Saudi Comedy Festival Controversy, Threads' Major Milestone, and Trump's Movie Tariff

Summary

Pivot Podcast Summary
Episode: Saudi Comedy Festival Controversy, Threads’ Major Milestone, and Trump’s Movie Tariff
Date: September 30, 2025
Hosts: Kara Swisher & Scott Galloway

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Overview

In this episode, Kara Swisher and Scott Galloway dive into several headline topics at the intersection of tech, media, and politics. The pair discuss the controversy over U.S. comedians performing at a Saudi government-sponsored festival, Donald Trump’s proposed 100% tariff on foreign films, Threads surpassing X in daily active users, retaliation politics around the Trump administration, and the power of collective economic protest in recent media disputes. As always, the hosts bring biting commentary, humor, and sharp disagreements.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Personal Catch-Up & Wellness Banter

• The episode begins with a personal chat, including health habits and family updates.
• Kara discusses her shift to running and healthier eating. Scott highlights long-term exercise and a less supplement-driven approach.
• Humorous banter about “kale shakes,” family dessert rules, and future plans (badminton, college visits).
• Notable Quote:
  "I’ve actually, unfortunately, my poor family is now like in my crosshairs because I’m like, no more sweets every night of the week, you know, Dessert." – Kara Swisher (02:28)

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2. Trump's Proposed 100% Tariff on Foreign Movies

(Segment begins ~06:46)

• Donald Trump floats the idea of a 100% tariff on all movies produced outside the U.S.
  • The pair note the impracticality and negative economic impact.
  • Most Netflix content and big studio projects are now produced outside the U.S. due to cost savings (“geographic arbitrage”).
• Scott’s Analysis:
  • Tariffs would hurt consumers, decrease Netflix’s content, and tank its stock value (07:17).
  • Other countries would likely retaliate with their own restrictions, thus harming U.S. media abroad.
  • Example: Content quotas in Canada and Europe.
• Kara’s Take:
  • The proposal is labeled “ridiculous” and a distraction tactic.
• Notable Quote:
  "All that's gonna happen is the following: his attempt to punish foreign firms who ship almost no films into the U.S…they’re gonna impose reciprocal tariffs…which will do nothing but reduce the consumption and the business for US media firms." – Scott Galloway (10:59)

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3. Saudi Comedy Festival Controversy

(Segment begins ~11:45)

• Major U.S. comedians (Kevin Hart, Dave Chappelle, Hannibal Buress, etc.) are set to perform at a Saudi state-sponsored festival, with big paychecks but strict content restrictions—no criticism of the Kingdom or its leadership.
• Kara’s Critique:
  • Calls out “free speech warrior” comics for hypocrisy.
  • Points out the contract’s explicit censorship and the comedians’ own history of railing against “cancel culture” and censorship in the West.
  • Specific attention on Chappelle, Tim Dillon (who was reportedly dropped for making censorship jokes), and Pete Davidson.
  • "If you’re going to literally lecture people about free speech and then get paid an enormous amount not to do your act…yuck." – Kara Swisher (17:05)
• Scott’s Perspective:
  • Admits to having taken money for speaking in Saudi Arabia and defends strengthening U.S.–Saudi ties for geopolitical reasons.
  • Argues that moral outrage is often “easier with other people’s money.”
  • Agrees with Kara’s hypocrisy argument but maintains that realpolitik and national interests are important.
  • "If you are constantly preaching about being censored and you sign up to something like that, you should be called out as you are doing. I had not thought of that." – Scott Galloway (19:36)
• Memorable Exchange:
  • "Hypocrites. Fucking hypocrites. If you say free speech to me, I’m gonna punch you in the nuts." – Kara Swisher (23:53)

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4. Broadcast Media Blackout – Power of Economic Protest

(Segment begins ~23:53, further at 67:38)

• Jimmy Kimmel Live! was blacked out on Sinclair and Nexstar stations as part of a standoff, with demands that ABC/Disney apologize or donate to conservative causes.
• Backlash from advertisers, viewers, and celebrities leads to a swift reversal (roughly 72 hours).
• Scott frames this as a positive moment—demonstrating the collective power of consumer boycotts, which achieved more than months of Democratic political pressure.
  • "You can try to mute dissent, but when the market and money push back, they restarted…and this really isn't just about one late night host. It's about broadcasters recognizing that bowing to the President's pressure is a precedent toward censorship and can cost their shareholders money." – Scott Galloway (69:31)
• Kara underscores that the stations’ stances were “never about values,” just commercial leverage for acquiring other assets.

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5. Threads Surpasses X (Twitter) in Daily Users

(Segment begins ~36:16)

• Threads has overtaken X in daily active users, though X users still spend more time per session.
• Both hosts discuss the strengths of Threads (positivity, seamless integration with Instagram), the differences with BlueSky (smarter, “finger-waggy” community), and the relative negativity and toxicity of X.
  • Kara: “I really enjoy Threads…I have a great feed… It’s a lot like Instagram…It’s a really good product.” (38:24)
  • Scott: “I find I really like Threads. I gotta admit it, I’m spending more time on Instagram, less time on TikTok though. I love TikTok. I think the nicest vibe of all of them is LinkedIn.” (41:17)
• Discussion on the shift from traditional news consumption to social media feeds, and the shrinking ROI for large-screen (TV/movie) media.

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6. Trump and TikTok: The 100% “MAGA” Promise & Crony Capitalism

(Segment begins ~45:33)

• Trump’s executive order aims to push TikTok to U.S. ownership but at a major discount, benefiting Republican-aligned billionaires.
• Scott opposes the auction process as unfair and anti-capitalist, arguing it’s pure oligarchy—ByteDance’s U.S. business massively undervalued, Democrats excluded.
  • "You don’t ban a company and then carve it up and give it to your biggest donors…It should have been an auction." – Scott Galloway (46:55)
• Both hosts see the move as a gimmick, with little real change in Chinese control or technology transfer.
• Kara sees the Chinese as “tap dancing” in Beijing at how good a deal this is for them.

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7. Political Retribution: Trump’s DOJ Indicts James Comey

(Segment begins ~53:58)

• Trump’s administration indicts former FBI Director James Comey over his 2020 Senate testimony.
• Kara points out the weaknesses in the case, Halligan’s inexperience as a prosecutor, and that even administration insiders warned against this move.
• Scott argues this is pure intimidation, not a pursuit of actual “justice.”
  • "This isn’t about legal victory. It’s about intimidation…This is about intimidation and convincing people it's better to just give him what he wants and stay out of his way." – Scott Galloway (55:22)
• The action is framed as performative retribution and distraction from other scandals, including Epstein files.
  • "A government that seems more focused on increasing the anxiety of certain groups of people… This is now a party of vengeance." – Scott Galloway (59:03)

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8. Wins and Fails of the Week

(Segment begins ~61:37)

• Kara’s Fail: Hakeem Jeffries—criticizes his lackluster social media and public performance, missing the gravitas needed for the moment.
  • "Everything Hakeem Jeffries was a big L on it as far as I'm concerned." – Kara Swisher (62:21)
• Kara’s Win: Excitement for the upcoming fall movie slate, especially “Wicked” and a George Clooney/Noah Baumbach film.
• Scott’s Fail: Tariff-induced bailouts for U.S. farmers suffering from Chinese retaliation—a wasteful, circular, and ultimately losing economic maneuver.
  • "Everyone loses. Consumers pay higher prices, taxpayers fund the bailouts, and farmers get temporary cash, but permanent loss of China market." – Scott Galloway (67:38)
• Scott’s Win: The triumph of consumer-led economic protest bringing Jimmy Kimmel back to air—a hopeful sign for accountability and pushback against censorship.

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9. Other Notable Moments & Quotes

• Lots of pointed swearing, banter about hypocrisy, and realpolitik versus idealism.
• Multiple references to “painting that guy’s fence” in terms of giving attention to toxic social media platforms.
• Nuanced discussion about the blurred role of broadcasters, political intimidation, and the downstream effects on democracy and public trust.
• Openly emotional segment plug: Kara's interview with parents of a teen who died by suicide after using ChatGPT (70:56).

