah i mean.

[Krystal Ball]

It'S not weird if you realize that what they're doing is intentionally touching on something that is again justifiably like forboden and you know has been for a long time pushed down in the mainstream and is now like back being mainstream.

[Sagar Enjeti]

If you look at public polling like across the board the american people are very anti racist maybe not in the kendi sense but like race relations in the united states have come remarkably far and it's not as though the american public while there are some people on the fringes that may be energized by fuentes and whomever else it doesn't behoove a major brand like you don't have to even be a smart marketing executive.

[Krystal Ball]

But it is behooving them they are.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Behooved but i don't think people are watching the ad but your point is that they're being behooved by the controversy created by the ad and it's not that american eagle supports eugenics and white.

[Krystal Ball]

Supremacy it's that they got attention that no no publicity is bad publicity i mean this is the secret of donald trump's success and his realization that like i mean he even said this about like doug burgum when he picked him for secretary of the interior he's like yeah he just doesn't you know he's not controversial enough so he can't get attention this is the attention economy the way to get attention isn't to just like you know have another ad with a beautiful woman woman there are a million other ads that have other similar like beautiful stars the way to get attention is to spark a conversation we're not covering the beyonce levi's ad are we no we're covering this one because they played with race science and eugenics and that's why we're talking about it.

[Sagar Enjeti]

I think they played with i think intentionally they played with this is where we disagree i think they played with the entire pun was about sydney sweeney being hot or not and that's when they say she said she wants to go far it's that and i think it was like obviously a very strange ad but their stock is going up because people liked the ad like sydney sweeney in the jeans they looked great and american eagle is ascendant because they have a young star like sydney sweeney repping them it used to be by the way dawson's creek i think they outfitted everybody on dawson's creek oh did.

[Krystal Ball]

They really yeah i'm pretty sure for.

[Sagar Enjeti]

A while they did but anyway they have a history of sort of partnering with i mean for a young brand like that we're not going to agree.

[Krystal Ball]

On this crystal well just my last piece is i will say even your explanation to me is very eugenics y that you would be like i am hot because i come from the right genetic stock is but that is true.

[Sagar Enjeti]

I mean like people are hot because of their genes i don't even like that either but like people to be fair like it's like the science of whether or not people are attracted to other people comes down to facial symmetry which is genetic i mean i don't like any like i hope we don't start tinkering with genetics in this way.

[Krystal Ball]

Like it's a weird thing to say like that's a weird thing to say is like no i can i can prove genetically that i'm that i'm not.

[Sagar Enjeti]

That i'm not mid because that is.

[Krystal Ball]

But this makes sense but i think.

[Sagar Enjeti]

No i know i actually think that helps my argument because on social media there have been deep deep deep analyses done on sydney sweeney's like facial symmetry over the years so yeah i mean like people have literally been debating this which is completely insane maybe that's our next debate is sydney sydney sweeney mid but maybe we agree on that we don't even have to debate it i.

[Krystal Ball]

Don'T think i don't think we she's not mid like i'm actually disgusted by this is like such a common thing not just with sydney sweeney of taking some like absolutely flawlessly gorgeous woman and then picking one photo of her where like she's not at her best and being like like she i don't even get it she's so mad it's like you know fuck off like she's a beautiful woman like just stop just stop and it's always like some guy who looks terrible you know and is like overweight and could never have a prayer of being with this woman who's posting this sort of shit so yeah that that particular conversation whether it's sydney sweeney or many other beautiful women is kind of disgusting to me this is what.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Happens when ryan goes on vacation for a week take over the show debate right you know who would have been really excited for this debate when sager would have loved this well i did.

[Krystal Ball]

Debate with sager off off air on this and of course he thinks my view is ridiculous but he's wrong so there you go we can many many.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Cases many many such cases we can continue this conversation on friday of course saga will be back in with crystal tomorrow so thanks everyone for tuning in as a reminder if you want to get those interviews like the great conversation that sager and crystal had with senator alyssa slotkin yesterday headlines all over the world you can become a member if you want to help support the work that makes those interviews possible you can become a member over at breakingpoints dot.

[Krystal Ball]

Com.

[Sagar Enjeti]

Foreign.

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[Sagar Enjeti]

Plus terms and conditions apply this is an iheart podcast.