← Christiane Amanpour Presents: The Ex Files
Christiane Amanpour Presents: The Ex Files
Should more people go to jail over the Epstein Files?
00:39:50
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- [00:03]
A
This is a Global Player original podcast.
- [00:10]
B
You know, it's really hard to hear the president of the most democratic state in the world attacking the independent judiciary that's been doing its job for, you know, hundreds of years under your system.
- [00:20]
A
On the chaos, you're absolutely right. It may get worse. It may be worse economically and politically and in terms of trade for our country because of this, nobody knows what to do now.
- [00:31]
B
Nobody is above the law and somebody needs to pay for what happened to those women and girls. And for even fuller disclosure, there's another mention of my name in these goddamn files. And that is. All right, everybody. Welcome to this episode of the X Files with me, Christiana Manpour in London,
- [00:53]
A
and me, Jamie Rubin in Long island, where there is one of the biggest blizzards I've ever participated. I mean, I've never seen anything like this. It's a foot of snow and blizzard created conditions, including drifts that are 2 and 3ft.
- [01:10]
B
Are you safely ensconced in the warmth of Carmela's kitchen?
- [01:16]
A
Yes, so long as the power holds out. And I'm praying that the power lines are underground. Otherwise I'm.
- [01:29]
B
So, Jamie, today we're going to be talking about what is next in the trade war that Trump launched, you know, almost a year ago now, has been slapped down by the Supreme Court, but says he's going to do a workaround. What's next in the actual potential war that's gathering around Iran. So we'll talk about all of that. But first, Jamie, we all were talking, weren't we, for a long time about waiting for the Supreme Court ruling on tariffs, whether they're legal, whether the president could have enacted them, which he did, but whether it was legal or did he bypass Congress in a, in a, in a unconscious constitutional way. And we've been waiting and waiting, waiting. And finally on Thursday, the SCOTUS ruled against potus, and he doesn't seem to be taking it lying down. So what's your read of this?
- [02:14]
A
Well, first of all, we have been talking about this, and I think you may remember I've said over and over again, if this Supreme Court can't read the Constitution as clearly as it is written, namely that Congress has the power to regulate economic commerce with other nations, then I don't know how the rule of law will survive in my country. There's been a lot of frustration by me, by others about the way in which the Supreme Court has temporarily permitted the Trump administration to exceed all limitations on the behavior of the executive branch for the last year and it's been very, very painful to watch, but thanks God, as they say on this issue, the Supreme Court ruled clearly. And I think it's a bigger ruling than just this tariff issue, because the tariff issue is so complex, and we're going to get into that for a moment. But it's a ruling about the rule of law in the United States. It's a ruling about the limitations. You know, we always talk about, what are the guardrails in democracy for President Trump? Well, one guardrail has now been demonstrated by this court because it's a real ruling. It's not a temporary pushing the issue down the road. It's a ruling that says Congress controls economic commerce, as the Constitution says. And more importantly, there have been other guardrails, you know, and, and so when we get to one and the court does the right thing, as painful as some of their other decisions may be to many people, we have to take a deep breath and say this is the way the system is supposed to work, and at least some things in that system are holding.
- [03:52]
B
Yeah, it was a 6 to 3 ruling, which was in itself interesting, which meant it wasn't just the liberals, so to speak. They were joined by three of the conservatives, including the Supreme Court chief justice. Now, President Trump in the aftermath, took to the White House almost immediately to the podium, and he basically blasted them. It was quite petulant, but it was very revealing. Here's what he said.
- [04:18]
C
The Supreme Court's ruling on tariffs is deeply disappointing, and I'm ashamed of certain members of the court, absolutely ashamed for not having the courage to do what's right for our country. They're against anything that makes America strong, healthy, and great again. They also are a, frankly disgrace to our nation, those justices.
- [04:46]
B
So, you know, my face probably says it all. You know, it's really hard to hear the president of the most democratic state in the world attacking the independent judiciary that's been doing its job for, you know, hundreds of years under your system. Disappointing, I understand, because disappointing is he had really been crowing about all the tens of billions of dollars that he had accrued into the treasury with his just under one year of all these what he used to call liberation date tariffs. Now, Jamie, there's this whole struggle, firstly about repaying them, and secondly, he seems prepared. And they all took to the Sunday talk show airwaves this weekend, his, you know, his treasury secretary and the others saying, actually, we have section 122 or whatever that we refer to and put even higher tariffs on. Apparently it lasts only about 150 days. But nonetheless, what sort of chaos and fallout are we going to see?