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Notable Quotes (with Timestamps)

• "But who amongst them are constantly saying, I'm being censored...?" – Scott Galloway on comics’ hypocrisy (21:18)
• "We're letting you know we're taking away healthcare from people... we're in no position to wave our finger at anybody right now." – Scott Galloway on the U.S. criticizing Saudi Arabia (13:28)
• "I just wanna acknowledge a point and I had not thought of it. Oftentimes you illuminate me to things and create nuance around my thinking." – Scott Galloway to Kara on comics’ double standard (18:11)
• "I think our comics are an incredible export…Go cash their check. Have a great time." – Scott Galloway (23:37)
• "Hypocrites. Fucking hypocrites." – Kara Swisher, repeatedly, on the comics (23:53)
• "It speaks to…a co-equal branch of government…being established via people's purchasing power." – Scott Galloway, on consumer protest impact (25:34)

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Conclusion

This episode of Pivot is a master class in smart, biting analysis of the ways economic, political, and cultural forces are colliding in 2025. Swisher and Galloway’s disagreements and dovetailing perspectives offer fresh insight, particularly on the hypocrisy rampant in both political and corporate behavior, and the often-overlooked power of organized consumer action. For those seeking a window into current debates around censorship, misinformation, media, and global political maneuvering, this episode is not to be missed.

Transcript

[Scott Galloway]

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[Guardian Narrator]

Not all journalism is the same. Take the Guardian. Our coverage has something unique. Fierce independence. Nobody owns us or tells us what we can and can't say, so we're free to report the whole picture. We connect what's happening in Washington to the rest of the globe, expose corruption wherever we find it, and give fresh perspective on everything from wellness and soccer to culture, the climate and more. Read, watch and listen to the Guardian for [e-mail] Some days call for working.

[Kara Swisher]

Up a sweat, working on your passion and endless action. Ditch the glitch with Liquid IV's new energy multiplier. Sugar free refreshing flavors like strawberry, kiwi and BlackBerry lemonade. Scientifically formulated to support physical energy, hydration, focus, mood and social stamina. Liquid IV's new energy multiplier, sugar free hydrating energy. Tap the banner to learn more. What is your latest scheme of healthcare?

[Scott Galloway]

You know, I don't really do much. Vitamin A, vitamin D, nad, testosterone, Botox.

[Kara Swisher]

Hi, everyone, this is Pivot from New York magazine and the Vox Media podcast network. I'm Kara Swisher.

[Scott Galloway]

And I'm Scott Galloway.

[Kara Swisher]

Scott, I just made the best kale shake. Look.

[Scott Galloway]

Best kale shake?

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah. You want my recipe?

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah. No, I think it's. All of a sudden I actually had a question for you. You're doing all this health stuff.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah.

[Scott Galloway]

What have been the most surprising things you started doing and stopped doing after digging?

[Kara Swisher]

You know, I actually had a pretty basic regimen, so it wasn't like I was one of these people that partook of all the things like you do, you partake a lot, as the word goes. You partake in whatever thing crosses the line, essentially. I started running again and I love it. I got a great new pair of shoes for that and really good structure. And I started running and I run three to four times a week and I love it, love it, love it.

[Scott Galloway]

That's nice.

[Kara Swisher]

And then, you know, just little things. I've actually, unfortunately, my poor family is now like in my. In my crosshairs because I'm like, no more sweets every night of the week, you know, Dessert.

[Scott Galloway]

Are you like a former smoker you're just obnoxious about.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, you know, but they shouldn't. It's something I should have done. A lot less processed foods like last night I made myself and I don't eat a lot of meat but I made a nice steak with a potato and a salad. Like I like cook a lot more, A little bit more. So all sort of whole foods. I'm eating less processed foods I would guess.

[Scott Galloway]

But no supplements or.

[Kara Swisher]

I don't take any really. I don't. I don't even take a multivitamin. Just a lot of kefir. I drink kefir. I like kefir a lot more. Not over protein because I think some people like all those sort of dude protein things are over the top, sleep a little better, stuff like that.

[Scott Galloway]

So makes sense.

[Kara Swisher]

And a little bit of an attitude change of like not getting all worked up about everything all the time, I think probably. Hmm.

[Scott Galloway]

I haven't seen that yet.

[Kara Swisher]

Uh huh. Thank you for asking. But my kale shake is delicious. Kale, fresh pineapple, fresh banana, a little bit of coconut water and kefir.

[Scott Galloway]

Nice.

[Kara Swisher]

And some chia seeds and stuff to give it a little bit of a shape. It's delicious anyway, but thank you for asking. What is your latest scheme of healthcare?

[Scott Galloway]

You know, I don't really do much Vitamin A, Vitamin D nad. Testosterone.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, this drug is testosterone.

[Scott Galloway]

Obviously Botox and I work out four times a week for the last 40 years. Other than that it's all, you know, just lucky, I guess.

[Kara Swisher]

I think the last one is the most important. That would be my guess. Of all the things, because of your mental health, not just for physical health, but mental health.

[Scott Galloway]

Oh, 100%.

[Kara Swisher]

100%. Anyway, I'm thinking now of playing badminton. Like all the.

[Scott Galloway]

I would like video. I think that would get out.

[Kara Swisher]

I should do that. You and I should play badminton. Anyway, how was your weekend? Was it good?

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah, really nice. I was in the US as you know. I got home yesterday. Yeah, I had a wonderful weekend. I had a wonderful kind of week and a half in the U.S. it was great.

[Kara Swisher]

Oh good. How's London? How's the weather? Is it cold yet?

[Scott Galloway]

You know what, it's a beautiful day today and going to the Chelsea game tomorrow with my youngest and my oldest is home and we're starting to go through his apps and that whole process for college and we went and bought him a movie poster or looked at movie posters today. So yeah, really good weekend.

[Kara Swisher]

Where's your favorite? You know, I was at the University of Wisconsin. They asked about your son. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Because I was doing a journalism thing with our friend Jessica Yellen, who was wonderful.

[Scott Galloway]

Love Jessica.

[Kara Swisher]

She's amazing. And then I went to the university. I went to Minneapolis, interviewed the senator there, and they've asked about you at Michigan, too.

[Scott Galloway]

So anyway, yeah, we loved UW Madison.

[Kara Swisher]

It's beautiful.

[Scott Galloway]

We love Michigan. I would say his top picks are. I mean, it's easy to say because unfortunately the schools he's going to don't like out of state students. But he was just blown away by UNC and uva. But he loved Michigan. UW Madison seems wonderful.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, they're all great. They're all great.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah, we do. Look, America does a small number of things really well. We make the best weapons in the world. We make the best software, technology, the best media in the world. And hands down, I do believe we do the best job at universities.

[Kara Swisher]

Barbecue.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah, barbecue. Okay, There you go. Barbecue.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, I agree with you.

[Scott Galloway]

I heard you were air quotes. Teaching at Michigan.

[Kara Swisher]

I am. I am teaching. You know that. I'm almost done, but let me ask you a question. How was your weekend with Ari? Sent me, left me a voice message where he told me to fuck off, which is great.

[Guardian Narrator]

Fuck you, Kara Swisher.

[Scott Galloway]

And don't ever say fuck me because.

[Kara Swisher]

Fuck you, Kara Swisher.

[Scott Galloway]

I know you're throwing me a voicemail with all this profanity. I'm like, what's going on here?

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, yeah. Well, that's our. That's our love language, Ari and I. Was it fun?

[Scott Galloway]

At least I'm not exaggerating. I'm scared to say anything. They.

[Kara Swisher]

They literally going to the comedy festival in Saudi Arabia. You can't say anything.

[Scott Galloway]

All I will say is I had a fantastic weekend.

[Kara Swisher]

Oh, okay.

[Scott Galloway]

I had a great weekend.

[Kara Swisher]

You people, all you fancy people, you are like the Saudi comments. We'll get to them in a second. Anyway, we have a lot to get to today. We have a lot. There's again more and more and more news. Donald Trump just announced that he's imposing 100% tariff on any and all movies that are made outside of the United States. He did not explain when this will happen or how it will work. Remember, he made the same threat back in May. They make a lot of movies outside. This actually will affect Netflix, finally. But what do you think of this situation?

[Scott Galloway]

I think it's more unnecessary. Own goal, cell phone stupidity. So more than 50%, one of the best performing stocks in media and arguably what has Kept the entire media ETF ecosystem above. That's kept it from being just abysmal and has fueled Hollywood with record content budgets is Netflix. And more than 50% the majority of Netflix content budget is now produced overseas. So does that mean he's going to start tariffing Netflix and dramatically increase the cost of subscriptions, dramatically decrease the amount of content people get for their Netflix subscription and gut the stock price, which has been one of the best performers over the last 10 years?