- [05:44]
A
Well, first on your point about the President's comments, as you said, deeply disappointing is is appropriate. But when president attacks personally, judges presumably from both parties elect, selected by both presidents, Republican and Democrat, and calls them a disgrace to the nation because they're not doing what's good for the country, he forget gets that. That's his opinion. What's good for the Constitution is what their job is, not his opinion about what's good for the country. Tariffs may or may not be good for the country, but what's good for the Constitution is to read it in black and white and in our world today. Christiane, I need to say this sometimes because we forget where facts and truth is so challenged, where simple things that you and I have known our whole lives are questioned. As you know, not really true. When you read something black and white like this and it's done properly, I breathe a sigh of relief on the chaos. You're absolutely right. It may get worse. It may be worse economically and politically and in terms of trade for our country because of this, because nobody knows what to do now because the big tariff, the flexible tariff, the one where he could do whatever he wanted, has been taken away. But there are lots of other tools. And remember, these tariffs are are threats and he used them successfully with dozens of countries to get trade deals. Now those countries, every single one of them, some of whom have not ratified these agreements, are going well. Why did I capitulate to these unfair terms? In their view, based on a threat that doesn't exist. So will their parliaments ratify those agreements? I think that's the first test of how chaotic this will be. The second test is what you said, which is will they try to use these other methods that are short term, 150 days or it depends on the case. But remember, these tariffs are dramatic. We're talking about slapping things 50%, 30%, 20%. And will the people who paid for those tariffs, those tens if not hundreds of billions of dollars, get their money back? Well, I read something today that was quite interesting. If they wanted to, there's a very simple method to return the money today. They can push a button and reverse the money they've collect. That would be what a country's government would do if it was trying to follow the Supreme Court. They're not going to do that. They're going to force people to go through lawsuits and paperwork and elaborate procedures and there's going to be people buying up Tariff debt and all the speculators, it's going to be a mess. And that's what this administration has done to our foreign policy, unfortunately, is make it very messy.
- [08:32]
B
And there's some countries, as you said, like in Asia, which rushed to do deals thinking that they would be on the right side of that before Supreme Court ruling, not knowing which way the Supreme Court was going to go. And now they're concerned because now Trump, who had kind of put a 10% on most countries, now says he's going to do across the board, 15%. And let's just not forget, and I think this is interesting, especially for you, Jamie, the Democrats in the United States are jumping on this because they say this is absolutely unbelievable, great election fodder. This is great for our election campaign because we are going to hammer the President on this because it's actually been, in the words of many Democratic leaders, a sales tax on the American people. So the Illinois Governor Pritzker released an invoice, according to Politico, demanding that the White House pay more than $8.6 billion in past due tariff revenue, which he calculated, listen to this, to be a thousand seven hundred dollars per family in his state. He wants that back. The President owes you apology and a refund, says Pete Buttigieg. You know, Governor Newsom, president should return that money immediately. You know, the veteran. It's the economy, stupid. James Carville. They imposed a sales tax on the attacks on the American people. What did you get? Nothing. And I think that's important because actually, even though, you know, the ledger of the government went up, it didn't mean that it, it benefited people because now we're seeing the latest apparent statistics show that growth in the US Is slowing and inflation is, is increasing. So the things that he said he was going to do for the American people, he hasn't done.
- [10:18]
A
Exactly. Look, I'm not an economist. I always say that whenever we talk about the American economy and America's economic growth and power in the, in the world. But I think it's perfectly obvious that the difficulties in the American economy is what caused the Democrats to suffer a defeat in 2024 and whatever difficulties we're having now, much of which is attributable to these new taxes or tariffs or whatever you want to call them, that have increased prices on products all over the world because we are at the center of a global market where we import enormous amount of our goods. That's just the way the American economy works. Somebody paid those taxes, whether it was the companies or the People, my guess is the companies passed a lot of that on, some didn't. But either way, there's going to be chaos for all those people and all those countries. And now what's going to happen is the Democrats are going to force Republicans to vote about tariffs. That's going to be their trick. You referenced all these statements by the governors and other political operatives in the Democratic Party. I think what's going to happen is they're going to force votes in Congress about tariffs. Because anytime the word tariff comes up now in a vote, if you vote for tariffs and support the president, everything that went with that economy for the last two years will be on your shoulders. That's what the Democrats are hoping. Whether it works, I don't know.