[Kara Swisher]

Yes, that's what his intention is.

[Scott Galloway]

Almost every Marvel movie now has some component of it made overseas.

[Kara Swisher]

All of them.

[Scott Galloway]

All of them, yeah. So if you think about, I love the term arbitrage, and that is there's two ways to add shareholder value. One is to increase the top line. The other is to decrease costs. And if you think about media, media has mostly. Well, it's been both. There's been. Because of streaming, there's been a war and an increase in subscriptions and top line revenue because everyone now has three or four subscriptions per household, which has inspired an arms race where there's a ton of content spending on the top line. The other way you add shareholder value is that $18 billion in content that Netflix produces is $30 billion worth of content from 10 years ago. Because they say, okay, we can make squid games in Korea for 70% of the price it would cost to make it in Atlanta and for 30% of what it would cost to produce in Los Angeles. So there's been a geographic arbitrage over the last 10, 20 years. And by the way, Los Angeles has been on the wrong end of that arbitrage. It's just too damn expensive. I'm going through this right now. We're producing our scripted series on big tech and we really did try to make it in la. There's no way. There's just no way.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, it adds to costs. Yeah. Unless you absolutely want a certain look. Right. That's the. In some cases, you want it to look like what it looks like, what you're trying to do. Correct. But a lot of things can be made to look like that.

[Scott Galloway]

Sure. But what we'll do is we'll film. We'll cram a bunch of shots, in this case in the Bay Area, where it's also irrational to film. And where we're. And again, probably end up filming is in New Jersey because New Jersey just supersized their tax credit budget and it's near New York and we'll do a lot of filming in New York, so. And then the other Arbitrage that's about to take place is through AI, I think.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, Especially storyboarding. I just, as you know, I did the CEO of Runway and we were talking about a bunch of just storyboards, production, how to create, you know, try these 10 outfits on someone and this and that. It's a, you know, I know California and other states have been trying to get better and better terms for movie makers to bring them back, but they did lose it. They did like act like they had no other choice. And then it was obvious they had another choice. And so Trump's trying to solve it by this. This is just ridiculous.

[Scott Galloway]

So what will likely happen is the same thing. One, I don't think it's gonna go anywhere because I think he's impressed by movie stars and I think a guy like Ted Sarandos probably carries a lot of weight. Or Reed Hastings. And in addition, all that's gonna happen is the following. His attempt to punish foreign firms who ship almost no films into the U.S. i mean, some, but not a lot. They're gonna impose reciprocal terror. Canada had this, used to have this rule. I don't know if they still had it. Some percentage of content had to be locally produced in Canada.

[Kara Swisher]

Often they do that. A lot of countries do that, right.

[Scott Galloway]

And then we would say, no, let competition reign because we're just better at it. So what nations will do is they love the idea of saying, we want to support a nascent film industry in Poland, so we'll impose reciprocal tariffs which will do nothing but reduce the consumption and the business for US Media firms. So this is just stupid. And I don't know where this is coming from other than his AI came back and said, what can I announce today that will keep. That is crazy. Will command media attention and keep the word Epstein out of the news.

[Kara Swisher]

Let's say it again. Epstein. Let's make a movie. Epstein. The Epstein the movie.

[Scott Galloway]

Oh, trust me, they're coming.

[Kara Swisher]

Let's do it all in the U.S. they're coming. We should make it in the U.S.

[Scott Galloway]

There'S going to be a lot of nervous people.

[Kara Swisher]

A lot of nervous people about that. Yeah. One of the things that's critical to remember here is that these movie companies all acquiesce to Donald Trump and this is what they get. I'm just saying, boys, guess what? He'll kick you in the fucking nuts just the same as. Look, take your money. Anyway. Speaking of taking money, top comedians are criticizing their peers for participating in the Riyadh Comedy Festival, a state sponsored Saudi event. The event will feature over 50 comedians, including Kevin Hart, Hannibal Barrass, and Dave Chappelle. As a reminder, the Biden administration held the country responsible for the 2018 killing of Saudi journalist Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi. People, different communists have put up the terms. It's enormous amounts of money these people are getting, but they have to promise not to talk about the kingdom in negative ways. So these are all the free speechers being completely paid off not to speak. I don't know. What do you think about this? It was pretty shocking when I saw the contract itself.

[Scott Galloway]

So let me be clear. I have gone to Riyadh and spoken and cashed their checks. And I do so openly and wholeheartedly and with a total absence of guilt. And also, I spoke last week at Nashville, and I got paid a lot of money to speak in front of the leadership of a tech team or of a big tech company. And they asked me not to bring up the struggles of young men because their parents in the audience, and they said it's kind of a downer. I mean, if people are paying you.

[Kara Swisher]

Yes, but these are comics, Scott. These are people who go on and on about free speech and insult everybody about it. Let me just say. I don't think you do that, but go ahead.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah, but I think it's really easy to be a purist with other people's money and the kingdom. One of the things I love about living in. So let me be clear. I believe MBS ordered the murder of Khashoggi in our nation. In our nation. We're letting you know we're taking away healthcare from people. We're removing security details from former officials. We're incarcerating and pulling people out of work with people en masse. I literally think we're in no position to wave our finger at anybody right now.

[Kara Swisher]

I think we should wave our. I completely disagree. I think we should absolutely wave our finger at these comics, because these are the comics that literally lectured the left on free speech, then haul them out.

[Scott Galloway]

Say to them, look, yeah, but if you want to go to.

[Kara Swisher]

They can do it. But they got censored. Like, they talk about censorship and literally make you feel like shit for doing it. And they cosplay that they care about free speech and they've agreed to. Comics are supposed to talk about anything they want and to agree. I'm giving comics a particular thing. You are different. You were doing a speech there. They're like, we don't want to hear about men. We want to hear about marketing, whatever the heck you're doing. But if you're going to literally lecture people about free speech and then get paid an enormous amount of not to do your act, which would be. They would easily make a joke. And one guy who did, I think it was. Who was it? Tim Dillon was someone. One of them made a. Talked about it and said, yeah, I don't care, I'm getting the money. That's right, I'll do whatever they say. He got dumped from the festival because he said what was everybody knew was happening, which was censorship. That's the only issue is this particular gang of people, especially Dave Chappelle, especially the rest of them went on and on and on about free speech. So I just. That's all I'm doing. You're not that person.

[Scott Galloway]

Look, if you're a free speech warrior and you're accepting money to have what is a highly edited, censored version. I was never. When I was in Riyadh, I was never. I've spoken in Riyadh. I've spoken in Dubai several times. I have never been asked to censor my content ever. Over there too. Just the realpolitik of the following. I'm focused on American interests. Well, first, let's be honest. I'm focused on my own interests and I get paid a lot when I go there. But also, I personally believe the new swing votes in terms of geopolitical power are the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia and India. They're the two largest, fastest growing economies. They're the only kind of two economies that are up for grabs that could either go towards Russia, towards Iran, or it could go towards America. I think that we want a bear hug and really strengthen our relationship with the Kingdom and with India. And I think it's so ridiculously fucking stupid that we insult India and thrust them into the arms of China and Russia. I think our relationship with the Gulf is really important. And our relationship with the kingdom in terms of peace with Israel, peace in the region, and also having secure safe pipelines and sources for fossil fuels. And also we have a lot of army bases there. They are a strong ally. And in terms of reforms, they're starting from a bad place. Let's be honest. We're starting from a better place. We're headed in the wrong direction. They're headed in the right direction.

[Kara Swisher]

I don't have a problem with Saudi Arabia. Actually, I do have a problem with these comics now. Atsuko Okat, that's Suka, I think that's her name. She's a comic who was invited, didn't Go. This is the content restrictions. This is the crowd that you can't. That always goes. You can't say anything anymore. Right? This is the crowd.

[Scott Galloway]

I think that's a fair point.

[Kara Swisher]

Knocks our fucking block off about how open they are and what they get to. They don't get to say what they want. Well, guess what? This is what they agreed to. Artists shall not prepare or perform any material that may be considered to degrade, defame or bring public disrepute, contempt, scandal, embarrassment or ridicule. The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, including its leadership, public figures, culture and people, Saudi royal family, legal system or government, and any religion, religious tradition, religious figure or religious practice. Sorry, guys. And it's mostly guys.