- [11:47]
B
Yeah. And I think important also to note that in terms of who paid for it, it definitely was the American taxpayer, whether it's a corporation or an individual, according to all the economists. But it's not the multi trillionaire gigantic corporations who don't, they might have done, but they don't really care. It's the small and medium businesses that have been so badly damaged and many of them probably have gone out of work. I remember when this or out of business. I remember when it all started in April. I mean, literally listening to radio programs and reading the newspapers of, you know, journalists who'd gone to talk to some of these business people, mom and pop, you know, single mothers, others who had had the gumption to set up their own businesses importing from Vietnam or whatever it was. I mean, they really were in tears. It was absolutely tragic to listen to that. So that's also again shows that actually this, whatever he called it, President Trump was not really helping the affordability crisis or making all these businesses, certainly not small and medium size, more thriving, not clear at all whether it's done a significant amount of, of reshoring on shoring in terms of manufacturing and apropos of absolutely nothing. But I think it's a, it's another economic, you know, you know, punch in the eye. There are tens of millions of tourists who are not coming to America and there's a gigantic budgetary hole in the tourist industry right now for America. So I think all of this means that these are basically they've been punitive tariffs and the kind of things that President Trump has wielded to get his way around the world. It's going to be interesting, Jamie, to see how it changes world leaders approach to Trump, especially as he comes up to a big meeting with Xi in April of China Exactly.
- [13:44]
A
When he wielded this tariff sledgehammer that he used for the smallest thing he wanted with a country like Switzerland, sometimes over watches and things like that, to the biggest, in the case of China, where he's using it hopefully to change the deep deficit where China, China import exports enormous, more than the imports from the United States. Those are his. This has been his sledgehammer that he carried on his shoulder. That sledgehammer is gone and countries are going to have to weigh that. But I need to say here, when you bring up the small businessmen, you know what I can't.
- [14:20]
B
Men and women.
- [14:21]
A
Men and women. What I can't believe the Democratic Party that I've been part of can't do a better job of is distinguishing between those small business people and even smaller corporations and the tech robber barons who are the ones that are in bed with this administration in terms of eating, dining, living with them in Mar a Lago, going to events, giving them money for the, Trump's rebuilding of the White House, for the Kennedy center, whatever they want, lobbying fees, all of that. Tech robber baron, big, big tech robber barons. And this administration, they have been the beneficiary of this administration's economic policies. And it's clear that very few other sectors of the economy have benefited. And so why the Democrats can't figure out a way when we have so many billionaires in his cabinet, when the tech robber barons are his biggest allies and why he can't find, they can't find a way to make clear that that is what the President is pursuing. And he's very honest about it. It's not like he's pretending. And we haven't figured out a way because those are not the most people in the world, nor should they be,
- [15:32]
B
not at the moment with actual trials going on about whether it's, you know, they've created this addictive social media environment and all the need for regulation of AI and all the. But let's, let's just, we can, we can transition to another war that is gathering. So there's the trade war and this punitive war using tariffs. But again, Trump basically said that he remained unbowed in this global trade war as we know it defines his second term in office. He signaled that he's actually pursuing even more. And this is what he said, said I can charge much more than I was charging, basically saying at one point that I can still destroy foreign countries by other means. Well, it's a pretty blunt statement and admission that that's what he wants to do. You know, destroy foreign countries, in this case, economically. But okay, let's move on quickly. In the last few minutes of this, of this, of this segment to Iran, we don't know, but we understand that is basically gathering storm. This storm is gathering in the Middle East. And I was absolutely stunned, and I still am, that we have had no public debate, no going to the people, no going to Congress. We don't know, even us in the business do not know what the aim is because they keep changing the goalposts. Is it regime change? Is it forcing concessions on nuclear and all the rest of it? What is it? And lately, Jamie, this weekend, I was shocked by chief negotiator Steve Witkoff expressing shock, horror, surprise that the Iran's Iranians hadn't bent over, essentially. Listen to what he told Fox News.