[Scott Galloway]

You realize most companies in the employment agreement have a defamation agreement that looks, smells and feels like that.

[Kara Swisher]

Great. Except for these guys. They don't get to. Because these are the ones that literally couldn't shut the fuck up about how they couldn't say things. And here they are agreeing. So I don't, I don't want to. If they say it one more to me, one more time to me, I'm is just also, by the way, someone who's going, Pete Davidson is performing. His father died on 9 11. He's allowing them to censor him and taking their money. That's his choice. Again, you're right, that's his choice if he wants to do that. But yuck. All over from Kara Swiss.

[Scott Galloway]

I just wanna acknowledge a point and I had not thought of it. Oftentimes you illuminate me to things and create nuance around my thinking. If you're one of these comedians that is constantly saying how you're censored and you can't say stuff and the left has no humor. Sense of humor, fine. I see the hypocrisy there. I have spoken there. It reminds me of the debate when everyone was giving Uber a hard time from accepting money from the Middle East. And I'm like, cash their fucking check.

[Kara Swisher]

I don't have a problem.

[Scott Galloway]

And I remember you were kind of with me too. Remember how much shit Uber was getting for taking money, dirty money from the Middle East? It's like, okay, you just want them investing in Chinese companies. The lower our cost of capital, the more jobs we have. Cash their fucking check. And I'm kind of the comedians. If Louis CK wants to go there and make a shit ton of money. I've never heard him preach about censorship or say that his speech is being squelched or whatever. Go. Also, I have found when I've gone to the Gulf that America has a tendency to wrap every country there in the same blanket. The Qataris have a strained relationship with the UAE but are close to Iran. Meanwhile, they host our largest air force base. Saudi hates Iran, yet gets along with us. We as Americans are so reductive and feel like we can make these blanket statements.

[Kara Swisher]

Would you sign that? I'll never say a word about this. You might, you might, but you never have. Have you signed? I don't say bad things.

[Scott Galloway]

I've never, I've probably spoken in the Gulf. First off, I vacationed there. I know a lot of people there. I really enjoy it there. And it is much different in Doha than it is in Riyadh. And it's much different when you're at a bar in Dubai for a lot of reasons. So you have to go country by country. I'm going to go to F1 in Bahrain and I'm really excited about it. And I have generally found the people in the Gulf to be warm. It's not where I would want to live. I think they have real issues as we do for the most part. That region I'd like to think is headed in the right direction. And also we have a very strong strategic interest geopolitically just being selfish as American and establishing tighter bonds with some of these governments. Having said that. So I'm sort of like, make money, take their money. If you are constantly preaching about being censored and you sign up to something like that, you should be called out as you are doing. I had not thought of that. But what I find in general is that one of the problems with the left oftentimes.

[Kara Swisher]

Oh, now it's about the left. Come on, go ahead.

[Scott Galloway]

Well, who's going after them?

[Kara Swisher]

That's other comics. No, but I mean, no, of course not. Because they would like, they would like literally.

[Scott Galloway]

Well, let me finish my statement. This is one of the problems I have with the left and one of the reasons I think we lose elections is we are more prone to virtue, signal and whine and bitch rather than focus on the material or economic well being of people and our country's strategic interests. And we are oftentimes very moral with other people's money.

[Kara Swisher]

I don't, again, I don't care about Saddie Baby. I care about these comics who exhausted me with their ridiculous performance of free speech. All the tech people who do the same thing. Oh, free speech. And then they, then they don't do it. I don't want to hear a word fucking one from them anymore about These issues, I just don't.

[Scott Galloway]

But who. I haven't followed this closely. Who amongst them?

[Kara Swisher]

A lot of them did. Trust me. They're all like, can't say anything.

[Scott Galloway]

But I am consistently asked by people who. They'll say something along the lines of, look, Amazon's our biggest client. We'd appreciate it if you didn't make fun of Jeff Bezos and Laurie.

[Kara Swisher]

I got in trouble for that. I got yelled at at a conference that was. They were one of our sponsors.

[Scott Galloway]

And I want to be honest, as much as I like to think of, I'm a purist. That's an easy give for me.

[Kara Swisher]

Although you did it and then I got yelled at and then we lost them as a sponsor, just if you recall. And I didn't. Did I once tell you not to say it? Did I once tell you not to say it?

[Scott Galloway]

You have always been supportive. You have never said to me, scott, dial it back. And I have said some stupid things that have reduced our revenue. And you have never once said, dial it back. Or don't say that. You've come. Oftentimes you've said to me that was stupid or whatever, but you've never once checked me back. But what I'm saying is, if I go to a conference and they're paying me a shit ton of money and I can always tell they are really worried about speaking to me. And basically what they're saying is it's the organizers usually, who just. They're like, do me a favor, don't talk about this. Because it's a real hot button. And oftentimes it's something weird that I never would have thought of. And I'm like, yeah, I don't want to make your life any harder. Fine. And I'm not a politician, I'm not a comic. I'm there talking about AI and I'm there talking about income, and I'm there. Or making predictions on tech or the algebra of happiness. And the reality is, when you cash people's check, you have two choices. Either kind of sign up or you don't cash their check. And as long as they make the terms transparent up front and you feel like you're. I don't know. When people pay a lot of money, they're probably going to have some conditions. By the way, a lot of times, you know what they tell me? They say when I speak at Walmart, Scott, lose the F bombs. This is a very religious community. Do not be profane. But who. This is an honest question, because I haven't been following it that closely. Who among those comics are constantly saying, I'm being censored in her.

[Kara Swisher]

Almost get off the top of my head. All of them. Like, all of them. I've heard a version of that. Chappelle certainly has. They all are like, you can't say anything. You can't say anything. And of course they. You can. But I would love it for one of them to say something. That's what I would love.

[Scott Galloway]

I think our comics are an incredible export. And I think the more comics in different parts of the world makes us look good and makes them less likely to declare war on us and feel affinity for us. I'm in. Go cash their check. Have a great time.

[Kara Swisher]

Hypocrites. Fucking hypocrites. If you say free speech to me, I'm gonna punch you in the nuts. Anyway, nexstar and Sinclair have brought back. Oh, speaking of people like Paper Tiger, nexstar and Sinclair brought back Jimmy Kimmel Live to their local stations after the standoff with ABC and Disney. Sinclair said it received, quote, thoughtful feedback from viewers and advertisers during the blackout and proposed some measures for ABC to adopt, none of which ABC adopted. Remember, they were asking him to give money to Turning Point and apologize. Fuck you.

[Scott Galloway]

Single. Yeah. Being generous with other. Being virtue signaling with other people's money.

[Kara Swisher]

Exactly. Nexter also referenced constructive conversations with Disney in a statement. But Disney and ABC have not made concessions to either company. I mean, seriously, these two. Former leverage secretary Robert Reich wrote in the Guardian in the Kimmel drama proves consumers have extraordinary power. You seem to be taking a page from Scott Galloway. Trump is now threatening another company, Microsoft, telling him to fire their head of global affairs, Lisa Monaco, who served in the Biden administration. Again, these are the people who are actual, like, trying to tell people what to do. I'm just pointing out.

[Scott Galloway]

Agreed.

[Kara Swisher]

I mean, these next are people. Any thoughts on what happened there?

[Scott Galloway]

I'm just really into this idea of the economic power of American citizens that if they're coordinated and can rally around. I was doing a live podcast with these two Canadian kids. I wish it was called what's on youn Mind or something like that. And this guy came up to me and shook my hand and he's like, no, buy Friday. I have gotten so much positive feedback from the idea of an economic strike, and it's really intoxicating and inspiring.

[Kara Swisher]

Lots of people have come up to me and mentioned to me and said.

[Scott Galloway]

Because look what these guys did. Clearly a bunch of advertisers, a bunch of stars, a bunch of people called Iger, canceled cruise ship reservations, canceled trips to Disney. People calling, saying, I want to cancel my contract or I don't want to advertise with Sinclair. And you know what? They backed the fuck down. And so I love this idea of a co. Equal branch of government of which there are none. Right now. There's no co, there's no equal. There's Trump, there's maga right now being established via people's purchasing power. And this is the first time, kind of shockingly enough, that it has really changed the tide. It has literally reversed the flow of the river. Was reversed in about 72 hours. And it's just. It speaks to the. And it makes sense. America is such a consumer economy.