- [17:08]
D
He's, I don't want to use the word frustrated. It's almost because he understands he's got plenty of alternatives. But it's curious, he's curious as to why they haven't, I don't want to use the word capitulate, but why they haven't capitulated. Why under this sort of pressure, with the amount of sea power, naval power that we have over there, why they haven't come to us and said we profess that we don't want to be, we don't want a weapon. So here's what we're prepared to do. And yet it's hard to, to sort of get them to that place.
- [17:41]
B
Okay, Jamie, there's so much to unpack there. It's like they have not been watching Iran or negotiations with Iran even by their former administration for the last 47 years. I mean, what is it that they don't get? I mean, from the State Department view.
- [17:57]
A
Yeah, look, this is another clear example of what happens when you have amateurs and amateur hour. Steve Witkoff, who's been literally delegated the powers of the president's negotiating positions all over the world on Ukraine, on remember,
- [18:15]
B
he said it's Trump that's frustrated, although he doesn't want to use that word yet.
- [18:19]
A
And so he's describing what I think is a truth. You know, this is a classic gaffe, as they say, where the truth is, is is uttered by mistake. President Trump doesn't understand Iran. We've talked on, you and I, because I tried to learn about Iran. And even after 20 years married to you and my studying in government, I still have my questions about Iranian attitudes and mentality in the regime. I know what I don't know, they don't know What? Anything. If they don't understand the first principle of the Iranian revolution is anti Americanism and not showing weakness to the United States. And the idea that you're to gather an armada and Iran is going to capitulate, just the fact that you would use that word as a diplomat, as a negotiator, shows the level of amateurishness in this administration. You don't tell your adversary that they are going to capitulate. No. These guys call themselves deal guys. We're deal guys. Kushner and Witkoff. You don't tell the other person when you're making a deal that he just capitulated. That's not how you make a deal. You make a deal by showing that he can achieve his objectives without ultimately destroying his country or his red lines or his regime. And the fact that they can't understand that simple diplomatic concept tells me that my hopes that there would be a deal are evaporating rapidly. And I'm now, I would say, 90, 95% sure we're in for a long war. This is not going to be a short one. He may be.
- [19:52]
B
Jamie, I ask. I ask you that. Interrupt you there, because the latest from Trump is, as we speak and record, is that maybe we'll do a little war and see if that brings them to the table, and then if it doesn't, we'll do a longer war and see what that is. Now, let's not forget, and we say this all the time now, many inside and many outside believe there should be some kind of war to dislodge this regime. But what do you think would happen if there was a little war and then a bigger war?
- [20:19]
A
Well, I think that's where we're going. I think Trump has signaled what their hope is, because so is Witkoff. They think they can use this armada, this naval force that he talks about and the President talks about, to force Iran to give up nuclear enrichment of any kind. And Iran as a regime, believes that if you capitulate on that, you will end up losing your regime. And that's what they care about. They believe this is a central principle, not capitulating to the United States, the enemy that caused the revolution. Let's remember that America was part and parcel of the rationale for this revolution. And anti American Americanism is built into that system. The idea that they could capitulate to the United States is nonsense. So this short war I think, is going to happen, and then they think, these amateurs, that then suddenly Iran is going to show up with a better deal. They know what's coming. The threat of force is already there. It's already happened a few months ago. They've done what they can to deal with it. I've been reading a lot about all the steps they've been taking. Look, I don't know what's going to happen in a war. What I know is that to un month overthrow the regime, we can't do from the air. I really believe that. And so what they're going to get is just a longer war with damage to the United States economy because of the effect on prices and possibly risks to Americans in the region that they are going to have to face if the Iranians decide to retaliate across the region. This is a real chaos coming in the international arena are, you know, which
- [22:00]
B
has not been debated in any capital in anywhere at all except the Brits have said you can't use our bases to do this. So talking about Brits, Keir Starmer showing a national interest here and, and a willingness to tell Trump he can't use Diego Garcia or others. But also Keir Starmer and the British establishment in general, including the palace, showing that they actually can, you know, forge the road to accountability over one of the most, you know, elite in this country over the Epstein files. And we're going to talk about that just after a break. So we're back, Jamie. I mean, let's face it, our country here, which is a constitutional monarchy and has a democratic government, is proving to be a lot more democratic in the accountability and rule of law space than the United States. There are investigations. There are potential charges. There's the palace and the government and all the press and every aspect of civil society showing that there needs to be accountability, even for somebody who was a prince of the realm when connected with the dastardly and criminal Jeffrey Epstein, not in the US Reputational damage, people have had to leave their jobs, et cetera. Maybe they've suffered financial damage, but that's their own fault. But no, no legal accountability. So what's the Jamie, have you been at all across it? What is the reaction to Andrew, formerly known as Prince Andrew's arrest? This, this at the end of this last week. He was since released but under investigation still.
- [23:43]
A
Look, Americans are always intrigued by the royal family in the UK that's been true since we revolted because of the royal family, George III back in 1776. The royal family, especially in an era of elitism in the Trump administration, they love the royal family. So royals get a lot of attention here. I think that Andrew's story of being arrested and losing his titles and all of those things, you know, hasn't been as dominant here as it would be there. And remember, I feel the need to say, you know, this is what a transition in the Royal, in the, in the, the who's in charge in the UK does because the Queen protected him and his brother doesn't want to protect him, has chosen not to protect him.
- [24:30]
B
His brother being the King.
- [24:32]
A
Yes, seemingly. Good reason. And so, you know, a passing of the royal torch has real impact for Mr. Mr. Mountbatten, if I can call him that.
- [24:42]
B
Mountbatten Windsor, apparently.
- [24:44]
D
Yeah.
- [24:44]
B
Never mind. Mount Batten's fine.
- [24:46]
C
Yeah.
- [24:46]
A
Look, I, I find this subject difficult because there's so many levels to it. There's elites being able to live their good life with crazy islands and planes and, and, and obviously in the case of, of Epstein, illegal and monstrous sexual behavior. And then there's elites raising money who went to dinner parties who didn't really know that he was a monster. I think that's honest and accurate that they all didn't know that. The ones who didn't are ones who went to dinner parties with leaders from around the world or were trying to promote nobod peace prizes or raise money for universities. They didn't necessarily. So in America, the criminal fact is because they don't have anyone in the government, at least because so much has been redacted from the Trump relationship to, to Epstein, where they provided corruption by providing information or insider trading or whatever the, the charges are against Andrew and, and, and Peter Mandelson that just kind of.
- [25:52]
B
We have to say there are no charges yet. It is an investigation still.
- [25:56]
A
Sure. Whatever they're investigating, whatever claim they're investigating, that thing isn't what's gotten the attention here in the United States. What's gotten the attention here in the United States is anyone who's touched or known or been at dinner or went to the island or been on the plane with Epstein is somehow considered to be a bad person at different levels. And what I hope we can do in life, because I believe in the word gray. Some things are black, some things are white, and some things are gray. And so there are monsters and then there are people who socialized.
- [26:30]
B
Yeah, but I'm just going to stop you there because, yes, I'm sure a little bit of that is true. But, you know, the more you read, the more, you know, even, even regarding those tainted here on this side of the Atlantic, you just know that there was always, probably by most people, this knowledge of what was going on. Maybe they didn't speak about it, maybe directly involved in it, but you knew that it was all this very ugly situation. Even if you just thought you could separate, you know, your fundraising from your knowledge of this, this monster. And, and I just, I really, I really feel again very, very badly for all the victims, including one who took her own life and who's been the one, Virginia Giuffre, you know, associated with Prince Andrew. He denies everything, but, but, but she, you know, took a major, major leap of courage to, to start talking about it and so many victims are still traumatized by it. But Jamie, you and I, you know, we, we have known in government then Prime Minister Gordon Brown, you knew his wife, I'm not sure before or after they got married. Sarah, you were, she was at Brunswick when you were working at Brunswick. And Gordon Brown, you know, some of the, the, some of the journalists here, senior journalists have said, you know what he has, he has been leading a massively important journalistic investigative charge this last few weeks since the Mandelson revelations, since the Andrew revelations. You know, he's written a five page memorandum, he's written pieces in various publications explaining they need, the police need to investigate this, this and this, including aircraft that might have landed here, a taxpayer money, you know, delivering women to be trafficked and sexually abused. I mean, it's, it's, it's awful, but it's happening. And the former Prime Minister is leading the charge for accountability.