[Kara Swisher]

Why would they ask for like that from Kimmel? Like ask for demands? First of all, by the way, these contracts are somewhat strict. If they dump shows too much, they're in breach of their contract. That's one thing. All they were doing it for was in order to get the deal from Brendan Carr. That's all they were. They had no values they were trying to protect. They had no public interest they were interested in. They were interested in this deal to buy Tegna. Both of them. I apparently want Tegna. And that's all this is about. Just so you know, it's money. And then they had to go the step further and ask for ridiculous things like that Jimmy Kimmel give money to Turning Point. He shouldn't have to do anything like. It's ridiculous. And then. And this new one about Lisa Monaco, who I know, who's a tremendous public servant demanding that Microsoft get rid of her. Let me just say, before you say anything, if they do that, Satya, Nadella, I'm gonna make your life so uncomfortable if you do something like this. If you give in to someone you hired who's perfectly qualified for the job you hired her for, you fire or Lisa Monica leaves. I'm gonna just talk about it endlessly for years to come.

[Scott Galloway]

I don't think he's going to. And I think that. I'd like to think this sort of represents a firewall. The first I've seen so far. I mean, they totally had to backtrack again. I hate this note. I thought that was just ridiculous that he should give money to Turning Point. Well, I'll tell you what. Sinclair and Nexter, or whatever the. Or Nextar. Whoever, or Tenga Tegna, stupid name. You guys should really donate money to the aclu. I mean, and that's an obnoxious statement. You don't Say that, but this is. They have the right to not carry Kimmel. They were trying to curry favor with the president. People recognize that all the free speechers are actually more censorious than anyone. And consumers and actors and travelers and advertisers push back. And it was what they accomplished was they accomplished in 72 hours what no one in the Democratic Party has been able to accomplish in eight months. And I understand that the Democratic Party is neutered, but no one in the Democratic Party, Charles Schumer, hasn't been able to rally a bunch of advertisers or cruise ship goers.

[Kara Swisher]

I mean, you saw their text this weekend over the shutdown, honestly.

[Scott Galloway]

So I think this is really exciting. I hope that a Democratic or a civic or business leader comes up and figures out a way without being too preachy and too drunk with power, figures out targeted ways to deploy the economic power. We're in America. It's all about money, folks. To deploy that economic power.

[Kara Swisher]

But asking different individuals get fired. They did that to Chris Krebs, who had to leave his company and is now involved because they threatened all kinds of investigations. And so he had to fall on his sword because the rest of the company was under threat. Right. This is the kind of thing that autocrats do. If you ask Microsoft to fire someone they hired and by name, that is sickening. As far as I can tell, the.

[Scott Galloway]

Left is guilty on a lower level. And that is the left, for a while was really into the idea of, oh, you said something that hurts our feelings or offends us. We would like you to fire them. Oh, you're an actress in the Mandalorian and you said conservative things that offend the sensibilities of people in Hollywood or offends our sensibilities. We want you to fire her. And they removed her from the series. That was wrong. The Republican Party and Trump have taken it to an absolutely new level where they are trying to go after entire industries and companies and also basically weaponize the government to go after people and threaten to put them in jail. So they have taken. This is, generally speaking, the pattern of politics right now. The Democratic Party does something really fucking stupid. They say, okay, or the Democrats, let's let a transgender woman swim in a woman's meat. Let's have a DEI department of 200 people in Michigan when 55% of the freshman class are non white. And we take pride in just not letting in people. That's actually not fair for Michigan, Harvard. Harvard's a better case study. And then the Republicans come in and use all of that that wrong and come in with a nuclear response where I know, let's kick all transgender people out of the military. I know. Under a false flag of DEI and DEI correction, let's take the most well deployed capital in history and cut it against research funding. It's like the Democrats do something stupid. Well intentioned, but stupid. Take it too far. And then the Democrat speaker Amerta is allowed to trade stocks. The S and p is up 200% in 10 years. Warren Buffett is up 300%. The Pelosi family is up 697%. They engage. It's not insider trading, but it's clearly trading based on information the rest of us do not have. So what does Trump do? He comes in and he says, I know I'll make 5 billion on a crypto scam.

[Kara Swisher]

Or letting that company that got the golf company into this TikTok deal at a ridiculous $14 billion.

[Scott Galloway]

Or dividing up TikTok among your donors for 14 billion.

[Kara Swisher]

14 billion.

[Scott Galloway]

Which is probably about a 60 to 80% discount to what the thing is worth. And by the way, Democrats not allowed to invest in it and nor should it should be an auction. It should be capitalism. So it's almost like we do something really fucking stupid and we give them cloud cover to come in and be mendacious and scale that ridiculous behavior. But I find all of this very, I'm very excited. The silver lining here is that and I didn't think it would happen over Jimmy Kimmel. It appears that people have figured out a way to push back and that's encouraging.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, we'll see. Okay, Scott, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, Threads just scored a major win over X Foreign.

[Scott Galloway]

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[Kara Swisher]

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[Kara Swisher]

Scott we're back with more news. Threads just hit a major milestone, passing X in daily active users. According to data from similar web the number of threads users is steadily growing while the number of daily active users on X continues to drop. So they're sort of crossing streams essentially, though data shows users spend more time on X than threads. The Wall Street Journal is also predicting the next Elon Zuckerberg battle is going to be over. Humanoid robots are both into this. And speaking of that, President Trump said He would make TikTok 100% MAGA if he could. President made the comment while signing an executive order to pave the way for American investors to own a majority share of the app. But then he added, unfortunately it won't work out that way, saying every group, philosophy and policy would be treated fairly. I'm not so concerned about that. I'm concerned about the price and the gimme. It's a really good deal for his. And speaking of his friends, in a recently resurfaced Q and A, Larry Ellison predicted the rise of modern surveillance, which would cause citizens to be on their best behavior. And that's a good thing because they're being surveilled. I don't know, there's a lot here. Larry Ellison just really has managed to do really well, but Zuckerberg has really done a nice job With Threads and Blue sky is also growing. They're both growing, but X is really. Nobody thought that Threads were would do this. I did because he's good at this stuff. Any thoughts on that? And then their humanoid robot battle.

[Scott Galloway]

So a lot there. So with respect to Threads, I think Threads is fantastic. So I invested in one of these things, I invested in post and it got a ton of traction out of the gates and then it kind of lost steam and now it's closed down. People love Blue Sky. I was using Bluesky and Threads. I got off of Twitter for my own mental health and. Cause I love your quote, I'm not gonna paint that guy's fucking fence. And I found it just so ugly. And I've been on Threads and bluesky and I'm curious what you think, but I find myself increasingly using Threads. I find it so seamlessly integrated into Instagram, which I love. And also I find the content that they elevate on Threads is a little bit more positive.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, your feed is probably done that way. Cause of what you pull from. It depends on the feed, right?

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah, that's true.

[Kara Swisher]

Amanda tried Thread and she just doesn't have a good feed. And I'm like, it's because you're pulling from doom scrolling or something. I have a great feed on Threads. It's all like cooking and like there's a thread of something called Fabrique, something where they. They take old toys and old, old things and refurbish them. There's a guy who's a gardener on Threads who's like this hunky gay gardener who I like. There's a lot of pleasant stuff. It's a lot like Instagram, as you said, but a little easier to consume. I really enjoy Threads and I again, you know, I don't throw a Mark Zuckerberg a bone if I can avoid it, but it's a really good product. I find it really enjoyable. I do like. I think Luke sky people are smarter a little bit. Although they're much more like Finger Waggy.

[Scott Galloway]

You know, it's a little bit more artisanal and a little bit more like Atlantic kind of.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, yeah. But I like it. I don't. I find interesting news. I have to say my news consumption threads is not as good for news consumption. Blue Sky's better for news consumption. And I like both of them because you can block people easily and get rid of all the shitty people who like either lecture at you or say vile things. But not many people say vile things on either of them. It's rare. It's usually just irritating. Just like, leave me the fuck alone. If I like Scott, stop bothering me.

[Scott Galloway]

Essentially that's their beef with you.

[Kara Swisher]

Whatever.

[Scott Galloway]

That's their beef.