- [28:30]
A
Well, good for him. I think there was something in the case when Mandelson was working with him in government where Mandelson is alleged to have provided information, again, allegations I'm describing. And that's the difference between what's gone on in the UK and here. I think what we need to also acknowledge knowledge and the Andrew case, this was not a popular royal, this was the least popular royal and that's how it's been seen. And, and I don't know what would happen if it was a very popular royal. You know, popular leaders around the world have managed to escape responsibility for many, many things. And I hope that popularity isn't the, the test, but I think we should acknowledge that it's sort of easy because everyone, nobody really liked Andrew anyway.
- [29:19]
B
So that's all coming out now because many called him arrogant and ignorant and all of that and not particularly, you know, smart about anything. And now the latest is certain senior civil servants have come out and said that, you know, when he was on his trade missions and stuff, for apparently he wasn't paid for it. Right. But he did get a lot of government support, civil service support and probably expenses paid or whatever. But these people are coming out of the woodwork now alleging that he had massages and other personal services paid for by the British taxpayer while either on the job or off the job or whatever. But that's the latest and I can tell you it's taken up all, obviously the Sunday political shows taken up so much ink all over the press. But I think at the bottom of it is nobody is above the law and somebody needs to pay for what happened to those women and girls who were repeatedly violated. Many, many of them. Again, he denies everything. Everything.
- [30:19]
A
That's what has made the world function so well. The rule of law and the idea that no one is above the law, beginning in an American revolution going back generations before that. So the Supreme Court decision, reading the rules. Honestly, Congress decides about economic commerce, not the President. No one is above the law in the Epstein case. That's the through line for all of this. And as long as we hold to the rule of law, as bad as things may be and, and as painful as they may be on many subjects as as much of a storm going on internationally and domestically, it's the rule of law that keeps our civilizations functioning properly.
- [31:01]
B
So let us be fully disclosive then, if that's a word. Let's, let's engage in some full disclosure, please. Not exposure. Our names, you and I as a couple appear in one of these, one of these released emails and I was actually called, you know, by, you know, by, by a journalist about it. And did I have any recollection? So let, let me just get this absolutely clear. In 2010, there was an associate of Epstein's in the PR world who was talking about trying to put a. I think this is what happened, putting a dinner together for a Brit, a British peer called Lord William Astor. And because my name is A, and I was at ABC then my name is one of the higher names on this gigantic list of invitees that goes all the way down to Zed. Right. And Jamie, I'm sorry, but you're in brackets as trailing spouse.
- [31:58]
A
A plus one. I lived as a plus one. I know what it's at least at
- [32:02]
B
that time, luckily for you in this case, but you are that your name is there. James Rubin. But when I, and I looked and I looked, I'm thinking, I don't remember that dinner.
- [32:11]
A
And did I ever have such dinner?
- [32:13]
B
There was no such dinner. But this was apparently a wish list. And I and the journalist who Asked me about it. I'm like, okay, send me the goddamn thing because I'm not trolling through the Epstein files, All right? So she sent it to me and I looked and then I went further down and went all the way to Zed. Jamie, it's like in every single who's who of Manhattan social media, that's the way they worked.
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A
They were trying to make elites show up so they could show up off.
- [32:40]
B
Yeah. And we don't know whether it ever happened. Apparently William Aster was asked about it and he said it was just a wish list. Anyway, we never met Epstein. Period. End of story.
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A
End of story, yes.
- [32:51]
B
And for even fuller disclosure, there is another mention of my name in these goddamn files. And that is associated with the wife of the former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, who apparently was staying at some Epstein residence. And I had just conducted an interview with the former Prime Minister of Israel while I was in New York. He was in new. And his wife was on one of these emails, basically back and forth with the assistant to Epstein saying, please can you get the household to fix the television and fix your cable so I can watch Christiana Manpur's interview with my husband? Okay. Just leaving it all out there. Okay, that.
- [33:33]
A
Yuck out of the way. Let's go to the next segment.