[Kara Swisher]

Some of them just like whatever, anyone. Anyway, it's usually fine and it's never, I'll tell you, it's not what happens on X, which is just vile and gross and a little scary right now. And so I'm thrilled that people are seeing all these different competitors. So I'm kind of hoping for all of them, if that makes sense, you know.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah, well first off, I mean and it should probably be broken up but Threads has just an unnatural advantage because 3 billion people are on Instagram and so the data they can mine that informs the Threads feed when you go onto threads about what you already like. And also just making it really seamless for those 3 billion people to say, hey, you don't need to log off and go onto Twitter if you want to share content here. We're just going to make it easier and the content's more likely to be elevated and get more of those precious likes for whatever it is you're trying to build, whether it's social capital or drive people to your website. We're just going to make it very seductive and very seamless to go for the 3 billion people to just ease of slip over here to Threads. They have a huge built in advantage and I would argue that at some point you're probably gonna have more innovation if these companies are separate companies. Having said that, I just find I really like threads. I gotta admit it, I'm spending more time on Instagram, less time on TikTok though. I love TikTok. I think the nicest vibe of all of them is LinkedIn. I think it's because everyone's thinking maybe someday this guy will give me a job. So they're just nicer to people.

[Kara Swisher]

No, it's just cause it's useful. Right. It's meant to be.

[Scott Galloway]

It's more professional and it's. But people are generally speaking are kinder. I also, to be honest, I think the environment, at least on the stuff I post on YouTube is quite positive.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, same thing with Reddit. I would say there's lots of choices now which is great actually. Reddit is really enjoyable. I go there all the time to find different and discover things. News discovery again, I would say Reddit and Blue sky threads is sort of fun and food and silly and ASMR stuff. There's a guy who just does the lawn and I watch he does the lawn. I forget what is. He's from Australia, I think. And I like that. I have to tell you, you know what? It's replacing tv. I find myself not watching as much television it is.

[Scott Galloway]

I was on Smirkonish last weekend with Richard Reeves talking about young men and I said to Drew, my tech guy, I'm like, pull up cnn. I didn't have it on my tv. My live Hulu thing had lapsed or I had too many locations. I tried to pull it up on Live on cnn. We couldn't figure out the credit card situation. And it kept timing out, asking me who I was with. Cox and everything. And finally I gave up. I haven't watched CNN live in a year. I don't watch live tv. And I've also noticed, like you, I'm watching less streaming. And I hate to admit this, I used to get my news from the Economist, the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. Now I'm getting all of my news from Social.

[Kara Swisher]

Well, it's from those places though.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah. A lot of times it's clicked. But they do a better job of curating the New York Times than the New York Times Times does. Of curating the New York Times.

[Kara Swisher]

Well, I would agree. I would agree that.

[Scott Galloway]

Which was interesting. I have become, I don't wanna say the enemy.

[Kara Swisher]

You and I are the same.

[Scott Galloway]

I'm not. I am. The only time I turn on the bigger screen in my household is for Premier League football or my boys wanna watch something and I wanna trap them somewhere.

[Kara Swisher]

Or you wanna watch a movie with your kids. Right?

[Scott Galloway]

That kind of thing. And even now, like my kids are. What I advise people who wanna be in the media ecosystem is the following. It's very easy. The bigger the screen, the lower the roi. If you're doing anything, anything that depends upon your ability to monetize content on a 30 meter by 10 meter screen called a movie theater, you're fucked. Don't go into that business.

[Kara Swisher]

I thought about going to the movies the other day and I was like, I don't wanna go to the movies. I'll just. I do particularly watch like I watch the Gilded Age. I watch. I'm very excited for the Diplomat to start again. I'm very excited.

[Scott Galloway]

But think about how we grew up. I used to get up. I used to get home from school at 3:30, wait till my watch cartoons until my mom got home, and then we'd watch Happy Days and Knight Rider. I'd watch seven hours. I'd watch seven hours of tv. Six hours, six times. A week. And now I'm down to maybe an hour, an hour and a half. And then again, that screen, big business still, still money in it. But the screen where there's champagne and cocaine is if you can figure out a way to monetize content on a tiny screen called affiliate. So ROI is inversely correlated to the size of the screen. I think that's true in the last 24 months. And again, it's pulse marketing. I have literally stopped watching tv. And I hate to say this, going to the original site of the media. I go to Bloomberg's site, but only after an article is recommended to me on threads or bluesky.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, it's true.

[Scott Galloway]

And eventually, if you're the gatekeeper, you will find the way to start the margin from the initial creator.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, it's true. We are a perfect case study. I watch everything on my phone. I watch. I wanted to watch the morning show the other day and I was like, oh, should I put on the tv? I'm like, no, I'm going to sit here and eat dinner and watch it on my phone, like that kind of thing. So anyway, it was a lot easier and easier to pull up, by the way. But tell me about TikTok. I don't care about the 100% MAGA. It'll be what it is, right? They could maybe manipulate it. I'm sure they have on occasion. I feel like this whole thing, it's of kind going to lease the algorithm from the Chinese. The number 14 billion is what Snapchat is worth right now. It was in the 55 to $100 billion range before, so they're getting a deal and I have a feeling TikTok's going to go down. This is my feeling at this moment with this gang of old men running it. But what do you think?

[Scott Galloway]

Well, first off, do we want the Ellison family or any family controlling CBS, CBS, CNN and TikTok. And keep in mind TikTok, and this is in the Ellisons. TikTok has more mind share of our youth than CBS, NBC and ABC had of adults in the 60s. We wouldn't have liked the Kremlin. Control him. So I am all about banning TikTok and I have been for a long time. What is illegal here and wrong is carving it up and giving it to your best Republican donors at a discount. Because ByteDance trades at a valuation of about 300 or 350 billion in the private markets, by the way, most undervalued tech company in the world. It's trading at about, I think two times revenues. OpenAI is trading at 30 times forward revenues and it's still growing about 20%, I believe, of the revenues come from the U.S. which means based on the suppressed valuation of 350 billion, it's worth about, about 70. So these guys are getting an 80% discount. And by the way, there isn't a single, there isn't a single Democrat involved in this fucking thing. Of course. So what do you get? You get to, I mean this is totally anti capitalist. You don't force, you don't ban a company and then carve it up and give it to your biggest donors.

[Kara Swisher]

And don't auction.

[Scott Galloway]

It should have been an auction.

[Kara Swisher]

Don't get the best price.

[Scott Galloway]

And also I'm convinced that the only way this goes through, and I got this wrong, I said this isn't going to happen. And by the way, I met the CEO of TikTok and he's like the most likable guy in the world. If there's anything, if this does go through. I think the only way it goes through is if she figures out a backdoor into the algorithm. Because the algorithm is everything TikTok really has.

[Kara Swisher]

I believe TikTok, they're using the algorithm, they're using the Chinese algorithm apparently.

[Scott Galloway]

But that's my point. My point is as long as the CCP can dial up or down things that continue to make young Americans feel bad about America or continue to dial, Trump wanted to, Trump was gonna ban it. He didn't like TikTok. You know what they did? They said take the dial on pro Trump content and dial it up. They will notice and they will decide they like TikTok dial down content, saying that an invasion of Taiwan is coming and would be banned.

[Kara Swisher]

I mean, also the CCP wants Trump to dial it down on Taiwan. There was a big story in I think the journal or the one of them that he really, she is hoping to get is Trump to shut up about Taiwan so they can soften up their approach there. And then secondly, he wants a summit and so this is a nothing burger. Cause he doesn't. I don't think the Chinese think they're giving up anything. I think they're tap dancing in Beijing. This is a great deal for them. And then these stupid rich guys get something at a real discount. This is such a gimmick.

[Scott Galloway]

But this is what we're missing. I mean it's all of the bad taste of an oligarchy. And it's like oligarchy meets cronyism meets socialism with all of the Calories of the fact that it'll still probably be a propaganda tool for the ccp. And this is what I am pissed off about, Democrats. If I were running for president, I would say, Marc Andreessen, Larry Ellison, Michael Dell, I am going to hit you so fucking hard when I'm in the White House. Because if you're engaging, you're all free marketers until you get a chance to be total fucking oligarchs with the comics.

[Kara Swisher]

They're all anti censorship until they get censored.

[Scott Galloway]

Well, this is like, okay, fine. And it's the same message to the folks in El Salvador. You're found incarcerating good Americans. I don't care if the previous president said it was okay, I'm coming for your ass. And if I were Rahm Emanuel or Governor Newsom or Governor Moore, I would be saying, look, my reach and my memory are long and far. And for those of you who claim to be free marketers engaging in this type of cronyism and this oligarchy, be clear, I'm coming for your ass.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah, you need to break the back.

[Scott Galloway]

Of that immediately and start saying, for those of you engaging in this type of ridiculous, you know, ridiculous prosecution of your political enemies, okay, we can do that too. I'm gonna start making a list.

[Kara Swisher]

That's their nightmare.

[Scott Galloway]

But instead we're like, this is illegal. This is wrong. This is. America needs to come together that, guess what?

[Kara Swisher]

Scott and I are coming for you people. We're coming for you. Speaking of paper tigers. All right, let's go on a quick break. When we come back, Trump's retribution campaign. Speaking of retribution.

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[Kara Swisher]

Be a good fit for any medical.

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[Scott Galloway]

Support for today's show comes from the Guardian. If you listen to Pivot, my guess is that you value independent voices and perspectives on the news. You want real reporting on real stories, and you don't want to wonder if the news you're getting is being skewed by an unseen hand. The Guardian is fiercely independent, too. Nobody tells them what they can or can't say. Not many competitors can say the same. That means the Guardian is free to report the whole picture. And their independence isn't just a slogan. It's a core value that's baked into every facet of how the organization is run. The Guardian lets you read, watch and listen to independent journalism covering today's biggest stories from around the globe. It's a kind of journalism that is increasingly rare. Rare that makes what the Guardian does all the more valuable. Their coverage goes beyond the news too. They also have new perspectives on culture, wellness, sports and more. And you're free to read it without a paywall. Read, watch and listen to the Guardian for [e-mail].

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[Kara Swisher]

Scott we're back. Donald Trump is insisting the indictment of former FBI Director James Comey isn't about revenge, saying it's really about justice. Comey was. Oh, whatever. Comey was indicted on two felony counts last week, both tied to his 2020 Senate testimony on the Trump Russia investigation. The indict came after Trump put his former attorney, Lindsey Halligan and former beauty queen in charge of the case, despite the fact that she had never prosecuted a federal case. In a video posted on Instagram, Comey declared his innocence and said he would welcome a trial. Let's listen.

[Scott Galloway]

My family and I have known for years that there are costs to standing up to Donald Trump, but we couldn't imagine ourselves living any other way. We will not live on our knees. And you shouldn't either.

[Kara Swisher]

He gets to take the high ground. Not one of my favorite people, I'll be honest with you. But still, he didn't do anything wrong. And Lindsey Halligan has made like error after error in the filing of this thing. And the grand jury only indicted on two counts, even though there were three. Every lawyer I know said this is going to be a slam dunk for Comey to get out of. By the way, people within the White House said don't do it, including Pam Bondi. Trump is also indicating more indictments are likely, pointing to New York Attorney General Letitia James as well as George Soros and Reid Hoffman as potential targets. I don't know. He's putting up really shitty cases and probably will lose, so. Thoughts?

[Scott Galloway]

This isn't about legal victory. It's about intimidation. And first off, if anyone should have a gripe with Director Comey, it should be Secretary Clinton going into, like, weeks left in the campaign. You're never supposed to discuss an investigation until you have actual indictments in the FBI, that's standard practice. And James Comey, always posing for the fucking cameras, who likes to think of himself as a bald eagle flying into an apple pie. He's so fucking sanctimonious. Decided to pose more for the cameras and put out a letter saying that they had found more emails with no specifics, which casts this Incredible doubt on Secretary Clinton's campaign. If anyone has a beef with the director, it's Secretary Clinton. And the fact that he's doing this again, I think it's another data point. Another suggestion from OpenAI, from what I understand of the case, is if it's not swatted away right away, it'll be soon swatted away. Meanwhile, he will have to raise millions of dollars to defend this. But this isn't about winning cases. This is about intimidation and convincing people it's better to just give him what he wants and stay out of his way. Whether it's cut him a ch for $14 million or 7 million or just don't say anything but Director Comey. Even a statement there. Director Comey is really poorly advised. We will not live on our knees. Jesus Christ. You're not Emiliano Zapata. Just get over yourself, all right?

[Kara Swisher]

It's the same thing.

[Scott Galloway]

Look, this is political vengeance. And it's one thing to say. He should have read that quote from the minister first. They came for the socialists. And I did not say. And he goes, just be clear, folks. At some point, they come for you. And this is awful. It will not go anywhere. But it's more distraction. It keeps Epstein out, and it intimidates people. People stop speaking their mind.

[Kara Swisher]

It does. These are all intimidations. Whether it's to Microsoft or anybody else, that's what it's doing.

[Scott Galloway]

It's sending a flare saying, I might be wrong. It may not hold up in court, but I am going to distract people. I'm going to come after you. You know, the Comey household right now, the job of a government, the job of you, to a certain extent as a man, is the job of a woman. And the job of the combination of masculine and feminine energy is to create leadership, nurturing, care, concern, such that you ease people's pain and make them feel comfortable. You ease their anxiety. You make them have rewarding lives. You let them focus on the tough stuff, losing people they love. How do they deal with kids who are struggling? And the people who are supposed to be the best at that and have the most resources are elected leaders. Our elected leaders are supposed to remove anxiety from our lives. They're supposed to give us a sense of that, you're safe and you're secure. We're gonna lower the crime. We're gonna give your kids more opportunity. And if your wife gets lung cancer, it means you're not gonna go bankrupt. That is what the government is supposed to do. We're gonna come up with great research Such that if your wife gets metastatic breast cancer, we've done this incredible research. You don't need to understand it, but there's better prospects every day that she will live. You don't need to worry about being invaded. You don't need to worry about if someone commits a crime against you that they go unpunished. And instead, we have a government that seems more focused on increasing the anxiety of certain groups of people. Because this is now a party of vengeance. It's not a party of preventing a tragedy to the Commons.

[Kara Swisher]

They're always so angry. How do you get so angry? Seriously.

[Scott Galloway]

And while he's spending all his time trying to figure out how to keep Epstein out of the news and how to harass fellow Americans and weaponize our great institutions, not against our enemies, but against the enemy within, then Putin and Xi are taking advantage of it, establishing new alliances and sending attack aircraft into NATO countries. And we're sitting out here trying to dodge incoming missiles that are fired domestically from Pennsylvania Avenue.

[Kara Swisher]

Agreed. And by the way, we didn't have time to talk about this today, but there were more Epstein file stuff coming out that had come out, including names of people like Peter Thiel and Elon Musk. Elon's denying it. I think he probably was invited and didn't go. I believe him on that. And I. We did go to the New York. The New York thing. I was invited to the New York thing, and I didn't go, like. So I don't know necessarily if it means anything, but more Epstein files, the better. And you saw Marjorie Taylor Greene saying she's going to be killed, that she's keeping going on this thing. People should focus on the Epstein files some more. That's what I say. Anyway. One more quick break. We'll be back for wins and fails.

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[Scott Galloway]

Are you playing me off?

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[Scott Galloway]

Okay.

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[Kara Swisher]

Okay, Scott, let's hear some wins and fails. Would you like me to go for this? Would you please? Do you know, Hakeem Jeffries is my fail this week. First of all, his social media is so bad, I just want to cry. He could benefit from a Gavin Newsom social media intervention. It is so boring. It's so dumb. It's so. He should just get off social media if he's not going to do it well. But when Eric Adams dropped out of the New York mayoral race, which I think people expected, although he did it after, his name is now still on the ballot. I believe he's still not endorsing. And then he effusively complimented Eric Adams. It was so strange. And I just, you know, I had a lot of hopes for Hakeem Jeffries, that he would live up. I know you don't like Nancy Pelosi, but she was good at her job, what she did there.

[Scott Galloway]

Very strategic.

[Kara Swisher]

Very strategic. This guy doesn't seem to have a clue. I just feel like what a. I just every. Everything. Hakeem Jeffries was a big L on it as far as I'm concerned. Again, just like, it's just so ridiculous, especially with Trump on the opposite side saying that if you vote for him, I'm gonna hurt new and what's the point of voting? He's putting his finger on the thumb of everything, which is also grotesque but typical from him. And then my win is I'm excited for the slate of movies for. I know you say I'm gonna see them not in the movie theater, but there's all these great movies coming out in the fall. I do always like the fall. I just keep seeing all these ads and stuff for different movies and things opening, and I'm super excited. Obviously, I'm most excited for Wicked, as I've noticed, Wicked for Good, and they keep dropping. And I'm very pleased with That. I really like that. And so I'm excited. I'll be talking about them as we move forward. But there's a ton of really cool stuff that looks like it's coming out, including this movie that George Clooney's in. It's called J. Kelly, and it looks. It's by Noah Baumbach. And I think it looks really good. He's playing himself, really. And it looks funny, as.