- [33:36]
B
And the next segment is. Are very, very good and upstanding recommendations. G. I feel sick. Right now. We're back with our recommendations which actually I've been told people quite like Jamie, so let's not disappoint people. I am going to go first since I'm here in, in the uk, where we've just had the BAFTA awards, which sometimes can be. Be, you know, a sort of a. A bellwether for what might happen to the next awards, the Oscars and this and that in the next month. So on Sunday night, Robert Arameo, who is a up and coming new actor, won two awards, the Best newcomer and best Actor award against Leonardo DiCaprio, Michael B. Jordan. Who are the others? I mean, all these are. I can't even remember, but all these other. Timothy Chalamet, all these Ethan Hawke, all these established stars, this guy wins the. Wins the BAFTA for best actor for a film called I Swear, which I swear I haven't seen yet and I will. And. And he is an activist for the Tourette's. The Tourette's community. And it's the first time something like this has been made and it's considered, you know, really groundbreaking and of course will put a huge amount of spotlight on the Tourette's other such communities. So that was interesting. I am going to say. I'm just going to leave it out there. Sinners was my favorite film of all time this year. I loved Hamnet. It was well rewarded. I loved one battle after another. It was well rewarded. But I would have liked to have seen Sinners get more and I wonder if it will at the Oscars.
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A
Yeah, well, you must be able to tolerate vampires better than me because I
- [35:29]
B
found it's not just a vampire story.
- [35:31]
A
I know, but it gave me the will. Billy's. I couldn't finish the thing.
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B
Oh, God, it's brilliant.
- [35:36]
A
All right, so I'm going to show my book. It's called the Hour of the Predator. It's a book by a man.
- [35:43]
B
Who's it by?
- [35:44]
A
Giuliano da Empoli. He's in Italian and it's important who the author.
- [35:49]
B
And he's done another one who's very important. Sorry to rain on your parade, but he's very important right now.
- [35:54]
A
Right. He wrote a narrative fiction book about the rise of Putin.
- [35:58]
B
Yes.
- [35:58]
A
Which got a lot of attention. And this is more of a non fiction book. Now what's interesting about this, the book is, as you may have heard, over these past weeks, I have developed a sort of an obsession with people understanding the links between the autocrats and the tech robber barons and the way in which their behavior, their lack of social conscience has made our world a worse place. The autocrats, for obvious reasons in Russia and China and the tech robber barons in our western societies, the damage they've done by damaging teenagers and young people and the basic ideas of facts in our world. This book does a brilliant job of explaining what all these people have in common. The predators, I should say. There was one part of it I found irritating. And. And he's an Italian and he was a national security advisor to the prime Minister of Italy and I. And his cynicism about government and the world is so profound. And as an American, I'm not as cynical as that Italian government.
- [37:10]
B
Although Trump may have changed your.
- [37:12]
A
He's made my. My lack of my cynicism threshold or my cynicism temperature has risen dramatically. But I still believe that in the General assembly and in the world's diplomacy that sometimes the good win out, sometimes the right thing is if Trump doesn't destroy the union.
- [37:29]
B
Un.
- [37:30]
A
That's correct. If the. The right is done for the right reasons and sometimes even in the right way, it doesn't happen often. But to. To associate everyone with that level of cynicism that an Italian government official would have because let's face it, Italians government is very minimal in that country. It's a minimal government. And Italy's role in the world is not what it would like it to be. And so it's easier to observe and to be cynical. But this is a brilliant book that brings together these important concepts of the tech robber baron meeting the autocrat and the and the elite all wrapped into one.
- [38:12]
B
Right, Jamie? Well, on that very, very happy note, we are going to say goodbye, everybody. Thank you so much. Thank you for tuning into this episode. Remember, you can always listen to us on the podcast and watch us on our YouTube channel. You just have to search Christiana Manor presents on the YouTube and you will find us. And that's not just the main episode. Did I say the YouTube? I did not. Just the main episode. Is that like the Google? Yeah, like that. But also the bonus Q and A of which there will be another episode this Thursday. On that note, we are saying over and out. And don't forget podcast on global player.com
- [38:49]
A
Goodbye for a real blizzard in real New York. This has been a Global Player original production.