[Scott Galloway]

Are you gonna see the Leo film?

[Kara Swisher]

No, I can't do it. I don't have enough energy.

[Scott Galloway]

It's supposed to be outstanding.

[Kara Swisher]

All as is. I didn't see the one, the Indian one. Wherever he poisons Indian Native Americans, so.

[Scott Galloway]

Oh, peak artistic masturbation.

[Kara Swisher]

I don't know. I just can't. I just. I'm so tired. I want to see fun things. So I'm going to go see.

[Scott Galloway]

This must be great. I'm going to sit tonight. I'll reply to you.

[Kara Swisher]

Well, tell me how it is. Tell me how it is.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah. So just a couple things with Leader Jeffries. I've met him, interviewed him on stage, really like him. In the corporate world, we have this pattern or this problem where oftentimes times when people are great at what they do, we keep promoting them until we find a position they're not great at. In other words, you promote them out of their competency. And so they came up with this idea of, I think it's called Solar Solo Contributor, where they say, look, this guy's a great bond trader. He or she can't manage people out of a fucking paper bag, right? So just keep them as a bond trader. Don't put them in charge of the fixed income department. And some people are just good at what they do and they end up being great managers. I think that applies to Leader Jeffries. I think he's an outstanding elected representative. I think he's a great representative in the House for his core constituents in Brooklyn. He lacks the killer instinct and gravitas and I don't wanna call it leadership ability, but ability to capture narrative and compel people to be the speaker of the House. I just don't think he has those skills. And. And especially for this moment, and him and Chuck Schumer, it's kind of like wet meat, blanket. I mean, it's just.

[Kara Swisher]

I agree.

[Scott Galloway]

These aren't the guys for the moment. And I think Leader Jeffries should go on and be his representative. And he's outstanding. Maybe run for Senate someday, but he's not the person for this moment. And Senator Schumer is literally become the invisible man. I just don't even see him when he's on screen anymore. Anyway, so my fail is it is so insane that we are now talking about bailing out farmers. I mean, let me get this. We walk up to someone, the US Government, shoot them in the leg, and then borrow money from future generations to pay for their hospital bills. And essentially, what do you know, we place all these tariffs on foreign goods. And China, who's much smarter than us, goes, I'm going to go after the heart and lungs here and put on a huge tariff on soybeans for all those farmers in red states. And they're basically, their entire business is collapsed. And by the way, without previous government subsidies, many of these farms are no longer economically viable anyways. So what do you have? You have circular payments. The government collects tariffs, which is a tax on US Consumers, then pays billions to farmers hurt by those same tariffs. So everyone loses. Consumers pay higher prices, taxpayers fund the bailouts, and farmers get temporary cash, but permanent loss of China market. The Chinese have already established new trade relationships with Brazil and Argentina. And they're not coming back to Iowa, folks. They're not doing it. This is done. This is not a shift. This is a structural shift. So unless the government and taxpayers are going to keep propping up these people to pay for the stupid tariffs, eventually they're going to go away. The money props up inefficiency. Instead of investing in infrastructure, what they need to be doing is crop diversification. And it's just pure political theater. Its bailouts are less about economic policy, and they're just, they're doing what Democrats do, and that is they're throwing money at people for votes. And we've literally, we've lit the house on fire and then sent taxpayers the bill for the fire department. They don't. These payments, the circular payments, they don't build competitiveness, they build dependency.

[Kara Swisher]

And they're doing it just because they're maga, that's why. Or they were Trump supporters and they're not helping others who were not. It's the same thing that's going to happen if this government shuts down.

[Scott Galloway]

And so while young people, so while we cut a check on young people's backs in terms of debt, Brazil builds railroads and steals China as a customer. It's just. This couldn't be more stupid. Anyway. All right, so that's my fail. My win is what we talked about before. Sinclair and nexstar had blacked out Jimmy Kimmel on their affiliates. And I think the blackout was pretty significant. It covered about, I think about a quarter of U.S. households.

[Kara Swisher]

It did mostly small places except for Seattle and dc.

[Scott Galloway]

Yeah, but these late night guys need everything. And then on the 26th, both companies announced they would end the boycott and restore the show to their stations. It's not cause they saw God or decided that they weren't censorious. It was because of the backlash of consumer of the backlash from viewers, media observers, advocacy groups and all kinds of pressure from different consumers. Sinclair's the bigger one. They own about 15% of U.S. television households via ABC affiliates and Nexstar's 9%. So it's almost a quarter. And after the reversal, Jimmy Kimmel regained its reach in those markets, obviously restoring viewership. And the bottom line is the distributors blinked. And I love this. You can try to mute dissent, but when the market and money push back, they restarted. And I think it's a good moment for us. And also, this really isn't just about one late night host. It's about broadcasters recognizing that bowing to the President's pressure is a precedent toward censorship and can cost their shareholders money. And we need to start connecting these really this overreach and vile activities on the part of the White House with economic punishment. That's the connection we need to make.

[Kara Swisher]

This socialist government is really getting on my nerves anyway. I think those are both good ones. I agree with you and you were correct about this idea of economic pressure that consumers can bring to bear. We want to hear from you. Send us your questions about business, tech or whatever's on your mind. Go to nymag.com pivot to submit a question for the show Oracle 85551, Pivot and elsewhere in the Kara and Scott universe. On on with Kara Swisher. I recently spoke with Matt and Maria Rain whose 16 year old son died by suicide after starting to use ChatGPT. Let's listen to a clip. What would you right now say to Sam Altman if you were looking at him? Why did you put out a product that killed my son? And why haven't you called me and expressed any remorse? I don't know, among other things. But I just, I don't understand how he can just be going through life knowing that my son is gone. Like my son doesn't matter, it's your product that matters. That was a tough, tough, tough show. It's well worth listening to. It's really upsetting but at the same time really incredibly cogent argument they're making as parents and as consumers too.

[Scott Galloway]

You did a really Nice job. You were able to thread the needle there. And it was very. I listened to it this week and I had to turn it off a couple times. But you made it about as just the facts as you could on a very heavy topic. And I was very emotional. But you managed to just kind of get through it in a way that felt, I don't know, very journalistic. I wouldn't have been able to do that interview. So it was hard.

[Kara Swisher]

As a parent, I can tell you that I am incandescent about some of this. And I just think AI should be limited. Limited with kids. It's just I now absolutely of that mind. It shouldn't be in toys. It shouldn't be in anything pet.

[Scott Galloway]

Content we have PG13 content for people under the age of 13. We have R rated content where an adult has to be present. It's not to say we can't have AI for kids, but it should be severely different.

[Kara Swisher]

Severely different.

[Scott Galloway]

And character. AI should just not exist for people under the age of 18.

[Kara Swisher]

Yeah.

[Scott Galloway]

Synthetic relationships.

[Kara Swisher]

No, no, there's nobody there. People do not, you know, it's fine if you want to, like, figure out your business plan, but this is bullshit. And I have been talking to, let me just say, a lot of legislators about a lot of this stuff aimed at kids. And every time I get the chance, and I'm gonna continue to do so. Okay, that's the show. Thanks for listening to Pivot and be sure to like and subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'll be back on Friday. Scott, read us out.

[Scott Galloway]

Today's show was produced by Lara Naiman, Zoe Marcus and Taylor Green Griffin. Ernie Andrew Todd engineered this episode. Jim Mackle edited the video. Thanks also to Gibros, Mr. Vera and Dan Shalon. Your Shock Crew has Fox Media's executive producer podcast. Make sure to follow Pivot on your favorite podcast platform. Thanks for listening to Pivot from New York Magazine and Vox Media. You can subscribe to the magazine nymag.com pod we'll be back later this week for another breakdown of all things tech and business.

[Kara Swisher]

The Prime Big Deal Days Conde del viscocho y alconde de los cuernitos Mi.

[Scott Galloway]

Ambro de France Prime Juan Ca?

[Kara Swisher]

Ola approvichas in Prime Big Deal Days Sieti October.